I2( TRUTH AND FALSE- HOOD ABOUT KOREA MISSIONARIES By ARTHUR JUDSON BROWN, D.D., Secretary of the Board of Foreign Missions of the Presby- terian Church {The Board of Foreign Missions of the r’-esbyterian Church in the U. S A., J 56 Fifth A venue, New York. Truth and Falsehood About Korea Missionaries. By Arthur J. Brown, D.D. Any one who has visited Korea or is ac- quainted with even the A B Cs of the situa- tion there will read with curious interest Mr. Angus Hamilton’s book, “ Korea.” The reader notes that the author criticizes pretty nearly everybody and everything. He is plainly anti- American and he loses no opportunity to sneer at everything American, not even excepting our excellent United States Minister Allen, whom I personally know to be a man of high character and sound judgment. Mr. Hamilton tells us that he “ found fleas and bugs in the houses of New York and Philadelphia unfortu- nately less amenable to such treatment (fresh mint) than any I came across in Korea.” This is a refreshing bit of naivete. Visitors in New York and Philadelphia who are obliged to stop at a class of houses that abound with “ fleas and bugs ” do not usually care to adver- tise the fact in print. Mr. Hamilton must have had very poor letters of introduction. He abuses the Japanese without stint, de- claring that they “ co mm it, social and adminis- trative excesses of the most detestable char- acter;” that ‘‘their extravagant arrogance blinds them to the absurdities and follies of their actions, making manifest the fact that their gloss of civilization is the merest ve- neer;” that “their conduct in Korea shows them to be destitute of moral and intellectual fibre;” that “they are debauched in business, and the prevalence of dishonorable practices in public life makes them indifferent to private virtue;” that, they are sunk in “commercial and social degradation;” that “their sense of power is tempered neither by reason, justice nor generosity ; ” that “ their existence from day to day, their habits and their manners, there commercial and social degradation, com- plete an abominable travesty of the civili- zation which they profess to have studied;” that “ the Japanese merchant is a rowdy,” and the Japanese coolie “ impudent, violent, and, in general, an outcast more prone to steal than to work.” He even reviles his own coun- trymen and nation, affirming that British mer- chants are characterized by “ apathetic indif- ference;” that the British “no longer show the enterprise and initiative which formerly distinguished us;” that “we are no longer the pioneers of commerce, nor have we the capaci- ty and courage of our forefathers.” And he ridicules “ the follies of the Imperial Govern- ment, the unreasoning prejudices and foolish blundering of the Foreign Office,” “ the drift- 4 ing and vacuous policy of Lord Salisbury,” and concludes his tirade by declaring that “ it seems almost as if the British merchant were so bent upon his own damnation that little could be done,” and that “ unintelligible inaction characterizes British policy there as else- where.” But oddly enough, the man who could see little of the actual good in Americans, Japanese and British, saw in Korea a gro- tesquely exaggerated good. He makes the extraordinary assertion that filthy Seoul is “ neat and orderly,” with “ streets clean and well drained,” and that “ evil odors have fled;” that straggling Chemulpo has “ imposing shops ” and a “ magnificent bund;” that Korea, “ once the least progressive of the countries of the Far East, now affords an exception almost as noticeable as that shown by the prompt assimilation of Western ideas and methods by Japan;” that Korea is “two hundred miles” from Japan; that while the passage across the Korean Strait requires “ fifteen hours,” the trip from Fusan to Moji can be made in “four hours;” that the cost of the journey (from Moscow to Dalny by the Siberian Railway) is almost pro- hibitive, if compared with ocean steamer charges;” and that several other statements are true, which any one who has been in Korea will read in Mr. Hamilton’s book with gasps of amazement. 5 By the time the intelligent reader has reached the chapter on “ the missionary question,” his confidence in the author’s trustworthiness has become considerably shaken, and he is there- fore not surprised to find this important sub- ject discussed in a way that reveals remarka- ble vastness, variety and profoundity of preju- dice and misinformation. He begins by severe- ly criticizing the French Roman Catholic priests for their “ unnecessary sacrifices.” He says that they “live in abject poverty;” that “ they promote anarchy and outrage, even encompassing their own deaths, whenever the interests of their country demand it;” that “ they have wooed the glory of martyr- dom;” that “the diffusion of Christianity (by them) is not unattended with bloodshed and disaster;” that “in the case of Quelpart this feeling of animosity and the immunity from taxation, which the French priests gave to their followers, created an intolerable posi- tion;” that in consequence “anarchy swept over the island and some six hundred believers were put summarily to death;” and that “ whatever may