The Little Match Man

I am going to tell you something that you must never tell any one. Stupid people wouldn’t believe it, anyway; and there are so many stupid people that I should seem like the gre...

I was stupefied. You understand why. It was all so unexpected. I didn’t in the least know what to say to him, but the idea of a match that was afraid of being burned up made me...

In this way I came to have a new companion and dear confidant with whom I lived happily for many months. I soon became accustomed to him, but I must own to you that during the f...

“My father was the geni of a maple tree. My mother was the spirit of a birch tree. They died of old age when their trees withered. I was lively and vigorous. My tree was the fir...

“The young man turned and bowing politely exclaimed, ‘Honorable Willow! may you live ten thousand years! I perceive that you are a Haji and my friend, although I have done nothi...

“No; every year at that date in May there was a festival in the wood. You see, I had become a god to these people; they adored me. But as the years passed the festival grew very...

“Well, then at last even my box was sold. I don’t know whether it was daytime or night, for shut up in there I knew nothing about time. I felt myself all shaken up; a little lat...

You know, this was just the time when a great war had broken out between Japan and another empire, and I was ordered to go out and describe what I saw there. While writing up th...

The train stopped at a large station. A dozen officers entered the car all talking, threw their bags into their racks, took off their swords and placed them near the window, sea...

One evening—it was the night before we were to land—the officers with us were polishing their swords, trying to make them like mirrors. In order to enjoy themselves while they w...

In the morning, not feeling Fiam move, I looked for him in his box, but it was empty, and he had disappeared. I was very anxious. There was no trace anywhere of my little friend...

Twice more during that long journey I thought I had lost Fiam. Each time it was on account of that hole in his box through which he crawled out to ramble, and which he couldn’t...

This time I was sure I should never find him. I went three whole days without seeing him. Every evening I shook my clothes, uselessly repeating my search. I would have given ten...

I don’t know how he managed it, but he understood the manœuvres of war better than I. You see, Hajis are unusually intelligent. Often I couldn’t make out what was going on. I co...

One day when we were far away from our post there was a great storm. It rained cats and dogs, and the brim of my hat dripped all around like an overflowing gutter.

After this to protect Fiam whenever we went out in bad or threatening weather, I covered him with a magnificent waterproof made from the tin-foil I had taken off of some chocola...

“Do you remember I told you Prince Funato died an old man? And every year at the anniversary of the battle where I had protected him by my branches”—(here Fiam gave two of those...

When I had seen the general studying the map so intently I had concluded that he had good reason to be so serious. Frankly, I understood very little of what was going on, but Fi...

He gave no answer. My request to dictate a telegram to the newspaper he flatly refused. Half an hour later we arrived at the encampment. From inside my tent I heard a horse trot...

“Look at me well. Do you think I could still take fire like any other match? I mean if I should strike myself against a stone could I set myself on fire?”

I entered my tent. How awfully alone I was! I should never find him again in the bottom of the camera or in the midst of postage stamps! I should never hear his little voice, pr...