on, land for settlement, implements
and other assistance. This company is an immense semi-official trust of big
financial interests in direct coeoperation with the Government, and is
supported by an official subsidy of L50,000 a year. Working parallel to it
is the Bank of Chosen, the semi-official banking institution which has been
placed supreme and omnipotent in Korean finance.

How this works was explained by a writer in the New York _Times_ (January
29, 1919). "These people declined to part with their heritage. It was here
that the power of the Japanese Government was felt in a manner altogether
Asiatic.... Through its branches this powerful financial institution ...
called in all the specie in the country, thus making, as far as
circulating-medium is concerned, the land practically valueless. In order
to pay taxes and to obtain the necessaries of life, the Korean must have
cash, and in order to obtain it, he must sell his land. Land values fell
very rapidly, and in some instances land was purchased by the agents of the
Bank of Chosen for one-fifth of its former valuation." There may be some
dispute about the methods employed. There can be no doubt about the result.
One-fifth of the richest land in Korea is to-day in Japanese hands.

Allied to this system of land exploitation comes the Corvee, or forced
labour exacted from the country people for road making. In moderation this
might be unobjectionable. As enforced by the Japanese authorities, it has
been an appalling burden. The Japanese determined to have a system of fine
roads. They have built them--by the Corvee.

The most convincing evidence for outsiders on this land exploitation and on
the harshness of the Corvee comes from Japanese sources. Dr. Yoshino, a
professor of the Imperial University of Tokyo, salaried out of the
Government Treasury, made a special study of Korea. He wrote in the
_Taschuo-Koron_ of Tokyo, that the Koreans have no objection to the
construction of good roads, but that the official way of carrying out the
work is tyrannical. "Without consideration and mercilessly, they have
resorted to laws for the expropriation of land, the Koreans concerned being
compelled to part with their family property almost for nothing. On many
occasions they have also been forced to work in the construction of roads
without receiving any wages. To make matters worse, they must work for
nothing only on the days which are convenient to the officials, however
inc