Chapter V: Part 5

"Then the Japanese soldiers marched out to our village, and to seven other villages. Look around and you can see the ruins of all. They spoke many harsh words to us. 'The Eui-pyung broke down the telegraph poles and you did not stop them,' they said. 'Therefore you are all the same as Eui-pyung. Why have you eyes if you do not watch, why have you strength if you do not prevent the Eui-pyung from doing-mischief? The Eui-pyung came to your houses and you fed them. They have gone, but we will punish you.'

"And they went from house to house, taking what they wanted and setting all alight. One old man--he had lived in his house since he was a babe suckled by his mother--saw a soldier lighting up his house. He fell on his knees and caught the foot of the soldier. 'Excuse me, excuse me,' he said, with many tears. 'Please do not burn my house. Leave it for me that I may die there. I am an old man, and near my end.'

"The soldier tried to shake him off, but the old man prayed the more. 'Excuse me, excuse me,' he moaned. Then the soldier lifted his gun and shot the old man, and we buried him.

"One who was near to her hour of child-birth was lying in a house. Alas for her! One of our young men was working in the field cutting grass. He was working and had not noticed the soldiers come. He lifted his knife, sharpening it in the sun. 'There is a Eui-pyung,' he said, and he fired and killed him. One man, seeing the fire, noticed that all his family records were burning. He rushed in to try and pull them out, but as he rushed a soldier fired, and he fell."

A man, whose appearance proclaimed him to be of a higher class than most of the villagers, then spoke in bitter tones. "We are rebuilding our houses," he said, "but of what use is it for us to do so? I was a man of family. My fathers and fathers' fathers had their record. Our family papers are destroyed. Henceforth we are a people without a name, disgraced and outcast."

I found, when I went further into the country, that this view was fairly common. The Koreans regard their family existence with peculiar veneration. The family record means everything to them. When it is destroyed, the family is wiped out It no longer exists, even though there are many members of it still living. As the province of Chung-Chong-Do prides itself on the large number of its substantial families, there could be no more effective way of striking at them than this.

I rode out of the village heavy-hearted. What struck me most about this form of punishment, however, was not the suffering of the villagers so much as the futility of the proceedings, from the Japanese point of view. In place of pacifying a people, they were turning hundreds of quiet families into rebels. During the next few days I was to see at least one town and many scores of villages treated as this one. To what end? The villagers were certainly not the people fighting the Japanese. All they wanted to do was to look quietly after their own affairs. Japan professed a desire to conciliate Korea and to win the affection and support of her people. In one province at least the policy of house-burning had reduced a prosperous community to ruin, increased the rebel forces, and sown a crop of bitter hatred which it would take generations to root out.

We rode on through village after village and hamlet after hamlet burned to the ground. The very attitude of the people told me that the hand of Japan had struck hard there. We would come upon a boy carrying a load of wood. He would run quickly to the side of the road when he saw us, expecting he knew not what. We passed a village with a few houses left. The women flew to shelter as I drew near. Some of the stories that I heard later helped me to understand why they should run. Of course they took me for a Japanese.

All along the route I heard tales of the Japanese plundering, where they had not destroyed. At places the village elders would bring me an old man badly beaten by a Japanese soldier because he resisted being robbed. Then came darker stories. In Seoul I had laughed at them. Now, face to face with the victims, I could laugh no more.

That afternoon we rode into Ichon itself. This is quite a large town. I found it practically deserted. Most of the people had fled to the hills, to escape from the Japanese. I slept that night in a schoolhouse, now deserted and unused. There were the cartoons and animal pictures and pious mottoes around, but the children were far away. I passed through the market-place, usually a very busy spot. There was no sign of life there.

I turned to some of the Koreans.

"Where are your women? Where are your children?" I demanded. They pointed to the high and barren hills looming against the distant heavens.

"They are up there," they said. "Better for them to lie on the barren hillsides than to be outraged here."

IX

WITH THE REBELS

Day after day we travelled through a succession of burned-out villages, deserted towns, and forsaken country. The fields were covered with a rich and abundant harvest, ready to be gathered, and impossible for the invaders to destroy. But most of the farmers were hiding on the mountainsides, fearing to come down. The few courageous men who had ventured to come back were busy erecting temporary shelters for themselves before the winter cold came on, and had to let the harvest wait. Great flocks of birds hung over the crops, feasting undisturbed.

Up to Chong-ju nearly one-half of the villages on the direct line of route had been destroyed by the Japanese. At Chong-ju I struck directly across the mountains to Chee-chong, a day's journey. Four-fifths of the villages and hamlets on the main road between these two places were burned to the ground.

The few people who had returned to the ruins always disclaimed any connection with the "Righteous Army." They had taken no part in the fighting, they said. The volunteers had come down from the hills and had attacked the Japanese; the Japanese had then retaliated by punishing the local residents. The fact that the villagers had no arms, and were peaceably working at home-building, seemed at the time to show the truth of their words. Afterwards when I came up with the Korean fighters I found these statements confirmed. The rebels were mostly townsmen from Seoul, and not villagers from that district.

