Page:EB1911 - Volume 15.djvu/943

Rh and cruciferae are numerous. The native fruits, except walnuts and chestnuts, are worthless. The persimmon attains perfection, and experiment has proved the suitability of the climate to many foreign fruits. The indigenous economic plants are few, and are of no commercial value, excepting wild ginseng, bamboo, which is applied to countless uses, and “tak-pul” (Hibiscus Manihot), used in the manufacture of paper.

Fauna.—The tiger takes the first place among wild animals. He is of great size, his skin is magnificent, and he is so widely distributed as to be a peril to man and beast. Tiger-hunting is a profession with special privileges. Leopards are numerous, and have even been shot within the walls of Seoul. There are deer (at least five species), boars, bears, antelopes, beavers, otters, badgers, tiger-cats, marten, an inferior sable, striped squirrels, &c. Among birds there are black eagles, peregrines (largely used in hawking), and, specially protected by law, turkey bustards, three varieties of pheasants, swans, geese, common and spectacled teal, mallards, mandarin ducks white and pink ibis, cranes, storks, egrets, herons, curlews, pigeons, doves, nightjars, common and blue magpies, rooks, crows, orioles, halcyon and blue kingfishers, jays, nut-hatches, redstarts, snipe, grey shrikes, hawks, kites, &c. But, pending further observations, it is not possible to say which of the smaller birds actually breed in Korea and which only make it a halting-place in their annual migrations.

Area and Population.—The estimated area is 82,000 sq. m.—somewhat under that of Great Britain. The first complete census was taken in 1897, and returned the population in round numbers at 17,000,000, females being in the majority. It was subsequently, however, estimated at a maximum of 12,000,000. There is a foreign population of about 65,000, of whom 60,000 are Japanese. It is estimated that little more than half the arable land is under cultivation, and that the soil could support an additional 7,000,000. The native population is absolutely homogeneous. Northern Korea, with its severe climate, is thinly peopled, while the rich and warm provinces of the south and west are populous. A large majority of the people are engaged in agriculture. There is little emigration, except into Russian and Chinese territory, but some Koreans have emigrated to Hawaii and Mexico.

The capital is the inland city of Seoul, with a population of nearly 200,000. Among other towns, Songdo (Kaisöng), the capital from about 910 to 1392, is a walled city of the first rank, 25 m. N.W. of Seoul, with a population of 60,000. It possesses the stately remains of the palace of the Korean kings of the Wang dynasty, is a great centre of the grain trade and the sole centre of the ginseng manufacture, makes wooden shoes, coarse pottery and fine matting, and manufactures with sesamum oil the stout oiled paper for which Korea is famous. Phyöng-yang, a city on the Tai-dong, had a population of 60,000 before the war of 1894, in which it was nearly destroyed; but it fast regained its population. It lies on rocky heights above a region of stoneless alluvium on the east, and with the largest and richest plain in Korea on the west. It has five coal-mines within ten miles, and the district is rich in iron, silk, cotton, and grain. It has easy communication with the sea (its port being Chin-nampo), and is important historically and commercially. Auriferous quartz is worked by a foreign company in its neighbourhood. Near the city is the illustrated standard of land measurement cut by Ki-tze in 1124

With the exceptions of Kang-hwa, Chöng-ju, Tung-nai, Fusan, and Wön-san, it is very doubtful if any other Korean towns reach a population of 15,000. The provincial capitals and many other cities are walled. Most of the larger towns are in the warm and fertile southern provinces. One is very much like another, and nearly all their streets are replicas of the better alleys of Seoul. The actual antiquities of Korea are dolmens, sepulchral pottery, and Korean and Japanese fortifications.

