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IX.] introduced, it is believed, in the third century of our era; the annals of the empire, however, claim to go back to a much higher antiquity, even to a time some centuries before Christ. It was unfortunate for an inflected tongue like the Japanese to be obliged to resort to China for an alphabet; and although a thoroughly practical and convenient set of characters, of syllabic value, easy to write and to read, was at one time devised, being made out of parts of Chinese ideographs, it is of very restricted use; and the mode of writing generally employed for literary texts is one of the most detestable in the world, and the greatest existing obstacle to the acquirement of the language.

The dialect of the Loo-Choo islands is nearly akin with the Japanese.

The peninsula of Corea, lying in close proximity to the empire of Japan, is occupied by a language between which and the Japanese, though they are not so dissimilar in structure that they might not be members of one family, no material evidences of relationship have been traced and pointed out. The Corean also possesses some literary cultivation, derived from China; but of both language and literature only the scantiest knowledge has reached the West.

Along the coast of Asia north of Corea, and also upon the island of Saghalien or Karafto, and through the Kurile chain of islands, which stretch from Yesso northward to the extremity of the peninsula of Kamchatka, dwells another race, that of the Ainos or Kurilians. They are hairy savages, who live by hunting and fishing, but are distinguished by nobility of bearing and gentleness of manners. Their speech has been sometimes pronounced radically akin with the Japanese, but, apparently, without any sufficient reason. A few of their popular songs have been written down by strangers.

The peninsula of Kamchatka itself belongs to yet another wild race, the Kamchadales; and to the north of these lie the nearly related peoples of the Koriaks and Chukchi, between whom and the American races a connection has been suspected, but not satisfactorily proved. The Namollos, who occupy the very extremity of the continent, next to