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• The following version of this story was used to create this Lesson Plan: Irving, Washington. "The Devil and Tom Walker," Tales of a Traveller. Project Gutenberg, 2004. E-Book.

• The story opens with a description of physical setting: a forested swamp near Boston where, legend has it, William Kidd the pirate buried his treasure under an oak tree, under the supervision of the devil, shortly before his death.

• The narrator then brings the story forward, to 1727, and introduces the main character, Tom Walker, who lives near this place--a miser with a miserly wife.

• Husband and wife, the reader is told, are so miserly that they even hide common property from one another and are constantly arguing over it.

• Their home is described as unwelcoming and dreary.

• Outside there is a horse that is clearly neglected and hungry.

• The reader learns that Tom and his...

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