[In the following essay, Zug traces folklore elements in Washington Irving's “The Devil and Tom Walker,” viewing the story as a masterful blending of German and American folk motifs.]

Although it is unquestionably one of Washington Irving's finest tales, “The Devil and Tom Walker” has never attracted much critical attention. First published in 1824 in Part IV of Tales of a Traveller, the tale recounts the fate of an avaricious New Englander, who sells his soul to the Devil in return for Captain Kidd's treasure, and is finally carted off to Hell after a long and profitable career as a usurer in colonial Boston. For the most part, critics have been content to note that the tale is “a sort of comic New England Faust,”¹ or that it “is redolent of the American soil.”² In other words, the consensus is that the tale has certain Germanic overtones but is indigenous to the young American republic in which Irving grew up. No one, however, has really attempted to examine the possible sources for this work or note the complex manner in which Irving has interwoven numerous motifs from American and German folklore.

There are a number of reasons for the lack of interest in “The Devil and Tom Walker.” Foremost, perhaps, is the fact that Tales of a Traveller was poorly received when it was first published and has never attained the popularity of such works Knickerbocker's History of New York (1809) or The Sketch Book (1819). Also, there is the oft-cited critical attitude that Irving lacked “the sustaining qualities of a great imagination,”³ and was always content to merely embellish and lengthen folktales which he had discovered during his extensive readings. This attitude is well substantiated in Henry A. Pochmann's collation of “Rip Van Winkle” and Otmar's “Peter Klaus.” Pochmann's study reveals that Irving must have had the latter before him as he wrote, and that he did not hesitate to borrow sentences or even whole passages.⁴ Citing Pochmann's article, Irving's biographer, Stanley T. Williams, labels Irving's imitation of his original source as “slavish,”⁵ and it is this general estimate of Irving's use of folklore that has largely prevailed over the last thirty years. As an example, a recent writer in a prominent folklore journal has described “The Devil and Tom Walker” as a typical New England folktale, naively stating that “one is inclined to think Irving almost wrote the tale exactly as he heard it, with perhaps some smoothing of the style and a conscious development of mood.”⁶ As will be shown, “The Devil and Tom Walker” is in no sense a folktale that has been merely copied down from oral tradition. Further, of the numerous traditional motifs contained in it, the majority are German and only six appear to be native to America.

At the outset, it is significant that no source has ever been discovered for “The Devil and Tom Walker.” Most commonly, critics cite the Faust theme as the basis for the tale, but this is rather inaccurate, for Tom Walker is in no sense a scholar who desires to extend the limits of human knowledge. In actuality, it is not the Faust theme but the wellknown motif M211, Man sells soul to devil,⁷ that lies at the heart of the tale. This, however, is only one of numerous folk motifs used, and taken by itself, it provides little insight into the source or structure of the tale. The problem here is that unlike “Rip Van Winkle,” which is largely patterned on a complete tale, “The Devil and Tom Walker” is based on a series of folk motifs gathered by Irving from a wide variety of sources. It is important at this point to understand the exact distinction between a tale and a motif. The former is a complete and independent narrative which consists of one or more motifs traditionally associated with each other, while the latter is “the smallest element in a tale having a power to persist in tradition.” Generally, motifs fall into one of three categories: “the actors in a tale,” “items in the background of the action,” and most commonly, “single incidents.”⁸ Although based on folklore like “Rip Van Winkle,” “The Devil and Tom Walker” is thus a much more complex and original work, for instead of starting with a fully developed plot, Irving began with a series of plot elements and fused them into a new and harmonious whole. That he was highly skilled in assembling these traditional motifs is evidenced by the number of critics who have accepted “The Devil and Tom Walker” as a rewritten version of a folktale that he had heard or read.

