The Han itself, rising in the Diamond Mountain of Kong-wön Do, and formed by a number of nearly parallel affluents, next to the border river Am-nok, is the river of Korea, which it cuts nearly across, its eastern extremity being within 25 miles of the Sea of Japan and its western at Chemulpo. I ascended it to within 40 miles of the Sea of Japan, and estimate the length of its navigable waters for small flat-bottomed craft at about 170 miles. A clear bright stream with a bottom of white sand, golden gravel or rock, chiefly limestone, with an average width of 250 yards well sustained to the head of navigation, narrowed at times by walls of rock or divided by grassy islands in its lower course, full of pebbly shallows, over which it ripples gaily, its upper waters abounding in rocky rapids, many of them severe and dangerous, its most marked features, to my thinking, are its absence of affluents after it emerges from the Diamond Mountain, and its singular alternations of shallow with very deep water. It was a common occurrence to have to drag my boat, drawing only 3 inches, through water too shallow to float her, and at the top of the ripple to come upon a broad, still, lake-like, deep, green expanse, 20 feet deep, continuing for a mile or two.
After passing the forks there are 46 rapids, many of them very severe, before reaching Yöng-Chhun, which for practical purposes may be regarded as the limit of navigable water.
These are a most serious obstacle in the way of navigation, but as there is usually a deep water channel in the middle, sailing junks of 25 tons, taking advantage of strong, favorable winds, get up as far as Tan-Yang. Beyond, boats not twice the size of my sampan must be used, which are only poled and dragged, and as they must keep near the shore, among rocks and furious water, their progress is very slow, not more than 7 miles a day. Nevertheless, the Han, with all its difficulties and obstructions, is the great artery of communication for much of Kong-wön-Do and Kyöng-Kivi Do, and for the northeast portion of Chung-Chöng Do; down it all the excess produce of this great region goes to Seoul, and nearly all merchandise, salt, and foreign goods come up it from the sea-board, to pass into the hands of the posang, or merchant pedlars, at various points, and through them to reach the market-places of the interior. During the first ten days from Han Kang there were 75 junks a day on an average bound up and down stream. There is a very large floating population on the Han. There is not a bridge along its whole length, but communication is kept up by 47 free ferries, provided by Government.
Not having been able to learn anything about the route or any of its features, I was much surprised to find a very large population, not only along the river, but in the parallel valleys, many of them of great length and extreme fertility, in its neighborhood. It was only necessary to climb a ridge or hill to see numbers of these, given up to rice culture, and thickly sprinkled with farming villages. Along the river banks only, between Han Kang and Yöng-Chhun, there are 176 villages. Much of the soil is rich alluvium, from 5 to 11 feet deep, and most prolific, bearing two heavy crops a year (not rice lands) with little or no manure. There is on the whole an air of greater ease and prosperity about the Han valley than about any other region that I have seen in Korea.[13]
The people are of fine physique and generally robust appearance. Some of them had evidently attained great age. There were a few sore eyes and some mild skin diseases, both produced by dirt, but there were no sickly-looking people; infants abounded.
Except for a monastery and temple, both Buddhist, not far from Seoul, and the Confucian temples at the magistracies, there were no signs of any other cult than that of dæmons. There were two shrines containing mirioks, in both cases water-worn boulders chafed into some resemblance to humanity; spirit shrines on heights; and under large trees heaps of stones sacred to dæmons; tall posts, with the tops rudely cut into something suggestive of distorted human faces, painted black and blue, with straw ropes with dependent straw tassels, like those denoting Shinto shrines in Japan, stretched across the road to prevent the ingress of malignant spirits, and trees with many streamers of rag, as well as worn-out straw shoes hanging in their branches, as offerings to these beings.
The dwellings do not vary much, except that the roofs of the better class are tiled. In villages where there is a resident yang-ban or squire-noble, his house is usually pretentious, and covers a considerable area, but yields in stateliness to the family tomb, always on a hill slope, a great grass mound on a grass platform backed by horseshoe-shaped grass banks, and usually by a number of fine pines. In front of the mound is invariably a stone altar on two stone drums, stone posts which support the canopy used when sacrifices are offered to the spirit of the deceased, and stone lanterns. A few of the grander tombs are approached by a short avenue of stone figures of warriors, horses, servants, and sheep.[14]
The peasant’s houses do not differ from those of the poorer classes in Seoul. The walls are of mud, and the floors, also of mud, are warmed by a number of flues, the most economical of all methods of heating, as the quantity of dried leaves and weeds that a boy of ten can carry keeps two rooms above 70° for twelve hours. Every house is screened by a fence 6 feet high of bamboo or plaited reeds, and is usually surrounded by fruit trees. In one room are ang-pak, great earthenware jars big enough to contain a man, in which rice, millet, barley, and water are kept. That is frequently in small houses the women’s room. The men’s room has little in it but the mat on the floor, pillows of solid wood, and large red and green hat-cases ranging from the rafters, in which the crinoline dress hats are stowed away. Latticed and paper-covered doors and windows denote a position above that of the poorest. A pig-stye, much more substantial than the house, is always alongside of it.
The villages from about 50 li up the Han from Seoul may all be described as “farming villages.” Lower down they export large quantities of firewood and charcoal for the daily needs of a capital which has left itself without a stick available for fuel in its immediate neighborhood. No special industries exist. The peasants make their rude wooden ploughs and spades shod with iron, and two villages within 40 li of Seoul supply them with their ang-paks and culinary utensils of the same coarse ware, which stands fire and serves instead of iron pots. Such iron utensils as are used are imported from Seoul along with salt, and foreign piece goods for dress clothes, and are paid for with rice, grain, and tobacco.
The people are peasant farmers in the strictest sense, most of them holding their lands from the yang-bans at their pleasure. The proprietor has the right to turn them out after harvest, but it does not seem to be very oppressively exercised. He provides the seed, and they pay him half the yield. Some men buy land and obtain title-deeds. In 1894 they paid in taxes on one day’s ploughing, so much for barley, beans, rice, and cotton, the sum varying; but a new system of collecting tax on the assessed value of the land has come into operation, which renders “squeezing” on the part of the tax collector far more difficult. Money is scarcely current, business transactions are by barter, or the peasant pays with his labor. His chief outlay is on foreign piece cottons for his best clothes. These are 30 cash per measure of 20 inches, dearer at Yöng-Wol, the reputed head of navigation, than at Seoul.