The Blue Dragon: A Tale of Recent Adventure in China

At the Italian barricade on Legation Street it was met by the remaining marines of the American guard and escorted to the legation. Although the streets were crowded with Chinese soldiers, Boxers, and citizens, no attempt was made to interfere in any way with the flight of these refugees, and that afternoon they were quartered within the spacious walls of the British Legation compound, where all foreigners, except those already sustaining attack in the Roman Catholic cathedral, were gathered for protection.

Here was a scene to beggar description. Streams of carts, and swarms of coolies laden with provisions, baggage, and household effects, were pouring in from every direction. The numerous low, one-story buildings of the legation were being assigned to different nationalities, or set apart for specific purposes. Men, women, and children, diplomats, soldiers, missionaries, railway engineers, bank clerks, customs employés, servants, and coolies, speaking every language under the sun, dogs and ponies, rapid-fire guns, jinrikishas, carts, and wheelbarrows, furniture, bedding, provisions, cases of wine, barrels of beer, and a thousand other things, all were mixed in apparently inextricable confusion.

At precisely four o'clock General Tung-Fu-Hsang's soldiers from Kwang-su opened fire with a sharp volley of musketry from the city streets, and the siege of the Pekin legations was begun.

CHAPTER XXVIII

FIGHTING SIXTY FEET ABOVE GROUND

Although the heavily walled compound of the British Legation, which during the siege sheltered four hundred foreigners and as many more Chinese Christians, or nearly one thousand persons in all, was the stronghold of the defence, the lines occupied and held embraced a wide outside area, both to the eastward and on the south. Beyond the imperial canal, just east of the legation, stood an extensive collection of buildings enclosed by a wall, forming the yamen, or palace, of Prince Su. On the first day of the siege this was seized and occupied as quarters for the hundreds of school-girls and native Christians whom the missionaries had refused to abandon. It was defended by the Japanese, assisted by the Italian and Austrian marines, and though it was subject to many fierce attacks and an almost continuous bombardment that set its buildings on fire a dozen times, it never was given up.

Besides this outpost, the American, Russian, German, Japanese, and French legations also were held, as was the Hôtel de Pékin of M. Charnot and his brave American wife. It was strongly fortified with sand-bags, and sent out to its guests, who had taken refuge in the British Legation, three meals a day with unbroken regularity during the siege. A large portion of Legation Street also was included within the foreign lines. On it stood a grain-shop, in which were found eight thousand bushels of wheat and several tons of rice, together with eleven one-mule mills, ready for grinding. As there were in all some three thousand persons to be fed, this food supply proved invaluable.

At first an Austrian captain, named Thomann, by virtue of seniority, assumed command of the defending force; but on the second day of the siege, he having proved himself incapable, the supreme command was, by unanimous consent, given to Sir Claude Macdonald, the British minister. Captain Thomann was killed a few weeks later during an attack on the Su Yamen, and now one of the streets of Pekin bears his name.

Under Sir Claude's intelligent supervision all the details of housing and feeding three thousand people, of preparing and placing fifty thousand sand-bags, of hospital and sanitary arrangements, and a thousand other things, were quickly systematized and placed in the hands of carefully selected committees. The work of fortifying the legations was given over to a young American missionary engineer, while the actual duty of defence was distributed according to nationality.

The British Legation compound, including the northwest angle of the whole line, was left to the resident inmates – ministers, attachés, missionaries, etc. The Su Yamen and northeast angle were intrusted to the Japanese, aided by Italians and Austrians. At the southeast angle were French and Germans, the latter occupying a section of the great city wall, from which, however, they ultimately were driven. On the southwest were the Americans and Russians, in their own legations, with the former holding their own section of city wall. This position, in spite of continuous shelling and repeated assaults, was held by American marines to the end; and, commanding, as it did, the entire legation area, it proved the key to the situation.

