A TRANSITION STAGE
During January, 1895, Seoul was in a curious condition. The “old order”
was changing, but the new had not taken its place. The Japanese,
victorious by land and sea, were in a position to enforce the reforms
in which before the war they had asked China to coöperate. The King,
since the capture of the Palace by the Japanese in July, 1894, had
become little more than a “salaried automaton,” and the once powerful
members of the Min clan had been expelled from their offices. The
Japanese were prepared to accept the responsibility of the supervision
of all departments, and to enforce honesty on a corrupt executive.
The victory over the Chinese at Phyöng-yang on 17th September, 1894,
had set them free to carry out their purposes. Count Inouye, one of
the foremost of the statesmen who created the new Japan, arrived as
“Resident” on October 20, 1894, and practically administered the
Government in the King’s name. There were Japanese controllers in all
the departments, the army was drilled by Japanese drill instructors,
a police force was organized and clothed in badly fitting Japanese
uniforms, a Council of Koreans was appointed to draft a scheme of
reform, and form the nucleus of a possible Korean Parliament, and
Count Inouye as Japanese adviser had the right of continual access
to the King, and with an interpreter and stenographer sat at the
meetings of the Cabinet. Every day Japanese ascendency was apparent in
new appointments, regulations, abolitions, and reforms. The Japanese
claimed that their purpose was to reform the administration of Korea
as we had done that of Egypt, and I believe they would have done it had
they been allowed a free hand. It was apparent, however, that Count
Inouye found the task of reformation a far harder one than he expected,
and that the difficulties in his way were nearly insurmountable. He
said himself that there were “no tools to work with,” and in the hope
of manufacturing them a large number of youths of the upper class were
sent for two years to Japan, one year to be spent in education and
another in learning accuracy and “the first principles of honor” in
certain Government departments.
Sundry Japanese demands, though conceded at the time by the King, had
been allowed to drop, and it was not till December, 1894, that Count
Inouye obtained a formal covenant that five of them should be at once
carried out. (1) A full pardon for all the conspirators of 1884;
(2) That the Tai-Won-Kun and the Queen should interfere no more in
public affairs; (3) That no relatives of the Royal Family should be
employed in any official capacity; (4) That the number of eunuchs and
“Palace ladies” should at once be reduced to a minimum; (5) That caste
distinctions--patrician and plebeian--should no longer be recognized.
Edicts on some of the foregoing subjects appeared in the _Gazette_,
and large numbers of the eunuchs packed up their clothes and left
the Palace quietly in the night, along with the “Palace ladies”; but
the King in his vast dwelling was so lonely without them that the
next morning he sent an order commanding their immediate return under
serious penalties, and it was obeyed at once!
The attitude of the Korean official class, with the exception of a
small number who were personally interested in the success of Japan,
was altogether unfavorable to the new _régime_, and every change was
regarded with indignation. Though destitute of true patriotism, the
common people looked upon the King as a sacred person, and they were
furious at the indignities to which he had been subjected. The official
class saw that reform meant the end of “squeezing” and ill-gotten
gains, and they, with the whole army of parasites and hangers-on of
_yamens_, were all pledged by the strongest personal interest to oppose
it by active opposition or passive resistance. Though corruption has
its stronghold in Seoul, every provincial government repeats on a
smaller scale the iniquities of the capital, and has its own army
of dishonest and lazy officials fattening on the earnings of the
industrious classes.
The cleansing of the Augean stable of the Korean official system, which
the Japanese had undertaken, was indeed an Herculean labor. Traditions
of honor and honesty, if they ever existed, had been forgotten for
centuries. Standards of official rectitude were unknown. In Korea when
the Japanese undertook the work of reform there were but two classes,
the robbers and the robbed, and the robbers included the vast army
which constituted officialdom. “Squeezing” and peculation were the rule
from the highest to the lowest, and every position was bought and sold.
