THE EDUCABILITY OF A SNAIL 61 



before the shock or punishment was received. This 

 looked like profiting by experience, but the snails 

 showed no ability to utilize this in the further 

 step of solving the labyrinth. Selective ability is 

 apparently lacking. The interest of Miss Thomp- 

 son's admirably conducted investigation is partly in 

 its ingenious methods, and partly in its demonstra- 

 tion of the educability of a very unpromising sub- 

 ject. Here we are on the threshold of a quality that 

 especially marks brains not loaded with ready-made 

 capacities of instinctive behavior, the quality 

 which Sir Ray Lankester has called educability, the 

 quality of being able to learn. 