be the compensating advan- tages of this martyrdom, the reckless and profligate sacrifice of life which missionary in- discretion in the Far East has promoted is an outrage upon modern civilization.” Having thus paid his respects to the French Roman Catholic priests, and to everybody else in sight, he calmly proceeds to criticize the 6 Protestant missionaries because their “ com- fortable existence ” does not equal the “ self- abnegation so manifest in the lives of the Roman Catholic priests.” Mr. Hamilton ap- pears to be a difficult man to please. MISSIONARY SALARIES. He expresses the remarkable opinion that the Protestant missionaries are “well paid;” that “ as a class American missionaries have large families, who live in comparative idle- ness and luxury;” that “they own the most attractive and commodious houses in the for- eign settlements and appear to extract from their surroundings the maximum of profit for the minimum of labor.” As a matter of fact, the salary of the aver- age Protestant missionary in Korea is about $600 a year with free rent and an allowance of $100 for a child. An additional $600 is paid to a wife, because prior to appointment, the Board made careful inquiry as to her qualifi- cations for missionary service, and sent her to the field not simply because she was a wife, but because she was expected to do special work among women and children. As to whether a missionary can live in “ luxury ” on $600 for a single man, or $1,200 for a married man with free rent and an al- lowance of $100 for a child, the people of this country can judge as well as Air. Hamilton by simply asking themselves what scale of living such an income would permit in the United States. Korea does not produce the kinds of food and clothing that an American has to use, and the missionary must buy in the United States at the same price that the average American at home pays, and in addition he must pay the cost of freight to Korea. True, he can purchase some of his supplies at a few foreign stores in Korea at what we should re- gard as exorbitant prices; but he usually finds it cheaper to buy his food and clothing in New York, Chicago and San Francisco, and then pay the freight on them to Korea. If in such circumstances missionaries with “ large fami- lies ” can live in “ luxury ” on the salary they receive, they are very remarkable financiers indeed. It is not true, as Mr. Hamilton asserts, that “ servants are provided free,” while the vaunted “ provision for the education of the children ” is $50 a year, and that is paid only when the child is in America and both parents are on the field. The average parent in the United States can doubtless give Mr. Hamilton some valuable information as to whether it is possible to feed, clothe, and educate a child on $100 a year if at home, or $150 if in college, while the larger the family, the greater the difficulty. I admit that the salary of the missionary is adequate to his support. But it is designed to cover only his reasonable needs, and while 8 ministers in this country may look forward to an increase, sometimes to large figures, the most eminent foreign missionary receives the same modest stipend to the day of his death. Other foreigners in Asia are, as a rule, paid far more liberally than missionaries. Macau- lay’s words are as true of Korea as of India — “ All English labor in India, from the labor of the Governor-General and the Commander - in-Chief, down to that of a groom or a watch- maker, must be paid for at a higher rate than at home. No man will be banished, and ban- ished to the torrid zone, for nothing. The rule holds good with respect to the legal profession. No English barrister will work fifteen thou- sand miles from all his friends, with the ther- mometer at ninety-six in the shade, for the emoluments which will content him in cham- bers that overlook the Thames. Accordingly the fees at Calcutta are about three times as great as the fees of Westminster Hall; and this, though the people of India are, beyond all comparison, poorer than the people of Eng- land.” Substantially the same statements might be made regarding the income of non-missionary foreigners in Korea. But missionaries like the Rev. H. G. Underwood, D.D., Dr. O. R. Avison, the Rev. S. A. Moffett, D.D., the Rev. J. S. Gale, D.D., the Rev. Graham Lee, D.D., and dozens of other distinguished missionar- ies, who could have commanded large salaries 9 if they had stayed in America, receive simply the ordinary missionary income. Nor has the missionary local resource like the home missionary. He cannot accept money from native Christians for his personal use without exposing himself to the charge of mer- cenary motives in coming among them. He must be able to say to them, “ I seek not yours but you. ’ ’ Therefore if he earns money, he turns it into the treasury of the Board, so careful is he to avoid even the appearance of self-seeking. It is true that it costs more to maintain the Protestant missionary than to maintain the celibate Roman Catholic priest; but Protes- tantism long ago decided for itself the ques- tion of marriage versus celibacy, and I am not afraid that the sensible people of the United States will be disposed to follow 7 Mr. Hamil- ton ’s lead in condemning the Protestant mis- sionaries in Korea for any such reason. I saw a good many of the Roman Catholic priests in Korea, and they impressed me as being quite as well fed and clothed as the Protestant missionaries, and, as far as I could judge, they appeared “ to extract from their surroundings ” quite as much “ profit ” for their *■ labor ” as the Protestant missionaries. 