Alone With The Hairy Ainu Part 22

[Ill.u.s.tration: AINU SALUTATION.]

CHAPTER XXV.

Ainu Music, Poetry, and Dancing.

The music of each nation has certain characteristics of its own; and though according to European ideas the music of what are called barbarous peoples may sound in some sense excruciating, it always has a certain occult charm, more especially to one who is able to forget his former training, and teach himself to see, hear, and think in the same way as the natives he is studying.

Undoubtedly we Westerns have brought music to a pitch of refinement that no savage nation has even attempted to reach; but in my opinion we do savages injustice when we call their music "unmitigated discord."

Barbarians like the Ainu do not indicate their rhythmical effects and modulations by means of a musical notation; and harmony is of course very defective with them, from our point of view. On the other hand, the feeling and pa.s.sion with which they chant their songs make them go straight to the heart, if as a melody they are not always pleasing to the cultivated Western ear.

An Ainu seldom sings for the mere pleasure of art as art, and it is only when full of joy or "crazed with care" that he gives expression to his feelings in music. Then he pours out his whole soul in that which to him is melody beyond the power of words to compa.s.s.

After a hunt, a fishing expedition, a journey, or a misfortune, the Ainu enters his hut and seats himself cross-legged on the ground. He then holds out both hands with the palms together, and rubs them backwards and forwards three or four times; after this he raises them, palms upwards, to a level with his head, gracefully lowers them to his knees, and then, raising them again, strokes his hair and beard. Again he lowers his hands twice, thrice, or even more times, according to the amount of respect to which the person saluted is ent.i.tled, the latter following in every smallest detail the motions of his saluting friend.

When this complicated salutation has been performed separately before each male member of the household, the new arrival relates the tale of his good-or ill-luck; and if the events be of an unusual character the story is chanted in a sort of sing-song which makes each note of joy or lamentation vibrate in the heart of the listener. It is only in such circ.u.mstances of stress of feeling that I ever heard the Ainu sing, though sometimes women and young folks when alone, fishing, riding, or travelling, sing out bits of their past lives as they remember this scene or that event.

Ainu music is almost entirely vocal, and their singing has more the character of the _recitative_ than of the _aria_ proper. Their songs are always for _solo_; and during my stay among the hairy people I never heard a concerted piece, nor even an air or a single voice with a chorus for a number of voices; neither did I hear any songs performed by men and women together, but invariably by men to other men, and by women to other women. It seems to me that the reason why they have no choruses is their strict etiquette, which forbids them to interrupt a speaker till he has finished his narrative; and as their songs are only narratives which the musical sing-song makes more impressive, it seems more than probable that the reason I have given is the right one. If a singer during his narrative stops, and is silent for a minute or two, another takes up the "lost chord" in exactly the same intonation of voice, asking a question or singing words of comfort, anger, or scorn, as the case may be; but no Ainu ever joins in the song before the person singing has stopped.

The hairy people are fond, not only of their own, but of all music, and their ear is acute enough to hit a tone or note when sung to them, and even to remember with more or less accuracy a short air after they have heard it two or three times. Many who have come in contact with the j.a.panese have learned from them songs of a totally different character from their own. Of my personal experience I can speak of a boy who, while I was sketching, heard me sing a few bars of the _Trovatore_. An hour or two later I heard him repeat this pa.s.sage, certainly with an Ainu _libretto_, and somewhat Ainuized; but for all that he had managed to catch the melody, which showed that the lad must have had some musical instinct as well as a good musical memory.

[Ill.u.s.tration: SIDE VIEW OF THE "MUKKO."]

[Ill.u.s.tration: A "MUKKO," OR MUSICAL INSTRUMENT.]

The Ainu are remarkably quick at reproducing sounds which are direct imitations of noises, cries of animals, &c., and it is instinctive in them, as when children they are not taught or trained to do so. The education of Ainu children is indeed a thing far to seek in every way, and what they know is self-taught. Nature is their only school. The Ainu voice is pleasant, flexible, and very soft in quality. The men are mostly baritone and ba.s.s, the women alto; but when singing, a falsetto is preferred to the natural voice, especially by the women, and this always without an instrumental accompaniment. Musical instruments are more than rare among the Ainu; indeed, I saw only one, which is now in my own possession. It is a black-stained wooden instrument, fifty-one inches in length and three wide. The upper part is flat, the under is half a cylinder scooped out by a knife, while five keys are fixed in the short neck, in which a cavity is cut, leaving a s.p.a.ce for the strings to be tied to each key. The top is circular, and flattened on each side.

