den, as a Christmas greeting: and I send it to you, my dear,
noble, Charles Dickens, who by your works had been previously dear to
me, and since our meeting have taken root for ever in my heart.

Your hand was the last that pressed mine on England's coast: it was
you who from her shores wafted me the last farewell. It is therefore
natural that I should send to you, from Denmark, my first greeting
again, as sincerely as an affectionate heart can convey it.

Hans Christian Andersen.

Copenhagen. 6th December, 1847.

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* The first seven in this volume.

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CONTENTS,

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I. The Old House

II. The Drop of Water

III. The Happy Family

IV. The Story of a Mother

V. The False Collar

VI. The Shadow

VII. The Old Street-Lamp

VIII. The Dream of Little Tuk

IX. The Naughty Boy

X. The Two Neighboring Families

XI. The Darning Needle

XII. The Little Match-Girl

XIII. The Red Shoes

XIV. To The Young Readers

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THE OLD HOUSE.

In the street, up there, was an old, a very old house,--it was almost
three hundred years old, for that might be known by reading the great
beam on which the date of the year was carved: together with tulips
and hop-binds there were whole verses spelled as in former times, and
over every window was a distorted face cut out in the beam. The one
story stood forward a great way over the other; and directly under the
eaves was a leaden spout with a dragon's head; the rain-water should
have run out of the mouth, but it ran out of the belly, for there was
a hole in the spout.

All the other houses in the street were so new and so neat, with large
window-panes and smooth walls, one could easily see that they would
have nothing to do with the old house: they certainly thought, "How
long is that old decayed thing to stand here as a spectacle in the
street? And then the protecting windows stand so far out, that no one
can see from our windows what happens in that direction! The steps are
as broad as those of a palace, and as high as to a church tower. The
iron railings look just like the door to an old family vault, and then
they have brass tops,--that's so stupid!"

On the other side of the street were also new and neat houses, and
they thought just as the others did; but at the window opposite the
old house there sat a little boy with fresh rosy cheeks and bright
beaming eyes: he certainly liked the old house best, and that b