(Character can now be told from the colour of the hair. Red hair, it is said, denotes purity of thought and intensity of feeling.)

Your locks, my friend, are auburn,
 Yet do not be dismayed.
With misery no more burn,
 Ashamed of such a shade.
Though street-boys call you “Ginger,”
 And bid you get it shorn,
The comment need not injure,
 No longer need you mourn.

For mark! the shrewd observer,
 Who knows a thing or two,
Will greet the man with fervour
 Whose head’s of such a hue.
For being so astute, he
 Is very well aware
That souls of rarest beauty
 Lie hid ’neath ruby hair.

Intensity of feeling
 And purity of mind,
And lack of double-dealing,
 Beneath red hair you find.
The murderer, the robber,
 The dissipated “spark,”
The fraud-promoting jobber,
 Are men whose locks are dark.

So cease with aid of hair-dye
 To bring a change to pass.
Regard not with a scared eye
 Your image in the glass.
Let not the caustic bellow
 Of “Carrots!” make you frown,
You’re twice as good a fellow
 As he whose hair is brown.

P. G. W.