Entering by a grand three-arched gateway with its stone-balustraded stone staircase, and stone lions on stone pedestals below, one is bewildered by the number of large flagged courtyards, huge audience-halls, pavilions, buildings of all descriptions more or less decorated, stone bridges, narrow passages, and gateways with double tiered carved roofs through and among which one passes. A Japanese policeman was at the grand gate. At each of the interior gates, and there are many, there were six Korean sentries lounging, who pulled themselves together as we approached and presented arms! What with 800 troops, 1,500 attendants and officials of all descriptions, courtiers and ministers and their attendants, secretaries, messengers, and hangers-on, the vast enclosure of the Palace seemed as crowded and populated as the city itself. We had nearly half a mile of buildings to pass through before we reached a very pretty artificial lake with a decorative island pavilion in the centre, near which are a foreign palace, built not long before, and the simple Korean buildings then occupied by the King and Queen. Alighting at the gateway of the courtyard which led to the Queen’s house, we were received by the Court interpreter, a number of eunuchs, two of the Queen’s ladies-in-waiting, and her nurse, who was at the head of the Palace ladies--a very privileged person, middle-aged, with decidedly fine features. In a simple room hung with yellow silk we were entertained in courteous fashion with coffee and cake on arriving, and afterwards at dinner, the nurse, “supported” by the Court interpreter, taking the head of the very prettily decorated table. The dinner was admirably cooked in “foreign style,” and included soup, fish, quails, wild duck, pheasant, stuffed and rolled beef, vegetables, creams, glacé walnuts, fruit, claret, and coffee. Several of the Court ladies and others sat at table with us. After this long delay we were ushered, accompanied only by the interpreter, into a small audience-room, upon the dais at one end of which stood the King, the Crown Prince, and the Queen in front of three crimson velvet chairs, which, after Mrs. Underwood had presented me, they resumed and asked us to be seated on two chairs which were provided.