To fully understand Irving's increasingly sophisticated use of folklore, it is necessary to briefly consider some of Irving's activities between the publication of The Sketchbook in 1819 and the writing of “The Devil and Tom Walker” in 1824. The key event here appears to have been the yearlong tour through Germany in 1822 and 1823. Prior to this journey, Irving had shown an increasing interest in German lore and literature, and had been encouraged by Sir Walter Scott “to study the fascinating history of folklore.”⁹ However, Irving's contact with German folklore at this time was limited to the few works over which he struggled to learn the German language and a number of English publications which were “Translated or adapted from the popular literature of Germany.”¹⁰ The trip to Germany in 1822 gave Irving a new opportunity: a chance to investigate and gather up German folklore at first-hand. As he wrote to Thomas Storrow at the beginning of the tour, “I mean to get into the confidence of every old woman I meet with in Germany and get from her, her wonderful budget of stories.”¹¹ In other words, Irving was out to collect folklore in its purest state, directly from oral transmission. Stanley Williams notes this shift in Irving's attitude, commenting that “he now formed a resolution that folklore should not merely entertain the knight-errant but should earn his lordship's bread and butter. He would really follow that impulse felt at Abbotsford in 1817 and create his volume of German legends. The tour now became a hunt for gnomes, pixies, and phantom armies; and he extended the journal into a saving bank for this species of coin.”¹² That the hunt was clearly successful is revealed by the numerous legends and scraps of lore that may be found in the letters and journals written during the German tour. At Salzburg, for example, Irving noted that “the mountain regions are full of fable and elfin story, and I had some wonderful tales told me.”¹³ In his journal, he even wrote out seven local legends from this region, all of them concerned with the imposing figure of Untersberg Mountain.¹⁴ Walter Reichart points out that none of these legends appears to have a literary source, “so that it seems likely that Irving actually heard them from some of the inhabitants.”¹⁵ Since Irving had little time or ability for reading German during his travels, this conclusion is almost inescapable. In addition, the letters and journals abound with fragments of and brief references to well-known tales and motifs, such as “the Emperor and his army shut up in the enchanted mountain” and “the Black Huntsman and the enchanted Bullets.”¹⁶ Altogether, it appears that Irving rapidly enlarged his working knowledge of German folklore, and there are numerous entries indicating that he also enjoyed retelling the tales to his friends. The German experience thus served not only to increase his “savings bank” of potential source materials, but more important, to teach him the technique of combining and recombining these materials so as to form new tales. It is exactly this shift in emphasis, from written to oral sources, from the tale to the motif, and from the mere materials to the actual mechanics of folklore, that is reflected in “The Devil and Tom Walker.” As such, this tale suggests that a re-evaluation of Irving's later use of folklore is very much needed. As the following analysis reveals, Irving's use of folklore after his German tour was somewhat less “slavish” than most critics have been willing to admit.

There are really two approaches to a study of the genesis and construction of “The Devil and Tom Walker.” The first, which might be considered an internal approach, consists of outlining the basic plot of the tale, and indicating the motifs which Irving employed. In abbreviated form and with the help of the Motif-Index, the structure of “The Devil and Tom Walker” appears as follows:

With each of the traditional motifs, I have listed the motif number from the Motif-Index and the countries indicated in the bibliographical references which are supplied. It should be noted that the bibliography for each motif in the Motif-Index is not meant to be complete; the references cited are intended to “give some preliminary guidance in finding examples of the items concerned.”¹⁸ Nevertheless, it is certainly remarkable that two thirds of the traditional motifs here have a known German source. And for two motifs (nos. 7 and 18), the only reference cited is from Germany. This clearly suggests that Irving's use of German folklore in “The Devil and Tom Walker” is far more extensive than has previously been suspected. Reichart, for example, who has produced a long and useful study of the influences of Germany on Irving's works, finds that “aside from the reference to the wild huntsman of German legend, … only the general theme of a pact with the devil is reminiscent of a German source.”¹⁹ While he has noted only two German motifs, there are in actuality at least ten.

