The Devil's Quoits
On Wytham Hill, where the wind runs cold
and the valley lies pale below,
the Devil came walking, proud and bold,
with a ring of iron aglow.
He'd heard tell of a beggar man
who slept in the frost and rain,
who owned no coat, no cart, no plan,
no roof to keep off the rain.
*"I'll wager you sport,"* the Devil said,
\*"a game to pass the night —
a ring of quoits, and a stake instead
of silver, or gold, or light.\*
\*Win, and you'll dine on a lord's own plate,
you'll sleep where the fires are banked.
Lose, and you'll walk through my black gate
and I'll have you for what you lack."\*
The beggar looked at his ragged sleeve,
at his hands gone stiff and blue.
\*"And what," he asked, "would you have me give,
if the losing throw falls to you?"\*
The Devil laughed, a sound like coal
cracking deep in a grate —
\*"Why, nothing so small as a beggar's soul,
you have naught worth calling a stake.\*
\*But I'll take the soul all the same, my friend,
for a soul's a soul, however thin —
a threadbare coat has a hem to mend,
and I'm not too proud to win."\*
So down they crouched on the hill's high crown
where the henge waits in the vale,
and they flung their quoits at the fields below
till the iron rang like a bell.
Stone after stone went screaming down,
struck earth, and stood, and stayed —
a circle rising round the town
of the wagers that they'd made.
The beggar's throws went wide and short,
his arm too weak, too worn —
until, near dawn, with his last resort,
he asked, *"Before I'm sworn,*
\*one throw for luck, one throw for pride —
but tell me first, my lord:
if I should win this final ride,
will you keep your devil's word?"\*
*"I swear it on the game itself,"*
the Devil said, and grinned,
\*"on every stone upon that shelf,
on the oath that binds a fiend."\*
The beggar smiled, for he'd heard it said
that a devil's word, once bound
to the stones themselves instead of his head,
must hold, or the stones fall down.
He threw his quoit — it caught the air,
it wobbled, dipped, and spun,
and landed square with a beggar's prayer
on the ring the Devil had won.
*"A tie,"* he said, \*"by your own decree,
sworn on the stones that stand —
no soul was lost and no soul went free,
so take your ring off my land."\*
The Devil roared, but the oath was made,
and stone does not unsay —
he stamped his heel, and the earth obeyed,
and he stormed the night away.
And still today, in the Oxford damp,
where cattle graze the plain,
the Devil's Quoits keep their ancient camp,
half circle, half refrain —
a ring of stones an old man won
not with strength, nor gold, nor art,
but a beggar's wit, when all was done,
outplaying the devil's heart.
~ Pranam ~ OM ~ aMEn ~
8/18/2026, 10:14 a.m. (in U.K.)
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