Accuracy has been my first aim, and my many foreign friends in Korea know how industriously I have labored to attain it. It is by these, who know the extreme difficulty of the task, that I shall be the most leniently criticised wherever, in spite of carefulness, I have fallen into mistakes. Circumstances prevented me from putting my traveling experiences, as on former occasions, into letters. I took careful notes, which were corrected from time to time by the more prolonged observations of residents, and as I became better acquainted with the country; but, with regard to my journey up the South Branch of the Han, as I am the first traveler who has reported on the region, I have to rely on my observation and inquiries alone, and there is the same lack of recorded notes on most of the country on the Upper Tai-döng. My notes furnish the travel chapters, as well as those on Seoul, Manchuria, and Primorsk; and the sketches in contemporary Korean history are based partly on official documents, and are partly derived from sources not usually accessible. I owe very much to the kindly interest which my friends in Korea took in my work, and to the encouragement which they gave me when I was disheartened by the difficulties of the subject and my own lack of skill. I gratefully acknowledge the invaluable help given me by Sir Walter C. Hillier, K.C.M.G., H.B.M.’s Consul-General in Korea, and Mr. J. M’Leavy Brown, LL.D., Chief Commissioner of Korean Customs; also the aid generously bestowed by Mr. Waeber, the Russian Minister, and the Rev. G. Heber Jones, the Rev. James Gale, and other missionaries. I am also greatly indebted to a learned and careful volume on _Korean Government_, by Mr. W. H. Wilkinson, H.B.M.’s Acting Vice-Consul at Chemulpo, as well as to the _Korean Repository_ and the _Seoul Independent_, for information which has enabled me to correct some of my notes on Korean customs. Various repetitions occur, for the reason that it appears to me impossible to give sufficient emphasis to certain facts without them; and several descriptions are loaded with details, the result of an attempt to fix on paper customs and ceremonies destined shortly to disappear. The illustrations, with the exceptions of three, are reproductions of my own photographs. The sketch map, in so far as my first journey is concerned, is reduced from one kindly drawn for me by Mr. Waeber. The transliteration of Chinese proper names was kindly undertaken by a well-known Chinese scholar, but unfortunately the actual Chinese characters were not in all cases forthcoming. In justice to the kind friends who have so generously aided me, I am anxious to claim and accept the fullest measure of personal responsibility for the opinions expressed, which, whether right or wrong, are wholly my own.