10 MISSIONARY HOUSES. As for houses, the missionaries do not “ own the most attractive and commodious houses in the foreign settlements,” as Mr. Hamilton al- leges; nor do they own any houses at all, the houses being owned by the mission boards and costing, as I have occasion to know, hut a mod- est sum. I have seen most of the missionary houses in Korea. Two or three were built by wealthy relatives for particular missionaries, and it may be that Mr. Hamilton had these places in mind. But if so, he should have been honest enough to explain that they are excep- tions. Even they, however, cost only about $3,000, including land, while the average mis- sionary residence is about like the home of a country clergyman or school teacher in the United States. The typical Protestant mis- sionary is a man of education and refinement, and his wife is a woman of cultivation and good taste, and 1 do not deny that their dwelling often appears palatial in comparison with the wretched hovels in which the natives herd like rabbits in a warren. Shattered health and rapidly filled cemeteries have taught mission- aries that if they are to live they must go a little apart from the nasty, malodorous, un- sanitary, human pigsty, with its rotting gar- bage and open cesspools, select a site high enough to afford natural drainage, and build a house with a sufficient number of cubic feet of space for the persons who are to occupy it. 11 Then the natural taste of the American-bred husband leads him to make a little lawn and set out a few flowers, while indoors his wife sensibly makes everything as cozy and attrac- tive as she can with the means at her disposal. As it is supposed to be a home for life, articles by gift and purchase are gradually accumulat- ed. It really becomes a pretty place and con- trasting as it does with the miserable habita- tions of a heathen city, it attracts attention. But its attractiveness is not due to the lavish expenditure of money, but to the good taste and inventiveness of a cultivated, intelligent family. MISSIONARIES AND BUSINESS. Mr. Hamilton alleges that “ American mis- sionaries in Korea were formerly closely asso- ciated with the more important export houses in the leading industrial centers of America.” He is careful to use the word “ formerly,” and he also tells us that this practice is “no longer openly indulged.” He insinuates, how- ever^ that such business interests represent the spirit of the American missionaries, and that they would be continued if it were not for “ diplomatic representation.” The simple facts are that when the first missionaries went to Korea they found a people who were quite destitute of even the commonest conveniences of life as practiced by Americans. Christian- ity means much in civilization as well as in 12 religion. To change a man’s heart and to give to him the great ideas of the Gospel are ordin- arily to beget in him a desire for a higher type of physical life. It was quite natural that when a Korean caller saw the clock or cook stove or sewing machine in the missionary’s house, he should manifest an interest and ask the missionary to get him one, and it was equally natural that the missionary should comply with the request. This was done in some instances by a very few of the missiona- ries. They did not do it, however, for financial profit, but simply out of kindly interest in the people, and now that foreign business firms are introducing American and European goods, the missionaries do not do such things at all, except in rare individual instances as a matter of personal friendship, or, perhaps, to prevent an extortionate profit by some unscru- pulous trader. It is grossly unjust to repre- sent all the Protestant missionaries in Korea as doing any thing of the kind, and it is mali- cious to charge mercenary motives upon a whole body of self-denying men and women simply because a half-dozen, more or less, gave such assistance as has been indicated in the earlier years of the work. Mr. Hamilton solemnly declares that one of the missionaries in Won-san has an “ or- chard,” and that another in Seoul occasionally permits a guest to pay for his entertain- ment. These are, indeed, awful crimes. I do 13 not attempt to reply to such charges, as words fail me. I understand that the guilty man who committed the enormity of raising a little fruit does not sell any of his produce and that the Seoul missionary host merely accepted a compensation that was thrust upon him by a few grateful visitors who felt that it would have been unjust to impose on the kindly missionary the extra cost of entertain- ing travellers when the missionary’s income was known to be barely sufficient for the needs of his own family. But, of course, these con- siderations do not atone