In conjunction with the prevalence of German motifs, it is important to note that practically the entire plot is made up of elements from folklore. In fact the only nontraditional portions of the plot are the two sections which I have labeled the domestic and financial subplots. The tale opens with three American motifs built around the legend of Captain Kidd. Immediately following is the domestic subplot, which is reminiscent of the marital situation in “Rip Van Winkle” and serves to develop the mutual emnity between Tom and his wife. Merely to infuriate her, Tom obstinately refuses to close his pact with the Devil. She, therefore, runs off with the family silverware to make her own bargain, and is apparently carried off by the Devil after an heroic struggle. After this humorous interlude, Irving immediately returns to the main plot of folk motifs, and it is not until after the pact is actually completed that he inserts the financial subplot. This section describes the state of affairs in colonial Boston, neatly delineating the avarice and religious hypocrisy of the inhabitants. With the uttering of the oath, Irving again returns to the main plot, and the tale moves swiftly to a close. Taken as a whole, the plot thus consists of a central chain of folk motifs into which two realistic subplots have been inserted.

One of the major difficulties in recognizing the extensive use of folk motifs in “The Devil and Tom Walker” is ironically due to Irving's craftsmanship. As previously mentioned, critics and readers have had little difficulty in isolating the well-known theme of the pact with the Devil or the explicit reference to the Black Huntsman. However, the remainder of the motifs have remained obscure because Irving has fused them so skillfully with the American setting, the American legends of the Indians and Captain Kidd, and the two realistic subplots. Take, for example, Irving's description of the Devil. In conjunction with the four German motifs listed above (nos. 7-10), Irving adds a distinctly American feature by describing the Devil as “dressed in a rude half Indian garb” (253) and associating him with former sacrifices held by the Indians. In addition, the Devil informs Tom that “‘I am the great patron and prompter of slave-dealers, and the grand-master of the Salem witches’” (254). The resultant figure is thus a neat composite of traditional German, American Indian, and Puritan elements. Although more explicit than a typical folk version,²⁰ Irving's Devil is clearly much closer to folklore than such sophisticated, literary versions as the suave, black-mustachioed villain in Stephen Vincent Benet's “The Devil and Daniel Webster.”

Irving's ability to disguise and integrate traditional motifs is also seen in his development of the two subplots. At the center of the domestic subplot is the soul-selling motif, for it is this which provides the final source of conflict between Tom and his wife and leads to the latter's flight and disappearance. In the financial subplot, Irving again employs the soul-selling motif as the primary motivation for the action. He also integrates Motif G303.16.2, Devil's power over one avoided by prayer, to accentuate the religious hypocrisy of Tom, and indeed, of the whole Boston community. This use of traditional motifs as a basis for satire is also evident earlier in the tale. When the tree with the buccaneer Absalom Crowninshield's name on it is hewed down by the Devil, the man dies and the papers piously announce that “‘A great man had fallen in Irsael’” (255). Motif E765.3.3, life bound up with tree, lies at the center of the incident and reveals the lack of scruples and lust for wealth that lie behind the pious, dignified veneer of Puritan society. Here, as throughout the tale, Irving is skillfully combining a folk motif with realistic elements, thereby obscuring the presence of the former.

However, it is not merely Irving's ability to fuse and integrate the traditional motifs that makes them so difficult to recognize. As previously suggested, it is also their unique combination into a new tale that has blinded most readers to Irving's heavy reliance on folklore. Unlike “Rip Van Winkle,” “The Devil and Tom Walker” has no single antecedent. The companion volume to the Motif-Index, The Types of the Folktale, lists numerous tales of the type “A Man Sells his Soul to the Devil,”²¹ but none of them is akin to Irving's version. While each of them is built around Motif M211, none of them contains the same auxiliary motifs, nor are they anywhere near as complex in structure. It is thus clear that in writing “The Devil and Tom Walker,” Irving must have drawn on a number of separate motifs that he had heard or recorded during his travels. In combining these motifs into such an original pattern, he was acting very much in the manner of the traditional tale-teller, whose major recourse to originality is to combine or recombine already existing motifs. However, Irving took far greater freedom than a conservative member of the folk would have done, for his new structure of motifs is far more complex than any of his sources, and includes materials which are distinctly nontraditional.

