Waves of color and Korean grandeur rolled by, official processions, palace attendants, bannermen, with large silk banners trailing on the stiff breeze, each flagstaff crested with a tuft of pheasant’s feathers, the King’s chief cook, with an enormous retinue, more palace servants, smoking long pipes, drummers, fifers, couriers at a gallop, with arrows stuck into the necks of their coats, holding on to their saddles and rope bridles, mixed up with dishevelled ponies with ragged pack saddles, carrying cushions, lacquer boxes, eatables, cooking utensils, and smoking apparatus, led caparisoned ponies, bowmen, soldiers straggling loosely, armed with matchlock guns, till several thousand persons had passed. Yet this was not the procession, though it might well have served for one.
At 7.30, while this “march past” was still going on, a gun was fired, and the great bell, which was very close to us, boomed heavily, and a fanfaronade of trumpets and the shrill scream of fifes announced that Li Hsi had at last left the palace. The cavalry opposite us prepared to receive His Majesty by turning tail, a manœuvre not accomplished without much squealing and fighting. There was a general stir among the spectators, men with arrows in their coats galloped frantically, there was an onslaught on the “Derby dog,” and an attack by men, armed with the long wooden paddles which are used for beating criminals, on inoffensive portions of the crowd.
It is said that there were 5,000 servants and officials connected with the palace, and there were nominally 6,000 soldiers in Seoul, and the greater part of these took part in the many splendid processions which went to form the Royal procession. It would be impossible for a stranger to give in detail the component parts of such a show, the like of which has no existence elsewhere on earth, passing for more than an hour in the bright sunshine, in detachments, in compact masses, at a stately walk or a rapid run, in the full splendor of a barbaric mediævalism, or to say what dignitaries flashed by in the kaleidoscopic blaze of color.
The procession of the King was led by the “general of the vanguard,” superbly dressed, supported by retainers on his led pony, and followed by crowds of dignitaries, each with his train, soldiers, men carrying aloft frames of arrows, reaching nearly across the road, and huge flags of silk brocade surmounted by plumes of pheasant’s feathers, servants in rows of a hundred in the most delicate shades of blue, green, or mauve silk gauze over white, halberdiers, grandees, each with a retinue of bannermen, rows of royal bannermen carrying yellow and blue silk flags emblazoned, cavalry men in imitation gold helmets and mediæval armor, and tiger-hunters wearing coarse black felt hats with conical crowns and dark blue coats, trailing long guns. With scarcely a pause followed the President of the Foreign Office, high above the crowd on a monocycle, a black wheel supporting on two uprights a black platform, carrying a black chair decorated with a leopard skin, the occupant of which was carried by eight men at a height of 8 feet from the ground. More soldiers, bannermen, and drummers, and then came the chief of the eunuchs, grandly dressed, with an immense retinue, and a large number of his subordinates, most of whom up to that time, by their position in the palace and their capacity for intrigue, had exercised a very baneful influence on Korean affairs.
The procession became more quaint and motley still. Palace attendants appeared in the brilliant garments of the Korean middle ages; cavalry in antique armor were jumbled up with cavalry in loose cotton frocks and baggy trousers, supposed to be dressed and armed in European fashion, but I failed to detect the flattery of imitation. There were cavalry in black Tyrolese hats with pink ribbon round them, black cotton sacks loosely girdled by leather belts with brass clasps never cleaned, white wadded stockings, and hempen shoes. Some had leather saddles, others rode on pack saddles, with the great pad which should go underneath on the top; some held on to their saddles, others to their rope bridles, the ponies of some were led by coolies in dirty white clothes; the officers were all held on their saddles, many tucked their old-fashioned swords under their arms, lest carrying them in regulation fashion should make their animals kick; the feet of some nearly touched the ground, and those of others hung only halfway down their ponies’ sides; ponies squealed, neighed, reared, and jibbed, but somehow or other these singular horsemen managed to form ragged lines.
Then came foot soldiers with rusty muskets and innumerable standards, generals, court dignitaries, statesmen, some with crimson hats with heavy black plumes, others with high peaked crinoline hats with projecting wings, others with lofty mitres covered with tinsel gleaming like gold, each with a splendid train. Mediæval costumes blazing with color flashed past, there were more soldiers, and this time they carried Snider rifles, two Gatling guns were dragged by yamen runners, who frantically spanked all and sundry with their paddles, drummers beat their drums unmercifully, fifes shrieked, there were more dignitaries with fairylike retinues in blue and green silk gauze, the King’s personal attendants in crowds followed in yellow, with bamboo hats trimmed with rosettes, standard-bearers came next, bearing the Royal standard, a winged tiger rampant on a yellow ground, more flags and troops, and then the curious insignia of Korean Royalty, including a monstrous red silk umbrella, and a singular frame of stones. More grandees, more soldiers, more musical instruments, and then come the Royal chairs, the first, which was canopied with red silk, being empty, the theory being that this was the more likely to receive an assassin’s blow. A huge trident was carried in front of it. After this, borne high aloft by forty bearers clothed in red, in a superb chair of red lacquer, richly tasselled and canopied, and with wings to keep off the sun, came the King, whose pale, languid face never changed its expression as he passed with all the dignity and splendor of his kingdom through the silent crowd.
More grandees, servants, soldiers, standard-bearers, arrow-men, officials, cavalry, and led horses formed the procession of the Crown Prince, who was also carried in a red palanquin, and looked paler and more impassive than his father. The supply of officials seemed inexhaustible, for behind him came a quarter of a mile of grandees in splendid costumes, with hats decorated with red velvet and peacock’s feathers, and throat lashes of great amber beads, with all their splendid trains, footmen in armor bossed with large nails, drummers, men carrying arrow frames and insignia on poles, then the “general of the rear guard” in a gleaming helmet and a splendid blue, crimson, and gold uniform, propped up by retainers on his handsome pony, more soldiers armed with old matchlock guns, lastly men bearing arrow frames and standards, and with them the barbaric and bizarre splendor of the Kur-dong was over, and the white crowd once more overflowed the mean street. Quite late in the evening the Royal pageant returned by the light of stationary torches, with lanterns of blue and crimson silk undulating from the heads of pikes and bayonets.
This truly splendid display was estimated to cost $25,000—a heavy burden on the small resources of the kingdom. It is only thus surrounded that the King ever appears in public, and the splendor accentuates the squalor of the daily life of the masses of the people in the foul alleys which make up most of the city. It must be remembered that the people taking part in the pageant are not men hired and dressed up by a costumier, but that they are actual Court officials and noblemen in the dress of to-day, and that the weapons carried by the soldiers are those with which they are supposed to repel attack or put down rebellion.
FOOTNOTES:
[9] If an apology be necessary for the following minute description of this unique ceremonial, I offer it on the ground that it was probably the last of its kind, and that full details of it have not been given before.