Between 10,000 and 20,000 people had been driven to the hills in this small district alone, either by the destruction of their homes or because of fear excited by the acts of the soldiers.

Soon after leaving Ichon I came on a village where the Red Cross was flying over one of the houses. The place was a native Anglican church. I was later on to see the Red Cross over many houses, for the people had the idea that by thus appealing to the Christians' God they made a claim on the pity and charity of the Christian nations.

In the evening, after I had settled down in the yard of the native inn, the elders of the Church came to see me, two quiet-spoken, grave, middle-aged men. They were somewhat downcast, and said that their village had suffered considerably, the parties of soldiers passing through having taken what they wanted and being guilty of some outrages. A gardener's wife had been violated by a Japanese soldier, another soldier standing guard over the house with rifle and fixed bayonet. A boy, attracted by the woman's screams, ran and fetched the husband. He came up, knife in hand. "But what could he do?" the elders asked. "There was the soldier, with rifle and bayonet, before the door."

Later on I was to hear other stories, very similar to this. These tales were confirmed on the spot, so far as confirmation was possible. In my judgment such outrages were not numerous, and were limited to exceptional parties of troops. But they produced an effect altogether disproportionate to their numbers. The Korean has high ideals about the sanctity of his women, and the fear caused by a comparatively few offences was largely responsible for the flight of multitudes to the hills.

In the burning of villages, a certain number of Korean women and children were undoubtedly killed. The Japanese troops seem in many cases to have rushed a village and to have indulged in miscellaneous wild shooting, on the chance of there being rebels around, before firing the houses. In one hamlet, where I found two houses still standing, the folk told me that these had been left because the Japanese shot the daughter of the owner of one of them, a girl of ten. "When they shot her," the villagers said, "we approached the soldiers, and said, 'Please excuse us, but since you have killed the daughter of this man you should not burn his house.' And the soldiers listened to us."

In towns like Chong-ju and Won-ju practically all the women and children and better-class families had disappeared. The shops were shut and barricaded by their owners before leaving, but many of them had been forced open and looted. The destruction in other towns paled to nothing, however, before the havoc wrought in Chee-chong. Here was a town completely destroyed.

Chee-chong was, up to the late summer of 1907, an important rural centre, containing between 2,000 and 3,000 inhabitants, and beautifully situated in a sheltered plain, surrounded by high mountains. It was a favourite resort of high officials, a Korean Bath or Cheltenham. Many of the houses were large, and some had tiled roofs--a sure evidence of wealth.

When the "Righteous Army" began operations, one portion of it occupied the hills beyond Chee-chong. The Japanese sent a small body of troops into the town. These were attacked one night on three sides, several were killed, and the others were compelled to retire. The Japanese despatched reinforcements, and after some fighting regained lost ground. They then determined to make Chee-chong an example to the countryside. The entire town was put to the torch. The soldiers carefully tended the flames, piling up everything for destruction. Nothing was left, save one image of Buddha and the magistrate's yamen. When the Koreans fled, five men, one woman, and a child, all wounded, were left behind. These disappeared in the flames.

It was a hot early autumn when I reached Chee-chong. The brilliant sunshine revealed a Japanese flag waving-over a hillock commanding the town, and glistened against the bayonet of a Japanese sentry. I dismounted and walked down the streets and over the heaps of ashes. Never have I witnessed such complete destruction. Where a month before there had been a busy and prosperous community, there was now nothing but lines of little heaps of black and gray dust and cinders. Not a whole wall, not a beam, and not an unbroken jar remained. Here and there a man might be seen poking among the ashes, seeking for aught of value. The search was vain. Chee-chong had been wiped off the map. "Where are your people?" I asked the few searchers. "They are lying on the hillsides," came the reply.

Up to this time I had not met a single rebel soldier, and very few Japanese. My chief meeting with the Japanese occurred the previous day at Chong-ju. As I approached that town, I noticed that its ancient walls were broken down. The stone arches of the city gates were left, but the gates themselves and most of the walls had gone. A Japanese sentry and a gendarme stood at the gateway, and cross-examined me as I entered. A small body of Japanese troops were stationed here, and operations in the country around were apparently directed from this centre.

I at once called upon the Japanese Colonel in charge. His room, a great apartment in the local governor's yamen, showed on all sides evidences of the thoroughness with which the Japanese were conducting this campaign. Large maps, with red marks, revealed strategic positions now occupied. A little printed pamphlet, with maps, evidently for the use of officers, lay on the table.

The Colonel received me politely, but expressed his regrets that I had come. The men he was fighting were mere robbers, he said, and there was nothing for me to see. He gave me various warnings about dangers ahead. Then he very kindly explained that the Japanese plan was to hem in the volunteers, two sections of troops operating from either side and making a circle around the seat of trouble. These would unite and gradually drive the Koreans towards a centre.

The maps which the Colonel showed me settled my movements. A glance at them made clear that the Japanese had not yet occupied the line of country between Chee-chong and Won-ju. Here, then, was the place where I must go if I would meet the Korean bands. So it was towards Won-ju that I turned our horses' heads on the following day, after gazing on the ruins of Chee-chong.

