The city of Seoul lies near the Han river, which flows all the way across Korea from the high mountains to the level sea. To most Korean people, in the old days when no one traveled abroad, Seoul was the center of the universe.
All roads in the kingdom led to this wonderful city, in which there were big shops and stores, and gay streets full of lively people in rich clothing. The gentlemen in their stiffly starched and glistening white clothes walked very proudly with their heads up in the air. When they straddled the little Korean ponies, which are not much bigger than Newfoundland dogs, it seemed as if elephants were trying to ride on donkeys.
From morning to night the avenues were full of traffic and business. All the wonderful things brought by the Arabs from India, and by the merchants from Japan and China, could be bought in the Korean capital.
A thousand bulls loaded with dry grass and fire-wood came through the city gates into Seoul every day. They could be seen passing along, but not much besides legs, tail and horns were visible. At breakfast and supper time clouds of blue smoke rose up from ten thousand low, and often underground chimneys, carrying the heat and fire from the kitchens, where good things to eat were cooked. The cartloads of bags of rice, millet, barley, fruits and vegetables, goodies and cookies, jars and crockery, seen in the shops, would make a mountain.
Palaces, pagodas, temples and mansions of the nobles and wealthy people made the place in which the king lived very beautiful, while out beyond were the high stone city walls, white or covered with vines.
When the sun dipped below the mountains the gates were shut, and after that no one could enter until morning. At every closing and opening of the gates the musicians played lively tunes and the great bell tolled out the time of sunrise and sunset. In the band were drums, fifes, trumpets and stringed instruments.
At night from inside the house and wineshops, one could hear the sounds of revelry, music, song, dancing and feasting, which often lasted till morning.
Out on the Great South Mountain, a mighty fire burned and the flames shot high up in the air. This was the welcome message that all was peaceful throughout the whole kingdom. On hilltop and mountain, from the snowy peaks of the Ever White Mountain to the islands out in the Southern Sea, and from the east to the west coast, these signal fires blaze. Flame answering flame made a telegraph announcing that all was well.
But at nine o’clock Seoul outdoors was a woman’s city. All boys and men must be off the streets. Any male person caught by the police would be taken to the magistrate’s office and there receive a severe beating with wooden paddles by the public spankers. Then the women and grown-up girls, old and young, went outdoors, breathed the air, took their walks, made their visits, and had a delightful time with play and chat and gossip. But by midnight every one must be indoors.
It was no wonder then that in the country the farmers and the village folk thought that Seoul, the capital, was the most splendid city on earth. If they ever heard of London and Paris and New York, they supposed that these places on the map were only villages. How was it possible that any city could equal or surpass Seoul? Why, the very idea was nonsense!
In every hamlet even the children hoped some day to see the city. Often they dreamed of riding through the air on a dragon’s back in order to get there. It was thought that anything which a mortal man or even the insatiable Tokgabi should require, could be bought in Seoul.
Now in a village up north, which in English we should call Cucumberville, lived a miller, Mr. Kim and his wife Cho. The man had worked hard for many years and heaped up piles of iron and brass cash, which he kept hidden under a rafter beneath the roof. He had long intended to see the royal city, and his wife encouraged him, for she wanted a new dress, and a comb and a pair of shoes, such as city people wear. His daughters said they would like to have girdles, ermine-trimmed slippers and silver hair pins. Kim felt that he must surely go, to please both himself and his family.
So one fine May morning he started off to walk to Seoul and see the sights. His wife and daughters, bowing down with their faces to the paper carpet, begged him to bring them the pretty things they talked about so much, and also whatever might please himself.
His faithful spouse bade him beware of thieves and robbers and not to let his money lie around loose in the inns by the way. When in Seoul he must not go into the wineshops, or to see the dancing girls called ge-sang (or geisha), or to spend his cash foolishly. There were many wicked men about and she had heard that beside the polite people there were boors even in the capital. This she thought must surely be the fact, for there was a proverb that said so.
On his part Kim cautioned his wife, since it was still chilly weather, to keep the kitchen fires burning, so as to have the house warm and not let the girls take cold. She must beware also of robbers. These bad men had the habit of coming after midnight, when the fire was out, and of quietly loosening the stones of the foundations under the floor and getting inside, and also into the rooms through the flues. The house must be well locked up and the door barricaded at night, so that no prowling leopard or tiger roaming around should get in. If she heard any scratching or clawing on the roof, she was to strike the gong. This would alarm the villagers, and then the men would rush out with torches and drive off the beasts of prey. If she should hear the pigs squealing out in the pen, she must sound the alarm for the tigers loved Korean pork even more than Korean people.
