In Korea with Marquis Ito

by George Trumbull Ladd

It was on Saturday, March 30, at 3.30 P.M., according to a notice sent the day before, that I was received in audience by the Korean Emperor. Under the escort of the Marquis’ secretary, Mr. Kurachi, and a Korean aide-de-camp, I went in a jinrikisha to the small gate of the palace which is very near to Miss Sontag’s house, and dismounting there, passed through rather irregular and intermittent lines of palace guards to the building where the audience was to take place. The rooms used for such functions, while the new palace is still in process of erection, are far enough from anything approaching royal magnificence. The aspect and furnishings of the entrance hall would scarcely rival a third-class hotel in Europe or the United States. The same thing is true of the waiting-room and of the audience-chamber itself. On arrival I was shown into the former apartment, where were already gathered some of the prominent Korean officials, including the Prime Minister, the Master of Ceremonies, and several officers of high rank in the Korean army. The entrance of Marquis Ito with his suite soon after filled the small room with men whose gorgeous apparel contrasted strongly with the cheap woodwork, which was painted light-pink and trimmed in light-green; and with its tawdry European furnishings. Almost immediately the little Prince, son of Lady Om, entered, and with an amusing air of boyish dignity, made more effective by the mannish costume of topknot and crinoline hat with which he had recently been invested, came straight up to me and gravely held out his hand. The young Prince has bright eyes, an intelligent but almost completely full-moon-shaped face, and a protruding abdomen suggestive of over-indulgence in sweets and other fattening foods. At the mature age of eleven years he had just secured the coveted honor of the man’s investiture, as described above. And seven maidens of suitable rank and age had already been selected, one of whom would subsequently sustain the ordeal of being chosen as his consort and future wife. After the hand-shaking and an interchange of courteous salutations, the boy disappeared. While waiting, I was being introduced to one official, Korean or Japanese, after another; but so often as I rose for this purpose, I was politely requested by the Korean aide-de-camp to be seated again.

The Resident-General and some of his suite went to the audience-room some minutes before I was summoned to follow. It was my conjecture, from what His Majesty subsequently said, that he was being told something about me and about the work which I was to attempt in Korea. In a still later interview with Marquis Ito I learned the truth of this conjecture. The Emperor had been assured that the visitor’s purposes were not political; but the Resident-General, believing that his lectures on matters educational and ethical had been of service in Japan, had invited him to come to Korea to assist in contributing to the same important interests here.

On being invited to do so by the Court interpreter, I followed him to the audience-room. Any expectation of being conducted through stately corridors to a splendid throne-room was speedily disappointed. The audience-room was as near the waiting-room as two small rooms can well be. It was itself so small that there was difficulty in making the requisite three bows before standing face to face with His Majesty, separated only by a round table of the most ordinary sort. At his right side stood, not the Crown Prince, the son of the late Queen, but the son of Lady Om. Before I had come near enough to take it, and indeed before I had made my third bow, the Emperor held out his hand. He is in appearance a quite ordinary man, of the Korean type; and there was nothing worthy of notice about his plain Korean dress. His face wore the pleasant smile with which he is said to greet all foreigners (for, as our hostess says: “Il est très gentil, très aimable”); although its æsthetical effect is somewhat hindered by a bad set of teeth.

His Majesty expressed the hope that I had a pleasant trip and was very comfortable and enjoying myself. A favorable answer, and especially an expression of pleasure at Korea’s beautiful mountain scenery and delightful climate, elicited the remark—he still smiling, while the young Prince looked as solemn as an owl—that, “besides the climate and the mountains, there was nothing else of interest in Korea.” “I cannot quite agree with Your Majesty,” was the response, “for I find the people and the country very interesting and I am sure that my interest will increase the longer I stay.” The Emperor then went on to say that he was glad to learn I had come to instruct his people in right ways; that he hoped they would open their minds to enlightenment and to modern ideas; and that my addresses would contribute to their progress. I answered that I should sincerely endeavor, by speaking on the same subjects on which I had been accustomed to speak in my own country, in England, India, Japan, and elsewhere, to contribute some little help to the same good cause in Korea. Up to this time, no sign of permission had been given to take my dismissal, and, indeed, once when a movement to withdraw had been made, a half-gesture had prevented it; but now His Majesty held out his hand. After taking it, I bowed and backed out safely over the threshold—a manœuvre made the easier by the small size of the room.