It soon became evident that I was very near to the Korean forces. At one place, not far from Chee-chong, a party of them had arrived two days before I passed, and had demanded arms. A little further on Koreans and Japanese had narrowly escaped meeting in the village street, not many hours before I stopped there. As I approached one hamlet, the inhabitants fled into the high corn, and on my arrival not a soul was to be found. They mistook me for a Japanese out on a shooting and burning expedition.

It now became more difficult to obtain carriers. Our ponies were showing signs of fatigue, for we were using them very hard over the mountainous country. It was impossible to hire fresh animals, as the Japanese had commandeered all. Up to Won-ju I had to pay double the usual rate for my carriers. From Won-ju onwards carriers absolutely refused to go further, whatever the pay.

"On the road beyond here many bad men are to be found," they told me at Won-ju. "These bad men shoot every one who passes. We will not go to be shot." My own boys were showing some uneasiness. Fortunately, I had in my personal servant Min-gun, and in the leader of the pack-pony two of the staunchest Koreans I have ever known.

The country beyond Won-ju was splendidly suited for an ambuscade, such as the people there promised me. The road was rocky and broken, and largely lay through a narrow, winding valley, with overhanging cliffs. Now we would come on a splendid gorge, evidently of volcanic origin; now we would pause to chip a bit of gold-bearing quartz from the rocks, for-this is a famous gold centre of Korea. An army might have been hidden securely around.

Twilight was just gathering as we stopped at a small village where we intended remaining for the night The people were sullen and unfriendly, a striking contrast to what I had found elsewhere. In other parts they all came and welcomed me, sometimes refusing to take payment for the accommodation they supplied. "We are glad that a white man has come," But in this village the men gruffly informed me that there was not a scrap of horse food or of rice to be had. They advised us to go on to another place, fifteen li ahead.

We started out. When we had ridden a little way from the village I chanced to glance back at some trees skirting a corn-field. A man, half-hidden by a bush, was fumbling with something in his hands, something which he held down as I turned. I took it to be the handle of a small reaping-knife, but it was growing too dark to see clearly. A minute later, however, there came a smart "ping" past my ear, followed by the thud of a bullet striking metal.

I turned, but the man had disappeared. It would have been merely foolish to blaze back with a .380 Colt at a distance of over a hundred yards, and there was no time to go back. So we continued on our way.

Before arriving at Won-ju we had been told that we would certainly find the Righteous Army around there. At Won-ju men said that it was at a place fifteen or twenty miles ahead. When we reached that distance we were directed onwards to Yan-gun. We walked into Yan-gun one afternoon, only to be again disappointed. Here, however, we learned that there had been a fight that same morning at a village fifteen miles nearer Seoul, and that the Koreans had been defeated.

Yan-gun presented a remarkable sight. A dozen red crosses waved over houses at different points. In the main street every shop was closely barricaded, and a cross was pasted on nearly every door. These crosses, roughly painted on paper in red ink, were obtained from the elder of the Roman Catholic church there. A week before some Japanese soldiers had arrived and burned a few houses. They spared one house close to them waving a Christian cross. As soon as the Japanese left nearly every one pasted a cross over his door.

At first Yan-gun seemed deserted. The people were watching me from behind the shelter of their doors. Then men and boys crept out, and gradually approached. We soon made friends. The women had fled. I settled down that afternoon in the garden of a Korean house of the better type. My boy was preparing my supper in the front courtyard, when he suddenly dropped everything to rush to me. "Master," he cried, highly excited, "the Righteous Army has come. Here are the soldiers."

In another moment half a dozen of them entered the garden, formed in line in front of me and saluted. They were all lads, from eighteen to twenty-six. One, a bright-faced, handsome youth, still wore the old uniform of the regular Korean Army. Another had a pair of military trousers. Two of them were in slight, ragged Korean dress. Not one had leather boots. Around their waists were home-made cotton cartridge belts, half full. One wore a kind of tarboosh on his head, and the others had bits of rag twisted round their hair.

I looked at the guns they were carrying. The six men had five different patterns of weapons, and none was any good. One proudly carried an old Korean sporting gun of the oldest type of muzzle-loaders known to man. Around his arm was the long piece of thin rope which he kept smouldering as touch-powder, and hanging in front of him were the powder horn and bullet bag for loading. This sporting gun was, I afterwards found, a common weapon. The ramrod, for pressing down the charge, was home-made and cut from a tree. The barrel was rust-eaten. There was only a strip of cotton as a carrying strap.

The second man had an old Korean army rifle, antiquated, and a very bad specimen of its time. The third had the same. One had a tiny sporting gun, the kind of weapon, warranted harmless, that fathers give to their fond sons at the age of ten. Another had a horse-pistol, taking a rifle cartridge. Three of the guns bore Chinese marks. They were all eaten up with ancient rust.

These were the men--think of it--who for weeks had been bidding defiance to the Japanese Army! Even now a Japanese division of regular soldiers was manoeuvring to corral them and their comrades. Three of the party in front of me were coolies. The smart young soldier who stood at the right plainly acted as sergeant, and had done his best to drill his comrades into soldierly bearing. A seventh man now came in, unarmed, a Korean of the better class, well dressed in the long robes of a gentleman, but thin, sun-stained and wearied like the others.

