Tag: Henry

  • The Little Match Girl

    The Little Match Girl

    “The Little Match Girl” the Short Story was written by Hans Christian Andersen; Most terribly cold it was; it snowed and was nearly quite dark, and evening—the last evening of the year. In this cold and darkness there went along the street a poor little girl, bareheaded, and with naked feet. When she left home she had slippers on, it is true; but what was the good of that? They were very large slippers, which her mother had hitherto worn; so large were they; and the poor little thing lost them as she scuffled away across the street, because of two carriages that rolled by dreadfully fast.

    One slipper was nowhere to be found; the other had been laid hold of by an urchin, and off he ran with it; he thought it would do capitally for a cradle when he some day or other should have children himself. So the little maiden walked on with her tiny naked feet, that were quite red and blue from cold. She carried a quantity of matches in an old apron, and she held a bundle of them in her hand. Nobody had bought anything of her the whole livelong day; no one had given her a single farthing.

    She crept along trembling with cold and hunger a very picture of sorrow, the poor little thing!

    The flakes of snow covered her long fair hair, which fell in beautiful curls around her neck; but of that, of course, she never once now thought. From all the windows the candles were gleaming, and it smelt so deliciously of roast goose, for you know it was New Year’s Eve; yes, of that she thought.

    In a corner formed by two houses, of which one advanced more than the other, she seated herself down and cowered together. Her little feet she had drawn close up to her, but she grew colder and colder, and to go home she did not venture, for she had not sold any matches and could not bring a farthing of money: from her father she would certainly get blows, and at home it was cold too, for above her she had only the roof, through which the wind whistled, even though the largest cracks were stopped up with straw and rags.

    Her little hands were almost numbed with cold. Oh! a match might afford her a world of comfort, if she only dared take a single one out of the bundle, draw it against the wall, and warm her fingers by it. She drew one out. “Rischt!” how it blazed, how it burnt! It was a warm, bright flame, like a candle, as she held her hands over it: it was a wonderful light. It seemed really to the little maiden as though she were sitting before a large iron stove, with burnished brass feet and a brass ornament at top. The fire burned with such blessed influence; it warmed so delightfully. The little girl had already stretched out her feet to warm them too; but—the small flame went out, the stove vanished: she had only the remains of the burnt-out match in her hand.

    The Little Match Girl
    The Little Match Girl

    She rubbed another against the wall: it burned brightly, and where the light fell on the wall, there the wall became transparent like a veil so that she could see into the room. On the table was spread a snow-white tablecloth; upon it was a splendid porcelain service, and the roast goose was steaming famously with its stuffing of apple and dried plums. And what was still more capital to behold was, the goose hopped down from the dish, reeled about on the floor with knife and fork in its breast, till it came up to the poor little girl; when—the match went out and nothing but the thick, cold, damp wall was left behind. She lighted another match. Now there she was sitting under the most magnificent Christmas tree: it was still larger, and more decorated than the one which she had seen through the glass door in the rich merchant’s house.

    Thousands of lights were burning on the green branches, and gaily-colored pictures, such as she had seen in the shop-windows, looked down upon her. The little maiden stretched out her hands towards them when—the match went out. The lights of the Christmas tree rose higher and higher, she saw them now as stars in heaven; one fell down and formed a long trail of fire.

    “Someone is just dead!” said the little girl; for her old grandmother, the only person who had loved her, and who was now no more, had told her, that when a star falls, a soul ascends to God.

    She drew another match against the wall: it was again light, and in the lluster there stood the old grandmother, so bright and radiant, so mild, and with such an expression of love.

    “Grandmother!” cried the little one. “Oh, take me with you! You go away when the match burns out; you vanish like the warm stove, like the delicious roast goose, and like the magnificent Christmas tree!” And she rubbed the whole bundle of matches quickly against the wall, for she wanted to be quite sure of keeping her grandmother near her. And the matches gave such a brilliant light that it was brighter than at noon-day: never formerly had the grandmother been so beautiful and so tall. She took the little maiden, on her arm, and both flew in brightness and in joy so high, so very high, and then above was neither cold, nor hunger, nor anxiety—they were with God.

