Vermont phÅ“nix. [volume] (Brattleboro, Vt.) 1834-1955, 1883-11-23
THE DEVIL AND rom WALKER.
One Of Washington IrVing's sketches.

One Of Washington IrVIng's sketches.
A few miles from Boston, in Massachusetts,.
there is a deep inlet, winding several miles
into the interior of the country from Charles
bay, and terminating in a thicky- wooded
swamp or morass.
On one side OF this inlet is beautiful dark
grove; on the opposite side the land rises Rb.
ruptly from the waters edge into a high ridge,
on which grow few scattered oaks of great
age and immense size.
Under one of these gigantic trees accord
ing to old stories, there was great amount Of
treasure hid by Kidd the pirate.
The inlet allowed facility to bring the
money in boat secretly and at night to the
very foot OF the hill the elevation of the
place permitted good lookout to be kept that
no one was at hand; while the remarkable
trees formed good landmarks by which the
place might be found again.
The old stories add, moreover, that tho devil
presided at the hiding of the money and took
1t under his guardianship but that, it is well
known, he always does with buried treasure,
particularly when it has been ill gotten. Be
that as it may. Kidd never returned to recover
his wealth, being not long after seized in Bos-
ton, sent to England and there hanged for a
pirate.
About the year 1927, just at the time that
earthquakes were prevalent in New England
and shook many tall sinners down upon their
knees, there lived near this place a meagre,
miserly fellow by the name of Tom Walker.
He had a wife as miserly as himself and they
were so miserly that they even conspired to
cheat each other. Whatever the woman could
lay hands on, she hid away; hen could not
cackle but she was on the alert to secure the
M w laid Her husband ypa aODfipuallg
prying about to discover her secret boards,
and many and fierce were the conflicts that
took place about what ought to have been
common property.
They lived in a forlorn-looking house that
stood alone and had an air Of starvation. A
few struggling sayin-trces, emblems of ster-
ilty, grew near it no smoke ever curled
from its chimney; no traveller stopped at its
door. A miserable horse, whose ribs we're as
articulate as the bars of a gridiron, stalked
about a field where a thin carpet of moss,
scarcely covering the ragged beds of pudding
stone, tantaliZed and baked his hunger and
sometimes he would lean his head over the
fence and look piteously at the passer. by,
seeming to petition deliverance from this land
of famine
The house and its inmates had altogether a
bad name. Toms wife was a tall termagant,
fierce of temper, loud Of tongue and strong of
arm. Her voice was often heard in wordy
warfare with her husband, and his face some
times showed signs that their conflicts were
not confined to words No one ventured to
interfere between them, however. The lone
ly wayfarer shrank within himself at the nor
rid clamor and clapper clawing, eyed the den
| of discord askance, and hurried on his way
rejoicing, il a bachelor, in his celibacy.
One day Tom Walker had been to distant
part of the neighborhood, and took what he
considered short way home, through the
swamp Like most short cuts it was an ILL
chosen route. The swamp was thickly grown
with great gloomy pines and hemlocks some
Of them ninety feet high, which made it dark
at MONDAY and a retreat for all the owls in
the vicinity, 1t was full of pits and quag-
mres partly covered with weeds and MOSES,
where the green surface often betrayed the
traveller into a gulf of black, smothering
mud; there were also dark and stagnsnt pools,
the abodes of the tadpole, the bull-frog and
the water snake, where ghe trunks of pines
| and hemlocks lay half-drowned, hRlfrotting,
| looking like alligators sleeping in the mire
Tom had long been picking his way through
this treacherous forest, stepping from tuft to
tuft of rushes and roots, which afforded pre-
carious footholds among deep sloughs, or pac
ing carefully, like cat, along the PROSTATE
trunks Of trees, startled now and then by the
sudden screaming of the bittern or the quack
ing of wild duck rising on the wing from
some solitary pool At length he arrived at &
firm piece of ground which ran out like
peninsula into the deep bosom of the swamp
1t had been one of the strongholds of the
Indians during their wars with the first colo
nists Here they had thrown up kind oi
fort, which they had looked upon as almos
impregnable and had used as place of refugt
for their squaws and children. Nothing re
mained of the old Indian fort but few EN-
bankments, gradually sinking to the level o
the surrounding earth, and already overgrowI
in part by oaks and other forest trees, the TO
liage of which formed a contrast to the darl
pines and hemlooks of the swamp.
1t was late in the dusk of evening as Ton
Walker reached the old fort, and he pauset
there awhile to rest himself. Any one but h
would have felt unwilling to linger in such
lonely melancholy place, for the common
people had bad opinion of it, owing to tn
stories handed down from the time of the In
dian wars, when it was asserted that the say
ages held incantations here and made sacrifice
to the Evil One.
Tom Walker, however, was not man to b
troubled with any fears of the kind. He re
posed himself for some time on the trunk @
fallen hemlock, listening to the boding or
of the tree-toad and delving with his wall
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feet.
Unconsciously turning up the soil, his sta
struck against something hard. He raked
out of the vegetable mould, and 10 a Glove
skull, with an Indian tomahawk buried dee
in it, lay before him. The rust on the weaI
on showed the time that had elapsed since b
death blow had been given. 1t was drear
memento of the fierce struggle that had tai
en- place in this last foothold of the India
warriors.
"Humph !" said Tom Walker, as he gave
a kick to shake the dirt from it.
"Let that skull alone !" said gruf voic,
Tom lifted up his eyes, and beheld a greI
black man seated directly opposite him, @
the stump of tree. He was exceeding
surprised, having neither heard nor seen an
one approach and he was still more perple
ed on observing, as well as the gatherir
, gloom would permit, that the stranger WI
neither negro nor Indian, 1t is true he vi
, dressed in rude half Indian garb, and ht
a red belt or sash swathed round his body
! but his face was neither black nor copper-co
or, but swathy and dingy, and begrimm'
with SCOT, as if he had been accustomed
toll among fires and forges. He had shoe
) of coarse black hair, that stood out from b
head in all directions, and bore an ak on
: shoulder.
He soowled for a moment at Tom with
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