“I’m spreading rumors that plague and anthrax are raging in the vicinity of our dacha.”
“What in the world for?”
“It’s very simple: I’ll be spared the onslaught of dacha guests!”
(Razvlechenie, Moscow, 1907)

(Strekoza, St. Petersburg, 1879)
(Some very unpleasant metaphors on display here.)

(Auction; bank offices)
This kind of plague is widely dispersed in Europe; there are not yet any remedies against it.

Left: “Oh! I’m terribly afraid of plague!”
“We ought to send you to some kind of Vetlianka [in the Astrakhan region, where the plague outbreak originated in 1878] like I have at home, it would be cleaner than the Astrakhan one…”
“How’s that?”
“It’s very simple: a wife is cholera, a mother-in-law is worse than plague! You’ll get along fine there.”

Center: “They sniffed us out… they don’t let us anywhere, just completely freeze us, where to live until spring!”

Right: Undertaker: “Eh, Fedor Adolfovich, just like when there was cholera, people are overwhelming me with orders, believe me, my heart is just overflowing.”
Pharmacist [of German heritage]: “Ja, ja, same with me, ja, ist a pity.”

Left: (Fresh groceries, imported goods) “We’ve just gotten in fresh, low-salt Astrakhan caviar and sweet Astrakhan grapes, now being sold at extremely low prices!”

Center: “It’s happened! Freeze the guests — now they’re freezing… Maybe now we can handle it.”

Right: “How are you not afraid of buying old things? Who knows how long until they spoil!”
“In a new frock coat you will sooner get sick [“get the plague”] dropping not ten, but forty-five rubles.”

Son: “Papa, what’s plague? Is it pestering us?”
Father: “It’s your mama.”
Mother: “Will you leave me alone, you obnoxious brute?!”
Father: “Leave alone! There’s the first instance of the unobtrusiveness of the plague.”
(Strekoza, St. Petersburg, 1879)
(Notwithstanding the flatfooted sexism of this cartoon, there was a recurrence of actual plague in Russia at this time.)

“What’s going on, did your husband get the plague?”
“Yes, he just got back from Serpukhov.”
“Oh, I forgot that the plague there is in the cattle.”
(Razvlechenie, Moscow, 1885)

“Your article isn’t suitable. If you had written something about plague, then it would be another matter.”
“But how can I write that? I haven’t been in those locales.”
“Then what’s your imagination for?”
(Razvlechenie, Moscow, 1879)

“Get up, old lady [Moscow], why are you sleeping? The plague is coming!”
Old lady: “Why are you shouting? As if I don’t hear the plague coming? When it arrives, I’ll get up.”
(Razvlechenie, Moscow, 1879)