One very small hole is bored exactly in the middle of the instrument and another is at the lower end, where the point of a triangular piece of leather, seven inches long, is pa.s.sed through and fastened by a knot tied in the leather on the opposite side. The five strings, which are of _Ulmus campestris_ fibre, are fastened to this leather piece and then to each key. A peculiarity of this instrument is, that it has two prism-shaped bridges, and they are placed at each end of the harmonic case. The Ainu call it _mukko_, which word, however, means only a musical instrument; and as it is applied by them to all j.a.panese instruments of music, it shows that they do not distinguish very sharply one instrument from another. Though in my long journeying I found one of these _mukkos_, I was never able to discover any Ainu who could play on it, and the Ainu of Ishikari from whom I bought it told me that the man, the only one, who could play on it, was dead. This was unfortunate, as none of the others could tell me how he tuned it; and one old man, in attempting to solve the problem, broke three strings. Seeing that I was then quite unable to learn any of the tunes of the deceased Ainu Paganini I purchased the instrument, and found by cross-examining the natives that it was played by tw.a.n.ging the strings with the fingers, and not with a plectrum, as is the case with the j.a.panese _shamesen_. In the ill.u.s.tration I have faithfully drawn a front and a side view of this instrument, so as to give the reader an exact idea of its shape. The Ainu of Volcano Bay sometimes make bamboo jew's-harps for their children; but even those are very uncommon, so we might as well define Ainu music as entirely vocal. Ainu music is sentimental, and not displeasing, but it is monotonous, and continually repeats itself. It is difficult to establish a rule as to what order of intervals their music is founded on, as their progressions, modulations, and rhythmical effects are often so peculiar as to make it impossible to indicate them accurately by means of our musical notation; but the nearest approach to it is the diatonic minor scale. The Ainu are fond of chromatic intervals, and when their recital comes to an exciting point they make use of this method in a _crescendo_ to give strength to the narrative, especially at the end of the tune, which invariably winds up in the tonic. The intervals which are of most frequent occurrence in the Ainu tunes are as follows:--

[Ill.u.s.tration]

The tunes seldom contain modulations from one key into another, except in the case of genius-gifted improvisators, who sometimes indulge in such a luxury, especially when intoxicated; but the usual modulation is generally begun _pianissimo_ and in irregular time, and is sometimes like a slow lamentation gradually and irregularly increasing in force, some notes marked violently and the next very faintly, thus giving a weird effect of light and shade. When a sentence comes to an end, there is a chromatic interval _fortissimo_, and the keynote generally concludes the tune. The melody repeats itself again in the next sentence, sometimes altering the _pianissimo_ into _fortissimo_, and _vice versa_, according to the force which the narrator wishes to give to certain words. The Ainu, as far as I could judge, have no fixed rhythmical method, and each man constructs his own. Their melodies are generally short and simple, and the same phrases and pa.s.sages--in fact, usually the whole melody--occur again and again in their songs. No Ainu melody that I heard was constructed according to any rule of musical form. All were invariably of one part only, in which the name of the tune was often applied to a certain form of rude poetical composition.

For instance, some of the folk-lore legends--which, unfortunately, are not purely Ainu--are chanted in a musical intonation, and are a kind of extempore composition, though the roots of the songs and the verse have probably been brought down from former generations. This is proved by the preservation in them of some obsolete words and forms of speech which are never used in current conversation, and which none of the younger folks can understand or explain. I believe, however, that none of these legends are very old. The Ainu, having no written language, it is but natural that their tradition and legends should have been greatly changed and corrupted, especially by intercourse with the more imaginative j.a.panese. It is to be noted, however, that the Ainu, though to a certain extent as imitative as monkeys, have also a large amount of personality and originality, due to their shy and unsocial habits. This originality is not surprising when we remember that they are taught nothing, and that each man provides for himself and his family, but has no markedly friendly feelings towards his neighbours; in other words, it is a state of degradation very similar to that of wild animals. Perfect indifference is shown by the people of one village towards those of another. They are neither friends nor foes. All have a right to live, but as for helping one another, that is out of the question.

