The king sent one Kang-In to Whang-ju ostensibly to sue for peace but in reality to find out what the Manchus were doing there. Not long after this the Manchu envoy returned to the same place but Gen. Kang remained on Kang-wha. When the enemy had advanced as far as P’yŭng-san, only a hundred _li_ from Kang-wha, the whole court urged the king to make peace on any terms, as all the soldiers had run away and the enemy were so near. When Gen. Kim, who had been left to guard Seoul, learned of the proximity of the Manchus, he fired all the government treasure and provisions and made good his escape. This was the signal for a general exodus of the people who swarmed out of the city and scattered in all directions seeking safety among the mountains or in remote provinces. Yun Hŭn had been imprisoned for having fled from P’yŭng-yang without so much as attempting its defense, and many of the officials begged the king to pardon him; but they overdid it, and so many petitions came in that the king thought he was dangerously popular and ordered his execution. When the messenger of death reached the doomed man he found him playing a game of chess. The man with whom he was playing burst out crying, but he said, “What are you crying about? I am the man who am going to die, not you. Let us finish the game.” So they finished the game, after which Yun Hŭn quietly submitted to his fate. This is a sample of _sang froid_ which never fails to elicit the applause of the Korean. On the twentieth the Manchu general Yu Hă left P’yŭng-san and went to Kang-wha to have an audience with the king. He advised the king to discard the Chinese calendar and use the Manchu one instead and he also said the king must send his son to the north as hostage. The king answered that his son was too young, but that he would send his younger brother. Accordingly he sent Wŭn Ch’ang-yŭng, not his brother but a distant relative. At the same time he sent 30,000 pieces of cotton, 300 pieces of white linen, 100 tiger skins and 100 leopard skins. Gen. Yu Hă was pleased at this and said that he wished to have Korea at peace but that it would first be absolutely necessary for the king to take a solemn oath of fealty to the Manchus. And he said it must be done immediately, before the Manchus should enter Seoul.