Now Kim was a first-rate fellow. When at home he was pretty sharp at a bargain while buying beans, millet or rice, and was skilful in grinding barley or chopping up straw for the donkeys. But when he was once inside the walls of the big city, one would think “he carried his head under his armpits,” as the Koreans say.
For amid so many strange sights and sounds he was dazed. Like a great gawk he stood on the main street, with his mouth open. As the crowds went by, he wondered where all the people came from, and how they all got a living.
He found the saying true that “There are rude people, even in Seoul,” for one fellow shouted at him asking him whether he intended to swallow the moon. Some of the boys laughed at him and one said his mouth was like a bird box, and something might fly in.
Kim looked at many things in the shops, but when he asked how much they cost he nearly fainted. He was truly scared at the price, and walked on. However, he bought some pretty things for his wife and daughters, such as a fan, a roll of silk for a dress, a box of hairpins, some amber beads, and a silver ring, so that when his oldest daughter, who was soon to marry, became a bride, she would have everything ready.
While in the silk shop the clerk who sold him the goods saw that Kim was from the country and thought he would have a little fun. So he told Kim about the fairies, and pointed out a shop across the way. There, if he looked at the round thing which the shop man would gladly show him, he would see and feel as he never felt or saw before.
At once Kim went across the street and over to the shop, where they made metal things, bright, shining, polished and silvery. There he stood in front of a round thing like the moon. In it was a man’s face. It was the face of some one he thought he knew. It was a man about his own age he fancied, yet he could not tell just who it was or call him by name, but he was sure he had seen the person before. When he turned around suddenly, hoping to surprise a friend, and perhaps a neighbor, from his home town, there was nobody near. He looked again. There it was! Had his friend hid himself and then come back?
When Kim dodged he lost sight of the face, but when standing in front of this round thing, there was the same man again in the mirror, for that is what the shining metal was.
When Kim laughed the fellow laughed too. When he made a wry face or grimaces, the other person, whoever he was, did the same. No matter how quickly Kim might turn around to catch him, he was gone.
Now Kim had never before seen a mirror and did not know what it might be. Yet thinking it was almost like fairy magic, he bought the metal disc and took it back with him.
When he arrived home he must first of all unpack the boxes containing the pretty things for the women of his family, for the girls were impatient to see what their father had brought them.
They were so absorbed in their gifts that they did not notice what Mr. Kim had bought for himself. So he laid the case containing the mirror on the table and put some other purchases away in the big cabinet, inlaid with mother-of-pearl, that stood in the best room. Then he went out to look after his mill, and the pigs, the donkey, and the bull.
No sooner had the girls opened the mirror case, than terrible things happened. The mother, who was behind the daughter, saw the face of a young woman and was startled at beholding a stranger, as she thought, in her house. Instantly she broke out in a fit of jealous passion.
“Your father has brought home another woman, a ge-sang, from Seoul, to take my place. What does he mean?”
At the same time the daughter, seeing a face in the polished metal, cried out, “No mother, we won’t have any strange woman in your place. Besides she’s too young and will be a tyrant to us.”
Hearing the loud voices and crying, the grandmother hobbled in and asked what was the matter.
“Look, see for yourself, what our daddy has brought home to us to make us miserable.”
Seeing the mirror, Granny looked into it for a moment. Then she too burst into a passion, and cried out, “I won’t have this old woman in our house. It’s enough for my son to support me and his family. Oh, why did he go to Seoul?”
By this time there was such a racket with four women, young, middle-aged, and old, crying so lustily, that each one quickly used up three paper handkerchiefs apiece, before they could dry their tears.
While still crying out, “ugo, ugo!” very loudly, grandfather came in, shaking his stick and ordering them to be quiet. Then, looking at their streaming faces and dropping tears, he demanded to know the cause of the trouble.
“See for yourself,” said his wife. Then she handed him the metal trouble-maker, such as had never before been seen in the village.
At once the old man turned almost purple with rage.
“What,” cried he in his cracked voice, “is my son so unfilial as to bring another old man into the house? How can he support two fathers? Where will he get the kimchi and millet for the old fellow to eat?” Then he threw the mirror into its box and slammed down the lid tight.
