Before Yun T‘ă-jŭn, Yi Cho-yŭn and Han Kyu-jik went to the palace and met their fate they sent word to Yuan warning him of the state of affairs and asking help, but he made no immediate move. As the morning broke thousands of Koreans came to him and said that the Japanese held the king a prisoner in the palace and begged him to interfere. Yuan replied by sending a messenger to the Japanese Minister demanding why he had surrounded the king with soldiers and had killed the ministers, and demanding that he immediately evacuate the place. Three hours passed and still no answer came; and at last Yuan and the two other Chinese leaders took a strong body of Chinese troops and several hundred Korean troops and proceeded to the palace. Entering by way of the Sun-in Gate and passing through the Ch‘ang-kyŭng Palace they approached the Po-t‘ong Gate which gave entrance to the “Old Palace,” but they found it strongly guarded by Japanese. Here a sharp encounter took place which lasted an hour, beginning about three o’clock in the afternoon. About ten each of the Chinese, Japanese and Koreans fell in this assault. As the darkness came on the Japanese began to fall back and taking the king and the newly appointed ministers they made their way to the extreme northeasterly portion of the palace grounds, not far from the Hong-wha Gate. The royal party took refuge in a summer house there and the Japanese stationed themselves behind trees and guarded the place, keeping up a lively fusillade with the Chinese who had followed them. Meanwhile the Crown Prince, the Queen and the king’s foster-mother had escaped in small closed chairs out the Sŭn-in Gate and had found refuge in the house of Yi Pom-jin in the village of No-wŭn, twenty li outside the East Gate. The chances of success for the Japanese were becoming smaller and smaller and the king was anxiously looking for an opportunity of escaping from them and making his way to the Chinese side. At last, taking advantage of the extreme disorder that prevailed, he made his way to the Puk-chang Gate at the extreme northeastern part of the palace enclosure. Outside there was a crowd of Korean soldiers who wished to gain entrance and rescue the king from his captors. When the latter made his presence known inside the gate these soldiers effected an entrance and lifting His Majesty on their shoulders carried him in triumph to the North Temple just inside the Northeast Gate. Seeing that all hope of immediate success was gone, Pak Yŭng-hyo, Kim Ok-kyun, Sŭ Kwang-bom, Sŭ Chă-p‘il and a part of the company of military students accompanied the Japanese troops out the front gate of the palace to the Japanese Legation which was then situated in Kyo-dong. This was accomplished in the midst of great excitement.