y the thick, damp, cold wall was before her.

She lighted another. Then she was sitting under a beautiful Christmas
tree; it was greater and finer than the one she had seen through the
glass door at the rich merchant's. Thousands of candles burned upon
the green branches, and colored pictures like those in the shop windows
looked down upon them. The little girl stretched forth both hands toward
them; then the match went out. The Christmas lights went higher and
higher. She saw that now they were stars in the sky: one of them fell
and made a long line of fire.

"Now some one is dying," said the little girl, for her old grandmother,
the only person who had been good to her, but who was now dead, had
said: "When a star falls a soul mounts up to God."

She rubbed another match against the wall; it became bright again, and
in the light there stood the old grandmother clear and shining, mild and
lovely.

"Grandmother!" cried the child. "Oh, take me with you! I know you will
go when the match is burned out. You will go away like the warm stove,
the nice roast goose, and the great glorious Christmas tree!"

And she hastily rubbed the whole bundle of matches, for she wished to
hold her grandmother fast. And the matches burned with such a glow that
it became brighter than in the middle of the day; grandmother had never
been so large or so beautiful. She took the little girl up in her arms,
and both flew in the light and the joy so high, so high! and up there
was no cold, nor hunger, nor care--they were with God.

But in the corner by the house sat the little girl, with red cheeks and
smiling mouth, frozen to death on the last evening of the Old Year.
The New Year's sun rose upon the little body, that sat there with the
matches, of which one bundle was burned. She wanted to warm herself,
the people said. No one knew what fine things she had seen, and in what
glory she had gone in with her grandmother to the New Year's Day.

THE TWELVE MONTHS

A SLAV LEGEND

BY ALEXANDER CHODZKO (ADAPTED)

There was once a widow who had two daughters, Helen, her own child by
her dead husband, and Marouckla, his daughter by his first wife. She
loved Helen, but hated the poor orphan because she was far prettier than
her own daughter.

Marouckla did not think about her good looks, and could not understand
why her stepmother should be angry at the sight of her. The hardest work
fell to her share. She cleaned out the rooms, cooked, wa