On the 1st of July, or after ten days of siege, during which time the Chinese fire of rifle-bullets, solid shot, and shell had been maintained almost without intermission from one quarter or another, thirty-five of the defenders had been killed and nearly twice that number were in the hospital. The Germans had been driven from their section of the wall, the French Legation had been destroyed, and several sorties, made for the purpose of capturing or at least silencing certain particularly annoying Chinese guns, had proved unsuccessful. In all this time no news had been received, nor had it proved possible to send any out; and it was not probable that the desperate plight of the Pekin legations was even known to the outside world.

The bright spots in this gloom were that there still was plenty to eat and to drink within the lines, the defences were constantly being strengthened by additional sand-bags, which the ladies and Chinese women were turning out by the thousand, the plucky Japanese still held the Su Yamen, and American marines still maintained their position on the wall. Also, very early in the siege the latter, dragging their Colt's automatic gun up to their elevated post, had made a raid along the top of the wall for a quarter of a mile, driving the Kwang-su troops in wild confusion before them, and mowing them down by hundreds.

Now, however, the Chinese, profiting by this sad experience, had advanced a series of brick and sandbag approaches, against which the Colt proved ineffective. At the end of the last one the Chinese had erected a small tower, only a few feet from the American barricade, and commanding it. From this, while protected against a return fire, they hurled down huge bricks upon the defenders, who were unable to reply. At the same time the American position, isolated since the Germans on the east had been driven from their wall, was exposed to a galling fire from both directions. The situation thus had become critical in the extreme; for, if the Chinese could succeed in forcing this position, the legations would lie at their mercy.

The top of the wall at this point was reached from the inside by two ramps, or sloping walks, that led upward like the two legs of a letter A. One of these was controlled by the Americans, whose barricades were at its upper end, while the other was in possession of the Chinese.

From the outset Rob Hinckley had cast his lot with the American marines, largely on account of his liking for Turner, the sharp-shooter, whose acquaintance he had made on that first memorable day of the siege. On the morning of July 3d these two had come down from the danger post for a much-needed rest after a forty-eight-hour tour of duty on the wall. At sunset they were to return to the almost untenable barricades. In the mean time, they slept like logs until late in the afternoon, when they were awakened to partake of a meal of cold boiled mule "beef," rice, hard bread, and tea.

"Look here, young man," said Turner, pausing for a moment in his hearty eating, "I don't see why you should go up on that old rockery again to-night. You ain't 'listed, and don't have to."

"I have to just as much now as I did at first," replied Rob, quietly, "and you didn't say anything against it then."

"Things have changed. We seemed to have some show then, with the Germans to look out for one side; but we haven't any now, and I don't see how we can hold the place through another night. You've noticed that the Chinks always get busier at night than in the daytime, and now they are right on top of us."

"The only wonder to me is that they haven't cleaned us out long since," said Rob. "They certainly have fired shots enough to destroy an army, let alone a couple of dozen men, which is as many as we ever have had up there at one time."

"It is a funny business," admitted Turner, "and I have puzzled over it a good deal myself. Do you know what I think? I believe that heavy firing from the Ha-ta tower is all a bluff and is mostly done with blank cartridges. If it isn't, we ought, by rights, to have been swept off the wall like puff-balls in a gale, long ago. There's another thing. It looks to me as if about nine out of every ten of the Chinks' rifle-shots must be fired straight up in the air, same as we kids used to do on Fourth of July. At night, when they fire most, I believe they all shoot into the air, 'cause you never hear of anybody getting hit at night, and they sure shoot to beat the band. Looks like they were only trying to scare us or kill us by keeping us from sleeping – I don't know which."

"Speaking of the Fourth of July," said Rob, "do you remember that to-morrow is the Fourth?"

"Sure, and I'm wondering if I'll live to see it. Somehow I don't feel as if I would."

"Oh, pshaw! Don't talk that way!" exclaimed the young volunteer. "You'll live to see it, and plenty more like it, only a heap happier. I felt blue myself this morning, but now, after a day's sleep and a good stuffing of mule, I feel all right."

At this point the conversation was interrupted by the entrance of Lieutenant Hibbard, who said:

"Well, boys, we are in for it! Word has gone out that we've got to capture those barricades to-night and sweep the wall clean as far as the Chien Men gate. There's a squad of Tommies going up to help us, and if we don't do the trick this time I am afraid it will be all up with the whole shooting-match. Of course, Hinckley, you don't have to go unless you choose."

