called the Moral Sense. Purify your language, Seppi; drop those lying
phrases out of it."

He spoke pretty sternly--for him--and I was sorry I hadn't warned Seppi
to be more particular about the word he used. I knew how he was feeling.
He would not want to offend Satan; he would rather offend all his kin.
There was an uncomfortable silence, but relief soon came, for that poor
dog came along now, with his eye hanging down, and went straight to
Satan, and began to moan and mutter brokenly, and Satan began to answer
in the same way, and it was plain that they were talking together in the
dog language. We all sat down in the grass, in the moonlight, for the
clouds were breaking away now, and Satan took the dog's head in his lap
and put the eye back in its place, and the dog was comfortable, and he
wagged his tail and licked Satan's hand, and looked thankful and said the
same; I knew he was saying it, though I did not understand the words.
Then the two talked together a bit, and Satan said:

"He says his master was drunk."

"Yes, he was," said we.

"And an hour later he fell over the precipice there beyond the Cliff
Pasture."

"We know the place; it is three miles from here."

"And the dog has been often to the village, begging people to go there,
but he was only driven away and not listened to."

We remembered it, but hadn't understood what he wanted.