The devil, who is later referred to as Old Scratch carves the names of the people he makes deals with into the trees. Those whose names are carved into the tress, having made a deal with old scratch, are those who have sold their souls to the devil.
In the Devil and Tom Walker, the place in where Old Scratch marked the names of the people he makes deals with are on the trees. This is a short story by Washington Irving. This first appeared in his 1824 collection Tales of a Traveller and it also became a part of the "Money-Diggers" section.
