A. &. Bickmore on the Ainos of Saghalien. 375 
and still less any disputing. The satisfaction that appeared 
in all their countenances as they spread their mats round the 
hearth for us ; their readiness, when we were going away, to 
launch their canoes and carry us across the shallows to our 
boat, when they perceived our men stripping themselves for 
this ose ; but still more than this, their modesty never to 
demand anything, and even to accept with hesitation whatever 
we offered them,—wherein they differ very much from the in- 
habitants of the west of Saghalien (that is, from the Gil- 
yaks),— these marks of their natural character make me con- 
sider the Ainos as the best of all the people I have hitherto 
been acquainted with.” 
The view herein expressed, that they form a member of our 
own family of nations, renders their language perhaps the 
most interesting of any that now remains uninvestigated, in 
the whole world. All that is known at present regarding it 
may be well summed up in these words of Von Siebold : 
“The Japanese, who have had intercourse with the natives 
of Yesso for centuries, carried on trade with them, and ruled 
over them, have gradually made themselves thoroughly ac- 
quainted with their language, and composed dictionaries in 
which they sought to render as faithfully as possible, and to 
fix the pronunciation of the words by means of their syllable 
writing. In this manner they have endeavored, by means of 
writing, to put a stop to the manifold sounds and variable ac- 
cent to which the dialect of a far dispersed and ee 
ple is so subject.” (This dictionary referred to was published 
in Japan in 1804, by Mogami Yoknai.) 
“ Although the Aino language has become ennobled by fa- 
miliar intercourse with a civilized people (the Japanese), yet 
it has preserved its original features, and is characterized as & 
peculiar and independent language, having no connection with 
that of any of the neighboring countries, as far as regards the 
roots of the words. hat some — words have been intro- 
duced ; 
