While it is true that certain writers show a tendency to create supernatural characters having an excess of evil power beyond the previous uncanny beings, on the other hand there is an equally strong and significant tendency to reduce the ghostly beings nearer to the human. Fiction here, as frequently, seems ahead of general belief, and refuses to believe in the altogether evil. Ghosts, angels, witches, devils, werewolves, and so forth are now made more human, more like to man, yet without losing any of their ancient power to thrill. Ghosts in late literature have more of the mortal characteristics than ever before, as has been pointed out in a previous chapter. They look more human, more normal, they are clad in everyday garments of varied colors, from red shirts and khaki riding-habits to ball-gowns,--though gray seems the favored shade for shades as well as witches,--and they have lost that look of pallor that distinguished early phantoms. Now they are more than merely vaporous projections as they used to be, more than merely phantasmogenetic apparitions,--but are healthy, red-blooded spooks. They are not tongue-tied as their ancestors were, but are very chatty, giving forth views on everything they are interested in, from socialism to the present war. And their range of interests has widened immeasurably. It would seem that the literacy test has been applied to ghosts in recent fiction. Modern specters are so normal in appearance that often no one recognizes them as ghosts,--as in Edith Wharton's story _Afterwards_, where the peculiar thing about the apparition haunting a certain house is that it is not till long afterwards that one knows it was a ghost. The man in the gray suit whom the wife thinks a chance caller is the spirit of a man not yet dead, a terrible living revenge-ghost, who finally takes his victim mysteriously away with him. Modern ghosts have both motions and emotions like men, hence mortals are coming to regard them more sympathetically, to have more of a fellow-feeling for them. Likewise the angels are now only a very little higher if any than men. Seraphs are democratic, and angels have developed a sense of humor that renders them more interesting than they used to be. The winged being that H. G. Wells's vicar goes gunning for is a charming youth with a naïve satire, as the angels in Mark Twain's story of heaven are realistically mortal and masculine in tastes. They care little for harps and crowns, grow fidgety under excess of rest, and engage in all sorts of activities, retaining their individual tastes. James Stephens's archangel, seraph, and cherub are chatty, cordial souls with an avidity for cold potatoes and Irish companionship.