Exalt thy love-dejected heart,
Be mine the task, or e'er we part
To make thee grief resign;

Now take the pleasure of thy chance;
Whilst I with Mab, my partner, dance,
Be little Mable thine.

He spoke, and all a sudden there,
Light music floats in wanton air—

The monarch leads the queen:
The rest their fairy partners found;
And Mable trimly tript the ground
With Edwin of the Green.

The dancing past, the board was laid,
And siker such a feast was made
As heart and lip desire;

Withouten hands the dishes fly,
The glasses with a wish come nigh,
And with a wish retire.

But now, to please the fairy king,
Full every deal they laugh and sing,
And antic feats devise;

Some wind and tumble like an ape,
And other some transmute their shape,
In Edwin's wond'ring eyes.

Till one at last, that Robin hight,
(Renowned for pinching maids by night)
Has hent him up aloof;

And full against the beam he flung,
Where by the back the youth he hung,
To sprawl unneath the roof.

From thence, "Reverse my charm," he cries, "And let it fairly now suffice

The gambol has been shown."

But Oberon answers with a smile,
Content thee, Edwin, for a while;
The vantage is thine own.

Here ended all the phantom play-
They smelt the fresh approach of day,
And heard a cock to crow

The whirling wind that bore the crowd
Has clapped the door, and whistled loud,
To warn them all to go.

Then screaming all at once, they fly,
And all at once the tapers die;
Poor Edwin falls to floor:

Forlorn his state, and dark the place,
Was never wight in sic a case

Through all the land before.

But soon as Dan Apollo rose,
Full jolly creature home he goes,
He feels his back the less;
His honest tongue and steady mind
Had rid him of the lump behind

Which made him want success.

With lusty livelihood he talks,
He seems a-dancing as he walks
His story soon took wind;

And beauteous Edith sees the youth
Endowed with courage, sense, and truth,
Without a bunch behind.

The story told, Sir Topaz moved
(The youth of Edith erst approved)
To see the revel scene:

At close of eve he leaves his home,
And wends to find the ruined dome,
All on the gloomy plain.

As there he bides, it so befell,

The wind came rustling down a deli,
A shaking seized the wall;

Up spring the tapers as before,
The fairies bragly foot the floor,
And music fills the hall.

Chill, dark, alone, adread, he lay,
Till up the welkin rose the day,

Then deemed the dole was o'er:
But wot ye well his harder lot?
His seely back the bunch had got
Which Edwin lost afore.

This tale a Sybil-nurse ared;

She softly stroked my youngling head, And when the tale was done

"Thus some are born, my son (she cries), With base impediments to rise,

And some are born with none.

"But virtue can itself advance
To what the fav'rite fools of chance
By fortune seemed designed;

Virtue can gain the odds of fate,
And from itself shake off the weight
Upon th' unworthy mind."