for such heinous of- fences. Is Mr. Hamilton’s virtuous indigna- tion to be accounted for by the supposition that the Won-san missionary objected to hav- ing his apples stolen, and that the Seoul fam- ily was unwilling to make their home an ac- commodation place for an unsympathetic trav- eler who wanted to quarter himself on the missionary when he should have gone to the hotel ? He asserts that “ there are few foreigners ( in Korea ) , not even excepting the representa- tives of the very miscellaneous collection of American missionaries, who have not come to Seoul from motives of self-interest.” We have no objection to Mr. Hamilton ad- mitting the self-evident truth that he was in Korea for that purpose, but we decidedly ob- ject to his classing the missionaries in the same category. What possible motive of self- 14 interest could induce missionaries to reside permanently in such a land? Mr. Hamilton intimates that he himself was so worn and jaded and disgusted by what he had endured during his short residence in the Land of the Morning Calm that he was eager to leave, and indeed, that he was compelled to do so by ill health. Why should missionaries remain not for a short period only but for a life service, broken only by an occasional furlough? If they are as good business men as Mr. Hamil- ton appears to think, they could certainly do better in a financial way elsewhere, and “ self-interest ” would doubtless prompt them to try. MISSIONARY IDLENESS. Tlie charge that the missionaries do “ the minimum of labor,” and that their families live in “ comparative idleness,” is absurdly false. Take, for example, the Presbyterian missionaries, with whom the writer of this ar- ticle is more particularly acquainted. Seven- ty missionaries, including wives and mother" who have the same family cares that such women have in America, have charge of 32.1 congregations, 79 schools, 5 hospitals and about 35,000 communicants and adherents. I have visited Korea and I did what Mr. Hamil- ton evidently did not do, take pains to inspect the missionary work. I have seen these mis- sionaries, I know what they are doing, and I 15 can testify that they are among the hardest- worked men and women in the world. They are literally wearing themselves out in their efforts to found and maintain churches, schools and hospitals, and to create in a heathen land some of the conditions of decent society. Few mission fields in all the world present such a record of achievement. It is only twen- ty years since the first Protestant missionary entered Korea — a solitary physician and his wife — to face a nation of fifteen millions of people who were deeply rooted in the grossest superstitions and degradations of age-old heathenism. It was not until a year later that the first ordained missionary arrived and not till within the last decade than any consid- erable re-enforcements joined them. Even now there are but 185 all told, including wives, physicians, teachers, translators, press-mana- gers, Bible Society and Y. M. C. A. representa- tives, and all who are absent on necessary fur- lough or sick leave. Each hospital, with work enough for two or three physicians, has but one medical missionary and he must perform every operation and attend every sick patient with- out any competent assistants or trained nurses. Each school, which at home would have several American teachers, has but a sol- itary missionary. As for ministers, there are not as many in all Korea as there are in the average city of eighty thousand inhabitants 16 in the United States. Each one of them is preacher, pastor, Sunday-school superinten- dent, architect, builder and bishop combined, with a diocese a hundred miles, more or less, in extent, and whose scattered cities and vil- lages can be reached only by toilsome jour- neys in regions where there are none of the conveniences of modern transportation. As I know from my owm travels with them in Korea, the missionaries journey through heat and cold and dust and mud, burned by the midday sun, drenched by the sudden storms, eating unaccustomed food, sleeping on the floor in vermin-infested huts— enduring every privation incident to travel in an uncivilized land — and yet, in spite of it all, instructing native helpers and church officers, settling dis- putes, visiting the dying, comforting the sor- rowing, and above all and in all preaching the glad tidings of the Kingdom of God. They have w r hat James Lane Allen calls that “ stark audacity of faith,” that “ burning spiritual heroism,” which inspire men to wander through the wilderness, “ carrying from cabin to cabin, through darkness, and snow and storm, the lonely banner of the Christ, and preaching the Gospel of everlasting peace to those who had never known any peace on earth.” To represent such men and women as living lives of ease and luxury is an outrage, not only upon truth, but upon common sense, and 17 should bring upon the critic the indignant contempt of every right-thinking man and woman. HOW MISSIONARIES ARE SELECTED. There is no other class in the world more carefully selected than the Protestant foreign missionaries. Our own Presbyterian Board makes such a rigid investigation as to