Sir Massingberd in his youth secretly married a gipsy, whom he drove mad with his cruelty.

Sir Massingberd disappears, and all search for him is vain; many months later his bones are found in an old tree, known as the Wolsey Oak.

It was supposed that he climbed the tree to look about for poachers, that the rotten wood gave way, and he slipped into the hollow trunk, whence he could not escape.

With his disappearance and death all goes well with the households on which the blight of his evil spirit had fallen, and the story ends happily.

[3] According to Helen Rex Keller, "It is a modern tale of English country life, told with freedom, humor, and a certain good-natured cynicism.