Thus far only an internal or textual approach has been considered for the construction of “The Devil and Tom Walker.” This has been useful in revealing Irving's debt to traditional motifs, notably German, and indicating the unique manner in which he combined and even disguised these motifs. However, there is yet another tack which can be used to corroborate and even complement the previous discussion. This involves the use of various external sources related to “The Devil and Tom Walker,” notably the journals and letters which Irving wrote while he was struggling to organize and write Tales of a Traveller. Through the use of these materials, it is possible to trace the actual process of construction of “The Devil and Tom Walker” and even some of the immediate sources on which Irving drew.

The first reference to the general plan for Tales of a Traveller appears in a journal entry for November 2, 1822, three months after Irving had begun his German tour. Irving was staying in Vienna at the time and wrote: “tho[ugh]t of preparing a collection of tales of various countries, made up from legends.”²² During the year following this vague initial formulation, Irving traveled extensively and spent a busy winter in Dresden among the fashionable English and German society. Apparently he gave little additional thought to the plan for the Tales of a Traveller during this period, for it is not until December 8, 1823, a little more than a year later, that he mentions it again. By this time Irving was living in Paris and was struggling to renew his literary activities. As he noted in his journal on this date, “tried to commence work on Germany but could not do any thing—towards twelve o'clock an idea of a plan dawned on me—Felt more encouraged—Felt as if I should make something of it.”²³. It is important to note the emphasis on Germany here, an emphasis clearly not present in the previous journal entry. As for the vague “idea of a plan,” Pierre M. Irving, Irving's nephew and early biographer, explains that “this was a plan, as he once told me, to mingle up the legendary superstitions of Germany, in the form of tales, with local descriptions and a little of the cream of travelling incidents.”²⁴ Although intended as a general description of the Tales of a Traveller, Pierre Irving's remark is particularly applicable to “The Devil and Tom Walker,” for it is exactly this mingling up of German legend that forms the backbone of the tale. Finally, along with these excerpts, there is the preface to Tales of a Traveller, in which the author states that “I rummaged my portfolio, and cast about, in my recollection, for those floating materials which a man naturally collects in travelling; and here I have arranged them in this little work” (6). This preface could hardly be more explicit or more in agreement with the journal entries and the preceding textual analysis of the tale. All of this evidence clearly reveals that Irving's general method gradually evolved during the German tour and was a well formulated and consistent one: he simply drew on his journals and his memory for German folk motifs, and reassembled them into new combinations.

While the journals help to indicate the general plan behind the construction of “The Devil and Tom Walker,” they are even more useful in revealing the specific origins and development of the tale. The key entries, all for 1824, may be tabulated as follows:

May 3 “Col Aspinwall called & told me stories about Kidd”

May 6 “This morning wrote story of the Devil & Tom Walker”

May 7 “Wrote all morning at Tom Walker”

May 8 “Wrote this Morng at story of Tom Walker”

May 10 “Wrote a little at the Story of Tom Walker, introducing dialogue between him & D[evil]. on subject of the bargain”

May 21 “This Morng—rewrote parts of Tom Walker”²⁵

From the above, it appears that the legends of Captain Kidd provided the impetus to start “The Devil and Tom Walker,” for Irving heard them just three days before he began writing the tale. The legends were told to him by his London literary agent, Colonel Thomas Aspinwall, a close friend who is mentioned frequently in the journal during this period. Once started, Irving apparently wrote at great speed, adding the numerous German motifs to the framework provided by the Kidd legends. Apparently the tale was finished after only two weeks, for there is no further mention of it after May 21.

Irving's choice of the Kidd legends as a framework for “The Devil and Tom Walker” was a good one, for it placed the tale in a distinctly American setting. Willard Hallam Bonner, who has made an extensive study of Kidd, notes that “the composite legend surrounding him is Saxon North America's first full-bodied legend.”²⁶ However, this legend is a limited one, in that it generally contains only a few, often recurring motifs. There is first a widespread belief that Kidd did bury his treasure, either along the southern New England coast or up the Hudson River.²⁷ In addition, there is the belief that the treasure is guarded either by a slain sailor or worse, by “the Earl of Hell himself, at whose command Kidd ‘buried his Bible in the sand.’”²⁸ As noted in the earlier plot outline, Irving used these American motifs at the beginning of the tale, although he shifted the place of burial to the Boston region. With the introduction of the domestic subplot, which follows immediately, Irving moved away from the Kidd legends and began using German motifs which concerned the Devil. Apparently it was the Kidd stories heard from Colonel Aspinwall that gave Irving the initial inspiration and got the tale underway. Once started, Irving inserted the two realistic subplots and used the figure of the Devil, first mentioned in the American legend (Motif 571), as the means of transition to the numerous German materials.