All this time while jealousy was eating up these angry people and threatening to disrupt the family, the noise increased so greatly, that the husband left his pigs and his mill, and rushed in to see what was the matter.
At once his wife, who was a very strong woman, flew at him, and seizing his topknot, pulled him and dragged him over the floor and outdoors, and along into the street, never stopping till she reached the house of the judge to tell her troubles. There she made out a terrible story.
Once in the presence of the great man who wore a mighty hat and had a string of amber beads hung over his ear, she told the story of what her husband had brought from Seoul, to destroy the peace of his family. Surely, he meant to go back to the capital and have a young wife! In her anger her tongue never stopped a moment.
She charged her husband with all the crimes known in the codes. Yet all that she could prove against him was that he had brought something round, made of metal, into the house. She assured the judge that it was as full of evil magic as Tokgabi and all his imps.
Now the other members of the family joined in accusation of the miller. Besides supporting the wife’s story, they all declared that it was true in every detail; because the five witnesses all agreed in their story.
When the flood of talk had subsided somewhat, the judge, who meanwhile had kept on smoking a brass-bowled pipe, the stem of which was a yard long, while the bowl was only as big as a chestnut, asked,
“In what form did you say this evil magic came?”
At this, the miller’s old father produced the box, opened it, and handed the metal mirror to the judge, who had never before seen anything like it. In fact, he had never been out of his district except once, when he went to the examinations, years before, in Seoul. Even then he was so much with his fellow students and so long shut up in his little cell writing out his essays that he saw hardly anything of the city.
When he held up the mirror before his eyes he suddenly became like a demon in his rage, and behaved just like the other people in the court-room.
On the face of the round thing which he held in his hand he saw a man in official robes, such as only men of eminence wear. He had on his head a high round hat, like those which only magistrates ever put on, while on his right ear hung a string of twenty-eight big round amber beads.
When he held the mirror down in front of him he discerned also the embroidered breastpiece, and the little silver stork, that served to hold together the folds of a judge’s coat of office, while around his waist was a decorated girdle.
All this made him almost choke with anger, at the idea that another magistrate should come into the village of Cucumberville, to take his place.
What should he himself do for a salary? If he lost his position how would he support his old parents and his twenty-five poor relations? He saw himself a pauper in his old age.
Speechless with rage there was silence in the court-room for at least half a minute. Even the women’s tongues did not wag. All looked at each other to see what would come next.
But the peace lasted no longer than thirty seconds, for the storm broke out again in full force when the jealous wife seized her husband by his topknot to drag him home. She feared that the magistrate was himself so angry and jealous, that he might adjourn the court.
Just when the hullaballoo was at its height, a messenger rushed into the court-room, to announce that the royal inspector direct from the king was on his travels of observation in the province. Within five minutes he would be at the gate of the court house.
Instantly the jealous wife let go her husband’s topknot. The magistrate called for order and posted his under officers in their places, according to the etiquette of welcoming the king’s agents. Then the magistrate adjusting his hat and topknot which had been badly tumbled in his passion went out to greet his worship, the Royal Inspector. Salutations over, he waved his hand to his superior to take to the chief seat of honor.
As soon as all formalities were over, the high officer inquired into the cause of the troubles and into the merits of the case.
The local magistrate put the mirror on a silken cushion and handed both to his highness, the inspector, saying:
“Please, your worship, it is this that has turned us all into devils of jealousy. What is it?”
Then this gentleman from the capital, who was every day accustomed to the comforts and conveniences of the great city and the splendor of the palace, explained what a mirror was. He gave them all a mild scolding for their folly and dismissed them, telling them that whenever he or she felt angry, or jealous, to go out and pull the tops off five turnips; or, to drink slowly a cup of rice water before speaking an angry word.
Thereupon, the miller’s wife fell on her face and begged pardon of her husband. Then, all the family, young and old, while walking home, laughed heartily at their mistakes.
When a Korean begins to laugh, it is sometimes hard for him to stop; but after half an hour, all was quiet again. After that, nearly every one who could afford it bought a mirror. All the girls in the village, sooner or later, possessed one.
They used to look into its face so often to see their own, that the oiled-paper carpet fronting the mirror was, in many houses, soon worn out.
In Seoul, the mirror-makers wondered what had happened in Cucumberville, the village, so long famous only for its cucumbers, but they slapped their thighs for joy and grew rich.