Obscurity of the Day: Polly, the Cap'n's Parrot

Here's a really short run strip from the Sunday Philadelphia North American. Polly, the Cap'n's Parrot ran from 3/29 to 5/24 in 1908. The cartoonist was George F. Payne, and he must not have thought much of this effort, because he only signed one or two of the strips -- our sample here is one of those he neglected to sign. This is Payne's only known comic strip credit. Kind of a shame that Payne didn't stick with it; his artwork shows a lot of promise. The gag on the other hand was the sort of thing that already had cobwebs on it in 1908.

I wonder if George was related to Charlie Payne, who had many long-running comic strips in Philadelphia papers before hitting the bigtime in New York with S'Matter, Pop.