One possible objection to this reconstruction of the development of “The Devil and Tom Walker” is that Colonel Aspinwall might simply have told Irving the entire tale as it stands. This would be in accord with the previously mentioned theory of Sara Rodes that “the lively story of ‘The Devil and Tom Walker’ is a New England folk tale which Irving merely retells with very little addition.”²⁹ However, the main flaw in this point of view is that there is absolutely no evidence that the Kidd legends ever accumulated the particular motifs that Irving used. Had they done so, folklorists and storytellers would almost certainly have recorded the evidence. The second weakness in this theory is, of course, the prevalence of German motifs. Only a person who was intimate with German folklore could have assembled so many of them so skillfully. And finally, there are the time and place in which “The Devil and Tom Walker” was written. Irving wrote the tale in Paris in May, 1824, shortly after a year in Germany and long after he had left America. Under these conditions, it is hardly possible that “The Devil and Tom Walker” could have evolved from a genuine New England folktale. Rather, as the journals, letters, and preface to Tales of a Traveller indicate, “The Devil and Tom Walker” can only be a skillful mingling up of folk motifs gathered for the most part in Germany and all neatly introduced by a true American legend that, ironically, was also heard in Europe.

Just about the only missing evidence in this reconstruction of “The Devil and Tom Walker” is the exact source material for the German motifs. However, there are still a number of definite clues contained in Irving's writings. One of Irving's references to the Black Huntsman has already been cited, and others can be found in both the journals and letters. Evidently Irving frequently encountered stories of this figure during his travels, and it is not unreasonable to assume that he picked up the other motifs used to describe the Devil in exactly the same manner. As for the soul-selling, there is an entry in the journal for August 24, 1824, indicating that Irving “told the story of Peter Schlemihl.”³⁰ This is the legend of a man who sold his shadow to the Devil, and while not exactly the same as Motif M211, it does indicate Irving's familiarity with the general theme of the pact with the Devil. As previously cited, Irving made a special note of writing this section of “The Devil and Tom Walker” in the journal entry for May 10, four days after he began writing the tale. This suggests that Irving considered the motif of special importance and that it was inserted as a unit independent of the Kidd legends received from Colonel Aspinwall. For the final motifs concerning the oath and the retreat of the Devil, there are no explicit references in Irving's journals or letters. This last section is really a unit in itself and is akin to tale Type 813, A Careless Word Summons the Devil. However, none of the examples of this type listed in The Types of the Folktale contains the same motifs, indicating that once again Irving devised his own combination.

Altogether, then, the internal and external evidence strongly suggests both the process and units of construction of “The Devil and Tom Walker.” To the native American legend of Captain Kidd, Irving added the well-known soul-selling motif, thereby giving the tale its main outline. Then, to give the tale body, he integrated a large number of traditional motifs focusing on the description and activities of the Devil. Finally, as a kind of moral to the action, he fittingly capped the tale with Motif G303.21.1, Devil's money becomes ashes. Of the nineteen plot elements listed, no less than fifteen are clearly traditional according to the Motif-Index. And of these fifteen, ten are from Germany and six are from the U.S.; only two (nos. 6 and 11) are listed as coming from other countries. While, as previously cited, the bibliography of the Motif-Index is not intended to be complete, it still clearly reveals the nature and extent of Irving's debt to folklore in “The Devil and Tom Walker.”

