The year 1888 beheld what is known as the “Baby War.” The report was spread abroad that the Europeans and Americans were stealing children and boiling them in kettles for food. It was also generally believed that the foreigners caught women and cut off their breasts in order to extract from them the condensed milk which was so commonly used among the foreign residents. The Koreans knew that the foreigners had no cows and they could explain the use of milk only on the above theory. The modus operandi was said to be as follows. The foreigners were possessed of a peculiar drug which became a powerful gas when introduced into the mouth. Approaching a Korean paper covered lattice door at the dead of night the operator would make a tiny hole in the paper and applying his mouth to it would blow the gas into the room. The effect would be that if there were a woman in the room she would waken and be seized with an uncontrolable[uncontrolable] desire to go outside. Once without the door, the foreigner would seize her, cut off her breasts and return to his home. It was believed that they had paid agents among the people to whom they taught the secret and whom they sent about the country to secure women’s breasts. Two suspicious looking men were set upon in Hong-ch‘ŭn charged with being breast-hunters. They narrowly escaped with their lives. For a short time there was imminent danger of an uprising but a royal proclamation couched in trenchant language did much to calm the excitement and the danger subsided as suddenly as it had arisen. In Eui-ju there was a most destructive flood in which 300 lives were lost and 1927 houses were swept away.
Chapter XVII.
Corruption.... edicts of reform.... trouble with Japan.... envoy to Europe.... death of Queen Cho.... the fisheries dispute.... oppression.... retrogression.... excessive taxation.... insurrections.... foreigners threatened.... on the verge of anarchy.... prefects punished.... revolt in Song-do.... Tong-hak manifesto.... government helpless.... Japan uneasy.... Kim Ok-kyun murdered.... revolting barbarity.... the fall of Chŭn-ju.... Korea asks China for help.... Chinese troops arrive.... Japanese movements.... the other powers interfere.... Japanese demands.... proposed reforms.... the palace taken by the Japanese.... the sinking of the Kowshing.... war declared.... Korea breaks with China.... Japan promises to leave Shanghai alone.... Japanese in Shanghai.... battle of Asan.... battle of P’yŭng-yang.... battle of the Yalu.
At this time the administration of the government was anything but exemplary. The selling of the same office at such short intervals increased the burden on the people to an almost unbearable point, so that there were frequent uprisings in country districts. In Korea the people form the court of final appeal. If a prefect oversteps the line which marks the limit of the people’s endurance and they drive him from the place the government ordinarily accepts it as final.
The following year the government was obliged to take notice of this state of things and the king sent out a proclamation saying that the taking of bribes and the extortion of money in the provinces would be severely punished. He took this opportunity also to speak about robbery and gambling, which had begun to run rife in the land. The people were forbidden to dress in silk, excepting those over fifty years of age.
The year 1890 opened with serious trouble in Ham-gyŭng Province. Cho Pyŭng-sik, a man of indomitable will and one whose unbridled temper had more than once gotten him into serious trouble, was governor in that province. The people had mortgaged their bean crop to the Japanese exporters, of Wŭn-san, and had received some $176,000 therefor. But when the beans had been harvested and were ready for shipment the governor forbade its delivery. He wanted the Japanese to sell it back to the people, as it was a year of scarcity, but this they refused to do; and the beans rotted where they lay. The Japanese promptly took the matter up and demanded an indemnity. The Foreign Office at once recognised the validity of the claim but the king ordered Cho Pyŭng-sik to pay the bill himself, since he had acted throughout without orders from Seoul. The unhappy governor was obliged to part with all his patrimony and several of his relatives had to do likewise. As this was not enough to settle the bill the government paid the balance.
This year saw the first embassy to Europe appointed in the person of Cho Siu-heui but owing to his illness his place was filled by Pak Che-sun who started on his mission but never got further than Hong-kong. It is probable that it was through Chinese influence that he got no further. The fourth moon of the year saw the death of the aged Dowager Queen Cho, through whose influence the present king came to the throne. She was buried with royal honors and the people assumed mourning for one year.
Serious difficulties arose in regard to the fisheries in the south. The Japanese had been accorded the right to fish in Korean waters, but on the island of Quelpart a curious custom prevails. The women do the fishing. They enter the water entirely nude and gather shell-fish. All males are prohibited by law from coming within sight of the fishing-grounds. The Japanese fishing-boats, however, did not hesitate to pass into these prohibited waters and as a result the Koreans were deprived of the means of livelihood. The Korean government took the reasonable ground that the Japanese in coming near the Korean coast should observe the local customs and prejudices, but the Japanese government refused to take any sentimental view of the question and after a long discussion the Koreans failed to carry their point.
The year 1891 beheld the elevation to power of Min Yong-jun a man who championed the most conservative principles of the retrogressive party in power. The king’s son by the concubine Lady Kang was made Prince Eui-wha. Corruption in official circles was accentuated by the lessening of the term of office of country prefects thereby entailing fresh burdens on the people, for they had to provide each prefect with money to liquidate the debt he had incurred in purchasing the position. There was an instant and loud outcry from all sides. The powers that be saw that the limit of the people’s[people’s] endurance had been passed and they hastened to revoke the law. This same year a consulate was founded at Tientsin and Yi Myŭng-sang became the first incumbent.
Another sign of retrogression was the execution of six men charged with being accessory to the insurrection of 1882 although eleven years had passed since that event.