When the picture was finished I had no little trouble to keep the many fingers of my audience off the wet painting. Moreover, some person endowed with kindly feelings threw a handful of sand in my face, which nearly blinded me for the moment and partly ruined the two pictures I had painted. The money and the buttons were duly paid to Angotsuro and I moved on.
That same evening I went out for a walk. It was a very dark night, and I love dark nights. When for some years you have done nothing but see strange things and new places there is indeed a great fascination in going about in complete darkness; it rests both your eyes and your brain. I walked for some time along the beach, stumbling against the canoes drawn on shore and against anything that was in my way. Hut after hut was passed, but everything was silent; there was not a sound to be heard, not a light to be seen. The Ainu are early people; they retire with the sun. I walked on yet farther and farther afield, till through the thatched wall of one of the huts I discerned a faint light. I stood and listened. The sad voice of a man was singing a weird, weird song, the weirdest song I have ever heard. Then came a pause, and another voice, even more plaintive than the first, continued the same air.
What with the strange melody in the hut, the soothing noise of the waves gently breaking on the shingle, and the distant howling of dogs or wolves, the mystic effect was such that I could not resist the temptation, and I crept into the hut. A fire was burning in the centre, but it had almost gone out, leaving a lot of smoke. Three old men were sitting on the ground. They decidedly looked as if they did not expect me, but, after their first astonishment was over, they asked me to squat down in a corner, and there I was left to amuse myself, while they resumed their singing and drinking. Of the latter they seemed to have had enough already; but, all the same, several wooden bowls, about five inches in diameter and two deep, were passed round and emptied in no time. The more they drank, the wilder and more melancholy the song became. Only one at a time sang, and he would begin in a very low tone of voice and go up in a crescendo, gradually getting awfully excited; then all at once he would stop, as if the effort had been too great for him. His head drooped, and he seemed to sleep. Then, suddenly waking up, coming back to his full senses in a startling manner, he drained one of the bowls, which meantime had been refilled, and resumed the song. The three men were facing each other, and so absorbed were they in their music that, though I was not more than four feet away from them, they seemed to have forgotten me altogether.
I was so impressed with the strangeness of the song that I pulled out my pencil and paper to write down the air. As there was no light but the flicker of the fire, I turned the white leaf of my sketch-book toward it to see what I was writing. This caught the eye of one of the men. He woke up, startled from his musical dream, jumped to his feet, and made a dash for me, yelling some words which I did not understand, and holding over my head something that I could not distinguish at the moment owing to the dimness of the light. Standing thus he paused, evidently waiting for an answer to something he had said. It came from one of the other fellows, who pushed him so violently as to send him sprawling on the floor, while, what he held in his hand—a big, heavy, pointed knife—fell and stuck deep in the ground about an inch from my toes. A dispute arose among themselves, but among the Ainu everything ends up in a drink. The large wooden bowls were again refilled; grand bows were made to me, and they all stroked their hair and beard several times—a sign of great respect. I was then handed one of the bowls and made to swallow the contents. But, heavens! never have I felt any liquid work its way down so far. Had I swallowed fire it could not have been as bad; and, indeed, it was neither more nor less than liquid fire.
As the night was wearing fast, and the old fellows had got on well with their drink, the sing-song became rather too languid and monotonous; and I crept out of the hut as quietly as I had entered it, not without first giving the inmates something for their trouble. I had some difficulty in finding my way back to my less musical quarters; and passing too close to some of the other huts, the dogs—which infest all Ainu villages—barked furiously and roused the whole place.
I learned afterwards that it is an Ainu fashion to try a man's courage. This is done in the way in which my musical friends tried mine, namely, by making a sudden rush with a knife as if death and destruction were imminent, which to a perfect stranger, unconscious of the strain of "bluff" in the action, is not very reassuring. If the person to be tested is aware of this fashion he has to submit to an unlimited number of whacks, administered to him on his bare back, with a heavy war-club. These tests of a man's courage and endurance are called the Ukorra.
In the first instance it is done, in a certain sense, good-naturedly, and not meaning to hurt one. Should, however, the person apparently so dangerously threatened show fright or signs of cowardice, he loses the respect of the Ainu, unless he has the happy thought of giving them a sufficient quantity of some intoxicating liquor to make them all drunk—which is a sure means of turning the most inimical Ainu you may meet into your fast friend, even if you have had a deadly feud with him.
The second way—with the war-club—of course is a painful process, and the Ainu have recourse to it when it is necessary to determine the relative amount of courage possessed by certain members of a community. The one that can stand the greater number of blows is naturally entitled to the respect and admiration of his neighbours, and he is elected leader in bear-hunts or similar expeditions. At the election of a new chief—when the chief's line of descendants dies out—this process, I was told, is often practised; for bravery is the first quality which an Ainu chief must possess.
At Aputa, through some of the half-castes, I was able to pick up a great number of Ainu words, which were most useful to me afterwards; and from that, gradually increasing my stock of words, I soon knew enough to understand a little and also to make myself understood.
One day I went along the coast to the next village of Repun, and then retraced my steps to Aputa, as there was nothing of interest at the former place.