"I tell you there are no elephants and there are no monkeys in these islands. I"ve been here twenty years or more!"
"But I know elephants when I see them!"
But just at that moment a much greater danger confronted us, for I saw three tigers leap out of the jungle and start after the two elephants; right down the trail toward us. Then I knew that we were as good as dead.
I yelled: "Tigers! Tigers! They are running after the elephants! They are on top of us!"
The fool of a missionary laughed aloud, as he lay on the trail and said, "Plumb crazy! Plumb crazy! Sun"s got him! Sun"s got him!"
"Sun"s got who, fool? The elephants and tigers will kill us in about a minute!"
But just then something happened which upset my calculations and made me have a feeling that--after all--perhaps the old missionary was right--for suddenly those two elephants; being too closely pursued by the tigers; nonchalantly flew into the air like two great birds, and lighted in the tree over our heads where I thought the monkeys were. If those elephants hadn"t started to fly; I should still be arguing with the missionary; but as it turned out; I shut my fool mouth and decided that the missionary was right and that I had "Missed too many boats."
CHAPTER VIII
FLASH-LIGHTS OF FREEDOM
"SELF-DETERMINATION!" That phrase has set the whole world on fire!
"Independence!" That word somehow has awakened the Oriental world; awakened that ma.s.s of humanity as it has never been awakened before.
Korea perhaps has thrilled to this awakening as no other section of the Orient or the Near and Far East. India"s millions are restless; the Filipino is hungry for Independence although he is loyal to the United States; but Korea has the matter set in its heart like adamant. This determination will never be broken; Korea will never be conquered by j.a.pan!
This dream of complete and full independence is buried in the souls of the children, as well as in the souls of the brave women, and of the old men of Korea.
"It is one of the most thrilling things I have ever seen in the Orient!"
said a man on the Editorial staff of _Millard"s Weekly_. "It is the most significant outcome of the war; Korea"s pa.s.sion for independence, and the Student Movement in China!"
I said to a business man of California who had traveled all over the Orient and who had been sent as part of the Commission that prepared the way for the abandonment of the Picture Bride custom, "What is the most significant thing you have seen in the Orient?"
"The determination of the Koreans for Self-determination!" was his quick reply.
"Will they get it?"
"It is inevitable in time!" he responded, and then he added: "Why the little rascals; the children, I mean; paint the Korean flags on their brown bellies, because the j.a.panese gendarmes will not allow them to display the Korean flag in public!" and he laughed aloud at the memory.
"Have you seen Korean kiddies with flags painted on their stomachs?"
"Dozens of them. They like to show them to Americans," he said.
A week later I was walking with a Korean missionary and asked him if what the business man from California had told me about the children was true and he said, "Wait until we find a group of them."
We waited for only a few minutes when we ran into a crowd coming home from school. A friendly smile and a low-voiced "Mansei" got attention.
Then we pointed to our own stomachs.
In a flash they caught on to what we wanted and, looking around cautiously, each little rascal untied his robe and there, sure enough was the flag of his country painted on his stomach.
"That is one of the most thrilling sights I have seen in the Orient!" I said with tears in my eyes. "If the children of the land feel that way, Korea will never be conquered!"
"The American understands! The American understands!" one of the little bright-eyed boys said to the missionary in Korean.
A missionary was teaching a cla.s.s of Koreans about Heaven.
A little hand shot up.
The missionary nodded that the child could speak.
"Will there be any j.a.ps in Heaven?"
This was a baffling question; for diplomatic destinies were at stake.
But missionaries are usually honest, so she said, "Yes, if they are good j.a.ps!"
"Then I don"t want to go!" said the little eight-year-old Korean with emphasis.
Another teacher was telling a cla.s.s in Geography to draw a map of the Orient.
One Korean child said, "Do we have to put in that little group of islands east of the coast of China?"
I met one Korean whom I had known in America. He was educated in the American universities. He was in every sense of the word a gentleman and an intellectual.
He told me that the older children of his family had taught the nine-months-old baby to raise its hands in the air above its head whenever the word "Mansei" was spoken.
I got an electrical shock of patriotism the day I saw that tiny child lift its little arms above its head when that sacred word was spoken. It was like a benediction of freedom!
"This posture of the child is more significant," said Mr. ----, "when you know that the most cruel method of torture that the j.a.panese use is that of stretching a man, woman or child up by the thumbs to the ceiling with his toes just touching the floor."
In that same posture of torture Koreans rise to their toes when they give their national cry of "Mansei" for all the world like an American student giving his college yell.
"It means life and death to give that cry as you know," said this intelligent Korean.
"Then what will your children do when they grow a bit older and go out on the streets and yell this cry?" I asked this intelligent father.
"Be killed, no doubt, by some ignorant, ruthless j.a.panese gendarme!" he said with finality.
"Then you should not allow them to teach its tiny lips that word!" I said.
"I would rather my child were dead than to have it forget that cry!"
In this same family one Sunday afternoon a two-year-old child was sleeping on a mat. The father and mother were reading some American papers sent them by their old college friends in the United States.
Suddenly that little two-year-old sat straight up in its mat bed, lifted its arms in the air and shouted "Mansei! Mansei! Mansei!" three times and then dropped back to sleep as if nothing had happened.