occurrence, I would not mention it. There are always occasional men who, invested with authority and not properly controlled, abuse their position. But here torture is employed in many centres and on thousands of people. The Imperial Japanese Government, while enacting paper regulations against the employment of torture, in effect condones it. When details of the inhuman treatment of Christian Korean prisoners have been given in open court, and the victims have been found innocent, the higher authorities have taken no steps to bring the torturers to justice.

The forms of torture freely employed include, among others:—

1. The stripping, beating, kicking, flogging, and outraging of schoolgirls and young women.

2. Flogging schoolboys to death.

3. Burning—the burning of young girls by pressing lighted cigarettes against their tender parts, and the burning of men, women and children by searing their bodies with hot irons.

4. Stringing men up by their thumbs, beating them with bamboos and iron rods until unconscious, restoring them and repeating the process, sometimes several times in one day, sometimes until death.

5. Contraction—tying men up in such fashion as to cause intense suffering.

6. Confinement for long periods under torturing conditions, as, e.g., where men and women are packed so tightly in a room that they cannot lie or sit down for days at a stretch.

In the latter chapters of this book I supply details of many cases where such methods have been employed. Where it can safely be done, I give full names and places. In many instances this is impossible, for it would expose the victims to further ill treatment. Sworn statements have been made before the American Consular authorities covering many of the worst events that followed the 1919 uprising. These are now, I understand, with the State Department at Washington. It is to be hoped that in due course they will be published in full.

* * * * *

When my book, "The Tragedy of Korea," was published in 1908, it seemed a thankless and hopeless task to plead for a stricken and forsaken nation. The book, however, aroused a wide-spread and growing interest. It has been more widely quoted and discussed in 1919 than in any previous year. Lawyers have argued over it in open court; statesmen have debated parts of it in secret conferences, Senates and Parliaments. At a famous political trial, one question was put to the prisoner, "Have you read the 'Tragedy of Korea'?" It has been translated into Chinese.

At first I was accused of exaggeration and worse. Subsequent events have amply borne out my statements and warnings. The book has been for a long time out of print, and even second-hand copies have been difficult to obtain. I was strongly urged to publish a new edition, bringing my narrative up to date, but I found that it would be better to write a new book, including in it, however, some of the most debated passages and chapters of the old. This I have done.

Some critics have sought to charge me with being "anti-Japanese." No man has written more appreciatively of certain phases of Japanese character and accomplishments than myself. My personal relations with the Japanese, more especially with the Japanese Army, left me with no sense of personal grievance but with many pleasant and cordial memories. My Japanese friends were good enough to say, in the old days, that these agreeable recollections were mutual.

I have long been convinced, however, that the policy of Imperial expansion adopted by Japan, and the means employed in advancing it, are a grave menace to her own permanent well-being and to the future peace of the world. I am further convinced that the militarist party really controls Japanese policy, and that temporary modifications which have been recently announced do not imply any essential change of national plans and ambitions. If to believe and to proclaim this is "anti-Japanese," then I plead guilty to the charge. I share my guilt with many loyal and patriotic Japanese subjects, who see, as I see, the perils ahead.

In this book I describe the struggle of an ancient people towards liberty. I tell of a Mongol nation, roughly awakened from its long sleep, under conditions of tragic terror, that has seized hold of and is clinging fast to, things vital to civilization as we see it, freedom and free faith, the honour of their women, the development of their own souls.

I plead for Freedom and Justice. Will the world hear?

F.A. McKENZIE.

Contents

I. OPENING THE OYSTER

II. JAPAN MAKES A FALSE MOVE

III. THE MURDER OF THE QUEEN

IV. THE INDEPENDENCE CLUB

V. THE NEW ERA

VI. THE RULE OF PRINCE ITO

VII. THE ABDICATION OF YI HYEUNG

VIII. A JOURNEY TO THE "RIGHTEOUS ARMY"

IX. WITH THE REBELS

X. THE LAST DAYS OF THE KOREAN EMPIRE

XI. "I WILL WHIP YOU WITH SCORPIONS"

XII. THE MISSIONARIES

XIII. TORTURE A LA MODE

XIV. THE INDEPENDENCE MOVEMENT

XV. THE PEOPLE SPEAK—THE TYRANTS ANSWER

XVI. THE REIGN OF TERROR IN PYENG-YANG

XVII. GIRL MARTYRS FOR LIBERTY

XVIII. WORLD REACTIONS

XIX. WHAT CAN WE DO?

I

OPENING THE OYSTER

Up to the last quarter of the nineteenth century, Korea refused all intercourse with foreign nations. Peaceful ships that approached its uncharted and unlit shores were fired upon. Its only land approach, from the north, was bounded by an almost inaccessible mountain and forest region, and by a devastated "No Man's Land," infested by bandits and river pirates. When outside Governments made friendly approaches, and offered to show Korea the wonders of modern civilization, they received the haughty reply that Korea was quite satisfied with its own civilization, which had endured for four thousand years.

Even Korea, however, could not keep the world entirely in the dark about it. Chinese sources told something of its history. Its people were the descendants of Ki-tzse, a famous Chinese sage and statesman who, eleven hundred years before Christ, moved with his tribesmen over the river Yalu because he would not recognize or submit to a new dynasty that had usurped power in China. His followers doubtless absorbed and were influenced by still older settlers in Korea. The result was a people with strong national characteristics, different and distinct from the Chinese on the one side and the Japanese on the other.

We knew that, as Korea obtained much of its early knowledge from China, so it gave the younger nation of Japan its learning and industries. Its people reached a high stage of culture, and all records indicate that in the days when the early Briton painted himself with woad and when Rome was at her prime, Korea was a powerful, orderly and civilized kingdom. Unhappily it was placed as a buffer between two states, China, ready to absorb it, and Japan, keen to conquer its people as a preliminary to triumph over China.

In the course of centuries, it became an inbred tradition with the Japanese that they must seize Korea. Hideyoshi, the famous Japanese Regent, made a tremendous effort in 1582. Three hundred thousand troops swept over Korea, capturing city after city, and driving the Korean forces to the north. Korea appealed to