During the many months of my stay in Korea I spent some days at a wayside farmhouse, the sole accommodation which could be obtained in a mountain village. The slight insight into the mode of life of the farming peasant which was thus gained was replete with interest, charm and novelty. Knowing something of the vicissitudes of farm life, I found the daily work of this small community supremely instructive. Upon many occasions I watched the farmer’s family and his neighbours at their work. The implements of these people are rude and few, consisting of a plough, with a movable iron shoe which turns the sods in the reverse direction to our own; a spade, furnished with ropes and dragged by several men; bamboo flails and rakes, and a small hoe, sharp and heavy, used as occasion may require for reaping, chopping and hoeing, for the rough work of the farm, or the lighter service of the house. [Illustration: A SPADE FURNISHED WITH ROPES] During the harvest all available hands muster in the fields. The women cut the crop, the men fasten the sheaves, which the children load into rope panniers, suspended upon wooden frames from the backs of bulls. The harvest is threshed without delay, the men emptying the laden baskets upon the open road, and setting to with solemn and uninterrupted vigour. While the men threshed with their flails, and the wind winnowed the grain, six, and sometimes eight, women worked, with their feet, a massive beam, from which an iron or granite pestle hung over a deep granite mortar. This rough and ready contrivance pulverises the grain sufficiently for the coarse cakes which serve in lieu of bread. Beyond the bull and the pig, there are few farm animals in the inland districts. The pony and the donkey are not employed in agricultural work to the same extent as the bull. This latter animal is cared for more humanely than the unfortunate pony, whose good nature is ruined by the execrable harshness with which he is treated. The gross cruelty of the Korean to his pony is the most loathsome feature of the national life. [Illustration: POUNDING GRAIN]