the qualifications of applicants and insists upon such a high standard of fitness that an aver- age of only one applicant in three is appointed. Those whom we send out are the pick of our institutions of learning. If Mr. Hamilton imagines that a man lacking in charity and common sense can receive a commission. I sug- gest that he make application for appointment and he will quickly discover the truth to his satisfaction, if not to his discomfiture. I per- sonally know the majority of the Protestant missionaries in Korea. It is my business to know about them. I am an officer of a Board that is responsible to the home churches for the maintenance of a large number of them. What possible motive have the Boards for maintaining in Korea incompetent men and women? Would not the strongest considera- tions of self-interest lead us promptly to re- call missionaries who were guilty of the things which Mr. Hamilton alleges? I have no hesita- tion in setting my personal knowledge of 18 Korea missionaries and their work over against the ignorance of Mr. Hamilton, colos- sal as it is, and I assert that the Korea mis- sionaries are among the very best men and women I know, excelling in character, in devo- tion and in self-sacrificing labors for God and for man. WHY DON’T THE MISSIONARIES RUN? The missionaries in Korea to-day are ex- posed to no small anxiety and even peril in the war between Russia and Japan. A part of the region in which they reside is already within the zone of hostilities. Everybody is advising them to leave in order to seek their personal safety and escape the scenes of ruin and car- nage which are imminent. If they are the kind of people that Mr. Hamilton supposes them to be, why do they not go? Why is it that they are staying at the post of duty? Many of them are in the interior. They are absolutely unarmed. They are forbidden by their principles to fight, and they are too few and too helpless to do so even if they were dis- posed. It takes more courage for them to stand their ground in such circumstances than it does to shoulder a rifle and join a regiment. Yet they are staying there to comfort and guide those terror-stricken Koreans in their time of sore need. It would be difficult to characterize too strongly the meanness of an 19 author who at such a time will attempt to ar- raign those men and women as unworthy of our sympathy and support. Some people, indeed, to whom the mission- aries are always wrong, are criticising them because they declined to leave Pyeng Yang on the warship which the United States Min- ister had sent for them. The engineer who stays at the throttle in time of peril is called a hero. The physician who refuses to desert his cholera-stricken patients is highly praised. The Roman Catholic priest who entered the burning Iroquois Theatre in Chicago to admin- ister the last rites to the dying was lauded by the secular press the country over. But the Protestant missionary who remains at his post of duty, is, forsooth, “ a visionary,” “ whose zeal is eating him up,” and regarding whom, in the language of Mr. Hamilton, “ it is imper- ative that certain measures should be adopted which will insure the safety of the individual zealot and be agreeable to the general com- fort of the community.” He sagely adds that “ these restraints upon missionary labors will, of course, be resented,” but that “ if we wish to avoid another such manifestation as the terrible anti-Christian upheaval in China, it is necessary to superintend all forms of mission- ary enterprise more closely.” And yet, if the missionaries had run away on that warship, these very people who are now criticizing them as zealots would have 20 sneered at them as cowards, and would have descanted upon the superior bravery of the en- gineer and the physician and the Roman Cath- olic priest. “ The missionaries,” rightly re- marks the editor of The Banner, “ are in a po- sition to protect, not only the Christians, but many of the non-Christians as well. While the Japanese officers, and doubtless many of the Russian officials, would deprecate any ill- treatment of the natives, yet there is a large number of rough, inconsiderate men in almost every army. Reports of outrages perpetrated on the Chinese peasantry, both men and women, during the Boxer troubles, are still fresh in our minds, and according to Chinese accounts the Russian soldiers were especially cruel. The poor, ignorant native in such eases is helpless. The chances are that, even if he dared, he could not obtain access to those in command. As a rule, few would dare to at- tempt it, lest some worse thing might happen them. On the other hand, a courteous note from an American to the authorities in com- mand could not well be disregarded, while at the same time all who could take refuge on his premises would be fairly free from molesta- tion. In such circumstances, the missionary's duty is plain, and those in Northern Korea are only doing what any Christian man of ordi- nary courage would doubtless do if in their situation.” 