Page:The passing of Korea.djvu/269

 the aid of a foreigner, he got the case taken up, he was roundly scolded for obtaining foreign help,—but the money was paid. An American gentleman was served the same trick by the same broker, and, though the Japanese authorities granted that it was a perfectly clear case, he recovered the money only after nine months of hard work, and then without interest. A Korean bought a valuable business block from a Japanese, but when he went to claim it the Japanese tenant who had rented it from the former owner refused to leave, on the plea that he had no other place to go. Time and again the owner applied to the Japanese for redress, and it was only after a foreigner interfered and pressed the matter that the Japanese authorities were shamed into doing tardy justice.

The trouble has been that, however good may have been the plans of the highest men in Japan, they have not a sufficient body of agents who are broad-minded enough to carry out the plans in the spirit they are given. To illustrate this: in the building and repairing of the railroad it is found cheaper to use Koreans than Japanese. The head office orders the work to be done and says that Koreans must be treated properly. There it ends. The Japanese headmen of the working gangs go into the villages all along the way, and at the point of the revolver or sword compel Koreans by the hundreds to go and work at one-third of a day's wage. They have the option of making a money payment in lieu of work, but they have to pay, for each day that they get off, twice what they would have received. In this way one township handed over some twenty thousand dollars of blackmail, and for part of it they had to pay twelve per cent a month to money-lenders!

The Koreans have suffered especially in the matter of real estate. On the strength of Korea's promise to supply all the land necessary for Japanese military operations, the latter have gone in and seized the most valuable property in the vicinity of the largest towns in Korea. When the people ask for payment, they are told to go to their own government for payment.