A Pretty Tough Mouthful to Swallow: Kruger as Porcupine
Puck cover: a helmeted British lion, its helmet badged with the royal arms, stoops over a tiny Paul Kruger whose back is a porcupine's mass of bayonets; title "A Pretty Tough Mouthful to Swallow." The tell: the Boer leader is drawn as an animal with fixed bayonets for quills, a label by image rather than a description of his government (name-calling).
- Date
- October 11, 1899
- Period
- Pre-1914
- Made by
- Puck, drawing by Udo Keppler
- Region
- North America
- Country
- United States
- Medium
- Cartoon
- Issuer type
- Media
- Regime
- Mckinley Administration
- Leader
- William Mckinley
- Audience
- Domestic public
- Purpose
- Warn or inform
- Theme
- War and the military
- Techniques
- Name-calling
- Source
- Identified Openly sourced: the speaker is who they say they are
- Source
- Library of Congress, retrieved October 2, 2026
- Rights
- Public domain in the US (pre-1931); LOC: "No known restrictions on publication"
Puck, vol. 46, no. 1179, 11 October 1899 (cover by Udo J. Keppler). Library of Congress Prints and Photographs Division, LC-DIG-ppmsca-28547; hosted at 1024 px.
Text on the object
Puck VOL. XLVI. No. 1179. PUCK BUILDING, New York, October 11th, 1899. PRICE TEN CENTS. Copyright, 1899, by Keppler & Schwarzmann. A PRETTY TOUGH MOUTHFUL TO SWALLOW. [signature:] KEPPLER
Read from the 1024 px LOC image.
