Still troubles multiplied thick and fast. In 1830 the Crown Prince died. He is the grandfather of the present Emperor of Korea. The son who had been born to him is known as the Tă wŭn-gun, who died in the spring of 1898. The building in which the body of this Crown Prince was placed burned to the ground and nothing but the charred bones of the prince were recovered. Two years later, in 1832 an English vessel appeared off Hong-ju and its captain, Basil Hall, sent the king a letter saying that he had come to trade, but the king refused permission. As the flag of the ship bore the device “Religion of Jesus Christ,” some Roman Catholic converts boarded her, but when they found that they were protestants they beat a hasty retreat. It is said that several boxes of books were landed and that some of them were sent to the king, who promptly returned them. The foreigners who made this attempt to enter Korea were Gutzlaff and Lindsay. During this year there were destructive fires and floods, but the greatest calamity of all was a famine that began at that time and continued for nine successive years, each year being accompanied with cholera. It is said that bodies were piled in heaps inside the South Gate. Many people are still living who remember that terrible time. The next year, in addition to famine and plague, the palace burned down. In the following year there was a devastating epidemic of native fever in Seoul, and a flood in Eui-ju which wrecked 2,000 houses. That summer, the people driven wild with hunger mobbed the government granaries but found nothing in them. They laid the blame on the Prime Minister and threatened his life. He fled precipitately to the country. In the last moon of 1834 the king died and his grandson a boy nine years old came to the throne. He is known as Hön jong Tă-wang. His grandmother Kim became regent. She is known as Sun-wŭn Whang-ho. She immediately began a work of reform. The law that made the relatives of prefects’ clerks liable to punishment for their crimes was abrogated. Many burdensome taxes were remitted. The government revenue collectors were kept to a strict account for all the monies passing through their hands. A conspiracy, headed by one Nam Ong-jung, was put down with a strong hand. The people were commanded not to slaughter their cattle for food, for the only hope for future crops was the cattle, without which the land could not be tilled. All prefects were commanded to have regular office hours during which they should attend to government business exclusively.