On returning to the waiting-room the question was asked whether the Crown Prince was present with his father; and no little surprise seemed to be excited by the fact that Lady Om’s son had on this occasion taken the place on the Emperor’s right hand customarily occupied by the older half-brother. After the entrance again of the Marquis Ito with his suite, and of the Korean officials, to the room for waiting, light refreshments were served; the ceremony was then considered at an end.

My first experience of lecturing to a Korean audience came on the evening of the same day. While waiting in the small, dingy rooms of the Korean building, then used for offices by the Young Men’s Christian Association of Seoul, I was introduced to several prominent Korean Christians. The most interesting of these was the pastor of one of the Korean churches, a member of a high-class family and one of the very few of his countrymen who combines a truly manly native character with a profession of the foreign faith. This man had been chosen by the Crown Prince to assist at the obsequies of his mother, the murdered Queen. The struggles with his conscience, which forbade him either to take part in heathenish rites, or escape with a lie, by feigning illness, or crawl out of the dilemma by resigning the official position he then held, made an interesting story. This man solved his problem of conscience in truly loyal style. And when the Christian pastor told his heathen prince that he could not go, and, as well, the reason why, instead of ordering him punished the latter said: “Why did you not let me know beforehand that you are a Christian, and then I should not have asked you? Go in peace.”

The lecture began late. The hall was crowded with some 600 Koreans, seated on the floor, standing in the open space about the door, and perched in the windows. Besides the native audience, a few missionaries and three or four Japanese friends were the only foreigners present. The arrangements for enforcing order were unusual and interesting. A number of young men, designated by badges, were posted near the door or distributed about the hall. Their office resembled, apparently, that of the tithing-man in the Puritan churches of a century gone by. Boys who became too restless were admonished and sometimes even gently rapped or pulled into place; and those who wished to leave the hall were prevented from doing so unless they could give peremptory reasons for the wish. It was deemed complimentary to the speaker that he did not develop any considerable number of this class of hearers; and, indeed, this particular audience was called attentive. It was, in truth, fairly so; although not after the pattern of the altogether respectful and quiet manners of the Japanese audiences. Indeed, there was always considerable restlessness and undoubted evidence of that kind of applause which imitates what the French call claque, in the Korean audiences at Seoul. On the one hand there was a lack of that intelligent and serious interest in the discussion of questions of education, morals, and religion which one meets everywhere in Japan; while, on the other hand, there was response by clapping of hands to any remarks which touched one’s hearers on the side of sentiment in an appeal to their personal or national experiences of injustice, pride, and weakness mingled with a certain form of ambition. These different characteristics may safely be interpreted as marking essential differences between the present attitudes and prospective developments of the two peoples.

This lecture, as were all the lectures delivered to the Koreans (since they were without exception given under the auspices of either the Y. M. C. A. or of the missionaries), was opened by religious exercises. Dr. Jones introduced the speaker; and Mr. Reynolds, whose reputation for a knowledge of the Korean language has secured him a prominent place in the work of translating the Scriptures, interpreted. The speaker availed himself of the words which the Emperor had that afternoon spoken in commendation of his purpose in visiting the country, to propitiate his first Korean audience. At the end of the two hours the foreigners present expressed themselves as well satisfied with the beginning which had been made.

On the afternoon of the next day, which was Sunday, the audience was equally large, and the attention about equally good; although the drizzle of rain which came on during the hours of meeting made some of the Korean men as nervous about the damage threatening their best-wear crinoline hats as American women are wont to be about their bonnets, under similar circumstances, on an Easter Sunday. As we entered the hall, Dr. Avison was leading the audience in singing. The quality of the song was not high, but it was perhaps equal to that attainable in Japan, outside of the Greek Cathedral at the time of my first visit fifteen years ago. The Koreans are probably more fond of music, and more apt at learning, than are the Japanese. Already, under the training of their German teacher, Professor Eckert, a Korean band is giving to Seoul fairly creditable music. This service of song continued for about one-half hour and ended with the performance of a quartette by Korean young men, one of whom is Chamberlain to the Crown Prince and a nephew of the Emperor. This Sunday’s audience was almost exclusively Christian.