Here is an example:

20 + 14? Answer: 34. 24 + 32? Answer: 56.
11 + 15 + 2? Answer: 28

Here again the most surprising thing was the celerity with which the replies were given. I was at first inclined to make her look at the paper attentively, but she would merely glance over it, then came a moment of quick thought—and the answer was ready. (I propose to return to this point again in the chapter on "Seeing.")

In the course of such exercises it is no exaggeration to say that one does actually see, by an alteration in the eye, that the dog is thinking; the gaze is withdrawn, so to speak, as it is in the eye of a person engaged in the process of thinking; and then brightens when the result has been attained. I have often been so absorbed in contemplating this process in Lola that I have almost forgotten to continue the work we were engaged on.

As the lessons progressed it became easy to teach her to read the letters, for she now knew what it was all about, and she soon picked up the figures requisite for any given letter. Personally, I always use the Latin script for writing, and it was therefore more convenient to teach her this form rather than the Gothic, but for the sake of simplicity I made use of the small characters only. I wrote these out on a sheet of paper, taking care to make them very large, and with the equivalent figure under each—thus:

a e i o u au ei
4 5 6 7 8 9 10

and so on.

I then gave a short explanation and stood the sheet on the floor again—just as I had done in the case of the figures.

The next day I questioned her, taking the precaution to write out a few letters on another piece of paper, so as to be able, by comparing the two, to know what the word was at once. In a few instances the right answers were given immediately, but there was still a great deal of uncertainty. I suppose the entire alphabet at one dose had been too much for her! But I tried her again in the afternoon—going over the letters carefully, and set up the card once more, to "jog her memory." And the next morning she knew it nearly to perfection, and was able to follow with her raps such words as—h, o, l, z, (holz = wood), for I took care to separate the letters, fearing she would otherwise get confused. Whenever she seemed in doubt over some letter I had recourse to her alphabet card, and made her look it up herself.

I began to feel that the foundation for all that was most important had now been laid, and that at no distant future I should be able to ask her all kinds of questions, and my joy was great. For now the moment was at hand when I might hope to gain insight into the very being of this dog, get into touch with its thinking and its feeling—all of which was so immeasurably strange to me. Yet what I here anticipated was not to be reached in so short a span of time as had hitherto sufficed for her other studies. For the present Lola spelt out no more than I told her to, and I continued practising her diligently, for I felt sure that as long as it gave her any trouble a more lengthy answer—and more especially, a spontaneous one—would not be forthcoming. It had taken one month of study to accomplish all I have here set down, and I felt both grateful, happy, and not a little awed—and, indeed, I did my best to thank her by my sympathy and consideration. It was only later that I came to see my own inconsistency!