136 REMARKABLE PHOTOGRAPHIC EXPERIMENTS. 



Boon after the world was formed out of the waters, which is tlie Genesis taught 

 in their cosmogony. The Ainos know of no land except islands ; so that really 

 this might be the form which tradition has taken since that remote period when 

 the isles of Japan and the Kuriles were forced up, as they appear to have been, 

 by volcanic action from the ocean bed. The Ainos tell how this woman, the first 

 of the race, floated over the waves in a vessel which was freighted with bows and 

 lances, with nets and lines, and all things necessary for the chase and fishing. 

 She landed ou an island where was a beautiful garden, and in it she dwelt alone 

 and happily for a long period of years. That garden still exists, say they, but no 

 living man has yet been able to find it. The close of this reign of single blessed- 

 ness, so long enjoyed by this the first of the amazons, was brought about, by a 

 singular circumstance, which, however, can scarcely be narrated here. There is 

 not, as in most legends, the record of a broken commandment; though trans- 

 gression of some kind is implied, the change being connected with the loss of the- 

 garden and the increase and dispersion of ^the race. These events followed after 

 the advent of a self-imposed protector, whom the lady of the island, in a period of 

 weariness, permitted to enter and share in her solitude. The Ainos are extremely 

 hospitable, and are even eager to place at the disposal of their visitors all their 

 little stock of provisions, their dried fish and furs. Besides the implements and 

 spoils of hunting and fishing, there is little wealth of any kind in their habitationa. 

 The Ainos formerly were monogamists, but now, when their resources admit of it,, 

 they imitate the Japanese practice of polygamy. In their marriage ceremonies 

 they also imitate those of their conquerors. Like most other degenerate races, 

 the Ainos have acquired a taste for tobacco and alcoholic drinks ; of the latter 

 they use sak-ki, an intoxicating draught made from rice. 



REMARKABLE PHOTOGRAPHIC EXPERIMENTS. 

 From Glasgow Morning Journal, 14th January, 1865. 



The Florence correspondent of the Morning Post, writing on the Tth inst, 

 reports the details of most remarkable photographic experiments on the eye of 

 a murdered person. It appears that on 13th April, 2nd June, and 22nd August 

 last year, three murders were committed in Florence, in almost precisely similar 

 circumstances, the victims in each case being lodging-house keepers. 



In each case the corpse was discovered lying on the floor, with the throat cut 

 from ear to ear, a pool of blood below her head, but only there — no marks of 

 blood in any other part of the room — and a pocket handkerchief, the property of 

 8ome one unknown, close to her person. The trinkets and money which she was 

 supposed to have about her had disappeared, as well as other articles in the 

 house. As no cries had been heard by the neighbours, the conclusion corae to by 

 the Florence police was to the effect that the murder had been perpetrated, in all 

 probability, by two assassins, who had obtained admittance into the house when 

 the poor woman was alone, under the pretext of wishing to see and hire Itev 

 rooms ; that one of them had suddenly thrown a pocket-handkerchief over her- 

 mouth and brought her to the gi'ound, and that, when thus held fast and her cries 

 efi^ectually stifled, his accomplice had cut her throat. 