Race.—The origin of the Korean people is unknown. They are of the Mongol family; their language belongs to the so-called Turanian group, is polysyllabic, possesses an alphabet of 11 vowels and 14 consonants, and a script named En-mun. Literature of the higher class and official and upper class correspondence are exclusively in Chinese characters, but since 1895 official documents have contained an admixture of En-mun. The Koreans are distinct from both Chinese and Japanese in physiognomy, though dark straight hair, dark oblique eyes, and a tinge of bronze in the skin are always present. The cheek-bones are high; the nose inclined to flatness; the mouth thin-lipped and refined among patricians, and wide and full-lipped among plebeians; the ears are small, and the brow fairly well developed. The expression indicates quick intelligence rather than force and mental calibre. The male height averages 5 ft. 4 in. The hands and feet are small and well-formed. The physique is good, and porters carry on journeys from 100 to 200 ℔. Men marry at from 18 to 20 years, girls at 16, and have large families, in which a strumous taint is nearly universal. Women are secluded and occupy a very inferior position. The Koreans are rigid monogamists, but concubinage has a recognized status.

Production and Industries. i. Minerals.—Extensive coal-fields, producing coal of fair quality, as yet undeveloped, occur in Hwang-hai Do and elsewhere. Iron is abundant, especially in Phyöng-an Do, and rich copper ore, silver and galena are found. Crystal is a noted product of Korea, and talc of good quality is also present. In 1885 the rudest process of “placer” washing produced an export of gold dust amounting to £120,000; quartz-mining methods were subsequently introduced, and the annual declared value of gold produced rose to about £450,000; but much is believed to have been sent out of the country clandestinely. The reefs were left untouched till 1897, when an American company, which had obtained a concession in Phyöng-an Do in 1895, introduced the latest mining appliances, and raised the declared export of 1898 to £240,047, believed to represent a yield for that year of £600,000. Russian, German, English, French and Japanese applicants subsequently obtained concessions. The concessionnaires regard Korean labour as docile and intelligent. The privilege of owning mines in Korea was extended to aliens under the Mining Regulations of 1906.

ii. Agriculture.—Korean soil consists largely of light sandy loam, disintegrated lava, and rich, stoneless alluvium, from 3 to 10 ft. deep. The rainfall is abundant during the necessitous months of the year, facilities for the irrigation of the rice crop are ample, and drought and floods are seldom known. Land is held from the proprietors on the terms of receiving seed from them and returning half the produce, the landlord paying the taxes. Any Korean can become a landowner by reclaiming and cultivating unoccupied crown land for three years free of taxation, after which he pays taxes annually. Good land produces two crops a year. The implements used are two makes of iron-shod wooden ploughs; a large shovel, worked by three or five men, one working the handle, the others jerking the blade by ropes attached to it; a short sharp-pointed hoe, a bamboo rake, and a wooden barrow, all of rude construction. Rice is threshed by beating the ears on a log; other grains, with flails on mud threshing-floors. Winnowing is performed by throwing up the grain on windy days. Rice is hulled and grain coarsely ground in stone querns or by water pestles. There are provincial horse-breeding stations, where pony stallions, from 10 to 12 hands high, are bred for carrying burdens. Magnificent red bulls are bred by the farmers for ploughing and other farming operations, and for the transport of goods. Sheep and goats are bred on the imperial farms, but only for sacrifice. Small, hairy, black pigs, and fowls, are universal. The cultivation does not compare in neatness and thoroughness with that of China and Japan. There are no trustworthy estimates of the yield of any given measurement of land. The farmers put the average yield of rice at thirty-fold, and of other grain at twenty-fold. Korea produces all cereals and root crops except the tropical, along with cotton, tobacco, a species of the Rhea plant used for making grass-cloth, and the Brousonettia papyrifera. The articles chiefly cultivated are rice, millet, beans, ginseng (at Songdo), cotton, hemp, oil-seeds, bearded wheat, oats, barley, sorghum, and sweet and Irish potatoes. Korean agriculture suffers from infamous roads, the want of the exchange of seed, and the insecurity of the gains of labour. It occupies about three-fourths of the population.

iii. Other Industries.—The industries of Korea, apart from supplying the actual necessaries of a poor population, are few and rarely collective. They consist chiefly in the manufacture