o the time for getting out of these perilous
conveyances. Certainly when going round corners or on uneven ground I
often saw them at an angle that would make the hair of anybody but a
grave and sedate Corean official stand on end. The palace gate reached,
he is let down gently, the front part of the chair being gradually
lowered, and, with a sigh of relief, steps out of it. Immediately he is
supported on each side by his followers, and thus the palace is entered,
the mono-wheeled chair being left outside standing against the wall, and
the tired carriers squatting down to a quiet gamble with the
chair-bearers of other noblemen.

Here let us leave him for the present, since the huge gates are closed
again upon our very noses.

The royal palace is enclosed by a high wall, at the corners of which
there are turrets with sentries and soldiers. In each of the sections of
the wall also there is a gate, the principal one of course being that
which we have already described.

We shall now retrace our steps down the royal avenue, but before leaving
it we must once again look back upon the royal enclosure. It is not a
very grand sight, but it is pretty to see a high hill towering at the
back of the royal palace. Undoubtedly the position where the palace is
now situated is the best in Seoul, both through being in the very centre
of the town and through the prettiness of its situation. The inside of
the royal enclosure we shall presently describe.

Continuing our way, then, towards the east gate, we soon come to another
big thoroughfare on our right-hand side, at one corner of which is a
picturesque ancient pavilion, with a railing round it. This is one of the
sights of Seoul, "the big bell."

It is a huge bronze bell raised from the ground only about a foot. It
possesses a fine rich tone when it is hammered upon by the bell-ringer,
but a good deal of the sonorousness is lost and the sound made dreary and
monotonous by its being so low down. The man rings it by striking heavy
blows at it with a big wooden mallet, and its first note in the early
morning makes the drowsy gate-keepers of the town begin to make
preparations for establishing communication once more between the capital
and the outer world; while at sunset, as its last melancholy notes are
blown away in dying waves by the wind, the heavy gates are closed, and
every man--though not every woman, as we shall see--has to retire to his
home until dawn the next morning, if h