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At length it happened that, one calm day in the latter part of summer, I was relaxing myself from the toils of severe study, by a day’s amusement in fishing in those waters which had been the favorite resort of my boyhood. I was in company with several worthy burghers of my native city, among whom were more than one illustrious member of the corporation, whose names, did I dare to mention them, would do honor to my humble page. Our sport was indifferent. The fish did not bite freely, and we frequently changed our fishing-ground without bettering our luck. We were at length anchored close under a ledge of rocky coast, on the eastern side of the island of Manhatta. It was a still, warm day. The stream whirled and dimpled by us, without a wave or even a ripple; and everything was so calm and quiet, that it was almost startling when the king-fisher would pitch himself from the branch of some high tree, and after suspending himself for a moment in the air, to take his aim, would souselh into the smooth water after his prey. While we were lolling in our boat, half drowsy with the warm stillness of the day, and the dulness of our sport, one of our party, a worthy alderman, was overtaken by a slumber, and, as he dozed, suffered the sinker of his drop-line to lie upon the bottom of the river. On waking, he found he had caught something of importance from the weight. On drawing it to the surface, we were much surprised to find it a long pistol of very curious and outlandish fashion, which, from its rusted condition, and its stock being worm-eaten and covered with barnacles, appeared to have lain a long time under water. The unexpected appearance of this document of warfare occasioned much speculation among my pacific companions. One supposed it to have fallen there during the revolutionary war; another, from the peculiarity of its fashion, attributed it to the voyagers in the earliest days of the settlement; perchance to the renowned Adriaen Blockli who explored the Sound, and discovered Block Island, since so noted for its cheese. But a third, after regarding it for some time, pronounced it to be of veritable Spanish workmanship.

“I’ll warrant,” said he, “if this pistol could talk, it would tell strange stories of hard fights among the Spanish Dons. I’ve no doubt but it is a relic of the buccaneers of old times,—who knows but it belonged to Kidd himself?”

“Ah! that Kidd was a resolute fellow,” cried an old iron-faced Cape-Cod whaler.—“There’s a fine old song about him, all to the tune of—

My name is Captain Kidd,

As I sailed, as I sailed;—

and then it tells about how he gained the devil’s good graces by burying the Bible:—

I’d a Bible in my hand,

As I sailed, as I sailed,

And I sunk it in the sand,

As I sailed.—

“Odsfish, if I thought this pistol had belonged to Kidd, I should set great store by it, for curiosity’s sake By the way, I recollect a story about a fellow who once dug up Kidd’s buried money, which was written by a neighbor of mine, and which I learnt by heart. As the fish don’t bite just now, I’ll tell it to you, by way of passing away the time.”—And so saying, he gave us the following narration.

The Devil and Tom Walker10

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 thickly-wooded swamp or morass. On one side of this inlet is a beautiful dark grove; on the opposite side the land rises abruptly from the water’s edge into a high ridge, on which grow a few scattered oaks of great age and immense size. Under one of these gigantic trees, according to old stories, there was a great amount of treasure buried by Kidd the pirate. The inlet allowed a facility to bring the money in a boat secretly and at night to the very foot of the hill; the elevation of the place permitted a good lookout to be kept that no one was at hand; while the remarkable trees formed good landmarks by which the place might easily be found again. The old stories add, moreover, that the devil presided