He shows diabolical sarcasm when he says, "I've kings enough below, God knows!" And how like Oscar Wilde is the devil he pictures to us in his symbolic story, _The Fisherman and his Soul_. The prince of darkness who appears to the young fisherman that wishes to sell his soul to the devil is "a man dressed in a suit of black velvet cut in Spanish fashion. His proud face was strangely pale, but his lips were like a proud red flower. He seemed weary and was leaning back toying in a listless manner with the pommel of his saddle." When the fisherman unthoughtedly utters a prayer that baffles the fiend for the time, the demon mounts his jennet with the silver harness and rides away, still with the proud, disdainful face, sad with a _blasé_ weariness unlike the usual alertness of the devil. He has a sort of Blessed Damozel droop to his figure, and the bored patience of a lone man at an afternoon tea. Wilde shows us some little mocking red devils in another of his stories,[143] and _The Picture of Dorian Gray_ is a concept of diabolism. [143] _A Legend of Sharp._ Scott in _The Talisman_ puts a story of descent from the Evil One in the mouth of the Saracen, the legend of the spirits of evil who formed a league with the cruel Zohauk, by which he gained a daily sacrifice of blood to feed two hideous serpents that had become a part of himself. One day seven sisters of wonderful beauty are brought, whose loveliness appeals to the immortals. In the midst of supernatural manifestations the earth is rent and seven young men appear. The leader says to the eldest sister: I am Cothreb, king of the subterranean world. I and my brethren are of those who, created out of elementary fire, disdained even at the command of Omnipotence, to do homage to a clod of earth because it is called man. Thou mayest have heard of us as cruel, unrelenting, and persecuting. It is false. We are by nature kind and generous, vengeful only when insulted, cruel only when affronted. We are true to those that trust us; and we have heard the invocations of thy father the sage Mithrasp, who wisely worships not only the Origin of Good, but that which is called the Source of Evil. You and your sisters are on the eve of death; but let each give to us one hair from your fair tresses in token of fealty, and we will carry you many miles to a place of safety where you may bid defiance to Zohauk and his ministers. The maidens accept the offer and become the brides of the spirits of evil.