The Trial of Nerves, illustration from 'Fashionable Bores or Coolers in High Life' by Peter...

He who aspires to become a man of Fashion must make up his mind now and then to "exchange cards" in fact these things under proper management are highly desirable as they insure you notoriety, but when you are compelled to stand fire against one who will not admit the blank catridge system & who has arrived at the enviable distinction of havving "kill'd his man" the pleasure of taking the field is apt to degenerate into a nervous Bore as you consider yourseld mark'd for crow's meat, and in pacing your ground you are only marching to your own grave. "And thus the native hue of resolution Is sicklied o're with the pale cast of thought"