00:00Most terribly cold it was.
00:12It snowed, and was nearly quite dark,
00:15and evening, the last evening of the year.
00:18In this cold and darkness there went along the street
00:21a poor little girl, bare-headed and with naked feet.
00:25When she left home she had slippers on, it is true,
00:28but what was the good of that?
00:31They were very large slippers, which her mother had hitherto worn.
00:35So large were they, and the poor little thing lost them
00:39as she scuffled away across the street
00:40because of two carriages that rolled by dreadfully fast.
00:45One slipper was nowhere to be found.
00:48The other had been laid hold of by an urchin, and off he ran with it.
00:53He thought it would do capitally for a cradle
00:55when he, some day or other, should have children himself.
00:58So the little maiden walked on with her tiny naked feet
01:02that were quite red and blue from cold.
01:06She carried a quantity of matches in an old apron,
01:09and she held a bundle of them in her hand.
01:12Nobody had bought anything of her the whole live-long day.
01:16No one had given her a single farthing.
01:19She crept along trembling with cold and hunger,
01:23a very picture of sorrow, the poor little thing.
01:27The flakes of snow covered her long, fair hair,
01:31which fell in beautiful curls around her neck.
01:34But of that, of course, she never once now thought.
01:37From all the windows the candles were gleaming,
01:41and it smelt so deliciously of roast goose,
01:43for you know it was New Year's Eve.
01:46Yes, of that, she thought.
01:49In a corner formed by two houses,
01:52of which one advanced more than the other,
01:54she seated herself down and cowered together.
01:58Her little feet she had drawn close up to her,
02:01but she grew colder and colder,
02:03and to go home she did not venture,
02:06for she had not sold any matches
02:07and could not bring a farthing of money.
02:11From her father she would certainly get blows,
02:13and at home it was cold too,
02:16for above her she had only the roof,
02:18through which the wind whistled,
02:20even though the largest cracks
02:21were stopped up with straw and rags.
02:27Her little hands were almost numbed with cold.
02:30Oh, a match might afford her a world of comfort
02:33if she only dared take a single one out of the bundle,
02:36draw it against the wall,
02:38and warm her fingers by it.
02:40She drew one out.
02:42Rist!
02:42How it blazed!
02:44How it burnt!
02:45It was a warm, bright flame like a candle
02:47as she held her hands over it.
02:49It was a wonderful light.
02:51It seemed really to the little maiden
02:53as though she were sitting before a large iron stove,
02:57with burnished brass feet and a brass ornament atop.
03:01The fire burned with such blessed influence.
03:04It warmed so delightfully.
03:05The little girl had already stretched out her feet
03:08to warm them too,
03:10but the small flame went out.
03:12The stove vanished.
03:14She had only the remains of the burnt-out match in her hand.
03:17You just stood and pulled ho centimeters in her tent.
03:21You just stood and went by into your plan.
03:24You just stood and stood and only again.
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05:12and service, and the roast goose was steaming famously with its stuffing of apple and dried plums.
05:36And what was still more capital to behold was, the goose hopped down from the dish
05:41and reeled about on the floor with knife and fork in its breast
05:53till it came up to the poor little girl when
05:55the match went out, and nothing but the thick, cold, damp wall was left behind.
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06:55She lighted another match. Now there she was, sitting under the most magnificent Christmas tree. It was still larger and more decorated than the one which she had seen through the glass door in the rich merchant's house.
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07:26Thousands of lights were burning on the green branches, and gaily colored pictures, such as she had seen in the shop windows, looked down upon her.
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07:46She saw them now as stars in heaven.
07:59One fell down and formed a long trail of fire.
08:16Someone is just dead, said the little girl, for her old grandmother, the only person who
08:42had loved her and who was now no more, had told her that when a star falls, a soul ascends
08:56to God.
09:12She drew another match against the wall.
09:18It was again light, and in the luster there stood the old grandmother, so bright and radiant,
09:24so mild and with such an expression of love.
09:28Grandmother, cried the little one, oh, take me with you.
09:32You go away when the match burns out.
09:35You vanish like the warm stove, like the delicious roast goose, and like the magnificent Christmas
09:40tree.
09:42And she rubbed the whole bundle of matches quickly against the wall, for she wanted to
09:55be quite sure of keeping her grandmother near her.
10:01And the matches gave such a brilliant light that it was brighter than at noonday.
10:05Never formerly had the grandmother been so beautiful and so tall.
10:15She took the little maiden on her arm.
10:17And both flew in brightness and joy, so high, so very high.
10:28And then, above was neither cold, nor hunger, nor anxiety.
10:41They were with God.
10:54And over is
11:05and before
11:07daddy
11:07and
11:08and
11:08I
11:08and
11:09I
11:11But in the corner, at the cold hour of dawn,
11:39sat the poor girl, with rosy cheeks and with a smiling mouth leaning against the wall,
11:45frozen to death on the last evening of the old year.
11:54Stiff and stark sat the child there with her matches, of which one bundle had been burnt.
12:00She wanted to warm herself, people said.
12:15No one had the slightest suspicion of what beautiful things she had seen.
12:20No one even dreamed of the splendor in which, with her grandmother,
12:34she had entered on the joys of a new year.