"Of course I do have to go, Mr. Hibbard!" cried Rob, hotly. "I should be too ashamed ever to call myself an American again if I didn't; and if we don't carry those barricades I hope I'll never come down again alive. What time do we start?"

"Orders are to assemble on the wall as soon as it gets dark enough to go up the ramp unnoticed."

"All right, sir, we'll be there," said Turner, "and I know I'll never come down again alive if we don't get the Chinks on a run. We have got it to do, that's all."

An hour later, in the dusk of evening, a little group of twenty Americans and as many British marines, all of them picked men, crouched on the lofty wall listening to the earnest but low-voiced words of Captain John Meyers, U.S.M.C., the gallant officer who was to lead the charge that would mean life or death to every foreigner then in the city of Pekin. He did not speak more than a minute, but what he said filled every man who heard him with the spirit of a hero. When he had finished he leaped the barricade and started down the wall, with every man of his little party striving to gain his side.

The Chinese tower, from which they had been so harassed, went down like a card-house before their on-rush. A scattering volley of rifle-shots came from the barricade, but the Chinese were too completely taken by surprise to make a stand; even the Kwang-su savages, who never before had known defeat, fled in dismay before that charge of yelling Americans, whose rifles seemed to pour forth a continuous and inexhaustible stream of deadly fire. The Chinese fired a few shots, hurled a few spears, and then ran for their lives, darting from one barricade to another, but never allowed to pause, until such of them as were left alive gained the safe shelter of the Chien Men tower, a quarter of a mile away.

As the jubilant Americans streamed back towards their own barricades, where ten of their number had been left on guard, Rob Hinckley, proudly bearing a Chinese banner that he had captured, gave utterance to his joyful excitement in the old academy yell with which Hatton boys announced their victorious return from hard-fought ball-games. "Hi-ho! Hi-ho! Hat-ton Hi-ho!" he shouted, and to his amazement the same call came back like an echo from far beneath him in the underlying southern city. "I wonder if it can be Jo!" he thought, and shouted again; but this time there was no reply.

There were no dead Chinese, nor any wounded, for a detachment of Russian marines, who had charged up the Chinese ramp after the Americans and British had swept by its upper end, had followed them, pitching every dead or wounded Chinese whom they discovered over the parapet and down into the southern city. When these Russians met the returning victors they reported that they had found two dead Americans and carried them back to the barricades.

This news suddenly quieted Rob Hinckley's jubilant shoutings, for instantly he recalled Turner's foreboding, and realized that he had not seen nor heard him since that first mad scramble over their own barricade. Now he shouted: "Turner! O Turner!" but there was no answer, and when they reached the American post his worst fears were confirmed. Turner and another marine, named Thomas, had been shot and instantly killed in the brief space between the two barricades. Here, too, had Captain Meyers received a spear wound that he disregarded until the affair was ended. Then it sent him to the hospital, where he remained for weeks. One of the British marines was found to be slightly wounded, as was one of the Russians; but these were the only casualties that the legation defenders were compelled to pay for the most important victory of the entire siege. By it they had gained a clear quarter of a mile of wall that they never afterwards gave up, and which remains to this day American Legation territory.

CHAPTER XXIX

JO HEAPS COALS OF FIRE

Turner, crack shot of the American marines and one of the best men in the corps, was buried. Rob laid a wreath of flowers, twined by Annabel Lorimer, on his coffin, and then went back to the wall, where he was on guard duty at the eastern barricade. A drizzle of rain had fallen since early morning. The Fourth of July of 1900, as celebrated by Americans in Pekin, had not been a particularly happy or enjoyable day.

When Rob relieved the man who had taken poor Turner's place on guard, the latter said:

"There's some chap down below there in the southern city who has bothered me a good deal. He keeps calling out, 'I-ho!' or something of that kind, every few minutes, and has been at it for more than an hour; but I can't get a sight of him or even locate him."

"Like this?" asked Rob, at the same time leaning over the parapet and uttering clear and loud the Hatton Academy call.