    But in the corner, at the cold hour of dawn, sat the poor girl, with rosy cheeks and with a smiling mouth, leaning against the wall frozen to death on the last evening of the old year. Stiff and stark sat the child there with her matches, of which one bundle had been burnt. “She wanted to warm herself,” people said. No one had the slightest suspicion of what beautiful things she had seen; no one even dreamed of the splendor in which, with her grandmother, she had entered on the joys of a new year.

  • The Last Leaf

    The Last Leaf

    “The Last Leaf” the Short Story was written by O. Henry; In a small part of the city west of Washington Square, the streets have gone wild. They turn in different directions. They are broken into small pieces called “places.” One street goes across itself one or two times. A painter once discovered something possible and valuable about this street. Suppose a painter had some painting materials for which he had not paid. Suppose he had no money. Suppose a man came to get the money. The man might walk down that street and suddenly meet himself coming back, without having received a cent!

    This part of the city is called Greenwich Village. And to old Greenwich Village, the painters soon came. Here they found rooms they like, with good light and at a low cost.

    Sue and Johnsy lived at the top of a building with three floors. One of these young women came from Maine, the other from California. They had met at a restaurant on Eighth Street. There they discovered that they liked the same kind of art, the same kind of food, and the same kind of clothes. So they decided to live and work together.

    That was in the spring.

    Toward winter a cold stranger entered Greenwich Village. No one could see him. He walked around touching one person here and another there with his icy fingers. He was a bad sickness. Doctors called him Pneumonia. On the east side of the city he hurried, touching many people; but in the narrow streets of Greenwich Village, he did not move so quickly.

    Mr. Pneumonia was not a nice old gentleman. A nice old gentleman would not hurt a weak little woman from California. But Mr. Pneumonia touched Johnsy with his cold fingers. She lay on her bed almost without moving, and she looked through the window at the wall of the house next to hers.

    One morning the busy doctor spoke to Sue alone in the hall, where Johnsy could not hear.

    “She has a very small chance,” he said. “She has a chance if she wants to live. If people don’t want to live, I can’t do much for them. Your little lady has decided that she is not going to get well. Is there something that is troubling her?”

    “She always wanted to go to Italy and paint a picture of the Bay of Naples,” said Sue.

    “Paint! Not paint. Is there anything worth being troubled about? A man?”

    “A man?” said Sue. “Is a man worth—No, doctor. There is not a man.”

    “It is a weakness,” said the doctor. “I will do all I know how to do. But when a sick person begins to feel that he’s going to die, half my work is useless. Talk to her about new winter clothes. If she were interested in the future, her chances would be better.”

    After the doctor had gone, Sue went into the workroom to cry. Then she walked into Johnsy’s room. She carried some of her painting materials, and she was singing.

    Johnsy lay there, very thin and very quiet. Her face was turned toward the window. Sue stopped singing, thinking that Johnsy was asleep.

    Sue began to work. As she worked she heard a low sound, again and again. She went quickly to the bedside.

    Johnsy’s eyes were open wide. She was looking out the window and counting—counting back.

    “Twelve,” she said; and a little later, “Eleven”; and then, “Ten,” and, “Nine”; and then, “Eight,” and, “Seven,” almost together.

    Sue looked out the window. What was there to count? There was only the side wall of the next house, a short distance away. The wall had no window. An old, old tree grew against the wall. The cold breath of winter had already touched it. Almost all its leaves had fallen from its dark branches.

    “What is it, dear?” asked Sue.

    “Six,” said Johnsy, in a voice still lower. “They’re falling faster now. Three days ago there were almost a hundred. It hurt my head to count them. But now it’s easy. There goes another one. There are only five now.”

    “Five what, dear? Tell your Sue.”

    “Leaves. On the tree. When the last one falls, I must go, too. I’ve known that for three days. Didn’t the doctor tell you?”

    “Oh, I never heard of such a thing,” said Sue. “It doesn’t have any sense in it. What does an old tree have to do with you? Or with your getting well? And you used to love that tree so much. Don’t be a little fool. The doctor told me your chances of getting well. He told me this morning. He said you had very good chances! Try to eat a little now. And then I’ll go back to work. And then I can sell my picture, and then I can buy something more for you to eat to make you strong.”

    “You don’t have to buy anything for me,” said Johnsy. She still looked out the window. “There goes another. No, I don’t want anything to eat. Now there are four. I want to see the last one fall before night. Then I’ll go, too.”

