She again rubbed a match on the wall, and the light shone round her; in the brightness stood her old grandmother, clear and shining, yet mild and loving in her appearance. "Grandmother," cried the little one, "O take me with you; I know you will go away when the match burns out; you will vanish like the warm stove, the roast goose, and the large, glorious Christmas-tree." And she made haste to light the whole bundle of matches, for she wished to keep her grandmother there. And the matches glowed with a light that was brighter than the noon-day, and her grandmother had never appeared so large or so beautiful. She took the little girl in her arms, and they both flew upwards in brightness and joy far above the earth, where there was neither cold nor hunger nor pain, for they were with God.
In the dawn of morning there lay the poor little one, with pale cheeks and smiling mouth, leaning against the wall; she had been frozen to death on the last evening of the year; and the New-year's sun rose and shone upon a little corpse! The child still sat, in the stiffness of death, holding the matches in her hand, one bundle of which was burnt. "She tried to warm herself," said some. No one imagined what beautiful things she had seen, nor into what glory she had entered with her grandmother, on New-year's day. THE END 她又在牆上擦了一根火柴，火光把她四周照亮了。她的老祖母就出現在那在亮光裏，清晰而又明亮。她看起來依然是那麼的慈愛和溫和。“奶奶！”小傢伙叫起來，“啊！把我帶走吧！我知道這火柴一熄滅，你就會象溫暖的爐火，香噴噴的烤鵝，美麗的大聖誕樹一樣不見的！”她急忙把剩下的一束火柴都擦着了，因爲她希望能留住祖母。這束火柴發出強烈的光芒，照得比白天還要亮。祖母從來沒有象現在這樣顯得這麼高大、這麼美麗。她把小姑娘抱起來，摟在懷裏。她們倆在光明和快樂飛走了，越飛越高，飛到既沒有寒冷，又沒有飢餓和痛苦的地方，因爲她們來到了極樂世界。
