Evening star., 1909-05-22

during the evening, and most Of the
houses have an oil lamp or an electric
light globe at their front gate. Looking
down the wide main streets of the city
towns of our country. for the lights alone
are to be seen, and the low ons-story
buildings are lost In the darkness
Seoul has now an electric car line run
by Americans. 1t was put in long be-
fore the Japanese took hold of the gov
ernment and about half of the stock
belongs to the retired emperor. who has
refused to sell out to the Japanese cap
italists. The Koreans are now patroniz-
ing the road. AT first they said 1t was
magic, and a mob destroyed some of the
cars. Their theory was that the line
would prevent the spirits giving them
rain. They said the cars were boats, and
that the gods. looking down from the
skies seeing them swimming to and fro
through the streets. would say: These
people need no rain, for their city is
swimming In water
A somewhat similar feeling prevailed
az to the magic in the telephone and
telegraph systems. Many of the Korean
women knowing that speech went over
the wires. thought the poles must con-
tain spirits and that the sound buzzing
on the wires was their voices. Indeed.
poles at the time.
Have you ever heard of Chin-Go- Kai ?
1t is section of Seoul which contains
10000 Japanese people. 1t has big official
buildings. many two-story houses and
long streets of stores which would be a
credit to Toxic. Some of the stores have
plate-giass windows. and nearly all carry
large stocks of goods. Here everything
is clean. The roadways are swept, and
most of them are as smooth as a floor.
haN N1yc hrio sob al h,,t1
post office and all sorts of business
establishments.
At one side of this section is a great
frame office structure devoted to the res-
ident general. who governs Korea. with
the emperor as the nominal head; and
back of it is the home of this high Off
cial with a thousand acres Or more OF
Nam-San mountain about 1t. The old
mountain had lain there a wilderness for
thousands of years. 1t had seen the wall
watched the generations rise and fall
from then until now. It remained for
the Japanese to make 1t beautiful park.
They have cut roads through the pines
and have built many pavilions. until
now 1t Is one Of natures most beautiful
gardens.
I had the good fortune to be invited
to a garden party given there by the
resident general the other day. More
than 2,OOO of the high-class Koreans and
cellency received us out in the open,
and there were lunchrooms and tea
houses throughout the grounds whose
walters were beautiful Japanese maidens
At the close we had dinner in a great
tent, covering tables sufficient to seat the
two thousand guests, and the Japanese
military band sang song composed by
Viscount Some in honor of the occasion.
Twenty-Five years ago there was not a
brick in Korea. The houses were all
made of mud. of wood or Of stones piled
up one on top of the other and covered
with roofs OF heavy black tiles. or straw
thatch. held down with straw ropes.
When I visited the city twenty years ago
outside the homes of the missionaries and
the palaces of the king there was not a
two-story structure to be seen anywhere.
The place contained two or three hundred
thousand people, the most of whom lived
in mud huts with roofs of straw thatch.
The huts were all made in the shape of a
horseshoe with quarters at the back for
the women. There were larger houses