Birdseye Views of Far Lands Part 2

The people in Korea nearly all dress in white no matter what their work may be. Men and women dress much alike. A curious custom among married women is the wearing of waists that expose the entire naked b.r.e.a.s.t.s.

This is all but beautiful and as some one says, gives the appearance of a shocking show window. The theory is, so they say, that to cover the b.r.e.a.s.t.s is to poison the milk. No man really amounts to much in Korea until after he is married, but that is largely true in our country.

There, however, silence is the wife's first duty. Marriage customs are much like those in j.a.pan where parents make the matches. It is said that often the husband never hears the voice of his wife until after marriage and even then she keeps silent for as long as a month.

The Korean people have some happy times together in spite of some of these strange customs. One of their national festival days is called "Swing day." Swings are prepared nearly everywhere and people drop their work and swing. The Koreans are different from any other people in the far east and when they play they play with all their might. Men and boys love to hunt the swimming holes along the streams and they seem to enjoy this sport as do our own men and boys in America.

While Korea has been a battleground for ages yet it was opened up to modern civilization by j.a.pan something like America, through Commodore Perry, opened up j.a.pan. Later on Korea paid tribute to China. The great crisis came in 1894 when the battle royal was waged between j.a.pan and China for this land. On September 15th of that year a great battle occurred on land and two days later, in the mouth of the Yala River occurred what is said to be the first great naval battle of history in which modern wars.h.i.+ps were used. In this battle the Chinese fleet went to the bottom of the sea and soon Port Arthur was besieged and taken and the j.a.panese army started across the country with the cry, "On to Peking." This opened the eyes of the Chinese and Korea was surrendered and was practically annexed by j.a.pan and its name changed to Chosen.

Since that time Korean civilization has gone forward by leaps and bounds and is fast becoming a country that has to be reckoned with. The story of j.a.pan's dealings with Korea during these years contains some mighty dark spots. These things have aroused the indignation of the whole civilized world and the end is not yet.

To plant the seed of Christianity on Korean soil has required a great effort and the story of the transformation of this nation that has occurred within the past forty years is as thrilling as can be found in the history of modern missions. It was the pleasure of the writer to travel to the far east with one who has been on the field in Korea for twenty-five years. Thirteen of these years were spent in the city of Pyeng Yang which became the scene of one of the greatest revivals in all the history of the Christian church.

At the time that Mr. and Mrs. Swallen, who were sent as missionaries by the Presbyterian church (Mrs. Swallen was my traveling companion), to Pyeng Yang, it was said to be the most wicked city in Korea. So frightful were the conditions that boys in their play would often drag the corpse of a person who had died during the night through the streets the next day, unmolested. It is almost impossible to believe the story of things that occurred almost daily in this city.

The first building of the mission was but eight feet square, not much larger than a storebox. As at that time men and women were always separate in public gatherings, the men met at one hour and the women at another. Soon the building was doubled in size. When the Swallen's took charge the mission was called the Central church. Then came the great revival wave and the church grew to a great congregation. A new building seating between five and six hundred was erected and before it was finished it was too small. About one hundred members then withdrew to form another congregation in another part of the city. A little later another hundred started still another congregation.

As the Central church building was even yet far too small they erected a great building that will seat two thousand. The interest was so great that other congregations had to be formed and at the time Mrs. Swallen told me this wonderful story, out from this little store-box mission seven great congregations had been formed in different parts of the city. Besides this the movement spread to the country and nearly thirty congregations had grown from this central mission.

Then came the great revival of 1910 which attracted so much attention.

These people started the cry, "A million converts in one year." The work was systematized. Bible cla.s.ses were formed and every Christian became a real missionary. Volunteers were called for, who could give one or more days to the work. Nearly everyone volunteered and during the first three months it was estimated that seventy-five thousand days of personal work was promised. Great earnestness and enthusiasm were manifest everywhere.

The pastor of this Central church and one of his elders formed the habit of going to the church every morning at dawn for prayer. This soon became known and others wished to join them. One Sunday morning the pastor announced that all who wished to do so might join them the following morning and the bell would be rung at four thirty. At one a.

m. the people began gathering and at two o'clock more than one hundred were present. For four mornings these meetings were kept up and between six and seven hundred were present each morning. On the fourth morning the pastor asked how many would give one or more days of service and every hand went up, more than three thousand days work being promised.

The secret of this mighty revival seems to have been caused by the study of the Bible and prayer. Everyone carried a New Testament. Bible training cla.s.ses were formed and sometimes two thousand men actually gathered to study the Bible. In the churches in Korea, even yet men and women sit apart from each other. A pet.i.tion divides the building but both men and women can see the minister. Men keep their hats on in church, but all, both men and women, take off their shoes before entering. To see these shoes, or clogs, is quite a sight. They are placed in racks made for that purpose, each having their own particular place in the rack.

