tried to
temporize with them, for he was afraid that, if he took too openly hostile
an attitude, the Japanese would punish him. The memorialists sat down in
the palace buildings, refusing to move, and demanding an answer. Some of
their leaders were arrested by the Japanese gendarmes, only to have others,
still greater men, take their place. The storekeepers of the city put up
their shutters to mark their mourning.

At last a message came from the Emperor: "Although affairs now appear to
you to be dangerous, there may presently result some benefit to the
nation." The gendarmes descended on the petitioners and threatened them
with general arrest if they remained around the palace any longer. They
moved on to a shop where they tried to hold a meeting, but they were turned
out of it by the police. Min Yong-whan, their leader, a former Minister for
War and Special Korean Ambassador at Queen Victoria's Diamond Jubilee, went
home. He wrote letters to his friends lamenting the state of his country,
and then committed suicide. Several other statesmen did the same, while
many others resigned. One native paper, the _Whang Sung Shimbun_, dared to
print an exact statement of what had taken place. Its editor was promptly
arrested, and thrown into prison, and the paper suppressed. Its lamentation
voiced the feeling of the country:--

"When it was recently made known the Marquis Ito would come to
Korea our deluded people all said, with one voice, that he is the
man who will be responsible for the maintenance of friendship
between the three countries of the Far East (Japan, China, and
Korea), and, believing that his visit to Korea was for the sole
purpose of devising good plans for strictly maintaining the
promised integrity and independence of Korea, our people, from
the seacoast to the capital, united in extending to him a hearty
welcome.

"But oh! How difficult is it to anticipate affairs in this world.
Without warning, a proposal containing five clauses was laid
before the Emperor, and we then saw how mistaken we were about
the object of Marquis Ito's visit. However, the Emperor firmly
refused to have anything to do with these proposals and Marquis
Ito should then, properly, have abandoned his attempt and
returned to his own country.

"But the Ministers of our Government, who are worse than pigs or
dogs, coveting honours and advantages for