The Great Weyler Ape.
The caricature produced by the campaign between Mr. McKinley and Mr. Bryan in 1900 offers few, if any, cartoons more admirable than that by Mr. Victor Gillam, representing Don Quixote Bryan meeting disaster in his fight against the full dinner pail. This cartoon has that literary flavor which has been too much lacking in American caricature, and which raises this particular cartoon far above the average in the same school. The idea, of course, is based on Don Quixote's disastrous encounter with the windmill, which that poor crack-brained gentleman took to be a giant. The body of the windmill is a huge dinner pail and its arms are a crossed knife and fork. Don Quixote, incased in armor from head to foot, and mounted on the Democratic donkey with free silver for a saddle, has tilted against the solid structure with disastrous results. His lance is shattered, and he and his faithful steed lie prostrate and discomfited on opposite sides of the road. The Sancho Panza needed to complete the picture appears under the familiar features of Mr. Richard Croker, who, leading the Tammany Tiger by a rope, is hurrying to his master's assistance. In the distance may be seen the White House, but the road in that direction is completely barred by the stanch windmill that has so successfully resisted the mad knight's onslaught.
"We are the People."
CHAPTER XXXI
THE SPANISH-AMERICAN WAR
The pent-up feeling throughout the United States, which reached a dangerous degree of tension during the weeks preceding the declaration of war against Spain, was forcibly symbolized in the Minneapolis Herald. The dome of the National Capitol is portrayed, surmounted by a "Congressional safety-valve." McKinley, clinging to the cupola, is anxiously listening to the roar of the imprisoned steam, which is escaping in vast "war clouds," in spite of all the efforts of Speaker Reed, who is freely perspiring in his effort to hold down the valve.
