The heir to the throne of Koryŭ was a lad of eight years. The emperor asked him, “Will you be like your father or like your mother?” The lad replied, “Like my mother,” and thereupon he was proclaimed king of Koryŭ. His posthumous title is Ch’ung-mok. Orders were sent to Song-do to discharge all the servants and officials of the late king, and to put an end to all the evils which had been fastened upon the people. The iron palace was turned into a school. The examination laws were changed. Heretofore the examination had been simply with a view to ascertaining the candidate’s knowledge of the classics. Now it was made to include an exegesis of obscure passages and exercises in penmanship. This was followed by an essay on “What is the most important question of the time.” The emperor also ordered the establishment of a new department, to be called the Bureau of General Oversight. The empress of China at this time seems to have been a Koryŭ woman and her relatives, who abounded in the Koryŭ capital, expected to have their own way in all matters. This new department, however, arrested and imprisoned many of them and a number died in consequence. The empress therefore sent a swift messenger demanding the reasons for this. The reasons seem to have been good, for the matter was dropped. Of course the young king was not of an age to guide the affairs of state in person. We are left in ignorance as to what form of regency administered the government for him. In 1348 the boy king died and the question as to succession arose. The king’s younger brother Chi was in Koryŭ at the time; but Keui, the son of Ch‘ung-suk, the twenty-seventh monarch of the line, was in China. The Koryŭ officials asked that Keui be made king, probably because he was of a proper age to assume the responsibilities of royalty; but the emperor refused, and the following year, 1349, Chi was made king at the age of twelve, posthumous title Ch‘ung-jong. Keui, the unsuccessful candidate, was married to a Mongol princess, perhaps as a consolation for his disappointment. With the year 1350 begins a series of Japanese depredations on the coasts of Koryŭ which were destined to cover a period of half a century and which, in their wantonness and brutality, remind us strongly of similar expeditions of the Norse Vikings on the shores of western Europe. In the second year of the young king these corsairs came, but were driven off with a loss of 300 men. Soon, as if in revenge, over 100 Japanese boats were beached on the shores of Kyŭng-sang Province; the government rice was seized and many villages wantonly burned. That same year a kingdom called Ul-lam sent an envoy with gifts to the king of Koryŭ. In 1351 again the Japanese corsairs came and ravaged the islands off Chul-la Province.