al but actual.

Edward B. Tylor.

[A] _The Language, Mythology, and Geographical Nomenclature of Japan,
viewed in the light of Aino Studies._ By Basil Hall Chamberlain.
Including an _Ainu Grammar_ by John Batchelor. (Memoirs of the
Literature College, Imperial University of Japan, No. 1.) T[=o]ky[=o]:
1887.

AINO FOLK-LORE.

By Basil Hall Chamberlain.

_Prefatory Remarks._

I visited the island of Yezo for the third time in the summer of 1886,
in order to study the Aino language, with a view to elucidate by its
means the obscure problem of the geographical nomenclature of Japan.
But, as is apt to happen on such occasions, the chief object of my visit
soon ceased to be the only object. He who would learn a language must
try to lisp in it, and more especially must he try to induce the natives
to chatter in it in his presence. Now in Yezo, subjects of discourse are
few. The Ainos stand too low in the scale of humanity to have any notion
of the civilised art of "making conversation." When, therefore, the
fishing and the weather are exhausted, the European sojourner in one of
their dreary, filthy seaside hamlets will find himself,--at least I
found myself,--sadly at a loss for any further means of setting his
native companions' tongues in motion. It is then that fairy-tales come
to the rescue. The Ainos would not suggest the idea themselves. To
suggest ideas is not their habit. But they are delighted to follow it
when suggested. Simply to repeat something which they have known by
heart ever since the days of their childhood is not such an effort to
their easily-tired brains as is the keeping up of a conversation with
one who speaks their language imperfectly. Their tongues are at once
loosened.

In my own case, I found myself, after a short time, listening to the
stories for their own sake,--not merely as linguistic exercises; and I
ventured to include a few of them in the "Memoir on the Ainos" which was
published a few months ago by the Imperial University of Japan. Some
remarks in a review of this "Memoir," contained in _Nature_ of the 12th
May, 1887, have encouraged me to believe that anthropologists and
comparative mythologists may be interested in having laid before them
something more than mere samples of the mental products of a people
which is interesting for three reasons,--interesting because its domain
once extended over the entire Japanese