As might be expected trouble over shoes is not unheard of. Some of the women who are not over scrupulous sometimes take the best pair of shoes.

In fact this custom became so universal that the women were taught to make and carry with them to church a small muslin bag. On reaching the church the women now take off their shoes, place them in the bag, and take them into the building with them. All, both men and women, sit on the floor. In some of the churches now small mats are piled high at the door and each takes one of these to sit on. One remarkable feature of these Korean churches is that each church is self-supporting from the beginning. Instead of leaning upon others they are taught to depend upon themselves.

The World's Sunday School Convention was recently held in Tokyo. A significant thing about the invitation cabled to this country for this convention was the fact that it was signed by j.a.pan's leading captain of industry and the Mayor of Tokyo as well. A Business Man's Sunday School Party had toured both j.a.pan and Korea before this, however. In almost every one of the forty cities visited this party was met by governors, mayors, chambers of commerce, boards of education, railroad officials, as well as Christian workers and the friendly att.i.tude of j.a.pan toward America was manifest in every possible way, at the very time too when the California legislature was stirring up so much trouble between the two nations.

But the greatest demonstration of all on this entire trip was that made in Seoul, Korea. The day was perfect. The great throng marched to the parade grounds, a Sunday school banner leading the way. Only members of Sunday schools and officials were admitted and fourteen thousand seven hundred Sunday school workers, by actual count, went into the grounds.

It is said that the j.a.panese officials who for the first time witnessed an array of the Sunday school forces of Seoul looked troubled. It was in the month of May and the bushes of the old palace yard were abloom in white and red. As the great mult.i.tude sang the Christian hymns in the Korean language the very buildings almost trembled.

CHAPTER V

A GREAT UNKNOWN LAND--MANCHURIA

Of all the lands in eastern Asia perhaps the least is known about Manchuria of any of them. And yet one of the finest sleeping cars I ever traveled in was on the South Manchurian railway. I had a large roomy compartment to myself. In it was a comfortable bed, or berth, a folding washstand and writing desk, electric fan, and various other conveniences. While this was an eastern model sleeper, an American pullman was also attached to the train for those who preferred it.

For two hundred and seventy years the Manchurians furnished the rulers for the whole Chinese Empire. The Empress Dowager was a Manchu. Born in a humble home, at the age of sixteen she became a concubine of the Emperor. She was so diligent in study and self-improvement that she was elevated to the position of first concubine and later became the mother of the Emperor's son and was raised to the position of wife. When her son was but three years of age the Emperor died and she swept aside all aspirants to the throne, placed her son upon it with herself as regent until he was of age. For forty-seven years, in a country where women had scarcely any power, this marvelous woman ruled one-fourth of the human race.

Manchuria is a little larger than the combined area of Iowa, Minnesota, Nebraska, Kansas, and Missouri. It is located at the northeast of China and until recently formed a part of the Chinese Empire. While nearly all kinds of grain and vegetables are grown, the one great staple crop of Manchuria is the soybean. Think of growing two million tons of these beans per year! Before the war Manchurian beans were s.h.i.+pped all over the world. In a Manchurian city I asked a business man to tell me the chief sights of the city and he said: "We have nothing here but bean mills. It is beans, beans, beans." In the hills and mountains nearly all kinds of wild beasts are found. The Manchurian tiger is perhaps most dreaded of all.

Perhaps the best known place in Manchuria is Port Arthur. Years ago the Chinese had what they believed to be an impregnable fortress in Port Arthur, but the wily j.a.panese battered it down in twenty-four hours.

Later on the Russians got it and worked seven years on the fortifications and gun emplacements and really felt that they had it secure. Although the forts were built on the Belgian plan and Port Arthur was as secure as Antwerp, yet the unconquerable j.a.panese took it with a loss of only a thousand or fifteen hundred men. Nature has been kind to Port Arthur by throwing up the mountains of "The Chair," "The Table," and the "Lion's Mane," but the best defense that nature provides has to give way before the genius of the human brain.

Only a little more than four miles from Port Arthur is the city of Dalney, also called Dairen. It is a beautiful little city of fifty or sixty thousand people with a good street car system and many modern buildings. On landing I went to the Yamato hotel and found comfortable quarters at a reasonable price. The South Manchurian railway operates a string of these Yamato hotels. This is a j.a.panese railway and operates with a steams.h.i.+p line crossing the Yellow Sea and the great Trans-Siberian railroad, or rather did so before the world war. In Dalny I found a good Y. M. C. A. building with an American secretary. This a.s.sociation has good buildings in nearly every large oriental city especially if it is near the coast. One can hardly realize the debt of grat.i.tude civilization owes to this organization. These buildings are oases on the great oriental desert where the American traveler can find rest and a quiet home.

