Limit columns to certain width in MySQL command
Looks like a character set issue. Here is why:
I ran
select left(text, 7) text from
(select 'The quick brown fox jumps over the' text union select '０１２３４５６７８９０') x;

in MySQL 5.6.22 for Windows. Here is that output
+---------+
| text    |
+---------+
| The qui |
| ??????? |
+---------+

Same query in MySQL 5.6.21 for CentOS 6.3
+-----------------------+
| text                  |
+-----------------------+
| The qui               |
| ０１２３４５６        |
+-----------------------+
2 rows in set (0.00 sec)

You should use the CAST operator
select left(CONVERT(text USING latin1), 7) text from
(select 'The quick brown fox jumps over the' text union select '01234567890') x;

When I ran this in MySQL 5.6.22 for Windows, I got this
+---------+
| text    |
+---------+
| The qui |
| ??????? |
+---------+

When I ran this in MySQL 5.6.21 for CentOS 6.3, I got the same thing
+---------+
| text    |
+---------+
| The qui |
| ??????? |
+---------+

Just hunt down the correct character set.
GIVE IT A TRY !!!