Page:A modern pioneer in Korea-Henry G. Appenzeller-by William Elliot Griffis.djvu/173

Ping Yang, the Boat City 151 men who owned the land dug out what they could and sold the mineral and metal to "the king," who is owner of everything underground. In later years Dr. H. N. Allen, our American minister, secured from the Government a concession of mining land. Many a million's worth of ore has been crushed, washed, or caught by mercury in amalgam, or dissolved in cyanide, and sent, in the form of dust or shining ingots, beyond sea, to enrich the already rich Americans. Yet we have never heard of the Koreans getting up riots, because of this wealth "taken out of the country." The Korean laborers are declared to be ideal, as they are in Hawaii, and probably will be so long as they are considered as merely "cheap labor" and are contented with their low wages. At one place, A. saw the village idiot the sport of the boys, in another "a Korean Tom Thumb."

The return homeward was made without striking incident, though the keen observer was as busy as ever seeing things. The pastoral simplicity of country life in Korea opened to him a gallery of biblical illustration, the customs being so "oriental" and characteristic of a long settled country ruled less by ideas than by custom. Threshing, fanning wheat for the bam and chaff for the fire, the coming of the bridegroom, and the hired mourners in the funeral procession, reminded him of many a scripture passage. At noon he noticed men and women in a comer of the field eating their lunch, and a bull near by refreshing himself out of a great dish.

On May 16, the travellers were home again.