Aino Folk-Tales

Whilst the greatest effort has been made to ensure the quality of this text, due to the historical nature of this content, in some rare cases there may be minor issues with legibility. Over most of the country of these rude and helpless indigenes the Japanese have long Since spread, only a dwindling remnant of them still inhabiting the island of Yezo. Since the early days when a couple of them were sent as curiosities to the Emperor of China their uncouth looks and habits have made them objects of interest to more civilised nations. Many European writers have described them, but hardly any with such opportunities as Mr. Basil Hall Chamberlain, Professor of Philology at the tokyo University, who has taken down from the Ainos the present collec tion of their tales, and prefaced it with an account of their ways and state of mind. It would hardly be for me to offer information on a subject so excellently handled, but the request of the Editor of the folk-lore Journal that I would write an Introduction enables me to draw attention to the views put forward by Professor Chamberlain in another publicationfi which, being printed in Japan, may be over looked by many English folk-lore students, even of those interested in the curious Aino problem.

Over most of the country of these rude and helpless indigenes the Japanese have long Since spread, only a dwindling remnant of them still inhabiting the island of Yezo. Since the early days when a couple of them were sent as curiosities to the Emperor of China their uncouth looks and habits have made them objects of interest to more civilised nations. Many European writers have described them, but hardly any with such opportunities as Mr. Basil Hall Chamberlain, Professor of Philology at the tokyo University, who has taken down from the Ainos the present collec tion of their tales, and prefaced it with an account of their ways and state of mind. It would hardly be for me to offer information on a subject so excellently handled, but the request of the Editor of the folk-lore Journal that I would write an Introduction enables me to draw attention to the views put forward by Professor Chamberlain in another publicationfi which, being printed in Japan, may be over looked by many English folk-lore students, even of those interested in the curious Aino problem.