Page:History of Corea, ancient and modern; with description of manners and customs, language and geography (1879).djvu/168

 144 GAOGOWLI. and would agree ; but the Princess, more noble than her father, raised an army in Loyang, which marched against the Turks, ndsed the siege and drove them out of the country. Though laxge tracts of country were in possession of the numerous rebel armies, the Emperor clung as tenaciously as ever to his mad desire to trample Corea under foot, and every expostulation only put him into a frenzy of fury. If the last of the Swi Emperors was an insanely selfish monarch, he was an ardent devotee of literature, and a generous patron of literary men. He employed one hundred and twenty of the ablest literary men, under the superintendance of Dasiaosu, or Grand Secretaries, — the highest dignitaries of the Empire. These were employed, for over twenty years, in making new books ; works on the Classics, on Essay Writing or Literary Style, on War, Agriculture, Geography, Medicine, the Eight Diagrams, Buddhism, Taoism, Chess, Fishing, Falconry, Hounds and the Chace. The new works formed 31 Too, and consisted of 17,000 rolls,— one to four of which rolls or jwan, forms a modem volume. From the name, we are entitled to infer that ancient Chinese writings were in long rolls like ancient Jewish ; and such scrolls well written are now hung up on walls as we hang pictures. In Changan he had a library of 370,000 rolls. He was himself a diligent annotator, as well as an eager reader. His annotations, afterwards revised by his literary assistants, extended over 37,000 rolls in Loyang, his second capital No expense was spared to make his extensive libraries, and especially his reading rooms, as magnificent as art could make them. Every three rooms had a square door, over which were two " Flying Genii^' Outside the door was a mechanical contrivance ("machine''), which yielded to the pressure of the first step over it, and brought down one of the genii, which opened the door and held it open, till his majesty passed through. An attendant bearing a censer, burning with fragrant wood, went before him. When he retired, the various automatic genii which he passed, returned to their places above their doors, and the doors were thus locked. In his new capital of Loyang he