The King placed dancing girls in all the 369 prefectures of the country and reserved three hundred of the fairest for the palace. For these he built sumptuous pavilions and a hospital for their treatment when ill. A special office was erected for the care of the dogs, falcons, nets and other instruments of the chase. The royal stables were in Chong-dong where the United States Legation now stands. Agents were sent into all the provinces to hunt for fair women and swift horses. Others were sent to wring from the people special taxes. The King thought the officials were blaming him behind his back, so he gave each of them a wooden tag on which was written, “The mouth is the avenue to misery. The tongue is a sword which may pierce the body. Watch the mouth and guard well the tongue; so shalt thou dwell in safety.” He changed the Confucian temple into a play-house, drove out all the students from the dormitories and put diviners and sorceresses in their places. When his grandmother died he did not assume mourning, but as two of the officials dared to do so he killed them. He wiped out the three districts of Ko-yang, P‘a-ju and Yang-ju to make a hunting ground and forbade anyone to settle there. Those who disobeyed were killed. This hunting park was then stocked with all manner of wild beasts. He stole the people’s boats to use in sport on the palace ponds and restricted the people to the use of a single ferry-boat on the river. This lessened the traffic to such an extent that the people of Seoul suffered severely and many inn-keepers were ruined. An aged eunuch remonstrated, but the King caught up a bow and shot him through. He taxed the people of the south a bolt of cotton a head, and they paid it only by taking the cotton out of their clothes and weaving it. He invited the wives of the courtiers to a feast and had each of them wear upon the breast the name of her husband. Of these he dishonored whom he would and gave the husbands official position. His uncle’s wife was enticed into his net, in consequence of which she committed suicide. Such were a few of the acts of this depraved monarch. We need not multiply details of his execrable career. It was one long carnival of murder, lust and oppression. The people were simply the instrument by which the spendthrift King could fill his coffers.