Page:A modern pioneer in Korea-Henry G. Appenzeller-by William Elliot Griffis.djvu/27

Rh. In poetry the chief ruler is the Sovereign of Ten-Thousand Isles, the people being sentimentally "Our Twenty Millions." In census mathematics, there are about two hundred islands and twelve million souls. To not a few visitors, Korea is the Land of Mosquitoes and Malaria; to hunters, the Country of the Tigers; to the lovers of the beautiful, the Garden of God. To a few, who have borne the cross of grief, it is the sleeping-chamber of the Beloved Dead and ante-room of resurrection glory. To the Christian, it is The Land of Golden Opportunity. In prosaic fact, Korea, in which great cities are absent, is The Land of Villages.

Oldest, grandest, suggestive of all things ancient and venerable, oftenest in the mouths of the natives and wisely made official, in the treaty of absorption by the Japanese Empire in 1910, is Cho-sen, that is, Morning Splendour. Other values expressed in English for the two Chinese characters, may be Dayspring, Radiance of the Dawn, Matin Calm, Tranquillity of the Morning, etc. Nevertheless those, who at the opening of history, coined this term, were not thinking so much of the smile of Heaven, the blush of the aurora, or even of "the innocent brightness of a newborn day," as of the favour of "the dragon countenance," that is, of the Chinese Emperor. Their eyes were on China. Korean nursery tales ascribe the first use of the name to Kija, 1122 B.C. The reality arose from the vassals, who, coming over the borders from the eastern land, basked in the glow of the suzerain's favour.