Letter to the Hamgyeong Inspector and the Southern and Northern Army Commanders移咸鏡道巡察使南北道兵使文

The feeble people of distant places, since passing through the fires of war, have had every sort of service gather upon them, and their resentment and distress and their scattering are the same in every place. This province is very far from the capital, so that I do not know in detail the vexations and ills among the people. For the present I will speak of what I have heard.

The men of arms of the southern and northern circuits who have passed the examinations, new and old alike, go into the riverside to stand defense, entering in the second month each year and being released in the tenth. In the farming season they cannot tend their own farming, and it is said that very many scatter on this account. Some say that if the men of arms of the province were divided into four shifts and sent in to stand defense by turns, resting their strength, they might escape the misery of hanging upside down. Look carefully into whether the course of the thing is suitable or not and into what the people wish, and report.

At the Six Garrisons of the northern circuit and the places where the government sells salt, it would seem that the price ought to be raised or lowered according to the market rate; yet of late, it is said, the price of salt has been forcibly fixed at four mal of grain, and the people are distressed by this too. Look into this as well and make a change.

Since those in this province who have won military merit must provide their own provisions and are constantly out on defense duty, their resentment and distress pierce the heavens. Those who won military merit have come to regret it of themselves, so that a government servant wishes to remain a government servant and a private slave wishes to remain a private slave, and the sound of their complaint is everywhere, all saying that military merit has become the means of harming their own persons. From now on, though trouble arise, there will surely be no one who will come forward for the state and win merit; it is utterly disheartening. Though I do not know where the plan for a change may lie, to sit and watch and not seek a remedy is also what I cannot bear. Some would have them fed on government provisions while on defense duty, doing away with the abuse of providing for themselves; but this is hard to carry out, the government's strength being insufficient. Only if the shifts are spread out, reckoning the distance of the going and coming, so that in the slack season of defense they farm at home, and when the ice has formed and defense is pressing they go out by turns, will there be times of rest as well, and it would seem somewhat easier; reckon it with all speed and arrange it.

Just now the troubles of the northwest grow worse by the day. Our country, in the aftermath of injury and enfeeblement, is caught between two strong foes; without soldiers the enemy cannot be controlled, and without the people the state cannot be held. This can be known without waiting for a wise man. Why then are there few among the border officers and magistrates who know it, who still tyrannize over the people as recklessly as before in their old habit, so that the hearts of the frontier people and of the barbarians grow more estranged by the day? It is truly painful to the heart, and though I have good plans there is no way to put them into effect. Let this province impress it to the utmost, driving out and dismissing the greedy and harsh and the weak and spineless so that they do not remain and become a harm to the people, and correcting the chronic troubles of many years one after another. If the feeling of the people is willing and compliant, the frontier will be firm of itself.

The people of the north have nothing to wear in the cold, and count it a great benefit merely to raise dogs and wear their skins. Yet it is said that the border officers and magistrates, whenever they feast the barbarians, collect the natives' dogs and kill some hundreds of them, taking the meat and seizing the hides along with it. As for the meat, there is nowhere else to provide for feasting the barbarians, and it may be said to be unavoidable; but the hides could be given back, and if they are taken as well, with what are the native soldiers, who have no clothing, to cover their bodies? From now on forbid this strictly and altogether, and return the hides one by one to their own owners. If there is any border officer who dares take even a single hide for himself, make it known as well that he is at once to be judged under the heavy law, and carry it out.