Having no written doc.u.ments, each man, in his easy-going manner, recites and sings as best pleases himself such verses or legends as he has heard from his father or from some other person, and the result is that, according to the reciter's greater or smaller poetical and musical tastes, the grandfather's composition, already altered by his father, is again altered by the son, which makes it a composition of his own. This transformation of a given theme is common even among civilised nations when people are set to repeat the same story verbally transmitted from one to the other--the version of the third person has but little in common with that of the first. If this we do with a spoken narrative, how much more with tunes learned by ear only, and characterised in the delivery by individual temperament and transient mood.

The Ainu do not teach these legends to their children, and if learned at all they are merely "picked up" by ear and, in a manner, at random; therefore, most Ainu profess ignorance as to their existence, and a man, when I asked him if he knew any, scornfully answered in these identical words, translated:--"The Ainu are taught nothing, and they know nothing."

The few legends, &c., that I heard were told me by Benry at Piratori, and by another old man, the chief of a village up the Saru River. The t.i.tle of one was "Tushi-une-pan"--"Twice Below;" the story of Yos.h.i.tsune, a j.a.panese hero, and Samoro-kuru (a j.a.panese man-friend of Yos.h.i.tsune), who came to Yezo and had a great struggle with a huge fish, which was harpooned by them and disappeared twice under the water, capsizing the boat which contained the two fishermen. Yos.h.i.tsune's temper was roused, and he cut the _nipesh_[38] rope to which the harpoon was fastened. The fish went to die at the mouth of the Saru River, when plains of hemp sprouted out of its body.

[38] _Nipesh_: a kind of hemp.

Another legend, called "Kimta-na," is a rather different and more simple version of Tushi-une-pan's story which I have just related.

Yet another variant of the same legend is found in the "Inu-sapk"--or "A Summer Story" (literally translated: _Inu_, hear, relate; _sapk_, summer), which was so very confused that I could not make head or tail of its minuter details; but, like the "Kimta-na," it was about a famine in the Ainu land.

Then there was a fourth, which went by the name of "Abe-ten-rui"--"Burning to embrace," or love-sick. It was again about Yos.h.i.tsune, who had fallen in love with a pretty Ainu maid, and could not eat either good or bad fish until she appeared to him in a dream. As Yos.h.i.tsune was a strong-minded man he got over his love, and taught the Ainu not to be deceived by woman's wiles.

These and other similar legends, some of which do not bear repeating, being too improper, can be collected at Piratori or on Volcano Bay from the half-civilised Ainu; but I am inclined to think that they are mostly concoctions of j.a.panese ideas construed or misconstrued in the Ainu language.

Ainu do not indulge in poetic compositions which have a definite metre, nor do they use special words for rhyme or rhythm; but all the words in their songs are intelligible, and seldom meaningless syllables are used, as in many of the chants of other savage nations. This of course is because, as has been said, their songs are merely a form of conversation adopted on certain occasions.

Some of their music seems to have been suggested to them by such animal sounds as the plaintive howling of bears, wolves, and dogs.

Music is believed by the Ainu to have the power of curing illness, or rather, of scaring away from the body those evil spirits which are supposed to have taken possession of it; but, when used as exorcism, the music is no longer grave, slow, and sentimental, but verily diabolical, consisting mainly of wild howling with an accompaniment of stamping feet and the rattling of sword and knife, and followed by a disgusting expectoration of chewed convolvulus roots, which are said to be powerful in expelling the evil spirit and restoring the sick person to health.

Furthermore, music is invariably used by the Ainu--especially by the women--to facilitate manual labour, as when pounding millet, rowing, pulling canoes on sh.o.r.e, or drawing water from a well, when packing sea-weed, or when preparing salmon for the winter; and also in their games, which I have already described in the chapter on the festival at Piratori.

During the process of pounding millet--which is only practised in the southern part of Yezo--two or three girls stand round a mortar in which the millet has been placed, and each girl, holding with both hands a pestle, beats and sings, one after the other, the words "_Huye, huye_,"

as the pestle is let down, increasing in loudness when the grain requires harder pounding, and slowly decreasing in volume towards the end. This pounding begins about sunset, and the place chosen for the operation is generally the small porch of the huts. It has indeed a weird effect to hear these many voices from the distant huts gradually dying away as darkness comes on, till finally only two or three break the stillness of the coming night. Then even those wear away, and everything becomes as silent as the grave.

When riding on horseback, especially if alone, young men are fond of singing, and when going through forests, chopping and collecting firewood, Ainu invariably sing.

