and the flogger; with his board all ready in his hand, took up a position on the left-hand side of his victim.  The magistrate, between one puff and another of smoke, gave a long harangue on the evils of borrowing money and not returning it, however small the sum might be.  The disgrace, he argued, would be great in anybody’s case, but for a soldier of the King, not only to commit the great offence of borrowing money from a person of lower grade than himself—­“a butcher,” but then also to add to his shame by not returning it—­this was something that went beyond the limits of decency.

“How much was it you borrowed?” he inquired in a roaring kind of voice.

“A hundred cash,” answered the thread of a voice from the head on the ground buried in the coat-sleeves.

“Well, then, give him a hundred strokes, to teach him to do better next time!”

As a hundred cash is equivalent to one penny-halfpenny, to my mind, the verdict was a little severe, but, as there is no knowing what is good for other people, I remained a silent spectator.

The flogger then, grabbing at one end of the board with his strong hands, swung it two or three times over his head, and gave a tremendous whack on the man’s thighs, causing them to bleed.  Then immediately another and another followed, each being duly reckoned, the poor fellow all the while moaning pitifully, and following from the corners of his frightened eyes the quick movements of the quivering plank.  Soon his skin became livid and inflamed, and, after a few more blows had been given, large patches of skin remained attached to the board.  The pain must have been intense.  The wretch bit his sleeves, and moaned and groaned, until, finally, he became faint.  Meanwhile, I had produced my sketch-book, and had already with my pencil jotted down magistrate, flogger, flogged and soldiers, when the ill-natured official took offence at what I was doing and ordered the flogging to be at once stopped.  Had I only known, I would have begun my sketch before.  As it was—­and the culprit had only received less than one-fifth of the number of blows to which he had been sentenced—­the performance was bad enough.  There was only one redeeming feature about it, and I must say no one was more astonished at it than myself.  Nearly all the soldiers, friends of the offender, blubbered like children while his punishment lasted.  This circumstance seemed to prove to me that the Easterns, though apparently cruel, are, after all, not quite so hard-hearted as one might be inclined to imagine.  And, mind you, the soldier-classes in Cho-sen are probably the most cruel of all; that touch of sentiment on their part, therefore, impressed me much, and upset entirely those first ideas I had formed about their lack of sensitiveness and sympathy for others.