ally chained up in rooms, either by a riveted iron bracelet, fastened
to a short heavy chain, or, more frequently, by an anklet over the right
foot.

Families in Corea are generally small in number. I have no exact
statistics at hand, for none were obtainable; but, so far as I could
judge from observation, the males and females in the population are about
equal in number. If anything, the women slightly preponderate. The
average family seldom includes more than two children. The death-rate of
Cho-sen infants is great, and many reasons can account for the fact. In
the first place, all children in Corea, even the stronger ones who
survive, are extremely delicate until a certain age is attained, when
they seem to pick up and become stronger. This weakness is hereditary,
especially among the upper classes, of whom very few powerful men are to
be found, owing to their dissolute and effeminate life.

Absolute sterility in women is not an uncommon phenomenon, and want of
virile power in the male part of the community is also often the subject
of complaint; many quaint drugs and methods being adopted to make up for
the want of it, and to stimulate the sexual desire. A good many of the
remedies resorted to by the Corean noblemen under such circumstances are
of Chinese manufacture and importation. Certain parts of the tiger, dried
and reduced to powder, are credited with the possession of wonderful
strengthening qualities, and fetch large sums. Some parts of the donkey,
also, when the animal is killed during the spring and under special
circumstances, are equally appreciated. The lower classes of Cho-sen--as
is the case in most countries--are more prolific than the upper ones. The
parents are both healthier and more robust, and the children in
consequence are stronger and more numerous, but even among these classes
large families are seldom or never found. Taken as a whole, the
population of Corea is, I believe, a slowly decreasing quantity.

The Corean is in some respects very sensible, if compared with his
neighbours. Deformities, artificially produced, are never found in Corea.
In civilised Japan, on the other hand, as we all know, the women blacken
their teeth and shave their eyebrows, while there are numberless people
in the lower classes who are tattooed from head to foot with designs of
all kinds. In China, too, people are occasionally deformed for the sake
of lucre, as, for instance, to be exhibited at village shows, and