It was a terribly cold night. Snow was falling, and darkness was closing in. It was the last evening of the year. A poor little girl, with no hat on her head and bare feet, walked along the street. She had been wearing her mother's big slippers, but they were too big for her. She had lost one when she hurried across the street to escape a carriage, and a boy had run away with the other, saying he would use it as a cradle when he had children. So the little girl went on her way with her little ba…