returned to our friends, who seemed in some measure reassured.
We tried to prevail upon them to accompany us
in our walk, in hopes that the rest of the cottagers might
be induced to return when they saw how peaceably we
were disposed. Captain Maxwell used every sign he could
think of to no purpose, and tired at length of these attempts,
took hold of the oldest man’s hand, drew it through his
arm, and walked off with him. I followed his example with
the other; and this familiarity amused the natives, who
now accompanied us in perfect good humour. The ease and
apparent indifference with which they walked along with us
was curious, and had so little of awkwardness in it, that one
might have supposed it to be the fashion of Corea to walk arm
in arm. Having reached the house which we had before
examined, we sat down in the verandah, and made signs that
we wished to smoke a pipe with them. In the meantime a
boat was observed to come to the landing-place ; the crew
quitted her and came towards us a t a rapid pace. The
quick manner of these people, so different from the ordinary
behaviour of the Coreans we had seen, made us apprehend
that some violence was meditated; but in this we were mistaken,
for they sat down with us, gave us their pipes to
smoke, and laughed immoderately at some of our words;
we took the hint from them, and laughed heartily whenever
we observed that any thing good had been said amongst
them; this was well received, and proved afterVards a good
mode of introduction.
Their curiosity was strongly excited by our clothing,
which' they examined minutely; they wished to see some
parts of our dress taken off, and in order to gratify them they
were allowed to have our coats, shoes, stockings, hats, &c.
They were more struck with the stockings than with any
thing else, frequently shouting 86 H o ta ! H o ta !” This word,
which is pronounced with a strong aspiration, was noted down
in our list as the Corean word for stockings f but it was found
afterwards to be an expression of approbation, applied indiscriminately
to whatever they consider remarkably good.
After sitting some time with these people, and smoking several
pipes with them, we gave up all hopes of seeing the villagers
return while we were there, and as the night was falling
we proposed taking a short walk with our friends, and then
going on board. But as soon as they saw us go up the hill
instead of returning to the boat, they became very uneasy,
and wanted us to turn back. As we had reason, however,
to conjecture that the women and children were on the other
side of the hill, we went on in the expectation of getting a
sight of them before dark. This the Coreans prevented by
following us with shouts wherever we went, so as to give