    “Johnsy, dear,” said Sue, “will you promise me to close your eyes and keep them closed? Will you promise not to look out the window until I finish working? I must have this picture ready tomorrow. I need the light; I can’t cover the window.”

    “Couldn’t you work in the other room?” asked Johnsy coldly.

    “I’d rather be here by you,” said Sue. “And I don’t want you to look at those leaves.”

    “Tell me as soon as you have finished,” said Johnsy. She closed her eyes and lay white and still. “Because I want to see the last leaf fall. I have done enough waiting. I have done enough thinking. I want to go sailing down, down, like one of those leaves.”

    “Try to sleep,” said Sue. “I must call Behrman to come up here. I want to paint a man in this picture, and I’ll make him look like Behrman. I won’t be gone a minute. Don’t try to move till I come back.”

    Old Behrman was a painter who lived on the first floor of their house. He was past sixty. He had had no success as a painter. For forty years he had painted, without ever painting a good picture. He had always talked of painting a great picture, a masterpiece, but he had never yet started it.

    He got a little money by letting others paint pictures of him. He drank too much. He still talked of his great masterpiece. And he believed that it was his special duty to do everything possible to help Sue and Johnsy.

    Sue found him in his dark room, and she knew that he had been drinking. She could smell it. She told him about Johnsy and the leaves on the vine. She said that she was afraid that Johnsy would indeed sail down, down like the leaf. Her hold on the world was growing weaker.

    Old Behrman shouted his anger over such an idea.

    “What!” he cried. “Are there such fools? Do people die because leaves drop off a tree? I have not heard of such a thing. No, I will not come up and sit while you make a picture of me. Why do you allow her to think such a thing? That poor little Johnsy!”

    “She is very sick and weak,” said Sue. “The sickness has put these strange ideas into her mind. Mr. Behrman, if you won’t come, you won’t. But I don’t think you’re very nice.”

    “This is a woman!” shouted Behrman. “Who said I will not come? Go. I come with you. For half an hour I have been trying to say that I will come. God! This is not any place for someone so good as Johnsy to lie sick. Someday I shall paint my masterpiece, and we shall all go away from here. God! Yes.”

    Johnsy was sleeping when they went up. Sue covered the window and took Behrman into the other room. There they looked out the window fearfully at the tree. Then they looked at each other for a moment without speaking. A cold rain was falling, with a little snow in it too.

    Behrman sat down, and Sue began to paint.

    She worked through most of the night.

    In the morning, after an hour’s sleep, she went to Johnsy’s bedside. Johnsy with wide-open eyes was looking toward the window. “I want to see,” she told Sue.

    Sue took the cover from the window.

    But after the beating rain and the wild wind that had not stopped through the whole night, there still was one leaf to be seen against the wall. It was the last on the tree. It was still dark green near the branch. But at the edges it was turning yellow with age. There it was hanging from a branch nearly twenty feet above the ground.

    “It is the last one,” said Johnsy. “I thought it would surely fall during the night. I heard the wind. It will fall today, and I shall die at the same time.”

    “Dear, dear Johnsy!” said Sue. “Think of me, if you won’t think of yourself. What would I do?”

    But Johnsy did not answer. The loneliest thing in the world is a soul when it is preparing to go on its far journey. The ties that held her to friendship and to earth were breaking, one by one.

    The day slowly passed. As it grew dark, they could still see the leaf hanging from its branch against the wall. And then, as the night came, the north wind began again to blow. The rain still beat against the windows.

    When it was light enough the next morning, Johnsy again commanded that she be allowed to see.

    The leaf was still there.

    Johnsy lay for a long time looking at it. And then she called to Sue, who was cooking something for her to eat.

    “I’ve been a bad girl, Sue,” said Johnsy. “Something has made that last leaf stay there to show me how bad I was. It is wrong to want to die. I’ll try to eat now. But first bring me a looking-glass, so that I can see myself. And then I’ll sit up and watch you cook.”

    An hour later she said, “Sue, someday I hope to paint the Bay of Naples.”

    The doctor came in the afternoon. Sue followed him into the hall outside Johnsy’s room to talk to him.

