Grass that has been laid upon has always a rather popular bank-holidayish look, and even the Devil's lair was not exempt from this. It was as though the grass were in league with him, faithfully playing-up to his pose of being a quite everyday phenomenon. Not a blade of grass was singed, not a clover-leaf blasted, and the rampion flower was withering quite naturally; yet he who had sat there was Satan, the author of all evil, whose thoughts were a darkness, whose roots went down into the pit. There was no action too mean for him, no instrument too petty; he would go into a milk-jug to work michief. And presently he would emerge, imperturbable, inscrutable, enormous with the dignity of natural behavior and untrammelled self-fulfilment.
To be this – a character truly integral, a perpetual flowering of power and cunning from an undivided will – was enough to constitute the charm and majesty of the Devil. No cloak of terrors was necessary to enlarge that stature, and to suppose him capable of speculation or metaphysic would be like offering to crown him with a few casual straws. Very probably he was quite stupid.
Sylvia Townsend Warner, Lolly Willowes (London: Virago, 1993), 200-201.