Show land calm ell 0 W x Q aar ax 77 r ral a 4 MI ral jaja 0 JJ ja 9 0 1 A krean korean blacksmith at work prepared by natle nal geographic society wash washington inet on D C hervle lia le chosen geographically korea has been in the center of the sino japanese controversy tro versy during the last two years yet the tha land of morning calm cairn has seldom broken into the daily news there la Is something elusive about the very name of the land of ti morning thorning calm japan everybody knows china nobody knows chosen or korea tier her light hidden under a bushel for centuries not yet yel very tolerant of tourists and standing aloof from the colonizer with all her proud heart Is as shrinking as the mimosa and yet to some travelers the most fascinating country of the three she asked of the ages only to be lot let alone but the gift was denied her under japanese influence and control the old ox os cart and river traffic has given way in large part to 49 0 miles of public and privately operated railways which annually carry some passengers the returning traveler notices a change in the appearance of korea from a dry woodless barren looking country with a leaving heaving mass of graves it la Is fertile well watered much cultivated and obviously defor ested give life to the mountains first and you will give life to the nation a japanese official had bad advised so one of japans first acts was to introduce an extensive program the forests are not yet of course fully grown but they are well started and will help conserve koreas boreas future rainfall at several points model forms farms started by the japanese also give unquestioned S evidence of the increased productivity and prosperity of the country the japanese naw now own about half of the cultivated land and why the graves disappeared the traveler learns itow bow f it was that hundreds of thousand graves have been made to disappear disappear in the old days the soothsayer and he only could declare the most fortunate position for a grave often the spot he chose was the fairest place to in the fam ilys most fertile field and after the grave had been placed there it would not have been respectful to the dead to cultivate the field in a country as old as korea and with such a reverence for graves the result con can be imagined once grassy mounds rolled everywhere like the waves of the sea the japanese changed all 11 that in japan 7 apan very little land Is given over to graveyards in a country so small so mountainous and with such a teeming population there lu la of necessity little waste land every arable foot Is cultivated tiva ted Cr cremation emotion was early carly favored consequently japanese cemeteries are small and insignificant except occasionally sio signally nally around a monastery in korea the japanese established graveyards at what seemed to them appropriate intervals koreans who refused to remove their ancestors to these cemeteries were opre compelled to pay a grave tax there was naturally much 0 opposition for tho the graves of a korean are his most cherished possession rut but taxes are taxes and this tax acco accounts ants for the increased fertile acreage the also Is re pon sible for the fact that so many fine pieces of celadon cr ladon n sen sea green porcelain all of them belonging to the koral period and nil all ur trove from graves found their way to the market korea Is a country of many capitals As one came to he be considered soothsayers would choose another again when from extravagance bad government or reckless taxation signs of misfortune began to appear tile the capital would be moved to a new site just its as loveless married couples move f from rom house to house hoping to leave tapir discontent behind them sulgen bulgen or sometimes ca called lied the flowery castle about 25 miles south of seoul had glory for a day its as time Is reckoned in the old old countries of the east for long years too it was one of the important defensive of seoul find at one time Is said to have shelt sheltered Pred 50 Kl people very ilk likely ely it perhaps more for the ruins are extensive the pity city now has about people in the latter part of the eighteenth century the place so captivated ono one of the kings kanca of seoul that he flirted with the iden of transferring his rap ital th there re the summer pavilion love ly in its decay Is all that Is left of the palace where he frequently used to resort two of these YI also callei called LI kings father and son the latte having built tile the cit city V walls found their last resting places within seigen s friendly confines ugly costumes Cosi umes although the korean costume rot foi men Is considered by some observers the most impressive in the dress Is decidedly tive alve its shapelessness would make a sylph look like a sa sack ek of potatoes the hair Is worn in the most ugly way possible parted in the middle then brushed back at either side of the head and wound luto loto a tight knot at the nape of the neck in a way that would make the venus ventis of sillo took look like SIs hopkins especially Is th the e poll polished shed forehead ruthlessly exposed and brought into prominence one would say that the hideousness of the costume might cause the attraction of korean men to the k or professional dancing girls if they had evolved anything prettier I 1 but the improvement Is slight the kel kelsting saing do pull out the hair on their temples and make a somewhat softer hair line than that of the other women but they draw it in the same tight knots the h have adopted a prettier sleeve which Is very long and trimmed with gay ribbons they wear brighter colors and many ornaments their dancing feet are tiny when you can get a glimpse of them beneath the voluminous skirts which trail all around but for professional dancers they are the most algor rigorously bously covered women la in the world congdo was the high tree capital or of korea from the tenth century until 1302 during the koral dynasty the elizabethan age of korea almost everything that Is loveliest in korean art and literature Is of tile the koral period and roost most of the arts of this golden age are now lost the making of celadon for instance congdo was also a walled city and Is still wonderful and extensive the palace of the old korean caesars caesara Is entirely gone more the pity though there Is something disappointing to ninny many western minds in chinese korean and japanese palaces there Is too much wooden simplicity too much dependence on paint and lacquer not enough comfort and no preciou aJ stones they are neither barbarous nor civilized just bare and uncomfortable looking apparently there has not been a fir fire e in congdo for a thousand years looking down from the heights one sees the remarkable thatched roofs of this old old city their ancient designs miraculously preserved they are brown and soft looking and curious in shape each house seems to follow any line its owner may have fancied they are almost never square some are shaped like horseshoes some like crescent moons and others are fashioned like gridirons grid irons all have a thick mushroom thatch scenery at pyongyang about miles north of S seoul charming old heljo Pyeng pyongyang yang sprawls on bluff ilke hills which rise above the sweep sweeping ang daldo daido daidone Dal Dai dong river one has missed much in this hermit kingdom until one has stood in the p pavilion a that Is perched atop botan dal or peony point and seen the supe superb rb panorama of mountains plain city and the sparkling river well might koreas boreas traditional founder who coined the title land of Nf morning ornIng calm have stood on this very eminence and watched the play of light and clouds over the marvelous landscape up and down and across the swift moving waters of the paldo daldo ply nu berous cargo craft and ferryboats ferry boats their white and golden sails glinting in the sunlight farther downstream spans of a modern steel bridge vault the river and still farther off rise smoking factory chimneys a twin bieth century touch impinging on the scene Pyeng pyongyang yang Is one of the oldest cities in norea korea for cent centuries urles previous to the rise of congdo it was the capital according to tradition it was here that the nations founder kitze KI kl tze a chinese scholar established his p palaces il when he became emperor his supposed burial place Is marked by a shrine the tablets stone images and lanterns that surround the mausoleum however were erected nearly 2000 years after he had lived ived and ruled and died in his adopted land tf it Is said that the falling of a miraculous ra snowstorm showed the ibe tl dynasty where to build the walls of keljo seoul seoul known as the snow capital now new the temple of leaven heaven Is the dancing room of a tourist ho tel some of the walls have been torn down and now skirts around as well as aa through the old sates gates the exquisite ten house like that pictured nn n the willow pattern plate only far lovelier where queen I 1 tin min used to entertain the chinese envoys hits has been razed and no longer rises in loveliness from its lotus loins led bed modern hanks banks and of offices flees bonu mental storie stone government buildings building 9 find and wide tram any Y anil hus served streets have riven given the metropolis a thoroughly roughly iho up to date him appearance liea bearance pe arance ranc e rather than that of an opi afi antal capital |