Along with Irving's use of German and American folklore, it is also important to note the particular setting and atmosphere which he has employed. As a background for the tale, Irving develops a genuine folk community, the Boston area in the year 1727. The countryside is rife with local legends of Captain Kidd's buried treasure and of ancient sacrifices and incantations held by the Indians. Earthquakes are regarded providentially, and send “many tall sinners down upon their knees” (251). Even the miraculous disappearance of Tom Walker is readily accepted: “the good people of Boston shook their heads and shrugged their shoulders, but had been so much accustomed to witches and goblins, and tricks of the devil, in all kinds of shapes, … that they were not so horror-struck as might have been expected” (261). Altogether, Irving's Boston reveals the major characteristics of the folk community: an essential isolation; a narrow, parochial outlook; credulous, superstitious attitudes; and homogeneity in behavior and belief.

In conjunction with the folk setting, Irving also constructs a mood which is appropriate to a folktale. He claims to have learned his story from “an old iron-faced Cape-Cod whaler” (250) and avers that he has given “the purport of the tale” “as nearly as I can recollect” (261). Furthermore, phrases such as “some say” (260), “the old stories add” (251), and “according to the most authentic old story” (256) are scattered throughout to give the flavor of an authentic folktale and the impression that the tale is coming directly from an oral source. With the identification of the “informant,” these stylistic devices, and a professed adherence to the “original tale,” Irving is attempting to simulate the mood of a genuine folktale, with its uncertainty, open credulity, and appeal to traditional belief. Irving's purpose in developing this mood is clearly to give the story an air of verisimilitude; he even ends by declaring that “the story has resolved itself into a proverb … prevalent throughout New England” (261).

However, despite the elaborate structure of folk motifs and the carefully devised setting and mood, it is clearly naive “to think Irving almost wrote the tale exactly as he heard it.” As stated earlier, this is exactly the sort of attitude that arises from the preconception that Irving merely rewrote folktales without making any significant changes. In actuality, “The Devil and Tom Walker” contains many elements that are decidedly foreign to folktales. Most obvious are the previously discussed domestic and financial subplots and the related satire on avarice and hypocrisy. In addition, there are the frequent, detailed descriptions, such as the delineation of Tom Walker's front yard: “a miserable horse, whose ribs were as articulate as the bars of a gridiron, stalked about a field, where a thin carpet of moss, scarcely covering the ragged beds of puddingstone, tantalized and balked his hunger” (251). The imagery has been carefully chosen here, for the specific purpose of depicting the essential sterility and desolation of Tom Walker's existence. In an actual folktale, however, such a description would be brief and stylized, and would not be designed to produce such a particular effect. Still another nontraditional element is the historical sketch of the Land Bank and the colonists' madness for land speculation which Irving includes in the financial subplot. Such detail has no place in a folktale, for the folk mind never possesses or is even concerned with a strict historical sense. And finally, there is the polished, well-balanced literary style of the tale, the very antithesis of the rough and often staccato vernacular which characterizes a tale taken directly from an oral source.

None of these nontraditional elements is really surprising here, however, for Irving certainly never intended “The Devil and Tom Walker” to be taken as a folktale. His purpose was to produce an entertaining, fast-moving story based largely on German folk motifs and firmly rooted in an American locale. In this he was eminently successful, and “The Devil and Tom Walker” deserves to be ranked with “Rip Van Winkle” and “The Legend of Sleepy Hollow” as one of his best tales. Stanley Williams has pointed out that the major flaw in Tales of a Traveller was Irving's failure “to draw bravely from that wonderful stock of German legend in his notebooks and in his mind.”³¹ While this analysis is true for most of these tales, it is clearly not applicable to “The Devil and Tom Walker,” where the carefully assembled chain of German motifs provides the backbone for a unique and vigorous plot structure. Still a second valid criticism of the Tales of a Traveller is that Irving did not succeed “in transplanting German legends into American settings where the native landscape could reflect the spirit of the tale.”³² Once again, “The Devil and Tom Walker” proves the exception, for Irving skillfully introduced the German materials through the use of the native Kidd legends, using the figure of the Devil as the unifying force for all of the motifs. By adding the two realistic subplots, a few brief character sketches, and some local history and legend, Irving succeeded in developing a truly American atmosphere. As William L. Hedge has observed, Irving was able “to bring certain aspects of Puritanism into dramatic focus by connecting Yankee shrewdness and Puritan respectability.”³³ As previously noted, this satire on the avarice and hypocrisy of colonial Boston is skillfully integrated with the folklore Irving used, and the final motif, Devil's money becomes ashes, is so well chosen that it serves as a fitting epilogue to the tale.

