HER PERFECT SENSE FOR SOUND 71 



attributed. I always knew from Lola when I might 

 expect a certain friend of mine a friend to whom, 

 by the way, she was really more attached than to me ! 

 I used to know by the heavy raps of her tail against 

 the floor. The room in which we would be at such 

 times was on the second floor and lay towards the 

 front of the house. But when those anticipatory 

 raps began my friend was still on her way, coming 

 by a path which lay in the rear of the house, and, 

 moreover, she always came alone. When the dog was 

 present she could never take me by surprise. 



My next ventures were of a musical nature, as I 

 thought it might be easiest to achieve something in 

 this direction. Lola knew the letters that are 

 associated with the different tones (c, d, e,f, g, a, h l , e), 

 having learnt these in her alphabet, so I only had to 

 strike the keys (and I confined myself to the white ones, 

 as involving fewer difficulties), telling her their names. 

 I began by saying : " Lola, you are going to learn 

 something quite new and very beautiful ; you must 

 listen to these sounds and tell me the names of each." 

 Then I played the notes over several times from c to c, 

 saying clearly and slowly : " c, d, e, f, g, a, h." Then 

 I paused and played them over again both the 

 ascending and decending scale. 



Then I struck " c," saying, " What note is that ? " 

 She answered " c." I struck " e," but she rapped 

 "no." I therefore played from c to e, accentuating 

 e in particular. " Do you know now ? " I asked, and 

 she replied, " yes : e." I struck " a," and the 

 answer came at once, "a." This seemed enough for 

 one day, for I wished to keep her interest fresh. So 

 we then went over some arithmetic. The next day 

 I played only once from c to c, asking the names of 



1 A is the term used in Germany for the note we call b. 