A pitiful group they seemed--men already doomed to certain death, fighting in an absolutely hopeless cause. But as I looked the sparkling eyes and smiles of the sergeant to the right seemed to rebuke me. Pity! Maybe my pity was misplaced. At least they were showing their countrymen an example of patriotism, however mistaken their method of displaying it might be.

They had a story to tell, for they had been in the fight that morning, and had retired before the Japanese. The Japanese had the better position, and forty Japanese soldiers had attacked two hundred of them and they had given way. But they had killed four Japanese, and the Japanese had only killed two of them and wounded three more. Such was their account.

I did not ask them why, when they had killed twice as many as the enemy, they had yet retreated. The real story of the fight I could learn later. As they talked others came to join them--two old men, one fully eighty, an old tiger-hunter, with bent back, grizzled face, and patriarchal beard. The two newcomers carried the old Korean sporting rifles. Other soldiers of the retreating force were outside. There was a growing tumult in the street. How long would it be before the triumphant Japanese, following up their victory, attacked the town?

I was not to have much peace that night. In the street outside a hundred noisy disputes were proceeding between volunteers and the townsfolk. The soldiers wanted shelter; the people, fearing the Japanese, did not wish to let them in. A party of them crowded into an empty building adjoining the house where I was, and they made the place ring with their disputes and recriminations.

Very soon the officer who had been in charge of the men during the fight that day called on me. He was a comparatively young man, dressed in the ordinary long white garments of the better-class Koreans. I asked him what precautions he had taken against a night attack, for if the Japanese knew where we were they would certainly come on us. Had he any outposts placed in positions? Was the river-way guarded? "There is no need for outposts," he replied. "Every Korean man around watches for us."

I cross-examined him about the constitution of the rebel army. How were they organized? From what he told me, it was evident that they had practically no organization at all. There were a number of separate bands held together by the loosest ties. A rich man in each place found the money. This he secretly gave to one or two open rebels, and they gathered adherents around them.

He admitted that the men were in anything but a good way. "We may have to die," he said. "Well, so let it be. It is much better to die as a free man than to live as the slave of Japan."

He had not been gone long before still another called on me, a middle-aged Korean gentleman, attended by a staff of officials. Here was a man of rank, and I soon learned that he was the Commander-in-Chief for the entire district. I was in somewhat of a predicament. I had used up all my food, and had not so much as a cigar or a glass of whiskey left to offer him. One or two flickering candles in the covered courtyard of the inn lit up his care-worn face. I apologized for the rough surroundings in which I received him, but he immediately brushed my apologies aside. He complained bitterly of the conduct of his subordinate, who had risked an engagement that morning when he had orders not to. The commander, it appeared, had been called back home for a day on some family affairs, and hurried back to the front as soon as he knew of the trouble. He had come to me for a purpose. "Our men want weapons," he said. "They are as brave as can be, but you know what their guns are like, and we have very little ammunition. We cannot buy, but you can go to and fro freely as you want. Now, you act as our agent. Buy guns for us and bring them to us. Ask what money you like, it does not matter. Five thousand dollars, ten thousand dollars, they are yours if you will have them. Only bring us guns!"

I had, of course, to tell him that I could not do anything of the kind. When he further asked me questions about the positions of the Japanese I was forced to give evasive answers. To my mind, the publicist who visits fighting forces in search of information, as I was doing, is in honour bound not to communicate what he learns to the other side. I could no more tell the rebel leader of the exposed Japanese outposts I knew, and against which I could have sent his troops with the certainty of success, than I could on return tell the Japanese the strength of his forces.

All that night the rebels dribbled in. Several wounded men who had escaped from the fight the previous day were borne along by their comrades, and early on the following morning some soldiers came and asked me to do what I could to heal them. I went out and examined the men. One had no less than five bullet-holes in him and yet seemed remarkably cheerful. Two others had single shots of a rather more dangerous nature. I am no surgeon, and it was manifestly impossible for me to jab into their wounds with my hunting-knife in the hope of extracting the bullets. I found, however, some corrosive sublimate tabloids in my leather medicine case. These I dissolved, and bathed the wounds with the mixture to stop suppuration. I had some Listerine, and I washed their rags in it. I bound the clean rags on the wounds, bade the men lie still and eat little, and left them.

Soon after dawn the rebel regiments paraded in the streets. They reproduced on a larger scale the characteristics I had noted among the few men who came to visit me the evening before, poor weapons and little ammunition. They sent out men in advance before I departed in the morning to warn their outposts that I was an Englishman (really I am a Scots-Canadian, but to them it was all the same) who must not be injured. I left them with mutual good wishes, but I made a close inspection of my party before we marched away to see that all our weapons were in place. Some of my boys begged me to give the rebels our guns so that they might kill the Japanese!

