Page:In Korea with Marquis Ito (1908).djvu/32

 guest was in the waiting-room, the Minister of the Household, watching his chance to escape observation, with his hand upon his heart, appealed to the distinguished American for his nation's sympathy against the oppression of the Japanese. During the two months of my own experience with the ways of the Koreans, all this, and much more of the same sort, was abundantly and frequently illustrated. And, indeed, no small portion of the recent movement toward Christianity is more a political than a religious affair. But of this I shall speak in detail later on.

It was the understanding with Marquis Ito at the interview in Kyoto that he should have me informed at Nagasaki, at some time between March 2oth and 24th, when he desired us to come to Seoul; and that arrangements should then be made for meeting our Japanese escort at Shimonoseki. On returning to the hotel parlor the Marquis apologized to Mrs. Ladd for keeping her husband away so long, and remarked, playfully, that the diplomatic part of the conference was not to be communicated even to her, until its expectations had become matters of history.

Three days later we started for Nagasaki, where I was to spend somewhat more than a week lecturing to the teachers of the Prefecture, and to the pupils of the Higher Commercial School. As we crossed the straits to Moji, the sun rose gloriously over the mountains and set the sea, the shore, and the ships in the two harbors aglow with its vitalizing fire. The police officer assigned to guard his country's guests, pointed out to us the battleship waiting to take the Resident-General to his difficult and unappreciated work in Korea; and nearer the other side of the channel we noted with pleasure the Aki Maru, on which six months before we had crossed the Northern Pacific.

It had been in my plans, even before reaching Japan, to spend a month or two in Kiushu, a part of the Empire which