By Robert Neff In the 1880s, Lillias Underwood, an early American missionary in Korea, wrote: "No matter how old one is, without a top-knot [a Korean] is never considered a man, addressed with high endings, or treated with respect. After assuming the top-knot, no matter how young, he is invested with the dignities and duties of a man of the family, takes his share in making the offerings and prayers at the ancestral shrines, and is recognized by his ancestors' spirits as one of the family who is to do them honor, and whom they are to protect and bless."