We had not gone very far before we descended into a rocky and sandy plain by the river. Suddenly I heard one of my boys shout at the top of his voice, as he threw up his arms, "Yong guk ta-in." We all stopped, and the others took up the cry. "What does this mean?" I asked. "Some rebel soldiers are surrounding us," said Min-gun, "and they are going to fire. They think you are a Japanese." I stood against the sky-line and pointed vigorously to myself to show that they were mistaken. "Yong guk!" I shouted, with my boys. It was not dignified, but it was very necessary. Now we could see creeping, ragged figures running from rock to rock, closer and closer to us. The rifles of some were covering us while the others advanced. Then a party of a couple of dozen rose from the ground near to hand, with a young man in a European officer's uniform at their head. They ran to us, while we stood and waited. At last they saw who I was, and when they came near they apologized very gracefully for their blunder. "It was fortunate that you shouted when you did," said one ugly-faced young rebel, as he slipped his cartridge back into his pouch; "I had you nicely covered and was just going to shoot." Some of the soldiers in this band were not more than fourteen to sixteen years old. I made them stand and have their photographs taken.

By noon I arrived at the place from which the Korean soldiers had been driven on the day before. The villagers there were regarded in very unfriendly fashion by the rebels, who thought they had betrayed them to the Japanese. The villagers told me what was evidently the true story of the fight. They said that about twenty Japanese soldiers had on the previous morning marched quickly to the place and attacked two hundred rebels there. One Japanese soldier was hurt, receiving a flesh wound in the arm, and five rebels were wounded. Three of these latter got away, and these were the ones I had treated earlier in the morning. Two others were left on the field, one badly shot in the left cheek and the other in the right shoulder. To quote the words of the villagers, "As the Japanese soldiers came up to these wounded men they were too sick to speak, and they could only utter cries like animals--'Hula, hula, hula!' They had no weapons in their hands, and their blood was running on the ground. The Japanese soldiers heard their cries, and went up to them and stabbed them through and through and through again with their bayonets until they died. The men were torn very much with the bayonet stabs, and we had to take them up and bury them." The expressive faces of the villagers were more eloquent than mere description was.

Were this an isolated instance, it would scarcely be necessary to mention it. But what I heard on all sides went to show that in a large number of fights in the country the Japanese systematically killed all the wounded and all who surrendered themselves. This was not so in every case, but it certainly was in very many. The fact was confirmed by the Japanese accounts of many fights, where the figures given of Korean casualties were so many killed, with no mention of wounded or prisoners. In place after place also, the Japanese, besides burning houses, shot numbers of men whom they suspected of assisting the rebels. War is war, and one could scarcely complain at the shooting of rebels. Unfortunately much of the killing was indiscriminate, to create terror.

I returned to Seoul. The Japanese authorities evidently decided that it would not be advisable to arrest me for travelling in the interior without a passport. It was their purpose to avoid as far as possible any publicity being given to the doings of the Righteous Army, and to represent them as mere bands of disorderly characters, preying on the population. They succeeded in creating this opinion throughout the world.

But as a matter of fact the movement grew and grew. It was impossible for the Koreans to obtain arms; they fought without arms. In June, 1908, nearly two years afterwards, a high Japanese official, giving evidence at the trial of Mr. Bethell before a specially convened British court at Seoul, said that about 20,000 troops were then engaged in putting down the disturbances, and that about one-half of the country was in a condition of armed resistance. The Koreans continued their fight until 1915, when, according to Japanese official statements, the rebellion was finally suppressed. One can only faintly imagine the hardships these mountaineers and young men of the plains, tiger hunters, and old soldiers, must have undergone. The taunts about Korean "cowardice" and "apathy" were beginning to lose their force.

X

THE LAST DAYS OF THE KOREAN EMPIRE

Prince Ito--he was made Prince after the abdication of Yi Hyeung--was Resident-General of Korea from 1906 to 1908, and was followed by Viscount Sone, who carried on his policies until 1910. Ito is still remembered as the best of the Japanese administrators.

He had an exceedingly difficult task. He had to tear up an ancient administration by the roots, and substitute a new. This could not fail to be a painful process. He had the best and the worst instincts of a nation aroused against him, the patriotism and loyalty of the Korean people, and also their obstinacy and apathy. He was hampered by the poor quality of many of the minor officials who had to carry out his orders and still more by the character of the settlers from his own land. The necessities of Japanese Imperial policy compelled the infliction of much injustice on the Korean people. The determination to plant as many Japanese on Korean soil as possible involved the expropriation of Korean interests and the harsh treatment of many small Korean landowners and tenants. The powerful and growing commercial interests of Japan were using every possible pressure to exploit Korea, to obtain concessions and to treat the land as one to be despoiled for their benefit. Ito meant well by Korea, and had vision enough to see that the ill-treatment of her people injured Japan even more than it did them. It was his misfortune to be committed to an impossible policy of Imperial absorption. He did his utmost to minimize its evils and promote reforms.

Unfortunately, all of his subordinates did not see eye to eye with him. His military chief, Hasegawa, believed in the policy of the strong hand, and practiced it. A large majority of the Japanese immigrants acted in a way fatal to the creation of a policy of good-will. The average Japanese regarded the Korean as another Ainu, a barbarian, and himself as one of the Chosen Race, who had the right to despoil and roughly treat his inferiors, as occasion served.

Some Koreans stooped to the favourite Oriental weapon of assassination.