At the close of the war between Russia and j.a.pan by the treaty of Portsmouth, Russia agreed to transfer to j.a.pan without compensation and with the consent of the Chinese Government, the South Manchurian Railway between Port Arthur and Changchun, a distance of four hundred and thirty-six miles, "together with all rights, privileges, and properties appertaining thereto in that region, as well as all coal mines in said region belonging to or worked for the benefit of the railway." The Chinese Government also agreed not to construct any parallel lines that would injure the interests of this railway, so the j.a.panese have an iron hold upon the whole proposition.

To travel the full extent of this railway in the late fall is an interesting experience. The soil is of a reddish color and the fall plowing was already done. The methods of farming used in China largely prevail here. I saw many of them taking their beans, grain, and other produce to market. Along the dusty highway the oxen slowly trudged, drawing great wooden wheeled carts. On one occasion the engine had frightened the oxen and they had their heads up and tails flying as the loaded cart b.u.mped along over the field with the driver doing all he could to get them back into the highway. Women and children were often sitting on the ground in the villages, seemingly without any work whatever to do.

The Manchurian people are larger physically than the Chinese and are better looking. But some one has said of the Manchu, "he knows not, neither does he learn." They say that he only bathes once a year and does not care who owns the ground as long as he can till it, and that it does not bother him in the least to see his wife and daughter sit on the stone fence for hours picking the lice from each other's head. The women folks are largely slaves of fas.h.i.+on and still persist in trying to stunt the growth of their feet. Even while they do this they often work in the harvest field, wash their clothing along the streams, clean out the donkey stable, and do all kinds of outdoor work. While baking bread, spanking their children and doing other household duties, they are not slow in looking after and waiting upon their lordly husbands.

Some years ago a plague of the most deadly description swept over northern Manchuria. It was so terrible and fatal that when one was stricken there was but little hope for recovery. It was so contagious that when one member of a family took it, generally the entire family perished, as simply a whiff of the breath of one stricken was sufficient to give it to another. The government made every effort to cope with the situation but the difficulties were tremendous and the scourge spread like a prairie fire. More than forty-two thousand took it and it is said that not a single one recovered.

The ground was frozen so hard that it was impossible to dig graves for the dead and preparation was made for cremating bodies. This created consternation among the Manchus. Every possible subterfuge was resorted to to conceal cases of the plague and bodies were often hidden in the snow all winter long. Dr. Jackson, a brilliant young physician of the Irish Presbyterian Mission in Manchuria, was stricken and died, as did Dr. Mesny, a splendid French physician. Early the next spring the plague ceased as suddenly as it broke out and has never appeared again in any country. However, many believe the "influenza" is a modification of this plague.

Mukden, the Manchurian capital city, has been called "The Asiatic Armageddon!" It is a walled city and contains a couple of hundred thousand people. During the Russian-j.a.panese war a portion of it is said to have been eight different times in the hands of the Russians and j.a.panese. The streets are unpaved; dirt and filth abounds. There are many big dirty restaurants. The Manchus are great feeders. They eat between meals, soup and vegetables and most everything else. The temperature of Mukden is about the same as Saint Paul, Minnesota.

The Imperial Tombs are not far from Mukden. The road to these tombs is paved with stones. This is called the "Road of the Spirit." On each side are six great life-sized stone animals. It is thought that these signify the Emperor's rule over certain countries. Visiting the great Ming Tombs near Nanking, China, one sees many of these large stone animals.

Not far from Mukden one can get a look at the great Wall of China, the building of which is said to be the greatest undertaking of all history.

It was fifteen hundred miles long, fifty feet thick at the bottom and from twenty-five to forty feet high. It was built over mountains, across valleys and rivers and down into the sea. There were towers about every three hundred yards and although built more than two thousand years ago, much of it is in good repair to this day. It took a million men ten years to do the job of building it. The Chinese and Manchus were great wall builders. Their cities were always walled.

Mukden stands on a plain but its walls are forty feet high and thirty feet thick at the top. At each corner, and over each of the eight gateways there used to be a tower, and then the great Drum Tower and Bell Tower were in the midst of the city. Nearly every city had its big Drum Tower upon which drums were beaten if the city was in danger or an enemy near. Here in Mukden nearly all these towers have been taken down, but large portions of the old city walls remain. There are said to be very many more men than women in the city today. Until 1905, it is said, the city never had a policeman. The gates were closed at dark and the city became silent as the streets were not lighted. There is not enough light in the streets yet at night to hardly be noticed. The old patriarchal family system often prevails. Sometimes a family will be composed of a hundred people--several generations. The following from Dugald Christie will give a glimpse of some of the strange customs of these people.

