CHAPTER I
WHERE AND WHAT KOREA IS ABOVE AND
BELOW GROUND
NEAR the eastern coast of Asia, at the forty-fourth parallel of latitude, we find a whorl of mountains culminating in a peak which Koreans call White Head Mountain[1]. From this centre mountain ranges radiate in three directions, one of them going southward and forming the backbone of the Korean peninsula. The water-shed is near the eastern coast, and as the range runs southward it gradually diminishes in height until at last it is lost in the sea, and there, with its base in the water, it lifts its myriad heads to the surface, and confers upon the ruler of Korea the deserved title of "King of Ten Thousand Islands."A very large part of the arable land of Korea lies on its western side; all the long and navigable rivers are there or in the south; almost all the harbours are on the Yellow Sea.[2] For this reason we may say that topographically Korea lies with her face toward China and her back toward Japan. This has had much to do in determining the history of the country. Through all the centuries she has set her face toward the west, and never once, though under the lash of foreign invasion and threatened extinction, has she ever swerved from her allegiance to her Chinese ideal. Lacordaire[3] said of Ireland that she has remained "free by the soul." So it may be said of Korea, that, although forced into Japan's arms, she has remained "Chinese by the soul."
The climate of Korea may be briefly described as the same as that of the eastern part of the United States between Maine and South Carolina, with this one difference, that the prevailing southeast summer wind in Korea brings the moisture from
- ↑ In Korean, 백두산 (Wikisource contributor note)
- ↑ In Korean, 황해 (Wikisource contributor note)
- ↑ Henri-Dominique Lacordaire (Wikisource contributor note)