In 1907 Mr. W.D. Stevens, Foreign Adviser to the Korean Government, was murdered by a Korean when passing through San Francisco. In October, 1909, Prince Ito, when making a journey northwards, was killed by another Korean at Harbin. Both of the murderers were nominal Christians, the first a Protestant and the second a Catholic. A deadly blow was struck at the Korean cause by the men who thus sought to serve her.

This book will probably be read by many Koreans, young men and women with hearts aflame at the sufferings of their people. I can well understand the intense anger that must fill their souls. If my people had been treated as theirs have, I would feel the same.

I hope that every man guilty of torturing, outraging or murder will eventually be brought to justice and dealt with as justice directs. But for individuals, or groups of individuals to take such punishment into their own hands is to inflict the greatest damage in their power, not on the person they attack, but on the cause they seek to serve.

Why?

In the first case, they destroy sympathy for their cause. The conscience of the world revolts at the idea of the individual or the irresponsible group of individuals taking to themselves the right of inflicting death at their will.

Next, they strengthen the cause they attack. They place themselves on or below the level of the men they seek to punish.

A third reason is that the assassins in many cases reach the wrong man. They do not know, and cannot know, because they have had no full opportunity of learning, what the other has had to say for himself. Too often, in trying to slay their victim, they injure others who have nothing to do with the business.

To attack one's victim without giving him an opportunity for defence is essentially a cowardly thing. Assassination--I prefer to give it its simpler name, murder--is wrong, whatever the supposed excuse, fundamentally wrong, wrong in principle, fatal in its outcome for those who adopt it. Have nothing to do with it.

The murder of Prince Ito was a cruel blow for Korea. It was followed by an attempt to assassinate the Korean Premier, the man who had handed his country over to Japan. For some time the military party in Japan had been clamouring for a more severe policy in the Peninsula. Now it was to have its way. General Count Terauchi was appointed Resident-General.

Count Terauchi was leader of the military party in Korea, and an avowed exponent of the policy of "thorough." A soldier from his youth up, he had risen to the General Staff, and in 1904 was Minister of War in the fight against Russia, earning his Viscountcy for brilliant services. Strong, relentless, able, he could only see one thing--Japan and the glory of Japan. He regarded the Koreans as a people to be absorbed or to be eliminated. He was generally regarded as unsympathetic to Christianity, and many of the Koreans were now Christians.

Terauchi came to Seoul in the summer of 1910, to reverse the policy of his predecessors. He was going to stamp the last traces of nationality out of existence. Where Ito had been soft, he would be hard as chilled steel. Where Ito had beaten men with whips, he would beat them with scorpions.

Every one knew ahead what was coming. The usual plan was followed. First, the official and semi-official plan was followed. The _Seoul Press_, now the lickspittle of the great man, gave good value for the subsidy it receives. It came out with an article hard to surpass for brutality and hypocrisy:--

"The present requires the wielding of an iron hand rather than a
gloved one in order to secure lasting peace and order in this
country. There is no lack of evidence to show an intense
dissatisfaction against the new state of things is fermenting at
present among a section of the Koreans. It is possible that if
left unchecked, it may culminate in some shocking crime. Now
after carefully studying the cause and nature of the
dissatisfaction just referred to, we find that it is both foolish
and unreasonable....

"Japan is in this country with the object of promoting the
happiness of the masses. She has not come to Korea to please a
few hundred silly youngsters or to feed a few hundred titled
loafers. It is no fault of hers that these men are dissatisfied
because of their failure to satisfy them.... _She must be
prepared to sacrifice anybody who offers obstacles to her work_.
Japan has hitherto dealt with Korean malcontents in a lenient
way. She has learned from experience gained during the past five
years that there are some persons who cannot be converted by
conciliatory methods. _There is but one way to deal with these
people, and that is by stern and relentless methods_."

The _Japan Mail_, as usual, echoed the same sentiments from Yokohama. "The policy of conciliation is all very well in the hands of such a statesman as the late Prince Ito," it declared. "But failing a successor to Prince Ito, more ordinary methods will be found safer as well as more efficacious."

Viscount Terauchi settled in the capital, and it was as though a chill had passed over the city. He said little, in public. Callers, high and low, found him stern and distant. "He has other things to think of than pleasant words," awed Secretaries repeated. Things suddenly began to happen. Four Japanese papers were suspended in a night. An item in their columns was objectionable. Let others be very careful. The police system was reversed. The gendarmerie were to be brought back again in full force. Every day brought its tale of arrests. Fifteen students were arrested this morning; the old Korean President of the Railway Board had been hurried to prison; the office of a paper in Pyeng-yang had been raided. It was as though the new Governor-General had deliberately set himself to spread a feeling of terror.

The Korean must not so much as look awry now. Police and gendarmes were everywhere. Spies seemed to catch men's thoughts. More troops were coming in. Surely something was about to happen.

Yet there were some smiling. They were called to the Residency-General to hear good news. This man was to be made a peer; he had served Japan well. This man, if he and his kin were good, was to be suitably rewarded. Bribes for the complaisant, prison for the obstinate.

