In olden times the hut was always destroyed at the death of its owner, or when abandoned; but in the former case the custom is seldom practised now, and in the latter they are merely left to decay.
It is singular that migrating Ainu, coming across an uninhabited hut, never live in it, but build a new one for themselves.
The Kurilsky Ainu until quite recently destroyed their huts when migrating from one island to another. They also burnt the huts of deceased persons. It is needless to say that the Ainu have no churches, no hotels, no hospitals, and no public buildings of any kind. The huts in villages are a little way from one another, and each hut has directly in front a separate storehouse, built on piles or posts so as not to be accessible to wolves, dogs, or rats. These are small structures, the architecture of which has the local characteristics of the habitations, with the exception that they are invariably on piles, while the habitations are on the ground. Clothes, furs, mats, and winter provisions of sea-weed are kept in these storehouses, and access to them is by means of a peculiar ladder. It is a mere log of wood, six or seven feet in length, pointed at one end, and with five or six incisions, which serve as steps, and remind me of the steps cut by an ice-axe in a glacier or on frozen snow. Natives go up and down these ladders with ease, even when carrying heavy weights on their heads; and good care is always taken to remove the ladder when leaving the storehouse. Women principally look after these storehouses, and seem to have the whole care and control of them. I have often seen an Ainu girl—for a storehouse could hardly hold more than one—sitting on the tiny door working at her lord and master's Atzis robe. Hour after hour I have seen her sitting there, working patiently till the sun has set and the darkness has come. Her materials were then stowed away; the mat at the door was let down; the ladder descended and kicked away; and sadly singing in her soft falsetto voice, she retired into the dirt and dark of her habitation.
The storehouses stand about six feet above the level of the ground, and are generally on four, six, or eight piles. Upon each pile is placed a large square piece of wood turned downwards at the sides, so as not to be accessible to rats and mice. Upon these square pieces of wood rest horizontally four rafters, forming a quadrangle about eight feet square. The small storehouse has as a base this quadrangle, and is seldom high enough to allow of an adult to stand inside.
Storehouses are thatched like all other houses. On the upper Tokachi, however, they are covered with the bark of trees.
Next in connection with Ainu habitations comes the skull-trophy at the east end of the hut. This is on a parallel line to the hut wall, and only a few yards away from it, and is made of a number of bi-forked poles, upon which are placed the skulls of the bears, wolves, and foxes killed by the owner of the hut. The Ainu is proud of this trophy, and if the number of bear skulls is very large, he commands a certain amount of respect from his hairy brethren. There is nothing that Ainu admire more than courage, and there is nothing in the world that an Ainu desires more than to be thought brave. When he has gained this character a man becomes in a certain way the "lion" of the village. He embellishes his trophy with a Nusa and Inaos (willow wands with overhanging shavings—see [Chapter on Superstitions]), and he always looks on it as an evidence of his manly glory. Besides this, many Ainu possess one or two live bears kept in cages. Bear hunters often secure one or more cubs, which they bring home and allow to live in the hut like one of the family or an Irishman's pig. These cubs are nursed along with and in the same manner as the children, and Ainu say that women often put them to the breast and suckle them like their own infants. Whether this is true or not I cannot say; but though I have never seen it, and therefore cannot vouch for it, it is not unlike Ainu women to do such a thing.
When the new-comers grow big and powerful enough to be dangerous, the men make a rough cage with logs of timber,
THE APE-KILAI, OR EARTH-RAKE, AS USED BY PIRATORI AINU. placing them one over the other in a quadrangular shape, and lashing them strongly together. The bear is driven into the cage, which is then roofed over; and after a couple of years of confinement, during which it is fattened, poor Bruin is killed for a bear festival. In the lower part of the cage there is a small wooden tray by which food is served to the captive.
On the north-east coast of Yezo I have also seen smaller cages, in which foxes, eagles, or other animals are kept; and I always noticed the care which Ainu took to feed up the imprisoned animals. That "charity begins at home" is true even among the hairy people; for if they are kind to animals it is only for the sake of making a good meal of them on the first occasion that presents itself.