2
1st. Sunday. Beautiful. Hot.
3
Seoul home a.m. Glad to find the 1898 Volume of 獨立新聞 which I edited in one of the closets of Sa-rang.
4
Left Seoul with 璋善 2:45 for Song Do.
5
The case against Japanese immigration is summed up by the Chicago Tribune: "The industry, ability, and thrift of the Japanese have put many American farmers and small trade men out of business. Do we want that to continue?" Happy America that can put a check on such an immigration. Yet, there are Americans and Canadians who think that the Japanese have put not 'many' but all classes of Koreans out of business are really helping the Koreans to prosper as they never did before!
7
2nd. Monday. Beautiful. Very hot.
8
School Office most of the day. Tea talk with teachers at 4 p.m. Decided 1. During the month of June, all the members of the faculty are to spend at least 3 hours a day at the School to prepare the lessons to be taught next term. 2. The Chapel to be remodeled in-to the Science Hall.
10
3rd. Tuesday. Beautiful. Hot.
11
Office in the morning. Returned to Seoul per 2:25 p.m. train.
12
The President of America signed the Japanese Exclusion Bill on the 26th May. The Japanese papers are all talking about "justice and humanity" 正義人道―that is they all blame the Americans for not practicing these virtues. The fact is no one nation or race has ever practiced justice and humanity toward another which does not possess strong enough army and navy. Let Japan show some justice and humanity toward the Koreans before she asks America to do the same to her.
14
4th. Wednesday. Cloud. Pleasant.
15
With children, except 文姬, I went to 城北洞 Had on the whole a pleasant outing―joy to see the precious children enjoying it, though I myself felt awful tired. The past Spring has been a hard one on me―what with the sickness of wife and Lambuth, what with the strikes etc. of the school boys―what with the constant going and coming between Seoul and Song Do. I wish I had a wife who could cheer me, sympathize with me and help me instead of a woman who cares nothing but her own personal, selfish comfort.
17
5th. Thursday. Beautiful. Hot
18
Seoul Home. Y.M.C.A. 理事會 at 6:30 p.m. The financial situation of the Central Y. has become so distressing that reduction of salaries from 15% to 5% has to be resorted to. Mr. Gregg suggested the abolition of the Middle School but was opposed by such men as Mr. 兪晟濬 who wouldn't pay a cent for its support.
20
6th. Friday. Beautiful. Hot.
21
Left Seoul with 璋善 12:10 p.m. train for Song Do. Felt exhausted―feverish. Thunder storm between 7-8 p.m. Not much rain.
23
7th. Saturday. Beautiful. Hot.
24
School in the morning. Left Song Do 5:45 p.m. train for Seoul.
25
Whether we accept the theories of evolution or the texts of the Bible, these can be no quarrel as to the fact that every improvement, progress or regeneration is based and conditioned on struggle―or fights or battles―viz: warfare. No individual or racial progress or regeneration has ever been accomplished without ceaseless warfare―between evil and good, filth and cleanliness, vice and virtue, life and death. The sooner, we recognize the fact that life is a warfare, the better we shall be. The spirit of warlike-ness is at the bottom of all success in life. Hence all men of success are all men of warlikeness. Hence no nation or race has done anything worth naming that is not warlike. The great pity is that no nation can have the spirit of war-likeness without actual experience in real warfare. Why didn't the Almighty and Alwise God so order things that an individual or a race could grow strong and wise without going through the agonies of actual warfare? Oh the mysterious "whys!"
27
8th. Sunday. Beautiful with cloud now and then. Pleasant.
28
Seoul home. With mother, wife and children went to 城北洞. Had lunch there. Returned home about 7 p.m.
30
9th. Monday. Rain. Cool.
31
Seoul home. Gentle rain from about 9 a.m. all the day long.
32
I clap my hands together and that produces a sharp explosive sound―due to the action of the air. The same current of air playing on two or more wires of different sizes stretched between two points well produce certain musical sound. The wonderful musical notes which pianos and organs produce owe their sweet sound to the simple currents of air passing through the instruments. Take the marvelous talking machines―the Vic, for instance which reproduce the living voices of master singers or the harmonious and sterling notes of famous bands. It is the simple current of air put through some ingeniously contrived mechanism wonderfully arranged and adjusted. A spring snapped or the record plate broken or the needle grown forks, the talking machines talks no more, though the air remains perfectly the same. That is: it is the more or less complicated mechanism that produces more or less musical sound―with the identically same kind of air. Now, the mysterious life current either makes the simple grass green of analbles a Shakespeare to produce a Hamlet―according to the perfection of biological mechanism. Where is the immortal soul?