I have often heard two or three Ainu, when packing sea-weed within a few yards of one another, each singing to himself, and each so much absorbed in his own composition as not to even hear his neighbours. An Ainu does not and cannot sing unless he feels in the mood for it; but if he sings he is carried away by his own music. Of course this is a good quality in Ainu music, as in all arts where "feeling" is to be appreciated as much as execution. The latter is to be got by constant practice and teaching; but the first has to be born in one.

My readers must forgive me if I am judging Ainu music, not from the European, but from the native standpoint, for I think it is only fair to give things as they are, without too much reference to our own ideas.

With savage nations, music is the expression of the feelings and pa.s.sions of the musician. Thus, it is necessary to well know the man himself before we can understand his productions and appreciate them; and such knowledge is only attained by constantly living with natives, not as a mere stranger, but as one of them.

Very few travellers have seen the real Ainu, or studied them accurately, while many, partly owing to their inability to differentiate one race from another, have given us highly imaginative descriptions, and even photographs, of j.a.panese half-castes and actual j.a.panese, describing them as Ainu. If such worthy ethnologists as have visited the "civilised part only" of the Ainu country, have been unable to distinguish types of the hairy Ainu race from those of the hairless j.a.panese, or from mixtures of the two, undoubtedly racial characteristics have been but imperfectly recorded.

It is more particularly in music and poetry, as I have already explained, that temperamental characteristics are shown, and one ought to be careful to clearly define what is native music and poetry--in which I include legends, traditions, and folk-lore--and what has been transmitted by neighbouring and conquering races. Loud music is not appreciated by the Ainu, and makes them grin with more scorn than enjoyment. I could only try experiments in this direction by singing to them, as I had no European musical instruments with me; but I found that singing _con brio_ at the top of my voice was not so pleasing to them as when I sang _piano con pa.s.sione_. For instance, the song "Toreador," in the opera _Carmen_, created fits of merriment from a crowd at Frishikobets, while the same crowd, a few minutes later, listened attentively and silently to Gounod's "Ave Maria," sung in a kind of "miaoling" voice.

I may here mention incidentally, to show the different musical tastes of Ainu and j.a.panese, that some months previous to this I was at a concert at Tokio in which the same "Ave Maria" was performed by some distinguished European musicians. The large j.a.panese audience, who had been attentive and well-composed till then, went into fits of laughter when Gounod's masterpiece was played, and all through it the noise of people laughing was so great as to drown entirely the orchestra and singers. Some of the women in the audience nearly went into hysterics at the long _legato_ notes at the beginning of the piece. Louder melodies and of a livelier character did not affect them so. I wish to draw attention to this fact, that amongst all primitive peoples the native music is sad and slow--the livelier melodies coming later; and also, that with both wild and domestic animals the most noteworthy effects are produced by slow and simple music. We all know how dogs will remain quiet and calm when a soft and gentle air is played, but get furious to the point of savageness under the "plan-plan-rataplan" of a merry noisy tune. As for the last item connected with Ainu music, viz., dancing, it is rarely practised, even by the Ainu women, to whom alone it pertains.

At the best it is of a very rude form. In the Piratori festival (Chapter IV.) we have seen that their dancing is accompanied by rhythmical sounds imitating the noises produced by implements in everyday use, as the squeaking of a paddle by the friction on the canoe, the cry which accompanies the pounding of millet, blowing alight the fire, and similar sounds. Time is kept by clapping the hands and by vociferations which tell the partners what position or action to a.s.sume, each action being accompanied by a different sound, but all performed while the hopping is kept up. I have not felt justified in cla.s.sifying these rhythmical sounds, which accompany the dancing, as choruses, for there is not enough in them to const.i.tute either a tune or a melody. They are suggested more by the action of the arms and upper part of the body than by the steps; in fact, if it were not for the continuous hopping it would be more accurate to describe Ainu dancing as "posturing." The dancers form a circle, with sometimes one or two children in the centre.

As there are no professional musicians, there are no professional dancers; but though each man may be his own composer of music, the women never alter their dances, which are handed down unchanged from one generation to another. It is only at festivals that the dance is performed, and never inside the huts, but in the open air. It is not for the amus.e.m.e.nt of spectators, for besides one or two of the older women, spectators there are none; but it is for the enjoyment of the dancers themselves. The men do not seem to take the slightest interest in the dancing, and apparently regard it as unmanly. They remain in the hut drinking while the girls enjoy themselves in this way outside, and should one of them by chance come out, he would stop and look on no more than men in civilised countries would stop and watch little children at play. On the other hand, on such occasions Ainu matrons squat in a semicircle not far from the dancers, and keep up a lament-like or sometimes quarrelsome conversation among themselves, and occasionally encourage the girls in their hopping, and suggesting _encores_ of this figure or that, which, between one quarrel and another, has taken their fancy.

