to the industry of the Japanese, and their undoubted commercial sagacity, its imports of foreign trade in recent years have contributed to the position which it now takes in the commercial progress of the country. The economic expansion of the port, however, has been promoted by the business resulting from the immigration of Japanese settlers and the doubling of the native population. Materials for clothing, cotton goods, grass-cloth, and silk are pre-eminent in the local requirements. A comparison of the annual returns discloses a steady advance in its prosperity, the paramount influence, which the Japanese exercise over its welfare, restricting foreign trade to those articles which cannot be imported from Japan. Business has just doubled in six years; but the increase in the import trade is not in favour of British goods. The imposition of the tariff, which prevails in European Russia, at Vladivostock, accounted for the general advance in foreign imports at Won-san during 1901. In the following year, 1902, the imports were again heavier than the exports, the figures being: Imports, £191,535, and exports, £102,205. The local government of the port is conducted upon Japanese lines. The streets are broad, well gravelled, and fringed with an irregular border of trees. After the foul and narrow lanes of the Korean town, through which it is necessary to pick one's way before entering the settlement, their appearance is cheerful and attractive.
Won-san, the native town which has given its name to the port, is two miles from the heart of the settlement, and comprises a quaint medley of thatched and tiled houses, crowded together in narrow and noisome alleys. The main road from Seoul to the frontier, one of the six great roads of the country, lies through the centre of the town. The