Men guessed what was coming. There were mutterings, especially among the students. But the student who spoke bravely, even behind closed doors to-day, found himself in jail by evening. The very walls seemed to have ears.

Then it was remarked that the Ministers of State had not been seen for some days. They had shut themselves in, refusing to see all callers. They feared assassination, for they had sold their country. Policemen and troops were waiting within easy calls from their homes, lest mobs should try to burn them out, like rats out of their holes.

And then the news came. Korea had ceased to exist as an even nominally independent or separate country. Japan had swallowed it up. The Emperor--poor fool--was to step off his throne. After four thousand years, there was to be no more a throne of Korea. The Resident-General would now be Governor-General. The name of the nation was to be wiped out--henceforth it was to be Chosen, a province of Japan. Its people were to be remade into a lesser kind of Japanese, and the more adept they were in making the change, the less they would suffer. They were to have certain benefits. To mark the auspicious occasion there would be an amnesty--but a man who had tried to kill the traitor Premier would not be in it. Five per cent of taxes and all unpaid fiscal dues would be remitted. Let the people rejoice!

The Japanese expected an uprising, and were all ready for one. "Every man should be ready to fight and die in the cause of his nation's independence," they said tauntingly to the Koreans. But the people's leaders kept them in. Up on the hills, the Righteous Army was still struggling. The people must wait for better times.

One man stuck a proclamation on the West Gate, threatening death to the traitors. Man after man, scholars, old soldiers, men who loved Korea, committed suicide, after telling of their grief. "Why should we live when our land is dead?" they asked.

The Japanese sneered because the people did nothing. "We may assume, indeed, that all fear of a national uprising is now past," declared a semi-Government organ. "The nation obviously has no leaders competent to execute and direct a crusade in the cause of independence. Whether that lack is due to adroit management on the part of the Japanese or to unpatriotic apathy on the part of the Koreans we cannot pretend to judge."

The Japanese decree announcing the annexation of the country was in itself an acknowledgment that the Japanese administration so far had been a failure. Here is the opening paragraph:--

"Notwithstanding the earnest and laborious work of reforms in the
administration of Korea in which the Governments of Japan and
Korea have been engaged for more than four years since the
conclusion of the Agreement of 1905, the existing system of
government of that country has not proved entirely equal to the
work of preserving public order and tranquillity, and in addition
a spirit of suspicion and misgiving pervades the whole peninsula.

"In order to maintain peace and prosperity and the welfare of the
Koreans and at the same time to ensure the safety and repose of
foreign residents, it has been made abundantly clear that
fundamental changes in the actual regime of government are
actually essential."

The declaration announced various changes. It abrogated all Korean foreign treaties, and brought the subjects of foreign nations living in Korea under Japanese law. In other words, extra-territoriality was abolished. The Government agreed to maintain the old Korean tariff for ten years both for goods coming in from Japan and abroad. This was a concession to foreign importers whose trade otherwise would have been swamped. It also allowed ships under foreign registers to engage in the Korean coasting trade for ten years more.

The annexation was put in the form of a treaty between the Emperors of Japan and Korea, as though the surrender of their land had been the act of the Koreans themselves, or their ruler.

His Majesty the Emperor of Japan and His Majesty the Emperor of
Korea having in view the special and close relations between
their respective countries and to ensure peace in the Extreme
East, and being convinced that these objects can best be attained
by the annexation of Korea to the Empire of Japan have resolved
to conclude a Treaty of such annexation and have for that purpose
appointed as their Plenipotentiaries, that is to say,
His Majesty the Emperor of Japan, Viscount Maskata Terauchi,
His Resident General.
And His Majesty the Emperor of Korea, Ye Wan Yong, His
Minister President of State,
Who, upon mutual conference and deliberation, have agreed to the
following articles.

Article 1. His Majesty the Emperor of Korea makes complete and
permanent cession to His Majesty the Emperor of Japan of all
rights of sovereignty over the whole of Korea.

Article 2. His Majesty the Emperor of Japan accepts the cession
mentioned in the preceding Article, and consents to the complete
annexation of Korea to the Empire of Japan.

Article 3. His Majesty the Emperor of Japan will accord to their
Majesties the Emperor and Empress of Korea and His Imperial
Highness the Crown Prince of Korea, and Their Consorts and Heirs
such titles, dignity and honour as are appropriate to their
respective rank and sufficient annual grants will be made for the
maintenance of such titles, dignity and honour.

Article 4. His Majesty the Emperor of Japan will also accord
appropriate honour and treatment to the members of the Imperial
House of Korea and their heirs, other than those mentioned in the
preceding Article and the funds necessary for the maintenance of
such honour and treatment will be granted.

Article 5. His Majesty the Emperor of Japan will confer peerages
and monetary grants upon those Koreans who, on account of
meritorious services, are regarded as deserving of such special
treatment.

Article 6. In consequence of the aforesaid annexation, the
Government of Japan assumes the entire government and
administration of Korea, and undertakes to afford full protection
for the property and person of Koreans, obeying the laws then in
force, and to promote the welfare of all such Koreans.

Article 7. The Government of Japan will, so far as circumstances
permit, employ in the public service of Japan in Korea those
Koreans who accept the new regime of Japan loyally and in good
faith, and who are duly qualified for such service.

