CHAPTER III.
SÖUL FROM THE CITY WALL.
Seen from the wall (a most wonderful wall which describes a circuit of 9975 paces), Söul looks like a bed of thriving mushrooms, mushrooms planted between the surrounding high hills, but grown in many places up on to those hills. Yes; they look very much like mushrooms, those low, one-storied houses, with their sloping, Chinese-like roofs, some tiled, some turfed, and all neutral tinted. The houses of Söul are as alike as mushrooms are, and as thickly planted.
The wall defines the city with a strange outline. Now it dips into the tiny valley, now it pulls itself up on to the top of some high hill.
Korea is a most distressingly hilly country. If you elect to go for a decent stroll, it is a matter of climbing a hill, and when you reach the summit of the hill it is a matter of tumbling down the other side, to scramble up another hill, and your path will be just such a succession of ups and downs, even though you go north until you reach the “Ever White Mountain,” and, in reaching it, reach the “River of the Duck’s Green,” which, flowing towards the south, divides Korea from China; reach the Tu Man Kang which, flowing towards the north-east, divides Korea from the territory of the Tsar. Up and down it will be, even though you push east until you reach the purple “Sea of Japan.” Still up and down you will find it, although you go as far south, or as far west, as Korea goes, and find yourself on the shores of China’s “Yellow Sea.” Korea looks like a stage storm-at-sea. Its hills are so many that they lose their grandeur, as individuality is lost in multitude.
But we must get back on to the wall, the wall of Söul.
The wall, which is purely Chinese in character, is punctuated by eight gates. All of them have significant names. Several of them are strictly reserved for very special purposes. The south gate is called “The Gate of Everlasting Ceremony.” The west gate is “The Gate of Amiability.” The east gate is “The Gate of Elevated Humanity.” The south-west gate is “The Gate of the Criminals.” The majority of Korean criminals, who are condemned to death, are beheaded. But this may not be within the city walls. The procession of the man about to die passes through the “Criminals’ Gate.” And that gate is never opened save on the occasions of such gruesome functions. The south-east gate is “The Gate of the Dead.” No corpse is interred within the city walls. And no corpse, save only the corpse of a king, may pass through any other gate than the “Gate of the Dead.” Any corpse (but the monarch’s) would defile the gates through which Söul’s humanity is wont to ebb and flow. The “Gate of the Dead” has another name. It is often called “The Gate of Drainage,” for by its side the River Hanyang flows out to the Yellow Sea. The northern gate stands high upon the summit of a peculiarly shaped hill, which the French missionaries aptly named “Cock’s Comb.” This gate is never opened save to facilitate the flight of a Korean king.
The gates differ greatly in size, which adds to the unusual picturesqueness of the wall.
The Cock’s Comb, up to whose highest ridge the wall of Söul runs, is at once the most distinct and the most interesting bit of Söul’s background. It is, among the mountains of the world, so uniquely shaped that no one who has ever seen it can ever forget it. And it is the altar of the most sacred of Korea’s national ceremonies.
Although a large portion of this hill is enclosed within Söul’s wall, Söul itself, climbing city though it is, has not climbed far up the hill. The summit of the Cock’s Comb is an uninhabited, high suburb of Söul.