It was just after noon when we arrived, going directly to Tunkamareg’s house. He had really gone hunting, but Charenga, his wife, was at home, and we were made welcome. Two families live in the house, each with two or three children. Tunkamareg and Charenga are both Ainu; the other man is Ainu, but his wife is Japanese and the little mongrel children were not much to my taste. We were cold and tired and hungry. The pot was boiling and we put some chicken that we had brought with us from Piratori in with the millet that the house supplied, and were soon eating our first Ainu meal. It was now snowing hard outside and we hugged the fire all the afternoon, while the villagers brought in all kinds of articles for sale. During the afternoon fresh venison was brought in and our evening stew was rice (secured somewhere, somehow) and deer-meat. It was interesting to watch the children of the two families quarrel over a deer-bone, fresh and bloody, which they took turns in sucking and in picking off shreds of raw meat. This house, though a true Ainu hut, is mission headquarters, and under outside influences a corner of it has been walled off into a sleeping room for Tunkamareg and his wife. This room Charenga surrendered to us for the night. In it was one of Mr. Batchelor’s little stoves, but it smoked badly; the night was cold and the room draughty, yet on the whole we were more comfortable when the fire went out. All night we suffered from the bitter cold. [Illustration: TYPICAL AINU HOUSE: SHIRAOI.] We were up early and left betimes. The only sled that could be secured was too small to do more than take our baggage, increased as it was by purchases! So we walked. Mr. Batchelor, more accustomed to this exercise and to Japan’s atmosphere and with little on his bones to carry, kept up a lively pace; Manuel did fairly; but the “leader” of the expedition played out completely before he reached Porosaru, by which time the party was strung out in three sections, along a couple of miles or so of road. It was with joy that he finally met an Ainu boy, with a little sled for dragging wood, who bore a written message stating that he was in our employ! At Porosaru the party was reunited and we made a visit of ceremony at the rather large house of an Ainu of consequence. We entered through the south door and were seated upon handsome mattings, which were folded and laid upon boxes at the east end of the fireplace. Here we photographed the interior of the hut, but our negative was bad; it was a pity, for the northeast corner full of treasures was fine. We had better success in photographing a Japanese lacquered tray, upon which, wrapped in _inao_ shavings, were three skulls—those of an otter, a fox, and an albatross. [Illustration: MOUSTACHE LIFTERS OR LIBATION STICKS.]