490 
PROCEEDINGS OF SECTION E. 
deal — his family, guild, or union will avenge his cause, and will wait 
long to do so. The Coreans have a proverb that if one wishes 
vengeance, put a stone in one’s pocket, keep it there seven yeats, 
waiting an opportunity to throw it. If such does not occur in the 
seven years, turn the stone, and wait another seven years. 
All men are to a great extent the creatures of circumstances, and 
the love of revenge in the Corean’s breast is forced upon him by the 
absence of obtaining justice for wrongs done him, and the knowledge 
of this characteristic in his countrymen acts as a check on cruelty and 
oppression. 
Another vice of the Coreans — improvidence — is the effect of the 
misgovernment and the cause of the stagnation and poverty of the 
country. A Corean plebeian has no motive for saving ; any sign of 
wealth would only make him an object for extortion. The consequence 
is the Corean spends at once on eating, clothes, or drinking — specially 
the last — everything he earns. To-day is his own; he never thinks of 
the morrow. In other words, he finds it wisest to invest every cent he 
makes in his immediate enjoyment. If he tried to save for a rainy 
day the money would be taken from him. I had a Corean in to mow 
my lawn ; it was a two-days’ work, and I foolishly paid him his day’s 
wages at the end of the first day. The second day he did not come. 
I sent for him and he replied, “ Why should I work ; I have enough 
to eat to-day and to-morrow ; I will come when I have spent all my 
money.” 
Again, a Corean gentleman was speaking to me about the 
Christians. “Ah,” he said, “ the Christians are very bad.” I asked 
him why. “ They are very bad ; they lend the Coreans money.” “ But 
there is nothing bad in that.” “ No, but you see they want to be 
repaid, and that is very bad.” I told Monseigneur Mutei, the French 
Bishop, this story, and he told me that he very much discouraged the 
Christians lending money, and, further, made the Christians forego 
the debt when the interest had covered the principal and a fair margin 
for the accommodation. 
One day the Bishop was asked for a loan of ten dollars. The 
Bishop refused, but said to the applicant, “ I won’t lend you anything, 
but I will propose to you a bargain by which we shall each gain five 
dollars. Do you agree to that?” “ Yes,” said the Corean hesitat- 
ingly. “ Well, then, I will give you five dollars, by which I gain five 
dollars, for I shall only lose five dollars instead of ten, and you will 
gain five dollars, for you won’t owe me anything.” 
That the Corean improvidence is entirely due to the evil conditions 
under which he lives is proved by the fact that if you take him out of 
those evil conditions he becomes a prudent and industrious man. Thus 
the Coreans who have crossed into the Russian province of Prcemersk 
are greatly prospering as farmers and artizaus, and save money, much 
of which they remit to their relatives in Corea. Call it work, and the 
Corean groans over a walk of twenty miles ; call it pleasure, and he 
will joyfully walk forty to see a stone-fight or procession, or for any 
bit of fun. But still there was a manifest improvement setting in as 
regards providence and industry from 1883 to 1894. In 1883 the 
trade of the country was carried on by barter. The Corean farmer 
took his sack of rice to market and swopped it for cloth or drink — 
specially drink ; but by 1894 he began to save money for foreign 
