Shadows and sunbeams: Being a second series of Fern leaves from Fanny's portfolio

Mr. Punch, did you ever see an enraged American female? She is the expressed essence of wild cats. Perhaps you didn’t know it, when you penned that incendiary paragraph; or, perhaps, you thought that in crossing the “big pond,” salt water might neutralize it; or, perhaps, you flattered yourself we should not see it over here; but here it is, in my clutches, in good strong English: I am not even “mistaken!”

Now, if you will bring me a live specimen of the genus homo who was ever known “to own that he was in the wrong,” I will draw in my horns and claws, and sneak ingloriously back into my American shell. But you can’t do it, Mr. Punch! You never saw that curiosity, either in John Bull’s skin, or Brother Jonathan’s. ’Tis an animal which has never yet been discovered, much less captured.

A man own he was in the wrong! I guess so! You might tear him in pieces with red-hot pincers, and he would keep on singing out “I didn’t do it; I didn’t do it.” No, Mr. Punch, a man never “owns up” when he is in the wrong; especially if the matter in question be one which he considers of no importance; for instance, the non-delivery of a letter which may have been entombed in his pocket for six weeks.

No sir; he just settles himself down behind his dickey, folds his belligerent hands across his stubborn diaphragm, plants his antagonistic feet down on terra-firma as if there were a stratum of loadstone beneath him, and thunders out—