Article 8. This Treaty, having been approved by His Majesty the
Emperor of Japan and His Majesty the Emperor of Korea shall take
effect from the day of its promulgation.

Some defenders of Japan have wasted much effort in attempting to show that in destroying the Korean Empire Japan did not break her word, although she had repeatedly pledged herself to maintain and preserve the nation and the Royal House. Such arguments, under the circumstances, are merely nauseating. Japan wanted Korea; so soon as she was able, Japan took it. The only justification was

"The good old rule ... the simple plan,
That he shall take who has the power,
That he shall KEEP, who can."

XI

"I WILL WHIP YOU WITH SCORPIONS"

The Japanese administration of Korea from 1910 to 1919, first under Count Terauchi and then under General Hasegawa, revealed the harshest and most relentless form of Imperial administration. When formal annexation was completed in 1910 all the hindrances which had hitherto stood in the way of the complete execution of Japanese methods were apparently swept on one side. The Governor-General had absolute power to pass what ordinances he pleased, and even to make those ordinances retroactive. Extra-territoriality was abolished, and foreign subjects in Korea were placed entirely under the Japanese laws.

Japanese statesmen were ambitious to show the world as admirable an example of efficiency in peace as Japan had already shown in war. Much thought had been given to the matter for a long time ahead. The colonial systems of other countries had been carefully studied. Service in Korea was to be a mark of distinction, reserved for the best and most highly paid. National pride and national interest were pledged to make good. Money was spent freely and some of the greatest statesmen and soldiers of Japan were placed at the head of affairs. Ito, by becoming Resident-General, had set an example for the best of the nation to follow.

Between the annexation in 1910 and the uprising of the people in 1919, much material progress was made. The old, effete administration was cleared away, sound currency maintained, railways were greatly extended, roads improved, afforestation pushed forward on a great scale, agriculture developed, sanitation improved and fresh industries begun.

And yet this period of the Japanese administration in Korea ranks among the greatest failures of history, a failure greater than that of Russia in Finland or Poland or Austria-Hungary in Bosnia. America in Cuba and Japan in Korea stand out as the best and the worst examples in governing new subject peoples that the twentieth century has to show. The Japanese entered on their great task in a wrong spirit, they were hampered by fundamentally mistaken ideas, and they proved that they are not yet big enough for the job.

They began with a spirit of contempt for the Korean. Good administration is impossible without sympathy on the part of the administrators; with a blind and foolish contempt, sympathy is impossible. They started out to assimilate the Koreans, to destroy their national ideals, to root out their ancient ways, to make them over again as Japanese, but Japanese of an inferior brand, subject to disabilities from which their overlords were free. Assimilation with equality is difficult, save in the case of small, weak peoples, lacking tradition and national ideals. But assimilation with inferiority, attempted on a nation with a historic existence going back four thousand years is an absolutely impossible task. Or, to be more exact, it would only be possible by assimilating a few, the weaklings of the nation, and destroying the strong majority by persecution, direct killing and a steady course of active corruption, with drugs and vice.

The Japanese overestimated their own capacity and underestimated the Korean. They had carefully organized their claque in Europe and America, especially in America. They engaged the services of a group of paid agents--some of them holding highly responsible positions--to sing their praises and advocate their cause. They enlisted others by more subtle means, delicate flattery and social ambition. They taught diplomats and consular officials, especially of Great Britain and America, that it was a bad thing to become a _persona non grata_ to Tokyo. They were backed by a number of people, who were sincerely won over by the finer sides of the Japanese character. In diplomatic and social intrigue, the Japanese make the rest of the world look as children. They used their forces not merely to laud themselves, but to promote the belief that the Koreans were an exhausted and good-for-nothing race.

In the end, they made the fatal mistake of believing what their sycophants and flatterers told them. Japanese civilization was the highest in the world; Japan was to be the future leader, not alone of Asia, but of all nations. The Korean was fit for nothing but to act as hewer of wood and drawer of water for his overlord.

Had Japan been wise and long-sighted enough to treat the Koreans as America treated the Cubans or England the people of the Straits Settlements, there would have been a real amalgamation--although not an assimilation--of the two peoples. The Koreans were wearied of the extravagances, abuses and follies of their old administration. But Japan in place of putting Korean interests first ruled the land for the benefit of Japan. The Japanese exploiter, the Japanese settler were the main men to be studied.

Then Japan sought to make the land a show place. Elaborate public buildings were erected, railroads opened, state maintained, far in excess of the economic strength of the nation. To pay for extravagant improvements, taxation and personal service were made to bear heavily on the people. Many of the improvements were of no possible service to the Koreans themselves. They were made to benefit Japanese or to impress strangers. And the officials forgot that even subject peoples have ideals and souls. They sought to force loyalty, to beat it into children with the stick and drill it into men by gruelling experiences in prison cells. Then they were amazed that they had bred rebels. They sought to wipe out Korean culture, and then were aggrieved because Koreans would not take kindly to Japanese learning. They treated the Koreans with open contempt, and then wondered that they did not love them.

Let us examine the administration more closely in detail.