34
10th. Tuesday. Pretty. Cool.
37
11th. Wednesday. Rain. Cool.
38
Left Seoul with 璋善 12:10 p.m. train for Song Do. Rain from about 2 p.m.
40
12th. Thursday. Rain. Cool.
41
School Office in the morning. Received notice that uncle Yi Tong Jin had passed away yesterday afternoon. He began his life a poor boy. His ability and sagacity enabled him to rise into power and affluence from the time he was a little over the age of 20. Between 1896 and 1911, he was the virtual ruler of Song Do. Through the speculations and thoughtlessness and extravagance of his two sons, his wealth got rapidly wasted away until he was declared bankrupt some years ago. During the last four or five years he suffered unspeakable destitution. Christ says: "I say unto all, watch." God grant I shall be wise enough to watch!
43
13th. Friday. Beautiful. Pleasant.
44
Returned to Seoul 11 a.m. train. Called on the family of uncle Yi Tong Jin. Contributed ￥200.00 to the funeral expenses.
46
14th. Saturday. Beautiful. Pleasant.
47
Seoul home. Took 璋善 and 琦善 to the zoo in the afternoon. The zoo is badly kept up. Am sure the Japanese officers are eating up most of the money appropriated by the King Yi House-hold for the zoo. If this state of things continues, it is only a matter of short time that the zoo will be depleted of all living specimens of animals―their places to be taken up by stuffed birds and beasts.
49
15th. Sunday. Cloud and sun. Cool.
50
Seoul home. Worshipped at 宗橋 Church.
51
5 p.m. attended the wedding ceremonies of Frank Kim and Miss 崔眞相. This is his third matrimonial experiment. He first married and then divorced an American wife. When he returned to Korea some years ago his mother got a Japanese girl for him in the illusion that the bride was a rich heiress. It was a smell wedding followed by an expensive banquet to which none but the Japanese notables and the Korean peers were invited. Not long afterward, the Japanese girl turned out to be no Japanese girl at all but a Korean orphan whom a Japanese coolie boss had adopted. After finishing a rudimentary education in Japan she entered Mr. 韓相龍's house in Seoul in what capacity I don't know. Then 韓 was mean enough to pass her off as a rich Japanese girl and to persuade Mrs. 金潤晶 to take her as daughter-in-law. When the truth came to light, of course divorce or separation naturally followed. Frank was simply a victim of the vanity of his mother and of the meanness of 韓相龍. I hope this new marriage will turn out to be more propitious than the former two.
53
16th. Monday. Beautiful. Warm.
56
17th. Tuesday. Cloudy. Cool.
57
Gentle showers with brief intermissions most of the day, Left Seoul 12:10 p.m. for Song Do. Felt exhausted.
59
18th. Wednesday. Beautiful.
60
Song Do School. Faculty meeting from 10:30 a.m. to 12 morning and again from 2:30 p.m. to 4 p.m. Decided to expel 26 Fourth Years and 11 3rd Years.
62
19th. Thursday. Beautiful. Hot.
63
Left Song Do 11 a.m. train for Seoul.
65
20th. Friday. Beautiful. Hot.
66
Seoul home 寶姬 sick, feverish.
67
4 p.m the Annual Meeting of the Central Y.M.C.A.―passed off without very much hitch.
68
Both the 徽文高普 and the 第一高普 are having strikes of the first magnitude. In the former the boys demand the dismissal of the principal 任景宰 and the dean 學監張□震 while the students of the Government Higher Common School two Japanese teachers and the objects of dissatisfaction.
70
21st. Saturday. Beautiful. Hot. 92°F. noon.
72
Ingratitude and parasitism seem to go hand in hand. Behold 金顯英, 兪鎭昌, 姜文秀―especially the last. He has been living on my generosity for the last twenty years. Yet he didn't hesitate to play a nasty trick on me that cost me near ￥3,500.00. It's sickening to find ingratitude where I expected appreciation. But gratitude is a virtue that is tabooed by the educated young men today. Some of the worst boys who led the strike are those who have been helped by individual missionaries or by the Textile Dept.
