There were indications of the cost of victory, however. The great military hospitals were full, the cemetery was filling fast, military funerals with military pomp and Shinto priests passed down the bannered street, and 600 transport coolies tramping from Manchuria arrived in rags and tatters, some clothed in raw hides and raw skins of sheep, their feet, hands, and lips frost-bitten, and with blackened stumps of fingers and toes protruding from filthy bandages. The Japanese schools teach that Japan has a right to demand all that a man has, and that life itself is not too costly a sacrifice for him to lay on the altar of his country. Undoubtedly the teaching bears fruit. Not long before at Osaka I saw the wharves piled high with voluntary contributions for the troops, and the Third Army leave the city amidst an outburst of popular enthusiasm such as I never saw equalled. Most of these coolies, when they received new clothing, volunteered for further service, and dying soldiers on battlefields and in hospitals uttered “Dai Nippon Banzai!” (Great Japan forever!) with their last faltering breath.
When I left Korea the condition of things may be summarized thus. Japan was thoroughly in earnest as to reforming the Korean administration through Koreans, and very many reforms were decreed or in contemplation, while some evils and abuses were already swept away. The King, deprived of his absolute sovereignty, was practically a salaried registrar of decrees. Count Inouye occupied the position of “Resident,” and the Government was administered in the King’s name by a Cabinet consisting of the heads of ten departments, in some measure the nominees of the “Resident.”[35]
PLACE OF THE QUEEN’S CREMATION.
FOOTNOTES:
[35] I repeat this statement in this form for the benefit of the reader, and ask him to compare it with a summary of Korean affairs early in 1897, given in the 36th chapter of this volume.
CHAPTER XXIII
THE ASSASSINATION OF THE QUEEN
In May, 1895, a treaty of peace between China and Japan was signed at Shimonoseki, a heavy indemnity, the island of Formosa, and a great accession of prestige, being the gains of Japan. From thenceforward no power having interests in the Far East could afford to regard her as a quantité négligéable.
After travelling for some months in South and Mid China, and spending the summer in Japan, I arrived in Nagasaki in October, 1895, to hear a rumor of the assassination of the Korean Queen, afterwards confirmed on board the Suruga Maru by Mr. Sill, the American Minister, who was hurrying back to his post in Seoul in consequence of the disturbed state of affairs. I went up immediately from Chemulpo to the capital, where I was Mr. Hillier’s guest at the English Legation for two exciting months.
The native and foreign communities were naturally much excited by the tragedy at the Palace, and the treatment which the King was receiving. Count Inouye, whose presence in Seoul always produced confidence, had left a month before, and had been succeeded by General Viscount Miura, a capable soldier, without diplomatic experience.