Once the construction of “The Devil and Tom Walker” is laid bare, it becomes evident that Irving, at least after his German tour, was no “slavish” imitator but rather a highly skilled manipulator of both American and German folklore. In avoiding the stock Gothic machinery and a distant, foreign setting for an American locale, and in assembling a chain of folk motifs that was distinctly his own invention, he created a vigorous tale that is still very much alive and meaningful today. This is not to assert that Irving possessed a first-rank imagination, as his successors Poe and Hawthorne did. Instead, as his contemporary Coleridge might have observed, Irving was endowed with a mechanical rather than an organic imagination. In this sense, he is not unlike the medieval French author Chrétien de Troyes, who drew so heavily on traditional materials yet left his own stamp on them. Like Chrétien, Irving knew and understood the traditional storyteller's skill in relating folk motifs and so, in tales such as “The Devil and Tom Walker,” he was able to recombine and reshape such motifs into new and significant forms.

Notes

1. O. S. Coad, “The Gothic Element in American Literature,” JEGP [Journal of German and English Philology], XXIV (1925), 85.

2. Maximilian Rudwin, The Devil in Legend and Literature (Chicago, 1931), p. 218.

3. Robert E. Spiller, The Cycle of American Literature (New York, 1957), p. 37.

4. “Irving's German Sources in The Sketch Book,” SP [Studies in Philology], XXVII (1930), 490-494. See also Walter A. Reichart's amplification of Pochmann's discussion in Washington Irving and Germany (Ann Arbor, 1957), pp. 26-29.

5. The Life of Washington Irving (New York, 1935), I, 183.

6. Sara Puryear Rodes, “Washington Irving's Use of Traditional Folklore,” SFQ [Southern Folklore Quarterly], XX (1956), 146.

7. This and subsequent motifs cited are from Stith Thompson, Motif-Index of Folk-Literature, 6 vols. (Bloomington, 1955).

8. Stith Thompson, The Folktale (New York, 1946), pp. 415-416.

9. Reichart, p. 20.

10. Reichart, p. 24.

11. Washington Irving and the Storrows, ed. Stanley T. Williams (Cambridge, Mass., 1933), p. 17.

12. Williams, Life, I, 225.

13. Pierre M. Irving, The Life and Letters of Washington Irving (New York, 1862), II, 119.

14. The Journals of Washington Irving, ed. William P. Trent and George S. Hellman (Boston, 1919), pp. 91-95.

15. Reichart, p. 53.

16. Williams, Storrows, pp. 23-24.

17. Washington Irving, Complete Works (New York, 1899), Vol. XV.

18. Motif-Index, I, 24.

19. Reichart, p. 156.

20. The actual features of the Devil are always nebulous and ill-defined in folktales. Where Irving has employed four traditional motifs (plus some nontraditional description), the average folktale would use only one. See Thompson, The Folktale, pp. 42, 251-252.

21. Antti Aarne and Stith Thompson (Helsinki, 1961). See in particular Types 1170-1199.

22. The Journals, I, 101.

23. Journal of Washington Irving (1823-1824), ed. Stanley T. Williams (Cambridge, Mass., 1931), pp. 83-84.

24. Life and Letters, II, 178.

25. Journal (1823-1824), pp. 176-180, 186.

26. Pirate Laureate: The Life and Legends of Captain Kidd (New Brunswick, N. J., 1947), p. xi.

27. Harold W. Thompson, Body, Boots and Britches (New York, 1962), p. 20.

28. Thompson, Body, p. 22.

29. Rodes, p. 147.

30. The Journals, II, 11.

31. Williams, Life, I, 265.

32. Reichart, p. 163.

33. Washington Irving: An American Study, 1802-1832 (Baltimore, 1965), p. 232.