forgotten? fairy tale

I sent this fairy tale to Leslie in an e-mail. I learned that most people I know are not familiar with this beautiful Hans Christian Anderson's tale. So I retold it in short in mainly my own words. Thought you all may like it.The Little Match Girl is from a very poor home way back in Industrial Britain. There isn't a mother anymore, and the father makes the children make flowers and then they are sent out on the street to sell the flowers and matches. The Little Match Girl has only slippers with wholes in it on her feet that are too big. They were her mother's. She walks the busy streets and barely escapes a collision between a motor car and a horse and buggy. She loses one slipper and has to go on bare feet in the snow. It is close to New years. She doesn't sell anything. The stores are full of goodies. Well dressed people shop. They don't even see her. She is cold and hungry. She doesn't dare to go home. Her father will hit her for not bringing home money. She finds herself a spot in the corner of buildings to sit down for a spell. She looks at the matches and wonders if she dares to light one. She does. In the warm flame she sees a hot stove and stretches out her feet to warm them. The match goes out, taking the vision away. She strikes anothe match. The wall across from her becomes transparent and a table set with festive foods is laid out for her, making her tummy rumble. The scene disappears, when the match goes out. She strikes another one, and a beautiful Christmas tree, full colourful decorations and blazing candles appears before her feasting eyes. When the match goes out, the lights are the stars in the night sky. One of the stars is falling. Her grandmother, who died, and who she had loved so very much, had told her that when a star falls. someone dies and goes to God. She then strikes a handfull of matches. Her Grandmother appears with stretched out arms. She looks in her beautiful, loving face and remembers all the good times they had together. The grandmother lovingly takes the Little match girl in her arms and they soar in a halo of light and joy, far above the earth to where there was no more cold and hunger and no pain for they were with God. The next morning people on the street find the dead body of the Little Match Girl frozen, with a smile still on her face. They saw the burned matches and said, "She must have tried to warm herself." But no one imagined what beautiful visions she had seen, nor in what glory she had entered with her grandmother in the New Year.
~Netty