"Yes, that's exactly it," answered the marine. "How did you know? There he goes now – "

The answer had been prompt, but still no one likely to have given it could be discovered. While they watched and speculated a Chinese arrow came flying up from some unseen bow, and fell on the wall just within the barricades.

"It was only a trick to get a pot shot at us!" exclaimed the marine, disgustedly; but Rob picked up the arrow, wrapped around which he found a sheet of thin paper. It was, as he had hoped, a note from Jo, that read as follows:

"Dear Rob, – Don't worry. Everything will come out right side. You have plenty friend in Pekin, among them Prince Ching, who tells that the spirits of air are protect you, and orders them fired at. I have fire-gun at Ha-ta tower, but only blank cartridge. Make plenty noise, and all body is please. Many big gun cannot be use, for fear shoot over and kill Chinese on other side. Now say can starve you out. If you want send letter Tien-Tsin, drop it over wall same place to-morrow, sun dark, and I take it."

From the foregoing it will be seen that Jo's ability to write English was not equal to his conversational fluency in that same tongue; but his letter was readily understood, and gave great satisfaction to the few persons in authority among the defenders, who shortly afterwards were made acquainted with its contents.

Repeated efforts had been made to get news of their situation to the outside world, but thus far all the messengers had been captured or turned back. Now, with renewed hope a despatch, descriptive of the situation in Pekin, and imploring speedy relief, was prepared and given to Rob Hinckley for transmission.

At sunset he again stood at the appointed place on the parapet, and with the first gathering of dusk a low but distinct call of "Hi-ho!" came up to him from the dark shadows at the foot of the lofty wall. His tiny message, folded in oiled silk and weighted with a bit of brick, already was attached to a thread, by which it was promptly lowered. Then came a slight jerk on the thread, and he pulled up the broken end to satisfy himself that the little packet really had been taken.

After this incident the siege dragged wearily on, with frequent skirmishes and constant firing on both sides, but with no decisive advantage to either. The death-list received almost daily additions, and the hospitals became filled to overflowing. To the heats of the summer season were added flooding rains that necessitated a constant repairing of washed-down defences. Thus weary days lengthened into tedious weeks, and the weeks formed themselves into an unbroken month of siege, before anything hopeful happened. Then came a white flag from the Tsung Li Yamen, with a note signed "Prince Ching and others," asking for a cessation of firing that negotiations for the departure of the foreigners might be renewed.

This proposition being accepted, active hostilities on both sides were suspended for a period of three weeks. During this interval the inmates of the legations were as closely confined to their lines as ever, and hardly a day passed without more or less rifle-firing.

In all this time there was no word from Jo, nor any proof that the precious message intrusted to him ever had been delivered. There were rumors, filtering through Chinese sources, that Tien-Tsin had been captured, and that a great foreign army was marching towards Pekin; but these rumors could not be verified, and as firing on the legations, especially at night, was again begun, the situation appeared more hopeless than ever.

Shortly before daylight, on the 10th of August, a furious fire was directed against the legations, beginning at the southwest, or Russian corner, and rapidly extending around the entire circle. While it was in progress, Rob Hinckley, who again was stationed on the wall, thought he heard the signal cry of Hatton Academy coming from the direction of the Ha-ta watch-tower. The noise of the cannonade and the rattle of musketry were so tremendous that he could not be sure, but he ventured an answering cry, and then breathlessly listened. Yes, there it was again, not loud, but distinct, and apparently close at hand. Rifle-bullets from the Ha-ta tower were sweeping the wall and thudding against the tough bricks of the shelter behind which crouched the Americans.

"Don't shoot, men! I am going out!" cried our lad. As he spoke he leaped the low barricade and ran to the outer parapet, from which the call had seemed to come.

"Jo!" he shouted. "Jo! where are you?"

"Here I am, Rob," came in feeble tone, and in another moment the young American had found his friend crawling weakly in the partial shelter of the parapet, but at the very end of his strength.

Somehow Rob got him behind the barricade, where he lay panting.