The transition stage, down to 12th February, 1895, when I left Korea,
was a remarkable one. The _Official Gazette_ curiously reflected that
singular period. One day a decree abolished the 3 feet long tobacco
pipes which were the delight of the Koreans of the capital; another,
there was an enlightened statute ordering the planting of pines to
remedy the denudation of the hills around Seoul, the same _Gazette_
directing that duly appointed geomancers should find “an auspicious
day” on which the King might worship at the ancestral tablets! One
day barbarous and brutalizing punishments were wisely abolished;
another, there appeared a string of vexatious and petty regulations
calculated to harass the Chinese out of the kingdom, and appointing as
a punishment for the breach of them a fine of 100 dollars or 100 blows!
Failure in tact was one great fault of the Japanese. The seizure of the
Palace and the King’s person in July, 1894, even if a dubious political
necessity, did not excuse the indignities to which the sovereign was
exposed. The forcing of former conspirators into high office was a
grave error, and tactless proceedings, such as the abolition of long
pipes, alterations in Court and other dress, many interferences with
social customs, and petty and harassing restrictions and regulations,
embittered the people against the new _régime_.
The Tong-haks, who had respectfully thrown off allegiance to the King
on the ground that he was in the hands of foreigners, and had appointed
another sovereign, had been vanquished early in January, and their
king’s head had been sent to Seoul by a loyal governor. There I saw it
in the busiest part of the Peking Road, a bustling market outside the
“little West Gate,” hanging from a rude arrangement of three sticks
like a camp-kettle stand, with another head below it. Both faces wore a
calm, almost dignified, expression. Not far off two more heads had been
exposed in a similar frame, but it had given way, and they lay in the
dust of the roadway, much gnawed by dogs at the back. The last agony
was stiffened on their features. A turnip lay beside them, and some
small children cut pieces from it and presented them mockingly to the
blackened mouths. This brutalizing spectacle had existed for a week.
Three days later, in the stillness of the Korean New Year’s Day, I rode
with a friend along a lonely road passing through a fair agricultural
valley among pine-clothed knolls outside the South and East Gates of
Seoul. Snow lay on the ground and the grim sky threatened a further
storm. It was cold, and we observed with surprise three coolies in
summer cotton clothing lying by the roadside asleep; but it was the
last sleep, for on approaching them we found that, though their
attitudes were those of easy repose, the bodies were without heads, nor
had the headsman’s axe been merciful or sharp. In the middle of the
road were great, frozen, crimson splashes where the Tong-hak leaders
had expiated their treason, criminals in Korea, as in old Jerusalem,
suffering “without the gate.”
A few days later an order appeared in the _Gazette_ abolishing
beheading and “slicing to death,” and substituting death by
strangulation for civil, and by shooting for military capital crimes.
This order practically made an end of the prerogative of life and death
heretofore possessed by the Korean sovereigns.
So the “old order” was daily changing under the pressure of the
Japanese advisers, and on the whole changing most decidedly for
the better, though, owing to the number of reforms decreed and in
contemplation, everything was in a tentative and chaotic state. Korea
was “swithering” between China and Japan, afraid to go in heartily for
the reforms initiated by Japan lest China should regain position and be
“down” upon her, and afraid to oppose them actively lest Japan should
be permanently successful.
On that same New Year’s Day there was more to be seen than headless
trunks. Through the length of Seoul, towards twilight, an odor of
burning hair overpowered the aromatic scent of the pine brush, and
all down every street, outside every door, there were red glimmers
of light. It is the custom in every family on that day to carry out
the carefully preserved clippings and combings of the family hair and
burn them in potsherds, a practice which it is hoped will prevent the
entrance of certain dæmons into the house during the year. Rude straw
dolls stuffed with a few _cash_ were also thrown into the street. This
effigy is believed to take away troubles and foist them on whoever
picks it up. To prevent such a vicarious calamity, more than one mother
on that evening pounced upon a child who childlike had picked up the
doll and threw it far from him.
On that night round pieces of red or white paper placed in cleft sticks
are put upon the roofs of houses, and those persons who have been
warned by the sorcerers of troubles to come, pray (?) to the moon to
remove them.
A common Korean custom on the same day is for people to paint images
on paper, and to write against them their troubles of body or mind,
afterwards giving the paper to a boy who burns it.
