He scowled for a moment at Tom with a pair of great red eyes. “What are you doing on my grounds?” said the black man, with a hoarse growling voice. “Your grounds!” said Tom, with a sneer, “no more your grounds than mine; they belong to Deacon Peabody.” “Deacon Peabody be d--d,” said the stranger, “as I flatter myself he will be, if he does not look more to his own sins and less to those of his neighbours. Look yonder, and see how Deacon Peabody is faring.” Tom looked in the direction that the stranger pointed, and beheld one of the great trees, fair and flourishing without, but rotten at the core, and saw that it had been nearly hewn through, so that the first high wind was likely to blow it down. On the bark of the tree was scored the name of Deacon Peabody, an eminent man, who had waxed wealthy by driving shrewd bargains with the Indians. He now looked around, and found most of the tall trees marked with the name of some great man of the colony, and all more or less scored by the ax. The one on which he had been seated, and which had evidently just been hewn down, bore the name of Crowninshield; and he recollected a mighty rich man of that name, who made a vulgar display of wealth, which it was whispered he had acquired by buccaneering. “He’s just ready for burning!” said the black man, with a growl of triumph. “You see I am likely to have a good stock of firewood for winter.” “But what right have you,” said Tom, “to cut down Deacon Peabody’s timber?” “The right of a prior claim,” said the other. “This woodland belonged to me long before one of your whitefaced race put foot upon the soil.” “And pray, who are you, if I may be so bold?” said Tom. “Oh, I go by various names. I am the wild huntsman in some countries; the black miner in others. In this neighbourhood I am known by the name of the black woodsman. I am he to whom the red men consecrated this spot, and in honour of whom they now and then roasted a white man, by way of sweet-smelling sacrifice. Since the red men have been exterminated by you white savages, I amuse myself by presiding at the persecutions of Quakers and Anabaptists; I am the great patron and prompter of slave-dealers, and the grand-master of the Salem witches.” “The upshot of all which is, that, if I mistake not,” said Tom, sturdily, “you are he commonly called Old Scratch.” “The same, at your service!” replied the black man, with a half civil nod. Such was the opening of this interview, according to the old story; though it has almost too familiar an air to be credited. One would think that to meet with such a singular personage, in this wild, lonely place, would have shaken any man’s nerves; but Tom was a hard-minded fellow, not easily daunted, and he had lived so long with a termagant wife, that he did not even fear the devil.