Grimm's Household Tales

There was once a little girl whose father and mother were dead, and she was so poor that she no longer had a little room to live in or a bed to sleep in, and at last she had nothing but the clothes she was wearing and a little bit of bread in her hand that some charitable soul had given her. She was, however, good and pious. And as she was thus forsaken by all the world, she went out into the open country, trusting in the good God. Then a poor man met her and said, “Ah, give me something to eat. I am so hungry!” She handed him the whole of her piece of bread and said, “May God bless it for your use,” and went on. Then a child came, who moaned and said, “My head is so cold. Give me something to cover it with.” So she took off her hood and gave it to him; and when she had walked a little farther, she met another child who had no jacket and was frozen with cold. Then she gave the child her own; and a little farther on, another begged for a frock, and she gave that away also. At length she got into a forest, and it had already become dark, and there came yet another child, who asked for a little shirt. And the good little girl thought to herself, “It is a dark night and no one sees you, so you can very well give your little shirt away,” and she took it off and gave that away also. And as she stood there with not one single thing left, suddenly some stars from heaven fell down, and they were nothing but hard, smooth pieces of money; and although she had just given her little shirt away, she had a new one that was of the very finest linen. Then she gathered the money into it and was rich all the days of her life.