ragic position, two coolies, carrying a coffin, appeared cautiously on
the scene; but, when still a long way from the bodies, they refused
positively to approach any nearer, and all the expostulation of the old
man who went down to meet them, all the extra strings of _cash_, the last
ones he possessed, were not sufficient to induce them to stir another
inch. This fright which had taken possession of them was thus great,
partly because of the natural superstitions which all Coreans entertain
regarding the souls of dead persons, and also because the fact of being
seen or found near these political criminals might in all probability
lead to the loss of their heads as well. At last, however, when their
terror was somewhat overcome, they promised to go near the bodies if
large sums should be paid them; whereupon the old man who had not another
_cash_ in the world, seemed to act as if he were in a state of thorough
despair. I watched his face and thought that he was actually going to
collapse. Not a word of complaint, however, did he utter to me. Intense
grief was depicted on his face, and I had pity on him. He was old, too,
and his features were refined. He opened his heart to me.

"That," lying dead there, with his head Heaven only knew where, was his
son! He had been a nobleman; that one could see at a glance, but was poor
now, "cashless," having spent his fortune in his efforts to bribe the
officials to let his son be released. His money had come to an end, and
there his son lay dead. The risk he was running, he well knew, was very
great, in thus coming to remove the body of the one he loved. Were the
officials only to know that he had visited the spot, he would straightway
be imprisoned, accused of complicity, tortured, and then put to death;
notwithstanding this, however, he felt sure that darkness would protect
him, and so in his anxiety he had come to remove his son's body, that he
might during the night bury it on one of the distant hills. He had given
the coolies the little money he had to help him in his enterprise, and
now that he was only a few yards from his beloved he could not get them
to proceed. He was himself too weak to move the body.

I took him by the arm, and we approached the bodies. The near view of
them made him shudder and turn pale, and as he rested on my arm he was
shivering all over. Not a word did he utter, not a lamentation did he
make, not a tear did he shed; for, to show one's feelings is cons