Page:The passing of Korea.djvu/540

 business or other. The husband of a slave has no right to eat the rice that she receives from her master. He must bring in his own provender, and the two will "pool" their interests and get along very snugly. Of course she will try to get enough out of her master to feed them both, but in any case the children eat of the master's rice till they are old enough to work for themselves.

We have seen that if a slave dies her daughter takes her place. If there are several daughters the eldest takes the mother's place, and the rest go free. If the eldest daughter dies before her mother, then the master selects one of the younger ones to take the mother's place. If a slave dies and the eldest daughter takes up her work, but dies immediately, none of the other daughters can be compelled to step into the vacant place. All male children are naturally free and cannot be enslaved. They owe nothing to their mother's master, and as soon as they can go alone they no longer feed out of his bag.

The slave does all the rough work about the house. She does the washing, brings the water from the neighbourhood well, goes to market, helps with the cooking, walks as a mourner in her master's funeral procession, runs errands and makes herself generally useful. In the country she will work as an ordinary field hand. She is not the familiar servant of the lady of the house, and she seldom acts as lady's-maid, nor is she ever called to do any of the sewing or nursing. Her place is in her master's kitchen or yard, and not in the chamber of her mistress.

Korean folk-lore is full of stories of faithful and unfaithful slaves.