[Ill.u.s.tration: A WOODEN PIPE.]

CHAPTER XXVI.

Heredity--Crosses--Psychological Observations.

The mental qualities of the Ainu are not many, and what they have are by no means great; nor are they improved by education, for what they know comes more from inheritance than personal acquirement, though naturally every rule has its exceptions. I repeatedly noticed that talent, such as it was, ran in certain families, the members of which were all more or less intelligent. Certain families were more musical than others; other families were more artistic--if, indeed, such a word could be applied to the very low development of the artistic faculty when at its best among the hairy people. Various members of one household were potently insane; others were as potently idiotic. I shall not cla.s.s under this heading of heredity transmitted disease, like leprosy, consumption, &c., but I shall limit myself to heredity in physical traits and mental qualities.

Unfortunately, with the Ainu intercourse between the s.e.xes is so imperfectly regulated as to often lead one to erroneous conclusions. The reader may easily imagine the difficulty of establishing precise rules of transmission in a race like the Ainu, where castes are not marked, with the exception of the chieftainship in each village, the only necessary qualifications for which are a sound, sharp intellect, a strong physique, and personal courage. The office is hereditary if these qualifications are also inherited; but should the sons or brothers of the chief prove unworthy of his place, the Ainu would a.s.semble in a "village council" and elect another strong, clear-headed, and brave man in place of the _roi faineant_ thus summarily deposed. These chiefs have no absolute authority, though the men often consult them in their quarrels and difficulties, which they are asked to settle. Thus, because of these qualities necessary for the office, these chiefs are a slightly superior type to the other natives; for with savages, as with civilised people, sharp-witted, strong, and brave men are naturally of a finer type than those who are their inferiors in these qualities: but the difference among the best Ainu and the worst is so small that I do not feel justified in cla.s.sing chiefs as of a different caste. Besides, exceptional beauty, strength, or larger stature is not necessarily transmitted in the families of chiefs, nor do the Ainu themselves consider them better-looking than others.

As Ainu laws of marriage have no relation to the physical and moral improvement of the race, the only way of cla.s.sifying the natives for purposes of heredity is by tribes, each village being considered as a tribe. Ainu villages are generally very small, and the inhabitants of each village intermarry among themselves, therefore each member of the community is in some way related to every other member; hence heredity in certain physical traits, mental qualities, and diseases shows itself in one community and not in another. The difficulty of tracing the exact connection of each individual with his or her relations beyond the acknowledged father and mother also baffles research in more minute details. Abnormal formations are sometimes transmitted to many members of one tribe, as, for instance, the hare-lip and webbed fingers, of which deformities two or three specimens could be found in a small village numbering fifteen or twenty houses. Malformation of the umbilicus is common--sometimes in almost every member of one small community--while it is very rare in others. Children are mostly affected by this, as in some villages the cord is not treated at all at birth; and this leads to an abnormality till the child grows older, when the few who survive seem to get all right. In other villages the cord is fastened in a very primitive, not to say imperfect, manner, with a common string of _Ulmus campestris_ fibre.

Albinism is very uncommon among the Ainu. I do not know of any case when it has been transmitted, as albinos are greatly disregarded by the Ainu, and, I was told, seldom marry.

Red hair, or hair with red shades in it, is common among the Ainu of the north-east coast of Yezo, and also among the Kurilsky Ainu of Shikotan, where nearly all the children have light hair. It darkens considerably as they grow older, as many of the men said they had light hair when young, which turned dark with age. Members of certain communities have inherited the love of bear-hunting; others the love of fishing; some tribes have a musical apt.i.tude, and a certain artistic talent for rough ornamentations on wood; others have developed their inherited power of sustaining hunger and thirst. The only characteristic which all the different tribes have inherited, without exception, is love for intoxicating drinks; and this love is not only inherited by thoroughbred Ainu, but also by half-castes.

Mixed marriages between j.a.panese and Ainu are frequent, but the progeny are unfortunate beings, of whom a large percentage die when very young: those who live are generally malformed, ill-natured, and often idiotic.