The Devil and Tom Walker
A miserly New Englander sells his soul for a pirate’s buried treasure, becomes Boston’s most ruthless moneylender, and discovers too late that piety on Sundays does not cancel a bargain.
Tom Walker is so stingy that he and his wife cheat each other. Taking a shortcut through a haunted swamp outside Boston, he meets a sooty stranger with an axe who knows where Captain Kidd buried his gold and is willing to deal. Tom’s wife tries to strike the bargain first and disappears. Tom strikes it later, becomes a usurer, grows rich on the ruin of his neighbors, and then, growing old and nervous, starts carrying a Bible everywhere. Irving tells it as a folk legend, a moral fable, and a sharp joke about money, all at once.
What happens in The Devil and Tom Walker
Near Boston, around 1727, lives Tom Walker, a miser married to a woman as greedy and quarrelsome as he is. Taking a shortcut through a gloomy swamp, Tom rests at an old Indian fort and uncovers a skull with a tomahawk in it. A huge, soot-covered man with an axe appears, the Black Woodsman, whom Tom recognizes as Old Scratch, the devil. The devil points to trees marked with the names of the colony’s great men, including Deacon Peabody and Absalom Crowninshield, which he is cutting down for firewood. He offers Tom the treasure that the pirate Kidd buried under the oaks nearby, on conditions Tom keeps to himself, and burns a fingerprint into his forehead as proof. When Tom learns that Crowninshield has just died, he believes the stranger. His wife urges him to take the deal; out of spite he refuses, so she goes to the swamp to bargain for herself, taking the household silver. She never returns. Searching, Tom finds her apron hanging in a tree with only a heart and liver inside, and hoof prints and tufts of black hair suggest she fought hard. Grateful to be rid of her, Tom seeks the devil again and agrees to terms: he will not become a slave trader, but he gladly becomes a usurer. He opens a counting house in Boston during a time of financial panic and grows rich by squeezing debtors. As he ages, he fears for his soul, becomes loudly religious, and keeps a Bible in his pocket and another on his desk. One stormy afternoon, refusing mercy to a ruined land speculator, he swears that the devil may take him if he has made a farthing. There is a knock at the door, and the devil is there with a black horse. Tom’s Bibles are out of reach. The devil sweeps him onto the horse and gallops into the storm toward the swamp. Afterward Tom’s bonds turn to cinders, his gold to wood chips, his horses to skeletons, and his house burns down. His ghost is said to haunt the swamp, and his name becomes a proverb.
Where and when The Devil and Tom Walker happens
A swamp near Boston
A dark, treacherous forest of pines and hemlocks with an old Indian fort at its center, where Tom meets the devil.
Tom’s Boston counting house
The office where Tom lends money at crushing rates and where the devil finally comes for him.
Colonial Massachusetts, around 1727
A time of earthquakes, religious zeal, paper money, and wild land speculation, which Irving satirizes.
Timeline the story arc, beat by beat
- The misers A bitter household
Tom Walker and his equally greedy wife live near Boston, cheating each other over every scrap.
- The meeting The Black Woodsman
In a haunted swamp Tom meets Old Scratch, who offers him Captain Kidd’s buried treasure on hidden terms.
- The wife A bargain gone wrong
Tom’s wife goes to deal with the devil herself, carrying the household silver, and never comes back.
- The remains The apron in the tree
Tom finds her apron holding only a heart and liver and feels more relief than grief.
- The deal Usurer for the devil
Refusing to trade in slaves but eager to lend money, Tom accepts the devil’s terms.
- The rise Rich and pious
Tom grows rich in Boston by ruining debtors, then turns showily religious out of fear for his soul.
- The end Carried off
When Tom swears the devil may take him, the devil arrives on a black horse and carries him into the storm.
Characters and how they connect
Tom Walker
Protagonist
A mean, fearless miser who sells his soul for money, grows rich as a moneylender, and tries too late to cheat the devil with outward piety.
Tom’s wife
Tom’s equally greedy wife
A fierce, quarrelsome woman who tries to make her own deal with the devil and disappears in the swamp.