73
The Primary education is an absolute necessity to every body. But I am now convinced that the secondary or higher education―especially of the kind which now prevails in Korea at present―is rather a luxury to a Korean. It tends to make of him an educated mendicant or a vagabond. I shall not from now on give any fellow money to graduate him an ingrate and a Bolsheviks.
75
22nd. Sunday. Rain. Cool.
76
Seoul home. A gentle but steady rain all day and night. Very welcome to the farmers.
78
23rd. Monday. Beautiful. Hot. 83°F. 1 p.m.
79
Seoul home. With Messrs. 李商在 and 朴勝鳳, called on Dr. Gale 8 a.m. to negotiate for the manuscript of the revised Old and New Testaments. It took over 20 years for Dr. Gale and two other missionaries to finish the revision. Dr. Gale's liberal or "sense" translation of the texts displeased some of the missionaries who maintain that the Word of God ought to be strictly literally translated. The British F.B.S. had to refuse the publication of the revised manuscript giving Dr. Gale the power to publish it privately if he so desired. 彰文社 made contract with Dr. Gale for the publication.
80
Mr. 李熙元 died the day before yesterday. A month ago his aged mother died. Then he said to me "When your mother dies I shall be the 親族代表." Now he is dead and gone! O, vanity of vanities!
82
24th. Tuesday. Beautiful. Hot.
83
Left Seoul for Song Do with 明姬 and 璋善 2:45 p.m. train. Felt so exhausted.
85
25th. Wednesday. Beautiful. Hot.
86
Song Do home. As soon as I took charge of the school Nov. 1922, I wrote to Bishop Boaz what I thought to be necessary for the proper maintenance of the school. Among other things I said: "To carry on a great plant like this in the name of the Church of Christ on a hand-to-mouth plan of finance is nothing short of imprudence. We must have a reserve fund on which we may fall back, and which can keep us going at least for six months in case of some unforeseen emergencies. At the present rate of expenditure ￥24,000.00 will do this."
87
Then I offered to give ￥10,000 and raise ￥5,000 locally while Deal volunteered to contribute ￥10,000.00 if the Board would consent to give us ￥25,000.00 in 3 year instalments or in one sum. I have paid every sen and more than what I promised. Deal has spent 7 or 8 thousand yen in the Dormitory I have offered to pay ￥4,000.00 for the remodeling of the Science Hall. Thus the contract is more than fulfilled on our side. Isn't the mission going to carry out its share of the agreement?
89
26th. Thursday. Beautiful. Hot.
90
Song Do School Office until 10:30 a.m. Left Song Do per Seoul 11 a.m. train.
92
27th. Friday. Beautiful. Hot. 92°F. 3 p.m.
93
Seoul home. 金逢賢 my sister's son was a well to do man in the country some years ago. He promised to be a thrifty and conservative man of property. Then he became obsessed with a passion or speculation. During the past five years he has squandered all his means of living and is now a poor no count fellow. He complained to my cousin 致昭 the other day, that his mother needed to take some ginseng but that he had no money to buy it for her. Fool!―he who gambled away precious rice fields exposing thereby his mother, wives and children to dire destitution, pretends to be sorry that he has no money to buy ꡐginsengꡑ for his dear old mother!
94
Chinese coolies, carpenters, bricklayers, stone masons, barbers, cooks, gardeners, farmers all underbid the Koreans―and thrive. The Koreans, whine, whine and do nothing but whine harping on the everlasting complaint that "we have nothing to live on." A young fellow in Song Do living near Allen's dairy refuses to cut hay for 80 sen a day because he says "누가 八十錢 밧고 그것을 해?" But a Chinese coolie would do so for 60 sen.
96
28th. Saturday. Beautiful. Hot.
99
29th. Sunday. Beautiful. Hot. 91°F.
100
Worshipped at 水標橋 Church. I spoke on the Policy of Self Support.
102
30th. Monday. Sun-Cloud. Sultry 92°F. 3 p.m.
104
I understand that Mr. Deal employ number of workmen in the Textile Department on the condition that they work 10 hours a day for ten yen a month for six months as probationers. Just 3 sen an hour! A common coolie gets a yen a day. Am sorry a man―a missionary―should squeeze money out of another man's sweat that way, even if that money is to be used to promote the course of the Gospel. No wonder the cause of the Gospel isn't much promoted in the world! No wonder labor hates capital.
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