During the next three weeks I had three more audiences, on the second being accompanied as before by Mrs. Underwood, the third being a formal reception, and the fourth a strictly private interview, lasting over an hour. On each occasion I was impressed with the grace and charming manner of the Queen, her thoughtful kindness, her singular intelligence and force, and her remarkable conversational power even through the medium of an interpreter. I was not surprised at her singular political influence, or her sway over the King and many others. She was surrounded by enemies, chief among them being the Tai-Won-Kun, the King’s father, all embittered against her because by her talent and force she had succeeded in placing members of her family in nearly all the chief offices of State. Her life was a battle. She fought with all her charm, shrewdness, and sagacity for power, for the dignity and safety of her husband and son, and for the downfall of the Tai-Won-Kun. She had cut short many lives, but in doing so she had not violated Korean tradition and custom, and some excuse for her lies in the fact that soon after the King’s accession his father sent to the house of Her Majesty’s brother an infernal machine in the shape of a beautiful box, which on being opened exploded, killing her mother, brother, and nephew, as well as some others. Since then he plotted against her own life, and the feud between them was usually at fever heat. The dynasty is worn out, and the King, with all his amiability and kindness of heart, is weak in character and is at the mercy of designing men, as has appeared increasingly since the strong sway of the Queen was withdrawn. I believe him to be at heart, according to his lights, a patriotic sovereign. Far from standing in the way of reform, he has accepted most of the suggestions offered to him. But unfortunately for a man whose edicts become the law of the land, and more unfortunately for the land, he is persuadable by the last person who gets his ear, he lacks backbone and tenacity of purpose, and many of the best projects of reform become abortive through his weakness of will. To substitute constitutional restraints for absolutism would greatly mend matters, but _cela va sans dire_ this could only be successful under foreign initiative.