Old Scratch
The devil
A sooty, axe-carrying figure known as the Black Woodsman, who presides over buried treasure and collects the souls of the greedy.
The land speculator
Ruined debtor
The man Tom refuses to spare on the day the devil comes to collect him.
Deacon Peabody
Hypocritical townsman
A respected man whose name is carved on a tree that is rotten at the core.
Absalom Crowninshield
Rich former buccaneer
A wealthy man whose tree the devil has just felled, and whose death proves the stranger’s power.
Character Relationships who connects to whom, and the themes that bind them
Love / marriage
Surveillance / society
Connection
Themes in The Devil and Tom Walker what the story is really about
Greed
Tom and his wife love money more than each other or their souls, and the story shows greed destroying both of them.
Religious hypocrisy
Tom’s loud Sunday devotion and his neighbors’ marked trees show Irving mocking people who confuse outward piety with goodness.
Exploitation
Tom grows rich by ruining desperate people during hard times, and the devil calls usurers his own people.
Moral consequences
The bargain comes due exactly when Tom shows no mercy, and everything he gained turns to ashes.
Folklore and the supernatural
Irving frames the story as a half-believed legend, mixing humor with the old tradition of the deal with the devil.
Symbols & motifs
The swamp
The dark, sinking landscape represents moral corruption, the place where Tom’s greed leads him.
The marked trees
Trees healthy outside and rotten inside, carved with the names of respected men, symbolize their hidden sinfulness.
The fingerprint on Tom’s forehead
The devil’s burned mark shows that Tom belongs to him from the moment of their meeting.
The Bibles
Tom carries them as protection rather than faith, and when he forgets them the devil takes him.
The black horse
The devil’s mount carries Tom to his doom, a traditional image of the damned being ridden away.
Recurring motifs
Buried treasure. Kidd’s gold, guarded by the devil, links wealth to crime and damnation.
Bargains. Deals of every kind, from marriage to loans to the pact itself, run through the story.
Things turning to nothing. At the end, gold, bonds, horses, and house all vanish or burn, showing the worthlessness of ill-gotten wealth.
Conflicts
Person vs. person
Tom and his wife fight constantly, and Tom later preys on his debtors.
Person vs. the supernatural
Tom tries to outwit the devil, who collects his soul in the end.
Person vs. self
In old age Tom is torn between his greed and his fear of damnation.
Literary devices
- Satire
- Irving mocks greedy bankers, speculators, and religious hypocrites of colonial New England, and by extension his own day.
- Frame narrative
- The tale is told by a character in a larger collection, which gives it the air of a legend passed along by word of mouth.
- Irony
- Tom’s Bibles fail him because he has buried one under the very mortgage he is foreclosing.
- Allegory
- The story works as a moral fable about the price of selling one’s soul for money.
- Humor
- Irving treats the wife’s grisly end and Tom’s relief with dark comedy.
Important quotes
“Like most short cuts, it was an ill-chosen route.”
“the devil being extremely anxious for the increase of usurers, looking upon them as his peculiar people.”
“Tom consoled himself for the loss of his property by the loss of his wife; for he was a little of a philosopher.”
“He prayed loudly and strenuously as if heaven were to be taken by force of lungs.”
“Tom, you’re come for!”
“Such was the end of Tom Walker and his ill-gotten wealth. Let all griping money-brokers lay this story to heart.”