    “The chances are good,” said the doctor. He took Sue’s thin, shaking hand in his. “Give her good care, and she’ll get well. And now I must see another sick person in this house. His name is Behrman. A painter, I believe. Pneumonia, too. Mike is an old, weak man, and he is very ill. There is no hope for him. But we take him to the hospital today. We’ll make it as easy for him as we can.”

    The next day the doctor said to Sue: “She’s safe. You have done it. Food and care now that’s all.”

    And that afternoon Sue came to the bed where Johnsy lay. She put one arm around her.

    “I have something to tell you,” she said. “Mr. Behrman died of pneumonia today in the hospital. He was ill only two days. Someone found him on the morning of the first day, in his room. He was helpless with pain.”

    “His shoes and his clothes were wet and as cold as ice. Everyone wondered where he had been. The night had been so cold and wild.

    “And then they found some things. There was a light that he had taken outside. And there were his materials for painting. There was paint, green paint, and yellow paint. And

    “Look out the window, dear, at the last leaf on the wall. Didn’t you wonder why it never moved when the wind was blowing? Oh, my dear, it is Behrman’s great masterpiece he painted it there the night that the last leaf fell.”

  • Two Thanksgiving Day Gentlemen

    Two Thanksgiving Day Gentlemen

    “Two Thanksgiving Day Gentlemen” the Short Story was written by O. Henry; There is one day that is ours. There is one day when all Americans go back to the old home and eat a big dinner. Bless the day. The President gives it to us every year.

    Sometimes he talks about the people who had the first Thanksgiving. They were the Puritans. They were some people who landed on our Atlantic shore. We don’t really remember much about them.

    But those people ate a large bird called turkey on the first Thanksgiving Day. So we have turkey for Thanksgiving dinner if we have enough money to buy a turkey. That is a tradition.

    Yes. Thanksgiving Day is the one day of the year that is purely American. And now here is the story to prove to you that we have old traditions in this new country. They are growing older more quickly than traditions in old countries. That is because we are so young and full of life. We do everything quickly.

    Stuffy Pete sat down on a seat in the New York City park named Union Square. It was the third seat to the right as you enter Union Square from the east.

    Every Thanksgiving Day for nine years he had sat down there at one in the afternoon. Every time, things had happened to him. They were wonderful things. They made his heart feel full of joy—and they filled another part of him, too. They filled the part below his heart.

    On those other Thanksgiving Days, he had been hungry. (It is a strange thing. There are rich people who wish to help the poor. But many of them seem to think that the poor are hungry only on Thanksgiving Day.)

    But today Pete was not hungry. He had come from a dinner so big that he had almost no power to move. His light green eyes looked out from a gray face on which there was still a little food. His breath was short. His body had suddenly become too big for his clothes; it seemed ready to break out of them. They were torn. You could see his skin through a hole in the front of his shirt. But the cold wind, with snow in it, felt pleasantly cool to him.

    For Stuffy Pete was overheated with the warmth of all he had had to eat. The dinner had been much too big. It seemed to him that his dinner had included all the turkey and all the other food in the whole world.

    So he sat, very, very full. He looked out at the world without interest, as if it could never offer him anything more.

    The dinner had not been expected.

    Thanksgiving Day

    He had been passing a large house near the beginning of that great broad street called Fifth Avenue. It was the home of two old ladies of an old family. These two old ladies had a deep love of traditions. There were certain things they always did. On Thanksgiving Day at noon, they always sent a servant to stand at the door. There he waited for the first hungry person who walked by. The servant had orders to bring that person into the house and feed him until he could eat no more. Stuffy Pete happened to pass by on his way to the park. The servant had gathered him in. Tradition had been followed.

    Stuffy Pete sat in the park looking straight before him for ten minutes. Then he felt a desire to look in another direction. With a very great effort, he moved his head slowly to the left.

    Then his eyes grew wider and his breath stopped. His feet in their torn shoes at the ends of his short legs moved about on the ground.

    For the Old Gentleman was coming across Fourth Avenue toward Stuffy’s seat.

    Every Thanksgiving Day for nine years the Old Gentleman had come there to find Stuffy Pete on his seat. That was a thing that the Old Gentleman was trying to make into a tradition. Every Thanksgiving Day for nine years he had found Stuffy there. Then he had led Stuffy to a restaurant and watched him eat a big dinner.

