Page:History of Corea, ancient and modern; with description of manners and customs, language and geography (1879).djvu/148

 124 GAOGOWLI. the fact that the surname of its first king was Oao ; which was also the surname of the clan which founded it. This looks as if a few men had retired, or fled south from Fooyii, to secure greater independence, and thus founded Corea. When it became more powerful, (Jaogowli was said to be 1,000 * li east of Liaotung city. Now, the road from Mukden, via Hingking right east to the Oorean border on the banks of the Upper Yaloo, is in round numbers just that distance ; and we cannot be far wrong in locating the original Gaogowli among the hills and rivers under the south-west shoulder of the Changbaishan, and immediately west of the river Taloo, which now shuts in their descendants to the east of it For the growth and operations of Gaogowli point to an origin west, and about the head waters of the Yaloo, rather than east of it, — especially as it was placed by the Han dynasty under the control of Huentoo. We also find it stated, that it was only after the destruction of Chaosien, the Gaoli people crossed the Yaloo eastwards. At the time, therefore, when Chaosien was broken up as a decrepit old kingdom, Gaogowli was an infant in swaddling clothes. We find the customs of Gaogowli, as described in the Han histories, diverging from those of Fooyti, and still further from those of Yilow. Instead of the Chinese mode of salutation, they bent the knee, as the Manchus still do, — ^possibly after their example ; for the Gaogowli originally occupied purely Manchu lands. They were remarkable for extreme personal cleanliness, — a trait noticed at this day by the Chinese who have seen Coreans at home. But there were no proper "barriers'' between men and women. They used to meet in midnight assemblies, and bad joyous times and unlimited license. Their chief men, in flowered robes, met in public to transact and deliberate upon national business. The bridegroom went to his father-in-law's to live, remaining till a son was bom and bred to maturity, when he returned with his family to his father's house — ^vestiges of which custom remain even now. Each man, while living, prepared the coffin in which he was to
 * See Map I.