The ending of The Devil and Tom Walker, explained
The ending of The Devil and Tom Walker delivers the punishment the whole story has been building toward, with a comic twist. In old age, Tom has tried to protect himself by becoming a loud churchgoer and by keeping a small Bible in his coat pocket and a large one on his desk, as if a book could work like a charm against the devil. On a hot, stormy afternoon, a ruined land speculator begs Tom for more time on a mortgage. Tom refuses, and when the man complains that Tom has made so much money from him, Tom loses his temper and swears that the devil may take him if he has made a farthing. At that moment three knocks sound at the door. The sooty stranger from the swamp is waiting with a black horse. Tom’s pocket Bible is buried at the bottom of his coat, and his desk Bible lies under the very mortgage he was foreclosing, so neither can help him. The devil throws him onto the horse and gallops off into the thunderstorm toward the swamp, where a thunderbolt seems to set the forest ablaze. Afterward nothing Tom gained survives: his bonds and mortgages are cinders, his gold is wood chips, his starved horses are skeletons, and his great house burns to the ground. The irony is exact. Tom’s own careless oath summons the devil, and his greed literally buries his protection. Irving ends with a mock-solemn warning to moneylenders and the claim that the phrase the devil and Tom Walker became a New England saying, which keeps the whole tale in the playful register of a local legend.
Common misreadings
MythThe story is only a scary tale about the devil.
ActuallyIt is largely a satire of greed and religious hypocrisy, told with dark humor.
MythTom agrees to every one of the devil’s terms.
ActuallyHe refuses to become a slave trader, though he eagerly agrees to become a usurer.
MythTom’s wife makes a successful deal.
ActuallyShe disappears in the swamp, and only her heart and liver are found in her apron.
Test yourself
1. What does the devil offer Tom?
The devil controls the pirate’s gold buried under the oaks.
2. What does Tom find in his wife’s apron?
It is all that remains of her after her encounter with the devil.
3. What business does Tom refuse to take up?
Even Tom will not become a slave trader, though he gladly becomes a usurer.
4. Why can’t Tom’s Bibles protect him at the end?
His own greed leaves them out of reach.
5. What happens to Tom’s wealth after he disappears?
Everything he gained vanishes or burns.
Tom Walker is a super stingy man who fights with his equally stingy wife. One day in a creepy swamp he meets the devil, who offers him a pirate’s buried treasure in exchange for his soul. Tom’s wife tries to make her own deal and disappears for good. Later Tom agrees to the deal and becomes a moneylender who gets rich by being cruel to people who owe him money. When he gets old, he gets scared and pretends to be very religious, carrying Bibles everywhere. But one day he angrily says the devil can take him, and the devil shows up on a black horse and carries him away. All his money turns to ashes. The story makes fun of greedy people who think acting holy will save them.
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Compare & connect the story universe
The Legend of Sleepy Hollow
Irving’s other famous tale mixes folklore, humor, and a supernatural horseman.
Young Goodman Brown
A New Englander walks into a dark forest, meets the devil, and discovers the hypocrisy of respected townspeople.
The Devil and Daniel Webster
A later American tale about a New England farmer who sells his soul and tries to escape the bargain.
A Christmas Carol
Another miser is confronted by the supernatural, though Scrooge is given the chance to change that Tom never takes.
Discussion & essay prompts for class, or your next paper
💬 Discussion questions
- What is the moral of The Devil and Tom Walker
- How does Tom Walker meet the devil
- What happens to Tom Walker’s wife
- How does The Devil and Tom Walker explore the theme of greed?
- How does The Devil and Tom Walker explore the theme of religious hypocrisy?
- What is the central conflict in The Devil and Tom Walker, and how does it shape the ending?
✎ Essay prompts
- Analyze how Washington Irving develops the theme of greed in The Devil and Tom Walker. Support your argument with specific evidence from the text.
- Examine the significance of the swamp in The Devil and Tom Walker. What does it represent, and how does it deepen the work’s meaning?
- How does Washington Irving use satire to shape the reader’s experience of The Devil and Tom Walker?
- Some readers assume that the story is only a scary tale about the devil. Argue for or against this interpretation, using evidence from the text.
Key questions students ask
- What is the moral of The Devil and Tom Walker
- How does Tom Walker meet the devil
- What happens to Tom Walker’s wife
- Why does Tom Walker become religious
- What do the trees symbolize in The Devil and Tom Walker
- How is The Devil and Tom Walker a satire
Analysis is original StoryBites commentary. Quotations are from Washington Irving’s The Devil and Tom Walker, published in Tales of a Traveller (1824; Project Gutenberg eBook #13514), which is in the public domain.