Nikolaevna Cholerina, the Russian house cat

Tsar Nicholas II: “Haha! My little daughter understands sweeping up even better than my best governors…?!”
(Die Muskete, Vienna, 1908)

Homeopathy

… So, we’ll give you this medicine by teaspoon in an hour, so that a salutary reaction sets in as soon as possible…
(Strekoza, St. Petersburg, 1908) (This cartoon appeared before the cholera outbreak in Russia that same year.)

Behold, cholera

Since cholera spread from the Russian Empire further west in Europe in 1908, casting Tsar Nicholas II as the “host” was a popular gambit.
(L’Assiette au beurre, Paris, 1908)

Similarly a week later:

Shall we summon War?

Cholera: “Extraordinary, this human breed! We work, and we can’t exterminate it!”
Plague: “Would it help us if we summoned War?”
(L’Assiette au beurre, Paris, 1908)

Variations on the same model

(Strong measures have been taken to prevent plague and cholera from entering the country.)
“O my God! plague… look, it’s plague!!”
“Iencuțu, don’t you know me anymore?… it’s me, Mother Smara!…”
(A dig at Smaranda Gheorghiu, a Romanian writer and feminist from a noble landowning family who frequently traveled abroad and sometimes published under the moniker “Mother Smara.”)
(Furnica, Bucharest, 1908)

Cholera in Russia

“We could play a game, Nicolas. Between you and me, let’s see who will kill more people.”
(La Campana de Gracia, Barcelona, 1908)

Audience with the little father

Leo Tolstoy: “Unfortunately I was not reposed to receive guests…”
Madame Cholera: “I’m use to entering without notice.”
(Nebelspalter, Zurich, 1908)

Democratic epidemic

“Who is this? Cholera?! Go around through the back door… You and your ilk are not allowed through the front!”
(Satirikon, St. Petersburg, 1908)

The new bacterium

“What a marvelous thing! Three young Hungarian medical scientists have discovered a new bacterium! The famine-typhus bacterium!”
“How can you be happy about this!? Aren’t there already enough bacteria!?”
(Kakas Marton, Budapest, 1908)

Monologue of the “true Russian”

Another bit of Russophobia which I post without additional comment:
“The cursed Social Democrats always shout that we lack freedom and without freedom there would be no happiness! We have always been fortunate, we have our little father Tsar, we have our schnapps, and now we also have mother cholera, so any true Russian can get by, just not the damned socialist, may God ruin him!”
(Der wahre Jacob, Stuttgart, 1908)

Cholera in Buenos Aires

“Don’t bother, gentlemen. It has been a pointless journey. I am returning to Europe, because I see that you are angry.” (Punning again on cholera/choler, I believe.)
(Caras y caretas, Buenos Aires, 1908)

The laughter of death

(4500 deaths to date from smallpox)
Penna: “How horrible!!…”
Mayor: “How horrible!”
Joe Public: “This is it! An epidemic that could have been vanquished perfectly well in the beginning, six months ago, when it killed 20 people a month; that it was not on a whim or relaxation and that now it laughs at those responsible!… I don’t know what I pay for these taxes that flay me! Perhaps for this: to see the people who govern me dumbfounded!”
Oswaldo Cruz: “Without mandatory vaccines, I can do nothing!…”
Smallpox: “Nothing, huh? Hahaha!!!…”
(O Malho, Rio de Janeiro, 1908)

The iconic Oswaldo Cruz

I lack the Portuguese knowledge to translate all these cartoons in full, but in this post I just want to highlight the iconic status of bacteriologist and public health leader Oswaldo Cruz (1872-1917). For an avowedly secular publication like O Malho, Cruz as the standard-bearer of modern medicine clearly exerted tremendous appeal, though of course its satire often drew attention to the many obstacles in the way of achieving his aims.
(Each image links to the appropriate issue.)

Vaccine-mandate war!… (1904)

The journey of the mosquito czar. Reception in Victoria (1905)

Journey of the mosquito czar — arrival in Bahia (1905)

Essential cleaning (1907)

One more broom… (1907)

Cruz in provincial Pará (1910)

In Pará: Mosquito plague does not kill Governor Coelho (1911)

Federal intervention in Ceara (1914)

At the Pharoux Quay: The messiah of consumption (1908)

The great magician… of coincidences

Roping it in time (1908)

The challenge of tuberculosis (1906)

Plagues on the go (1907)

See also this multi-panel cartoon from 1905. And another from 1908. And a marvelous color cartoon from 1907. And this vaccination cartoon from 1904. Ditto.

The smallpox and the vaccine

Oswaldo Cruz [prominent Brazilian bacteriologist]: “Get thee hence, in the name of science!”
Smallpox: “What science? Jenner’s? That’s known to me for 85 years and it still rides an ox cart in Brazil, whereas I already drive a car…
Thrive and flourish!”
(O Malho, Rio de Janeiro, 1908)

Prophylactic rhetoric

Oswaldo Cruz [famous Brazilian bacteriologist]: “Did you see, my dear Barata, how smallpox declined with the increase in vaccination?”
Barata Ribeiro [mayor of Rio de Janeiro, but as it happened, also trained as a physician]: “You are very mistaken! The epidemic has retreated in the face of my speeches.”
(O Malho, Rio de Janeiro, 1908)