THE FAIRY'S GIFT.

The Fays that to my christ'ning came

( For come they did, my nurses taught me ),

They did not bring me wealth or fame,

‘ Tis very little that they brought me.

But one, the crossest of the crew,

The ugly old one, uninvited,

Said, “I shall be avenged on YOU,

My child; you shall grow up short-sighted!”

With magic juices did she lave

Mine eyes, and wrought her wicked pleasure.

Well, of all gifts the Fairies gave,

HERS is the present that I treasure!

The bore whom others fear and flee,

I do not fear, I do not flee him;

I pass him calm as calm can be;

I do not cut — I do not see him!

And with my feeble eyes and dim,

Where YOU see patchy fields and fences,

For me the mists of Turner swim -

MY “azure distance” soon commences!

Nay, as I blink about the streets

Of this befogged and miry city,

Why, almost every girl one meets

Seems preternaturally pretty!

“Try spectacles,” one's friends intone;

“You'll see the world correctly through them.”

But I have visions of my own,

And not for worlds would I undo them.