In the Tunnel, or It Wasn't Arthur!

This strip demonstrates the visual vocabulary emerging in early newspaper comics: numbered panels, speech balloons, and a narrative arc built across sequential frames. A man and woman enter a tunnel; a second character named Arthur follows, prompting an exclamation of surprise in the darkened space. The final panels reveal the punchline—the woman's honest denial that the man in the tunnel was Arthur. The strip relies on the formal conventions of panel progression and character dialogue that were rapidly becoming standard in Sunday supplements and dailies, establishing the visual grammar that would define the medium.