HORTUS VEITCHII 



and the people congregate in villages and towns the only 

 means of communication a limited and sorry lot of ponies. 



On approaching a village or small town, uniformed runners 

 from the local Yamen were sent to meet the traveller, and woe 

 betide any unfortunate pedestrian who did not make way on 

 the public road for the officially recognized personage. 



The official gates of the Yamen were opened for the 

 inevitable reception, held in spacious courtyards, with build- 

 ings barbaric in design flanking the boundary walls. The lesser 

 officials were much interested in the general accoutrements, 

 and apparently now saw most of these for the first time- 

 women, when met, turned their heads away, and enveloped 

 the face and hands in the long, loose, spotlessly white cotton 

 robes which the entire nation wear ; children, in the outlying 

 districts, fled as the white man rode down the village street. 



There is no rice in the Far East to equal the rice of the 

 Coreans, the seed is larger and has more weight than the 

 varieties Japan produces ; nor can Japan grow sufficient for 

 her own population, and is dependent for much of her supply 

 on Corea. 



It was known that the flora of the peninsula was of little 

 value, that the nature of the country and climatic conditions 

 were such, that it would not be possible to find any plants new 

 and suitable to English gardens ; hill-slopes covered with 

 Platycodon grandiflorum Mariesii were pretty, and solitary 

 specimens of Pinus koraiensis, never found wild in Japan, of 

 interest. 



This pine was introduced to Europe from a Japanese nursery 

 in 1861 by the late John Gould Veitch. 



Continuing the journey, James H. Veitch sailed southwards, 

 spent several months in Australia and New Zealand, and 

 returned to England in 1893. 



90 