A more singular New Year custom in Seoul is “Walking the Bridges.” Up
to midnight, men, women, and children cross a bridge or bridges as many
times as they are years old. This is believed to prevent pains in the
feet and legs during the year.
This day, the “Great Fifteenth Day,” concludes the kite-flying and
stone fights which enliven Seoul for the previous fortnight, and every
Korean insists on keeping it as a holiday. Graves are formally visited,
and gathered families spread food before the ancestral tablets. Curious
customs prevail at this time. A few days before, the Palace eunuchs
chant invocations, swinging burning torches as they do so. This is
supposed to ensure bountiful crops for the next season. People buy
quantities of nuts, which they crack, hold the kernels in the mouth,
and then throw them away. This is to prevent summer sores and boils.
Also on the Great Fifteenth Day men try to find out the probable
rainfall for each month by splitting a small piece of bamboo, and
laying twelve beans side by side in one of the halves, after which it
is closed, and after being bound tightly with cord, is lowered into a
well for the night. Each bean represents a month. In the morning, when
they are examined in rotation, they are variously enlarged, and the
enlargement indicates the proportion of rain in that special moon. If,
on the contrary, one or more are wizened, it causes great alarm, as
indicating complete or partial drought in one or more months. Dogs do
not get their usual meal on the morning of the “Great Fifteenth,” in
the belief that the deprivation will keep them from being pestered with
flies during the long summer.
If a boy has been born during the year, poles bearing paper fish by day
and lanterns by night project from the house of the parents. The people
at night watch the burning of candles. If they are entirely burned, the
life of the child will be long; if only partially burned, it will be
proportionately shorter.
I left Seoul very regretfully on 5th February. The Japanese had
introduced _jinrikshas_, but the runners were unskilled, and I met with
so severe an accident in going down to Chemulpo that I did not recover
for a year. The line of steamers to Japan was totally disorganized by
the war, and in the week that I waited for the _Higo Maru_ war was
uppermost in people’s thoughts. There were some who even then could not
bring themselves to believe in the eventual success of the Japanese.
The fall of Wei-hai-wei and the capture of the Chinese fleet opened
many eyes. I was in the office of the “N.Y.K.” when the news came, and
the clerks were too wild with excitement to attend to me, apologizing
by saying, “It’s another victory!” Chemulpo was decorated, illuminated,
and processioned for victories, Li Hung Chang was burned in effigy, and
unlimited _sake_ for all comers was supplied from tubs at the street
corners.
There were indications of the cost of victory, however. The great
military hospitals were full, the cemetery was filling fast, military
funerals with military pomp and Shinto priests passed down the bannered
street, and 600 transport coolies tramping from Manchuria arrived in
rags and tatters, some clothed in raw hides and raw skins of sheep,
their feet, hands, and lips frost-bitten, and with blackened stumps of
fingers and toes protruding from filthy bandages. The Japanese schools
teach that Japan has a right to demand all that a man has, and that
life itself is not too costly a sacrifice for him to lay on the altar
of his country. Undoubtedly the teaching bears fruit. Not long before
at Osaka I saw the wharves piled high with voluntary contributions for
the troops, and the Third Army leave the city amidst an outburst of
popular enthusiasm such as I never saw equalled. Most of these coolies,
when they received new clothing, volunteered for further service, and
dying soldiers on battlefields and in hospitals uttered “_Dai Nippon
Banzai!_” (Great Japan forever!) with their last faltering breath.
When I left Korea the condition of things may be summarized
thus. Japan was thoroughly in earnest as to reforming the Korean
administration through Koreans, and very many reforms were decreed
or in contemplation, while some evils and abuses were already swept
away. The King, deprived of his absolute sovereignty, was practically
a salaried registrar of decrees. Count Inouye occupied the position of
“Resident,” and the Government was administered in the King’s name by a
Cabinet consisting of the heads of ten departments, in some measure the
nominees of the “Resident.”[35]
[Illustration: PLACE OF THE QUEEN’S CREMATION.]
FOOTNOTES:
[35] I repeat this statement in this form for the benefit of the
reader, and ask him to compare it with a summary of Korean affairs
early in 1897, given in the 36th chapter of this volume.