The daily morning journal and courier., 1905-12-30
COREANS X QUEER PEOPLE,
FOR ONE THING, THEIR SLEEP
 IS NOISE PROOF.

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 Natives.
 One of the latest studies of Corea is by a Frenchman. It is entitled Tn Coree' and the author is Emile Bour- daret. The Coreans are a strange people, not only from the point of view of our civilization, but even from that of their near neighbors,, the Japanese, and M. Bourdaret describes with abundance of detail their habits, morals and daily life.
 The first night a stranger passes in Seoul is one of painful surprise. If he be fatigued and hopes for several hours of restful sleep he is promptly dis- illusionized.
 He Is kept awake by a weird noise, ceaseless and prolonged. It continues from dark until dawn. It opens with a low rumble in volume until it becomes an internal gallop.
 This uproar comes from the washing of clothes, which is carried on exclu- sively at night. Coreans are not dis turbed by 1t; nothing ever gets upon their nerves; but to one unaccustomed to it is a formidable menace to health. , The noise is caused by the method em- ployed to cleanse clothing. The garment is wrapped about cy- lindrical stone and pounded with two clubs, which resemble those carried by policemen. Only a small quantity of water is used, but the process gives a glaze and finish peculiar to Corean linen or cotton.
 Forty thousand of these stones may be hammered in unison but the Corean sleeps on undisturbed. Nothing inter- rUpts his sleep. He may be seen slum- tbering on tho trunk of a slender tree in the full blaze of sunlight, mouth open, devoured by multitude of flies, ab- solutely motionless, unconscious of an- noyanoe.
 The beds of the lower classes consist of a mat upon which they sleep nude, even in winter, a Wadded quilt for covering, stone or block of wood for pillow.
 Commerce street in Seoul is the retail quarter of the town. Here everything is sold-wood for fuel, old clothes, cop per vessels. pipes books, spectacles, paper napkins, Sc.
 The merchant, in the rear of his shop, is seated in the pose of Buddha, sur rounded by his wares, his moments of leisure employed in reading a. Corean newspaper This he reads aloud for the benefit of illiterate customers and idlers.
 The journal records passing events confiscations at the custom house of counterfeit nickel imported by Japa- nese, dismissal of a Minister by the Emperor, announcement that one Pax has changed his name, 1t no long ger him; an official decree according postumous honor to a person who has l been dead hundred years, accounts of peasants robbed by brigands. These, 1 armed with clubs, descend at night upon a village; the inhabitants offer no resistance, abandoning everything to 1 the marauders.
 1 Stories of brigands have invincible l fascination for Coreans. Every night ! the taverns are filled with audiences raptly absorbed in narrations of their
 prowess, told by professional racon- 1 teurs In the domestic circle children are regaled with brigand stories which send them terrified to bed, to awaken of night with shrieks of fear.
 To find a drinking shop it is only ne- cessary to look upward. At every other step will be seen pole with a
 willow basket attached; beneath it a
 small flag This is the universal sign
 of these establishments.
 | The interior of a Corean drinking
 shop is squalid. The tipple sold has ar
 after-havor of petroleum it is anti.
 pathetic to a European palate, but oi
 rapturous suavity to that of a Corean 1 Some of these saki shops are more se-
 lect. They are conducted by women 1 In fact this is the one business 1T which an honest woman can engage
 without loss of caste.
 1 Notwithstanding the acceptance o1 l the tenets of Buddha in Corea, the old
 belief that preceded is still has i'm.
 mense power. The Coreans believe that spirits, either benign or malevolent, in l fest everything that surrounds them
 the soil, mountains, rivers and trees are alive with them. l Sickness is caused by demons; there. 1 fore, exercising sorceresses have great vogue in Corea, They are the curse oi | the country If the Emperor would
 suppress them. as well as a multitude
 of magicians, astrologers, and necro.
 mancers, Corea would make great
 strides in the paths of progress. ] At every moment of the day or night may be heard in every quarter of Seou the tambourine of a sorceress exercising l in a house where the demon of dis
 ease has entered. This is accomplished
 by the forcefur beating of the tam- tam, frantic dances, furious in propor- l tion to the proffered fee.
 The blind predict the future, The
 birth of a sightless girl is greeted
 with delight by her parents. That in- 1 firmity insures to her profitable
 career and future support of her pa rents for she is certain to become a
 sorceress or charnane.
 | These individuals hold such power
 that they have established guilds; the 1 blind forming one and the other fakirs
 8 second corporation. Each has 8 l chief, subject to control by the Govern.
 ment. The poor Corean cannot be born ! 11a .of5 ca o1,5 HEy;fn