21 THE REAL MAKER OF TROUBLE. In view of Mr. Hamilton’s opinion that the missionaries make trouble among the natives, it is interesting to note h'is own conduct in dealing with them. He informs us that when the Korean sellers of curios became importu- nate, he “ found the specific cure for their pes- tiferous attentions to be administered best in the shape of a little vigorous kicking.” A sorcerer, who was making noisy incantations to exorcise a devil, so aggravated Mr. Hamilton that “ losing my temper and my reason alto- gether, I dropped his gongs and cymbals down a well, depositing him in it after them.” Exe- crating the Koreans for their laziness and vice, he says : “ There is, however, an antidote for this state of things. If sufficient point be put into the argument and the demonstration be further enforced by an occasional kick as customs may require,” etc. He complains be- cause, as he alleges, an American missionary advised a newlv-engaged servant to leave him. I lllillll Um missionary deserves credit for a good deoil. The “ boy ” was probably a decent fellow whom the missionary desired to save from a hard experience. Mr. Hamilton takes his revenge, however, in the splenetic advice to other would-be travelers in Korea that in employing servants, “ it is safer in every ease to take men who are not converts.” That is false, and Mr. Hamilton either knows that it is false or he is culpably ignorant of the plain- 22 est facts. What is there in the teaching of the Gospel of Christ to make a man less reliable than he was before? Why should it be worse for any Korean to stop worshipping evil spirits and to begin worshipping the true God; to turn away from the intemperance, immor- ality and laziness, which Mr. Hamilton de- clares are so common, and become a sober, moral and industrious citizen? The Protes- tant Christians in Korea are the very best ele- ment in the population. Indeed before they were pointed out to me, I could ordinarily tell them on the streets by the unmistakable evi- dences of superior neatness and character. In all my travels in Korea, I had no trouble with native servants, Christian or heathen, and I did not “ curse ” or “ flog ” them either. Mr. Hamilton continues: “ The interpreter will suggest that he re- quires a servant. For this remark he should be flogged.” When the poor inhabitants of a poverty-stricken village declined to sell him their scanty stock of chickens, “ the grooms, the servants and the interpreter at once tackled the mob, laying about them with their whips . . . and fowls and eggs were at once forthcoming.” Imagine the treatment that an Asiatic traveler would receive if he adopted such methods in an American town. In further pursuit of this interesting in- quiry, we find the following passages in Mr. Hamilton’s book: “The interpreter ap- 23 proaehed me to intimate that if his brother did not go he also would stay behind. I looked at him for a moment, at last understanding the plot, and struck him. He ran into the court- yard and yelled that he was dead — that he had been murdered. The grooms in charge of the horses gathered round him with loud cries of sympathy.” * * “ The head groom came up to me, demanding an increase of thirty dol- lars. * * I refused the thirty dollars and thrashed him with my whip. The end of my journey for the moment had come, with a ven- geance. The head groom stormed and cursed and ran raving in and out of the crowd. He then came for me with a huge boulder, and, as I let out upon his temple, the riot began. My baggage was thrown off the horses and stones flew through the air. I hit and slashed at my assailants and for a few minutes became ihe center of a very nasty situation. Servants and grooms, my interpreter, and a few of the spectators went at it keenly while the fight continued.” After having thus described the effect of his own methods upon the natives, he has the self- possession to arraign missionaries for the anti-foreign feeling which he professes to be- lieve their “ indiscretion ” has caused. He also vouchsafes the interesting opinion that “ the practice of scattering missionaries broad- cast in the interior of these Far Eastern coun- tries should not continue.” But he is evident- 24 ly of the opinion that it is entirely proper that travelers like himself should be allowed to go storming, and cursing, and fighting through Asia to their heart’s content. After all that has been disclosed regarding the real causes of the Boxer outbreak in China, the man who ascribes it to the missionaries does so at the expense of either his intelligence or his honesty. It is all too clear that that outbreak was primarily caused by the political and commercial aggressions of Europeans. It would be ludicrous, if it were not so serious a matter, to represent the missionaries in Korea, who have to an extraordinary degree the confi- dence and the affection of the people from the Emperor to the coolie, as a source of disturb- ance. The Koreans know well enough who their real friends arc, and they testify to the accuracy of their knowledge by loving the missionaries, but by hating the “ Puffsnaub- ers,” and mobbing the “ Wintershines,” whom Mr. Hamilton would probably regard as con- genial friends and high authorities. While Mr. Hamilton makes the remarkable suggestion that the activity of missionaries ought to be limited by