THE TINDER-BOX
BY HANS CHRISTIAN ANDERSEN
A
STORY about a tinder-box? Yes, but then it was such a wonderful one! Why, it must certainly have been a magic box!
It belonged to an old witch, this tinder-box, but it had been [page 259] left right down inside a tree by the ugly old witch's grandmother. But get it again she must, for she knew it really was a magic tinder-box.
But how could she get it?
Ah! here was her chance.
Tramp, tramp; right, left, right, left. She heard the steps come nearer and nearer. She looked! There was a soldier coming along; tramp, tramp.
She could see him now, with a knapsack on his back, and his sword at his side.
The soldier had been to the wars and was coming home.