    They do these things more easily in old countries like England. They do them without thinking about them.

    But in this young country, we must think about them. In order to build a tradition, we must do the same thing again and again for a long time. The Old Gentleman loved his country. He believed he was helping to build a great American tradition. And he had been doing very well. Nine years is a long time here.

    The Old Gentleman moved, straight and proud, toward the tradition that he was building. Truly feeding Stuffy Pete once a year was not a very important tradition. There are greater and more important traditions in England. But it was a beginning. It proved that a tradition was at least possible in America.

    The Old Gentleman was thin and tall and sixty. He was dressed all in black. He wore eyeglasses. His hair was whiter and thinner than it had been last year. His legs did not seem as strong as they had seemed the year before.

    As this kind Old Gentleman came toward him, Stuffy began to shake and his breath was shorter. He wished he could fly away. But he could not move from his seat.

    “Good morning,” said the Old Gentleman. “I am glad to see that the troubles of another year have not hurt you. You continue to move in health about the beautiful world. For that blessing, you and I can give thanks on this day of thanksgiving. If you will come with me, my man, I will give you a dinner that will surely make your body feel as thankful as your mind.”

    That is what the Old Gentleman said every time. Every Thanksgiving Day for nine years. The words themselves were almost a tradition. Always before, they had been music in Stuffy’s ear. But now he looked up at the Old Gentleman’s face with tears of suffering in his eyes. The snow turned quickly to water when it fell upon his hot face. But the Old Gentleman was shaking with the cold. He turned away, with his back to the wind, and he did not see Stuffy’s eyes.

    Stuffy had always wondered why the Old Gentleman seemed sad as he spoke. He did not know that it was because the Old Gentleman was wishing that he had a son. A son would come there after he himself was gone. A son would stand proud and strong before Stuffy, and say: “In remembrance of my father.” Then it would really be a tradition.

    But the Old Gentleman had no family. He lived in a room in one of the old houses near the park. In the winter he grew a few flowers there. In the spring he walked on Fifth Avenue. In the summer he lived in a farmhouse in the hills outside New York, and he talked of a strange bug he hoped someday to find. In the fall season, he gave Stuffy a dinner. These were the things that filled the Old Gentleman’s life.

    Stuffy Pete looked up at him for a half minute, helpless and very sorry for himself. The Old Gentleman’s eyes were bright with the giving-pleasure. His face was getting older every year, but his clothes were very clean and fresh.

    And then Stuffy made a strange noise. He was trying to speak. As the Old Gentleman had heard the noise nine times before, he understood it. He knew that Stuffy was accepting.

    “Thank you. I’m very hungry.”

    Stuffy was very full, but he understood that he was part of a tradition. His desire for food on Thanksgiving Day was not his own. It belonged to this kind Old Gentleman. True, America is free. But there are some things that must be done.

    The Old Gentleman led Stuffy to the restaurant and to the same table where they had always gone. They were known here.

    “Here comes that old man,” said a waiter, “that buys that old no-good fellow a dinner every Thanksgiving.”

    The Old Gentleman sat at the table, watching. The waiters brought food and more food. And Stuffy began to eat.

    No great and famous soldier ever battled more strongly against an enemy. The turkey and all the other food were gone almost as quickly as they appeared. Stuffy saw the look of happiness on the Old Gentleman’s face. He continued to eat in order to keep it there.

    In an hour the battle was finished.

    “Thank you,” Stuffy said. “Thank you for my Thanksgiving dinner.”

    Then he stood up heavily and started to go to the wrong door. A waiter turned him in the right direction.

    The Old Gentleman carefully counted out $1.30 and left fifteen cents more for the waiter.

    They said goodbye, as they did each year, at the door. The Old Gentleman went south, and Stuffy went north.

    Stuffy went around the first corner and stood for one minute. Then he fell.

    There he was found. He was picked up and taken to a hospital. They put him on a bed and began to try to discover what strange sickness had made him fall.

    And an hour later the Old Gentleman was brought to the same hospital. And they put him on another bed and began to try to discover what his sickness could be.

    After a little time, one of the doctors met another doctor, and they talked.

    “That nice old gentleman over there,” he said. “Do you know what’s wrong with him? He is almost dead for need of food. A very proud old man, I think. He told me he has had nothing to eat for three days.”