A VISIT TO KOREA 293 



fully and attracted the geese, who alight here at sundown and 

 feed during the night, leaving again just before break of day. 

 We had no luck with them, could never get near enough ; there 

 was no cover, and the geese always got up just out of range. 

 A heavy gun with heavy charges was wanted, or a reed shelter 

 in the fields, or a boat on the creeks. It was difficult to get to 

 the fields early enough, for it entailed floundering along the bad 

 roads and narrow divisions between the rice-fields in the dark, 

 and the same if we remained long enough in the evening. 

 There was then no moon, and the nights were very dark. But 

 at full moon with high tides, when the mud-banks are covered 

 and the geese must all come to feed on the rice-beds, the sport, 

 with proper appliances and a hunter who knows the ropes, must 

 be very good indeed. A reed hut to lie hidden in would 

 probably be best, or a small punt disguised with reeds on a 

 creek near mud-banks and rice-fields. The native hunter walks 

 up to the geese behind a bull, an experiment which a European 

 need not try, for the moment when that, with a Korean, so 

 docile animal with load or without sees a foreigner he turns 

 swiftly round and bolts as fast as he is able. We saw thousands 

 of geese, some in the fields, others flying over, and knocked the 

 feathers out of a few, but no ducks, only a few mergansers. 

 Pheasants seemed plentiful among the dry grass and dwarf 

 pines, oak, and chestnut on the hillside, and quails. 



No, the sport was a dead failure. In this country, as in most 

 others, one visit is necessary in order to find out where and how 

 best to get it during a second. The scenery, though somewhat 

 bare, was very pretty ; the small villages scattered about the 

 valleys seemed prosperous ; they have the same colouring as the 

 ground ; but men in white stalk about, the pink jackets of the 

 children and occasional blue coat of a woman, and here and 

 there bright scarlet chillies laid out to dry on the roofs, give 

 colour. The cabbage is not yet all gathered in, and fresh green 

 barley and wheat are coming up in a field here and there. 



The grounds of a Bhuddist monastery on a mountain near, 

 surrounded by a huge wall several miles in circumference, was 

 the only exception to this otherwise treeless country. On enter- 

 ing by one of the picturesque Chinese concave roofed gates, sur- 

 prise was great to find oneself in park-like scenery, in a forest 

 of huge and very old trees of many kinds filling the whole 



