Page:Science vol. 5.djvu/275

 Uasch ST, I

��S.]

��liam P. Sliinn, io the sketch of liU life id the Railroad gazette, says, " His last professional worlc, and that which moat fuliy ilhistiates the extraordinarr character of his professional ability, and the esteem in which he was held by his engineering contemporaries, was his employment as a consulting engineer on the proposed new Croton aqueduct. ., . That he should be equal to this work at the age of eighty-six was sutHcienlly remarkable; Itut that be should be considered as worthy of being con- sulted by men themselves veterans in the pro- fession, is a still more extraordinary evidence of the exceptional character of the man."

His health and his faculties remained unim- paired till near the close of his life; and he died of old age, in his ninetieth year.

��THE NEW PALACE AT SOUL.

Svcu is the name of that collection of grounds and buildings in Soul which is at present the abode of the reigning sovereign of Korea. Strictly speaking, the title is in both parts a inisDomer: for the place so called is neither new. nor is it exactly what in western parlance would be styled a palace; and yet to Korean thought it is both. Its age is comparati\'e merely, as indeed must be that of every thing which does not contain within itself a terra of life. In this case, the comparison is with what IB now known, in the same antithesis, as the OW Palace. But there is also n certain abso- lute jDsttce in this last name: for the Old Palace could not possibly be any older where it la. It is coeval with the beginning of the (ireseRt state of things, dating from the found- fajg of the city of Siiul. now hard upon the Ire-bnndredth anniversary. The New Palace was laid out some hundred years later, and fa therefore about four centuries old at the present time. In consequence of being later milt, it occupies a somewhat less honorable poBttioD than the older one: for even position ban its allotted ceremonial ig Korea. North, east, west, and south, — this is the relative rank of the four cardinal |H>ints. In etiquette the sovereign always faces the south, and bis sabjecta look to the north. I-'ollowing the same rule, the post of honor gcnernlly, on all occasioDS of ceremony, such as dinners oi- feasts, is at the northern end of the room. A nngtilar practice this, of deterniiuing by exte- rior terrestrial phenomenn the etiquette of en-

��NCE, 251

tertainmeuts carried on within four walls, which are themselves in no wise subjected to orienta- tion, and may face any direction indifferently, according to the fancy of the owner.

When the city of Soul was laid out. there- fore, the palace was given the post of honor. — the northern end of the space enclosed by the city's wall; and, when the second palace came to be built, it was placed as nearly north as was possible consistently with the position of the older one. to whose left, reckoned as facing the city, it lay.

Exactly what was the origin of this custom of allotting a rank among themselves to the cardinal points, it would be interesting to know. We may, perhaps, look to some rude astronomy for an explanation. Like the p,\Ta- mids, it may. in its way. bo the relic of an old study of the stars. Certainly eaily man could hardly fail to he struck by the sight, that, while all else in the heavens moved, the pole alone remained in dignified repose. The Ko- reans themselves suggest a more earthly origin for the practice. Because the south is the bright, the warm, and therefore the happy, region of the earth, they say, the king sits so that he may always face it. When we call to mind the cold winters of those lands whence the far-eastern jjeoples migrated, as well as those to which they nClerwards came and now inhabit, we realize how instinctive this turning in body, as in thought, toward the south, would naturally be.

The New Palace was originally built as a residence for the crown prince, or, to speak more accurately, the heir apparent i for in Ko- rea the heir to the throne is chosen by the king during his life, and is not necessarily bora to the position, though it is customary for his majesty to so designate his eldest son. This is no doubt a reason for the superiority, archi- tecturally, of the other, the older one. But the newer possesses a charm of its own. first from the imeveu cliarnctcr of the ground over which it rambles, and secondly from iieing much less artiflciaily laid out. It is also some- what the larger of the two in the extent of ground it covers. The high wall which sur- rounds it ent'loses about ten thousand acres. In this wall are set gates at various i»ints, four- teen of them in all. There is no symmetry in their arrangement: nor is there any in the line of wall itself, which meanders about in so aim- less a fashion as to cause surprise when at last il ends by meeting itself again. The gates, or archways, arc quite as various in siBeand honor as they are unsymmetricalin position. — a fact typified by their names, which range through

�� �