The most obvious thing of interest in Seoul is the city wall. Its construction was begun early in 1396, four years after the present dynasty came to the throne; it was finished in about nine months by the forced labor of men aggregating in number 198,000. According to the legendary account, the course of the wall was marked out by a Buddhist monk, who had the help of a miraculous fall of snow that indicated the line which should be taken in order to avoid a dangerous mixture of the “tiger” influence and the “dragon” influence. To this day the Koreans, like the Chinese, whose pernicious domination they have followed in this as in many other respects, are firm believers in geomancy. The fact is, however, that the wall surrounding Seoul wanders, without any assignable reason, some twelve miles, as recent surveys have settled the long dispute about its length, over hills and along valleys, enclosing a vast amount of uninhabitable as well as inhabited space. It is built of partially dressed stone, with large blocks laid lengthwise at the base, and the superstructure formed of layers of smaller stone—the whole surmounted by battlements about five feet high and pierced with loop-holes for archery adapted to the varying distances of an approaching foe. In height it ranges from twenty to forty feet; it is banked by an embankment of earth from twelve to fifteen feet thick. Various attempts have been made at patching up this decaying structure, but it can never have had the solidity and impregnability against attack by the methods of mediæval warfare which were given to fortifications of the same era in Japan. Moreover, the Korean defenders of the wall customarily ran away as the foe approached; and this the Japanese seldom or never did. Thus Seoul was easily captured by the warriors of Hideyoshi in 1592, and nearly a half century later by a Manchu invading army. The wall is, of course, useless for purposes of defence against modern warfare; and its continuance in existence, at least in large part, depends upon the length of time during which the sentiment of pride triumphs over more utilitarian considerations.