d filled them with ecstasy. This was all the more the case because
contrary to man, they had never suspected the beauties of the sky;
they had been able to look only sidewise and not upward, this being
the exclusive right of the king of animals.

So it came that Short-tail, the Wolf, the Ewe, the Lamb, the Birds,
the Sheep-Dogs, the Spaniel, discovered that the sky was as beautiful
as the earth. And all except Rabbit, who was sometimes troubled by
the problems of direction, enjoyed an unalloyed pleasure in this
pilgrimage toward God. In place of the heavenly fields, which only a
short while ago seemed inaccessible above their heads, the earth now
became in its turn slowly inaccessible beneath their feet. And as
they moved further and further away from it, this earth became a new
heavenly canopy for them. The blue of the oceans formed their clouds
of foam, and the candles of the shops sprinkled like stars the expanse
of the night.

Gradually they approached the regions which Francis had promised them.
Already the rose-red clovers of the setting suns and the luminous
fruits of the darkness which were their food grew larger and fuller
and melted in their souls into the sweets of paradise.

The leaves and ardent pulp of the fruits filled their blood with some
strange summer-like power, a palpitating joy which made their hearts
beat faster as they came nearer and nearer the marvels that were to be
theirs.

* * * * *

At last they came to the abode of the beasts, who had attained eternal
bliss. It was the first Paradise, that of the dogs.

For some time already they had heard barking. Bending down toward the
trunk of a decayed oak they saw a mastiff sitting in a hollow as in
a niche. His disdainful and yet placid glance told them that his mind
was disordered. It was the dog of Diogenes, to whom God had accorded
solitude in this tub, hollowed out of a very tree itself. With
indifference he watched the dogs with the spiked collars pass by.
Then to their great astonishment he left his moss-grown kennel for
a moment, and, since his leash had become undone, tied himself fast
again using his mouth as aid. He reentered his den of wood, and said:

"_Here each one takes his pleasure where he finds it_."

And, in fact, Rabbit and his companions saw dogs in quest of imaginary
travelers who had lost their way. They dared descent into deep abysses
to find those who had met with accident, bearing to