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arch-conspirators in Tokyo again disquieted the Corean Government, who now sent a more discreet assassin in the person of Ri-itsu-shoku. He came to Japan in 1892, and entered by some means or other into the closest intimacy with Kin-giok-kin, who imparted to his false friend all his secrets. Ri-itsu-shoku won over as his accomplice Ko-sho-u, a young Corean lately returned from France, whose name will never be forgotten in the dark history of assassinations. Ri-itsu-shoku made Kin-giok-kin believe that Li-Hung-Chang was tired of the Bin Government in Corea, and wished to enter into personal relations with Kin-giok-kin in order to carry out in Seoul a plan suited to bring back the Japanese party to power. He presented Kin-giok-kin with a false cheque for 5,000 yen drawn by Li-Hung-Chang on a Chinese bank in Shanghai, and told the latter that Ko-sho-u and an attaché of the Chinese Legation in Tokyo would accompany him to the Chinese port, whence the party might find passage to Tientsin. Kin-giok-kin was foolish enough to believe all this, despite the warning given him by some of his Japanese friends, and was shot by Ko-sho-u while resting in a Japanese hotel in Shanghai on the 28th of April, 1894. Ko-sho-u was captured by the Chinese police, and Li-Hung-Chang ordered him to be sent to Corea under escort, together with the corpse of Kin-giok-kin, which, arriving in Corea, was cut into six pieces (head, body, and limbs), and exposed for three days in each of the eight provinces of the realm. As for Ko-sho-u, he was set free by the Corean Government, despite the representations made to the Tsung-li-Yamen by the foreign Consuls in Shanghai through their Ministers in Peking, and to the Corean Government by our Minister in Seoul.

Meanwhile, Ri-itsu-shoku remained in Tokyo in order to assassinate Boku-ei-ko, but was not so fortunate as Ko-sho-u. He was betrayed by two of his accomplices, who went over to Boku-ei-ko, invited Ri-itsu-shoku to the boarding-house of the Corean students in Tokyo, and, tying him up with ropes and threatening him with fire and sword, compelled him to disclose all the details of the secret mission. His papers were seized, and among them were found as many as two letters patent from the King of Corea. Of course, illegal arrest and torture were punishable by Japanese law, and the Corean students were sentenced by our district court to several months’ imprisonment. Ri-itsu-shoku was also tried, and acquitted for want of evidence.

Since March, 1894, several provinces of Corea had been in a disturbed condition. The so-called To-gaku-to (Tonghaks—party of Oriental learning) were driven to despair by the