governmental author- ity it is significant that he does not propose that the activity of traders should be so limit- ed. But I got the very distinct impression from my own long journey through Asia, and conversation and correspondence with hun- dred of foreigners and Asiatics have confirmed 25 the impression, that the foreign trader has done ten times more than the missionary to alarm and irritate the Asiatic. While some of those traders are men of high Christian character, it is notorious that the typical trader in Asia is brutal, profane, intemperate, lustful and greedy, and that in his treatment of the natives and in his remorseless pushing of his own selfish interests he creates the very conditions of hatred and unrest which Mr. Hamilton ignorantly ascribes to the missionar- ies. Captain Brinkley, of the Japan Mail, is authority for the statement that the antipathy to missionaries of the foreign communities in the sea ports of Asia has absolutely no founda- tion in justice or reason. When a traveler returns from foreign lands to malign the best people in them, we may be tolerably sure that he was either making a fool of himself so that he had to be rebuked by the missionaries, or that he got his information from men whose habits gave them personal reasons for dislik- ing Christian men and women. We are re- minded of Charles Darwin’s blunt statement that ‘ ‘ the foreign travelers and residents in the South Sea Islands, who write with such hostility of missionaries, are men who find the missionary an obstacle to the accomplishment of their evil pursuits. ’ ’ Mr. Hamilton gives less than a dozen pages out of 307 to “ the missionary question,” but he has packed into those pages more ignorance, 26 misrepresentation and maliciousness than can be found in an equal space in any other book of my acquaintance. It is plain that he knows practically nothing at first hand regarding the missionaries in Korea; that he has simply picked up the sneers and slanders current among those foreigners who, for reasons best known to themselves, find it convenient to slander pure, high-minded men and women who are not in Korea for personal aggrandize- ment, but for the uplifting of an oppressed people. If I may adapt the reply of Ruskin to one of his critics — “ I do not know that even in this age of charlatanry, I could point to a more barefaced instance of imposture on the simplicity of the public, than the insertion of these pieces of criticism in an apparently re- spectable book. We are not insulted with opin- ions on music from persons ignorant of its notes; nor with treatises on philology by per- sons unacquainted with the alphabet; but here is page after page of criticism, which one may read from end to end, looking for some- thing which the writer knows, and finding noth- ing." TWO TRUSTWORTHY BOOKS. Those who wish to know what Korea and the Koreans really are should turn from Mr. Hamilton ’s overwrought pages to Mrs. Horace G. Underwood’s “ Fifteen Years Among the Top-Knots,” and to T)r. James S. Gale’s “ The 37 Vanguard.” It is true that these authors have not spent any time at treaty-port hotels and that they have not drawn on their imagi- nation for facts to be sent to foreign newspa- pers. But they have lived in Korea more than a dozen years. They know the language of the Koreans. They have studied the country and the people until they have more knowledge of Korea in their little fingers than Mr. Hamil- ton has in his whole body. In “ Wintershine,” one of his characters. Dr. Gale has shown us how critics of the Hamilton type behave in Asia, and how they get their false impressions of missionaries. Both Dr. Gale and Mrs. Un- derwood have written with inteligence and sympathy. Their books give a picture of Korea of such vividness and accuracy that one feels by the time he has finished them that he really knows something about the land of the Morning Calm. They have, what Mr. Hamil- ton has not, eyes to see and ears to hear the mighty forces which are gradually inaugurat- ing a new era in Korea. They show us the real American missionary, not as an idle, lux- urious mercenary individual, but as an edu- cated, consecrated man or woman, the embodi- ment of the highest type of American Chris- tian character and culture, going about among those poor down-trodden Koreans in the name and in the spirit of the Master — healing the sick, teaching the young, translating the Bible, creating a wholesome literature, proclaiming 28 in season and out of season, those great truths of the Christian religion to which Europe and America owe whatever of true greatness they possess, and at the cost of toil and pain and loneliness and misrepresentation, seeking to up- lift a fallen people. No one is perfect, not even a critic, but the man who can write only evil of such men and women is not one whose judg- ment will be accepted by sensible people. Rather will they give in more abundant meas- ure their sympathies and prayers and gifts to the end that the devoted Korea missionaries and the work which they represent may be adequately sustained in this time of extraor- dinary demands upon strength and funds. DATE DUE SEP 2. 2 APR 3 u m » W A GAYLORD PRINTED IN U.S A.