Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1894-09-01

ing everything about him into his own mir
vana. have secured photograph of him.
with lot of his dancing girls behind him.
and his sen at ais side. His feet rest UPON
leopard skin. ami he is by no means a
bad-lookins Corean. lie has evidently
great organizing powers. and he has
brought office brokerage down to a system.
Land of Squeexers.
Corea, like China, is land of squeezers
Officials who are paid something like $500
year are expected to squeeze about
1900 annually from the people. There Is
no security of property Ia Corea, and hence
no incentive for the people to accumulate.
III man lays up money and the magis-
trates find IL out, they have one of their
VI der strappers accuse him of some crime.
False witnesses are plenty, and they can
whip the man or torture him until he pays
something 10 be let go. Sometimes poor
men are arrested on such charges. When
tortured they say they have nothing and
car give nothing. The reply often is you
nave rich uncle. or a rich cousin, and he
must pay this amount for you" As to the
off1cials, they must get their money out
OF the people. and if they pay high prices
for their offices they have got to Cypress
their subjects. Until within the last year
or so the magistrates were allowed to have
terms of from two to three years. The
prices of the offices were high. By judi
cially apportioning their expressions over
this time they could squeeze enough to
make a profit and still let the people live.
The rebellion was not against the king,
but against his officials, and had the king
rot fOolishly sent his troops against the
rebels he might have escaped his present
troubles and the war between China and
Japan deferred.
How They Squeezed Carp"
This squeezing, which exists among the
magistrates. runs. in fact. through the
whole of Corean society. You remember
this:
The biggest 1eas have smaller fieas
Upon their backs to bite 'em,
And those small fieas have other fieas,
And ad infinitum.
Well, the Corean official flea is of all
0iZes, from this great prime minister, Min
Yung Jun. down to the kesos who trot
along beside your chair when you so
through the city of Seoul. i had four chair
bearers to carry me, and part of the time
there was soldier on each side of us. In
addition, there was Gen" PAX and
doubt not that every one of them got his
percentage out of everything l bought.
had to have the money paid over in my
presence to be sure that 1t would be paid
at all and when PAX bought a cigar for
me i venture he always received a cigar
cite as his commission on the purchase.
The Chinaman who kept house for Mr..
Power the electrician TO the king, with
whom / stopped, got his percentage on the
price of every mouthful of food We ate
ard of everything we bought L could not
hire a horse that the man who ran behind
il and acted as my groom did not get his
percentage of the hire. Such things are
perfectly legitimate in Seoul. The man who
keeps the gate of your house is given III
per cent of the amount Of all purchases
made. This, of course. comes out OF the
landlord who is charged an additional
price. If the percentage is not paid, the
seller will get no more business, and ne
will be boycotted by all the gatemen OF
the town.
y case of sqeezing occurred not long
ago in connection with the Russian legation,
and Il was carried on long time before
the Russian minister found ii out. These
kesoS went out into the country and found
men who were in debt to people in Seoul
They told them that the Russian minister
had bought the claims against them. and
that they must be paid with high interest.
They put them in chains and brought them
right to the legation and kept them in
the outhouses, which are reserved for the
kesos, and which surround every large
Corean establishment. Here they whipped
them from time To time with paddles.
They would strip them half naked. sus-
pend them by their elbows, and torture
them by touching their bare legs with red