Page:In Korea with Marquis Ito (1908).djvu/13



contents and purposes of this volume may be conveniently classified under three heads; for here are statements of fact, expressions of opinion, and certain ventures into the realm of conjecture. The statements of fact are, almost without exception, made on grounds of personal observation, or on the authority of the most competent and trustworthy first-hand witnesses. For the earlier periods of the history of the relations, friendly or hostile, between Japan and Korea, these authorities are indeed no longer living, and they cannot be subjected to cross-questioning. But the choice between the truth they told and the mistakes and falsehoods of a contradictory character is in most cases not difficult to make. For events of the present generation the reader will find the statements of the witnesses quoted, and of the documents cited, to be in general unimpeachable. I believe, then, that what is claimed to be truth of fact in this book is as nearly exact and worthy of implicit confidence as it is ordinarily given to human beings to be in matters pertaining to the history of human affairs.

In expressing my own opinions as to the truth or untruth of certain contentions, and as to the merit or demerit of certain transactions, I have uniformly tried to base these opinions upon the fullest obtainable knowledge of the facts. In some cases the judgments at which I have been compelled to arrive contradict those which have been and still are widely current; in some cases they can scarcely fail to be interpreted as an impeachment of other writers who have had either a