He says: "There was in Mukden a wealthy family who had land in the country adjoining that of some poor people. A dispute arose over boundaries and they went to law. Having money to back him the rich man won the case. The next day a son of the poor man committed suicide at the rich man's door and he had to compensate the parents heavily. When that was settled another son did the same, calling on all to witness that he did this because of the injustice his parents had suffered at the hands of this man. This time a much heavier indemnity was demanded and after months of haggling it was paid. Then a third son killed himself in like manner and the payment of the still further increased blood money reduced the once wealthy man to a state poorer than his rival. Again the law suit was heard and this time the country family won the case."

Another Manchurian city of note is Harbin. This is located in the great agricultural district of the country. Twenty-five or thirty years ago this was open prairie, but one night two Russians pitched their tent on the spot that is now the center of the city. Like Jonah's gourd, the city almost grew up in a night. For years it was about the worst city to be found, there being at least one murder committed almost every day.

After changing trains at midnight and rambling around a few hours I would say that it is not filled with saints yet. During the Russian-j.a.panese war it was one of the great gateways, more than a million soldiers pa.s.sing through it.

From Harbin west one pa.s.ses through the Kuigan mountains. This is said to be the coldest place of like lat.i.tude on the globe. Here grows in abundance the Edelweiss, which is so rare and so prized in Switzerland.

Mr. Taft, in "Strange Siberia," calls attention to the fact that one of the Manchurian towns here is named for Genghis Khan, who was one of the great military geniuses of the old days. He united the vast hordes of warring tribes of Siberia into one vast army and swept over this whole country like a mighty conqueror. Our American soldiers who were sent to this section of the Far East sure got a glimpse of Manchuria that they will never forget.

Before the world war many of the Chinese and Manchus crossed the line and worked in the Russian gold mines and grew rich, but they had a time getting their gold out of Russia without being discovered. But their cuteness is proverbial. Even Chinamen die, and they as well as the Manchus must sleep their long sleep in their native land. In a certain Russian city it is said that these Chinese were paying great attention to the dead bodies of their kindred in preparing them for the journey back home. The Russians became suspicious and peeping through a keyhole at the embalming processes these policemen discovered that gold dust was blown from a tube into the dead man's skull. This let the cat out of the bag, for these Chinese were making the bodies of the dead the carriers of gold, for as soon as the bodies reached home the gold was extracted.

CHAPTER VI

THE LAND OF SORROW--SIBERIA

Away yonder in eastern Siberia, on the banks of the Amur River, high on the projecting cliff stands a huge iron cross which can be seen many miles away. Upon this Christian emblem is inscribed one of the greatest sentences in all the literature of the world. Here it is: "Power lies not in force but in love." Strange it is indeed that such an emblem and such an inscription should be found in the wilds of this country. But many are the strange sights one beholds on a journey across this great lonely, strange, and sad land. Having crossed this country it is my purpose to recount some of the observations and experiences of the journey.

But few people today realize the immensity of Siberia. You could take a map of the whole United States, including Alaska and Hawaii, and add to it a map of Great Britain, Spain, Portugal, France, Belgium, Italy, Switzerland, Germany and Austria (before the war), Holland, Denmark, the Turkish Empire, Greece, Roumania, and Bulgaria, and lay all these together down on Siberia alone and have territory left. Nearly five thousand miles of the main line of the great Trans-Siberian railway are in this one country.

The building of this railroad was a gigantic undertaking and its construction cost the Russian Government four hundred million dollars.

With all our boasted American hustle it took twenty years to build the Canadian Pacific railway from coast to coast. The Trans-Siberian is more than twice as long and was completed in half that length of time.

Before the war there was hardly ever an accident on this railway. Every verst (about two-thirds of a mile) there is a little guardhouse and there was always a man or woman, generally a woman, standing with a flag as the train pa.s.sed. I crossed on the International Sleeping Car train.

It took ten days and ten nights and the average speed was more than twenty miles per hour.

The berths on this train were very comfortable. They were crosswise of the car while ours are lengthwise. The train consisted of two first-cla.s.s, two second-cla.s.s sleepers, a diner and a baggage car. These international trains ran once a week each way before the war and sometimes one had to purchase a ticket weeks in advance to go at a given time. When all berths were sold those who had none simply had to wait a week for the next train. I was the lone American on the train all the way across. There were a number of Englishmen and many Frenchmen on board.