"What is it, old man?" cried his friend, bending anxiously over the exhausted and pitiably emaciated figure. "Are you sick, or wounded, or what? Did you get through to Tien-Tsin? Are troops on the way?"

Jo's eyes were closed, and he barely breathed; but his lips moved, and Rob caught the whispered words:

"Army most here. Look, leg bandage, Rob, dear friend – "

That was all, and Chinese Jo never spoke again. The last great, self-imposed duty of his life had splendidly been performed, but at what expense of suffering never can be known, for in the turmoil of the days immediately following his heroic death he was forgotten. Afterwards General Gasalee, commanding the relieving army, could only say that he had given several despatches to as many messengers, with the hope that at least one of them might be got through. The one borne by Jo was found hidden in a blood-stained cloth bound around one of his legs. It was a brief note from the commanding general, stating that an allied force of twenty thousand men, British, American, Japanese, and Russian, were fighting their way towards Pekin, and making such steady progress that they expected to be at Tung Chou, only twelve miles away, on the 12th, and to reach the capital by the 13th or 14th.

This, the first reliable news received from the relieving army, was hailed with extravagant joy by the long-imprisoned inmates of the British Legation, and for hours the bulletin-board on which it was posted was surrounded by a dense throng of all nationalities, many of whom could not read English, while some could not read at all, but all anxious to see the blessed words that promised them speedy safety.

The story of Chinese Jo's bravery was told from mouth to mouth until all knew it; and when, that evening, his poor, emaciated body, covered with mute evidences of his sufferings in the form of livid scars and unhealed wounds, was laid to rest in the legation grounds, his funeral was the most largely attended of any during the siege. Although it was not a military funeral, the guns of his own countrymen, firing upon those he had given his life to save, thundered a requiem alike for him and for the dying era of Chinese national life that was about to close.

Again Rob Hinckley and Annabel Lorimer stood together at an open grave, and as they turned away at the conclusion of the simple but solemnly impressive ceremony of committal, the latter said, with tear-choked voice:

"I think he was the bravest boy I ever knew."

"He certainly was," replied Rob, "and also he was the best friend I ever had."

When Sir Claude Macdonald first read the welcome despatch from General Gasalee, and at the same time heard that its bearer was dead, he exclaimed: "What a pity he could not have lived to take back a plan of the city walls, showing the best place of entrance!"

A little later this regret became generally expressed, but it did not reach Rob Hinckley's ears until the day after Jo's funeral. Immediately upon hearing it, he went to the American minister and offered his own services as a messenger to convey any desired information to the approaching army.

At first the minister refused his consent. "The southern city, as well as the country between here and Tung Chou, is crowded with the enemy," he said, "and for a foreigner, or even for a native messenger, to attempt a passage through them would be to court an almost certain death."

"My friend gave his life for us," replied Rob, simply, "and he was a Chinese who had been badly treated by Americans. What he did any American ought to be willing to do. Besides, I believe I can get through. He taught me how to travel in China as a Chinese, and now, if ever, is my chance to profit by his lessons. Please let me go, sir. If I am killed, it will only be one life lost; if I get through, the information I can give about the water-gate may save thousands of lives."

That night a Chinese beggar, apparently old and on the verge of starvation, clad in the filthiest of rags, and with a scanty, unkempt queue coiled in slovenly manner about his half-shaven head, hobbled, by aid of a stick, towards the low water-gate, under the Tartar City wall, that carried off the surplus water of the imperial canal. This gate nominally was closed by iron bars, and in times of flood was impassable; but now there was little water flowing through it, and it was only choked with black mud. Above it was that section of the city wall held by American marines.

Fumbling in the darkness of this almost-forgotten water-gate, the beggar found a bar so rusted and worn by age that he could force a way through. When he emerged on the other side of the wall he was covered with black, vile-smelling mud. It rendered him so disgusting an object that even a Chinese could not tolerate his presence, and, whenever he approached one with a whining plea for alms, he was driven away with blows and curses. Thus he wandered on from group to group, through many streets, until he came to a gate in the eastern wall of the southern city that was guarded by a troop of Chinese cavalry. These amused themselves by teasing him, until, at length, one of them, tired of the sport, said: