The Red Book of Heroes

At last he rested from the heavy responsibilities of the last few years, though he worked as he always must do, and, now a major-general, in April 1882 set sail for the Cape, where the governor of the colony, sir Hercules Robinson, wanted his advice on the settlement and administration of Basutoland. But when Gordon arrived he found his views on the subject so totally different from those of the men in power that he resigned and left, and from London he carried out the great longing of his life – a visit to the Holy Land. Few people knew and loved their Bibles like Gordon, and every stone in Palestine was full of interest to him. Here he was alone and quiet, respecting the faith of others, and therefore causing them to respect his; talking and praying with those of different religions, teaching them and learning from them; preparing himself, as the Master whom he served had also done, for the fiery trial through which he was to pass.

All this time the king of the Belgians had been offering him the command of an expedition his majesty was anxious to send to the Congo, and continued to press the matter in spite of the refusal of Mr. Gladstone, then prime minister, to lend him Gordon to lead it. On January 1, 1884, Gordon went over to Brussels to talk over affairs with the king, and while he was there the English government suddenly decided to send him at once to the Soudan, where matters were in a very threatening state.

Since Gordon had left the country, four years before, Arabi pasha had revolted, and been crushed at Tel-el-Kebir, and a dervish in the Soudan, Mohammed Ahmed by name, had made himself famous by proclaiming himself mahdi, the expected prophet of the whole Mahometan world. Thousands flocked to the standard that he raised, and his armed escort stood with drawn swords in his presence. The Egyptian governor-general summoned him to Khartoum to answer for his proceedings, but the mahdi answered that he was master of the country and obeyed no one. The troops despatched against him he always defeated, and when a new governor-general and a fresh army gave him battle they were utterly destroyed. Obeid in Darfour surrendered after a five months' siege, and, flushed with success, he carried all before him.

In June 1883 colonel Hicks was given by the Egyptian government the military command at Khartoum, with ten thousand men and thirty guns; but he had no knowledge of the country where he had to fight, and fell an easy prey to the mahdi's army, which was ten times as numerous as his own. The tribes of the eastern Soudan joined the victor's banner, and here, while Gordon was on his way to Khartoum, Baker pasha was defeated by Osman Digna, a slave-dealer of Suakim.

On January 17, 1884, Gordon, who was in Brussels, received a telegram from lord Wolseley, bidding him come over to London by the evening train. He started at once, and reached London early in the morning, and at twelve o'clock was taken by Wolseley to the Cabinet Council.

'He went in,' writes Gordon, 'and talked to the ministers, and came back and said, "Her majesty's government want you to undertake this. The government are determined to evacuate the Soudan, for they will not undertake to guarantee its safety. Will you go and do it?" I said, "Yes!" He said, "Go in." I went in and saw them. They said, "Did Wolseley tell you our orders?" I said, "Yes." I said, "You will not guarantee the future government of the Soudan, and you wish me to go up to evacuate now?" They said, "Yes," and it was over, and I left at 8 p. m. for Calais.'

He was seen off from the station by lord Wolseley and by lord Hartington, afterwards the duke of Devonshire, who always stood loyally by him, and repeatedly urged that help must be sent instantly, while his colleagues in the Cabinet waited to see how things would drift, till the time for help was past.

On January 26, the day which a year hence was to witness his death, Gordon, with colonel Stewart, was in Cairo, where he spent two busy days. The first news that greeted him was the success of the mahdi in all directions, and that the Mahometans in Syria and in Arabia would probably rise against their rulers. Yet he does not seem to have understood any better than the English and Egyptian governments what a terrific force the man really was, not so much in himself, but because he stood in the minds of hundreds of thousands for the deliverer who would aid them to shake off a yoke under which they groaned. 'I do not believe in the advance of the mahdi,' says Gordon a few days later; 'he is nephew to my old guide in Darfour, who was a very good fellow,' and on several occasions he shows that he had no idea as yet of the task that lay before him, and considered the mahdi a mere puppet in the hands of the slave-owners, who had joined him to a man. While in Cairo he did his best to make arrangements to ensure good government. He desired to see Nubar pasha, of whom he thought highly, placed in power, and the dangerous Zebehr banished to Cyprus, but Tewfik the khedive would listen to neither proposal. So, to the horror of some of the anti-slavery societies in England, who knew nothing of the supreme difficulties of Gordon's position, the newly appointed governor-general of the Soudan asked to take Zebehr with him, and keep him under his own eye. 'He is the ablest man in the Soudan,' said Gordon afterwards, 'a capital general and a good governor, and with his help I could have crushed the mahdi.' But Gordon's friends at Cairo had no faith in Zebehr's loyalty, and much in his hatred of Gordon, and at their entreaty the plan was given up. Yet Gordon did not sleep one night in Khartoum without knowing he was right, and writing to beg for Zebehr.

Forty-eight hours after reaching Cairo Gordon started with Stewart and four Egyptian officers for Khartoum.

'I go with every confidence and trust in God,' he wrote to Wolseley a few hours before he set out, in the spirit in which he lived and died, and in twenty days he was at Khartoum, where the whole population came out to welcome him.

With the help of the garrison of five thousand men Gordon began to fortify the town, and to throw up proper defences for Omdurman, on the left bank of the river. Provisions were stored, and a telegraph wire rigged up between the outworks and his palace, where he spent hours every day in sweeping the horizon with his field-glass. Once at Khartoum he began to realise what a force the mahdi had become. In March he wrote to the English government, 'I shall be caught in Khartoum, and even if I was mean enough to escape, I've not the power.' He begs both for men and money, but no notice was taken of his letter; so in April he telegraphs to sir Evelyn Baring, the English agent in Cairo, saying that he had asked sir Samuel Baker to try and obtain £30,000 from English and American millionaires to enable him to get three thousand Turkish soldiers, 'who would settle the mahdi for ever. I do not see the fun of being caught here to walk about the streets as a dervish with sandalled feet,' he goes on; 'not that I shall ever be taken alive.'

He had been sent expressly to evacuate the Soudan, yet he was not allowed to do it when it came to the point, and, as usually happens, attempts at compromise proved failures. An expedition was despatched to Suakim, and two bloody battles were fought, but the only result of these was to inflame the zeal of the mahdi's followers and to enable him to capture Berber, the key of the Soudan.

In Khartoum Gordon was using all his skill to fit the place to stand a siege, for he speedily saw that his garrison of one thousand Soudanese were all he had to rely on, the three thousand Egyptians and Bashi-Bazouks being worse than useless. Later his troops amounted to about double the number, and the population which he had to feed he reckoned at forty thousand. The provisions, he estimated, would last for five months; but in the end they had to do for ten, and up to the very last, when all else was eaten, there was still some corn left in the granary.

While the river was yet open, and before the Arabs had cut off all communication between Khartoum and the outer world, Gordon managed to send away some old and helpless soldiers, various government officials, and two thousand three hundred refugees, who had fled to the town for safety. Everything he could think of was done for their comfort; and in order to prevent the poor black women and children from feeling strange and frightened, he ordered colonel Duncan to ask a German woman living at Korosko to be ready to meet and help them. In Khartoum itself there were no fevers or pestilence, and food was given daily to the very poor.

It was in the middle of March that the town, with its three rings of defence, was invested by the Arabs; but when the time came for the Nile to rise it was easy for Gordon to send his steamers up and down both branches of the river, and to attack the Arab camps. Besides those boats he had already, he built some new ones, and kept his men busy in the workshops of the arsenal. But when April came, and there were no answers to his appeals, he wrote home that the matter must be settled before the Nile fell in November, when the river route would become not only difficult but dangerous.

In this way the months went on, and in England his friends were doing all they could to help him, though vainly. Lord Wolseley repeatedly urged on the Government the need of sending out a relief force, and in a letter of July 24, to Gordon's brother, he writes that if he was allowed to start immediately he could be at Dongola by October 15, and could go all the way to Khartoum by the river. Lord Hartington, too, never forgot Gordon, but the rest of the Cabinet turned a deaf ear; they had other things to think about.

The next move came from the French consul, monsieur Herbin, who was inside Khartoum. He suggested to Gordon that now that it was September, and the Nile had risen to its greatest height, the cataracts would be covered to a depth of thirty or forty feet; therefore it would be quite easy for a small steamer such as the Abbas to make its way to Dongola, and from there to send on letters and despatches to Cairo. Gordon approved of the plan, and Stewart offered to command the little force of forty or fifty soldiers – all that could be spared to go with it. On board were some Greeks, monsieur Herbin himself, Stewart, and Power the 'Times' correspondent, the only two friends Gordon had. How he must have longed to go with them. But that being impossible he put the thought out of his mind, and gave them most careful directions as to the precautions they were to take. But on their return journey Gordon's orders were neglected, the steamer was taken by the mahdi's troops, and all on board put to death, Stewart among them.

Thus Gordon was left alone in Khartoum, without a creature to share his responsibility or to help him in his work. From henceforward he was obliged to see to everything himself, and make sure that his orders were carried out.

From his journal and letters, which we have up to December 14, we know all that was going on inside the town: the measures of defence; the decoration which he invented to reward the soldiers for their courage or fidelity, an eight-pointed star with a grenade in the centre, and consisting of three classes, gold, silver, and pewter; the presence of Slatin (later the sirdar) in the mahdi's camp, and the chains put upon him. But in November the fighting grew fiercer; the mahdi cut all communication between Khartoum, stretching from the Blue to the White Nile, and Omdurman, on the right bank of the latter river. However, though he took the town, he did not keep it long, for he was shelled out of it; but day by day his forces crept closer, and Gordon, who had sent his steamers down to Shendy to meet the relieving troops which he thought were on their way, had no means of stopping the mahdi when he began to transport his army from one bank of the Nile to the other, in preparation for the last assault.

During the summer months Gordon had been cheered by the knowledge that sir Gerald Graham was fighting Osman Digna and keeping him at bay, but this was all the consolation he had.

'Up to this date,' he writes on October 29, 'nine people have come up as reinforcements since Hicks's defeat, and not a penny of money.' Still, for seven months not a man had deserted; but with the advance of the mahdi many of the defenders of Khartoum might be seen stealing after dark to his camp. He sent an envoy across the river to offer Gordon honourable terms if he would surrender, knowing full well from the papers which his spies had stolen from the steamer Abbas what straits the garrison were in. But Gordon, putting little faith in the word of the mahdi, rejected the proposal and returned for answer, 'We can hold out twelve years.'

By this time 'Relief Expedition No. 2, to save our national honour,' as Gordon persisted in calling it, was on its way, and many of us can recall with what sickening hearts we watched its daily progress. The obstacles which had been foretold months before by both Gordon and Wolseley proved even greater than they expected. The Nile had fallen, and its cataracts, like staircases of rocks, were of course impassable, and the transport of the boats was a terrible difficulty. Then, owing to treachery, all the useful camels were spirited away, and only enough could be collected to carry one thousand men across the desert. Sir Herbert Stewart started first, and reached the wells of Jakdul on January 3, and being obliged to halt there, as the camels were needed to bring up other troops, he occupied the time in building a fort. On the 12th they all pushed on to Abou Klea, where they arrived on the 17th, to find the mahdi awaiting them. Here two fierce battles were fought, in one of which sir Herbert Stewart was mortally wounded. In each the mahdi was defeated, but he proceeded to attack Metemmeh on the 21st, the British force being now commanded by sir Charles Wilson, who was unexpectedly reinforced during the battle by some troops on board Gordon's four steamers, which were returning to Khartoum. Three days later (January 24) Wilson started in two steamers for Khartoum, ninety-five miles away, and the river was so low that it was necessary to be very cautious. On the morning of the 25th one of the boats ran on a rock, and could not be floated off till nine o'clock that night. As soon as he possibly could Wilson got up steam again, but eight miles from Khartoum a native hailed him from the bank. 'Khartoum has fallen!' he said, 'and Gordon has been shot.'

Wilson would not believe it. To have failed when success was within his grasp seemed too terrible to think of. It must be one of the mahdi's devices to stop the advance of our troops, so he went on till he could command a proper view of the town. The masses of black-robed dervishes that filled the streets and crowded along the river bank told their own tale, and, bowing his head, Wilson gave the signal to go back down the river.

From Slatin pasha, then a captive in the mahdi's camp, we know how it happened. Omdurman had fallen on the 13th, but Khartoum would probably not have been assaulted so soon had not the mahdi suffered such severe defeats at Abou Klea and at Abou Kru, three days later; then he hurried back to Khartoum and again summoned Gordon to surrender. His offer was refused, and addressing his men he informed them that during the night they were to be conveyed across the river in boats, but that if victory was to be theirs, absolute silence was necessary.

About half-past three in the morning they were all ready, and attacked at the same moment both the east and west gates. The east held out for some time, but the west gate soon gave way, and the rebels entered with a rush, murdering every man they met. In an open space near the palace they came up with Gordon, walking quietly in front of a little group of people to take refuge at the Austrian consul's house. A shot ended his life, and saved him from the tortures that men like the mahdi inflict on their captives. Death, as we know, had no terrors for him. 'I am always ready to die,' he had said to the king of Abyssinia nearly six years before, 'and so far from fearing your putting me to death, you would confer a favour on me, for you would deliver me from all the troubles and misfortunes which the future may have in store.' Now death had delivered him, yet none the less does his fate lie like a blot on the men who sent him to his doom, and turned a deaf ear to his prayers for help until it was too late. England was stricken with horror and grief at the news, and showed her sorrow in the way which Gordon would have chosen, not by erecting statues or buildings to his memory, but by founding schools to help the little orphan boys whom he always loved. But whatever bitterness may have been in the hearts of his friends towards those who had sacrificed him, Gordon we can be sure would have felt none.

'One wants some forgiveness oneself,' he said, when he pardoned Abou Saoud, who had tried to betray him. 'And it is not a dear article.'

THE CRIME OF THEODOSIUS

Everyone who stops to visit the town of Trèves, or Trier, to give it its German name, must be struck by the number and beauty of its ruins, which give us some idea of the splendour of the city at the time that Ambrose the Prefect lived there and ruled his province. About the city were hills now covered with vines, and through an opening between them ran the river Moselle. A wall with seven gates defended Trèves from the German tribes on the east of the Rhine, but only one, the Porta Nigra, or Black Gate, is left standing. Its cathedral, the oldest in Europe north of the Alps, was founded in 375 a. d. by Valentinian I., who often occupied the palace which was sacked and ruined a century later by Huns and Franks. A great bridge spanned the Moselle, and outside the walls, where the vineyards now climb the hills, was an amphitheatre which held 30,000 people, and when these came back, tired and dusty, from chariot races or games, there were baths and warm water in the underground galleries to make them clean and comfortable.

It was somewhere about the year 333 a. d. that a boy was born at Trèves in the house of the governor, and called Ambrose, after his father. He was the youngest of three children, his brother Satyrus being only a little older than himself, while Marcellina, their sister, who was nearly four, looked down upon the others as mere babies. Ambrose the elder was a very important person indeed, for the emperor Constantine had made him ruler, or prefect, of the whole of Europe west of the Rhine, that is, of Spain, Gaul or France, and Britain. The prefect was a good and just man, and the nations were happy under his sway; but he died after a few years, and his wife, unfortunately, thought it wiser to leave Trèves and take her children to Rome, where they could get the best teaching and would become acquainted with their father's friends.

It was a long and difficult journey for a lady and two boys (Marcellina had already gone to a convent in Rome), though they were rich enough to travel in tolerable comfort. Even in summer the passage of the Alps was hard enough, and the towering mountains, steep precipices, and rushing rivers must have seemed strange and alarming to anyone fresh from the fertile slopes of the Rhineland. But the boys were not frightened, only deeply interested, and they quite forgot to be sorry at leaving their old home in the excitement of what lay before them.

No doubt they had many adventures, or what they would have considered as such, before they reached the corn-covered plains of Lombardy, and stopped to rest in the city of Milan, whose name was hereafter to be bound up for all time with that of little Ambrose. But we are not told anything about their travels, and when they arrived in Rome they went straight to the old house, which had been for generations in their father's family. That family was famous in the annals of the city, and had become Christian in the time of the persecution; but nowadays Christians and pagans lived happily together, and divided the public offices between them.

The children soon settled down in their new surroundings, and felt as if they had lived all their lives in Rome. Marcellina they seldom or never saw, and, however much her mother may have longed after her, she was forced to content herself with her two boys and to take pride in their success.

The prefect of Rome, Symmachus by name, had taken a great fancy to Satyrus, in spite of the fact that the boy was brought up a Christian, while he himself was a pagan. Symmachus shared with the Christian Probus the chief authority in Rome, and while Satyrus was to be found in his house during most of the hours when he was not attending, with his brother, classes in Greek and Latin literature and in law, Ambrose was no less frequently in that of Probus. Though this caused their mother to spend many lonely evenings, she was well pleased, for both men bore a high character, and would be able to help her boys in many ways that were impossible to a woman. The two youths were very popular, pleasant, and well-mannered, and with strong common-sense which proved useful in saving them from pitfalls that might otherwise have been their ruin. They had friends without number, but they liked no one's company so much as each other's, and it was a sad moment for both when Symmachus gave Satyrus a post under his own son, and the two young men set sail for Asia Minor.

For some time Ambrose remained at home, learning the duties of a prefect under Probus. He early showed great talent for managing men, a quick eye for detecting crime, impartiality in giving judgment, and firmness in seeing it carried out. Probus must have watched anxiously to see how far the young man's sense of justice and his desire for mercy would act on each other, but what he saw satisfied him. Ambrose knew at once what was the important point in every matter, and never allowed his mind to be confused by things that had nothing to do with the real question. This was his safeguard as a judge, and this was the principle he held to all through his life, which caused him to be such a different man from Hildebrand or Thomas à Becket, or many great bishops who came after him. To Ambrose, murder was murder, theft was theft, whether it was done by a Christian or a pagan, and the punishment was equally heavy for both.

Perhaps the emperor Valentinian may have noted the qualities of the young lawyer, or perhaps he may have consulted with Probus, but in any case, in the year 372 Ambrose was sent off to govern the whole of North Italy, under the title of 'consul.' At the utmost he was only twenty-nine, and he may have been younger, for the date of his birth is uncertain. But his head was in no way turned by his position, and the emperor, a well-meaning but tactless man, beheld with satisfaction that the restless people of Milan, the capital of the north, were growing daily quieter under the rule of Ambrose. What his own severity had been powerless to accomplish Ambrose carried through without any difficulty. The parties, religious as well as political, into which the city was split up, all came to him with their grievances, and, wonderful to say, never murmured at his verdicts. Before he had been consul much more than a year, Milan was in a quieter state than it had been for half a century.

But the death of the bishop early in 374 threatened to plunge everything into the old confusion. Valentinian was consulted, but refused to have anything to do in the matter of the election of a new prelate; it was not his business, he said. So the bishops streamed in to Milan from the cities of the north and met in the gallery of one of the large round churches that were built in those days. In great excitement the people pressed in below; so much depended on who was chosen – to which party he belonged. For hours and hours they waited, and every now and then a murmur ran through the crowd that the announcement was about to be made; but it died away as fast as it came, and the weary waiting began again. At last the strain grew too great, and it was quite plain that the smallest spark of disagreement would kindle a great fire.

A man wiser than the rest saw this, and hastened to summon Ambrose to the spot.

'Do not delay an instant,' he cried, 'or it will be too late. Only you can keep the peace, so come at once.'

Ambrose needed no urging. What his friend said was true, and, besides, he was as a magistrate bound if possible to prevent a riot, or, if one had already begun, to quell it.

The loud, angry voices ceased as he entered the church, and amidst a dead silence he begged the crowd to be patient yet a little while longer, and to remember that the choice of a bishop was one that affected them all, and could not be made in a hurry. As he spoke he noted that the excitement began to grow less, and by the time he had ended the flushed faces were calm again. Then the voice of a child rang through the church.

'Ambrose, bishop!'

'Ambrose, bishop,' echoed the people, but Ambrose stood for a moment rooted to the spot. It was the last thing he had expected or wished, but the continued cries brought him to himself, and hastily leaving the church he went to the hall where he gave his judgments, the crowd pressing on him right up to the door.

Never before or since has any man been so suddenly lifted into a position for which he had made no previous preparation. He, a bishop! Why, though a Christian, in common with many of his friends and also with his brother, he had never even been baptized, still less had he studied any of the things a bishop ought to know. Oh! it was impossible. It was only a moment's craze, and would be forgotten as soon as he was out of sight; so he stole away at night and hid himself, intending to escape to another city. But on his way he was recognised by a man who had once pleaded a cause before him. A crowd speedily collected, and he was carried by the people back to his house within the walls, and a guard placed before it, while a letter was despatched to the emperor informing him that the lot had fallen upon Ambrose.

'Vox populi, vox Dei' ('The voice of the people is the voice of God'). Valentinian gave a sigh of surprise and relief as he read the wax tablets before him. Losing no time, he sent a paper, signed by himself, the imperial seal affixed, nominating Ambrose bishop of Milan, while to Ambrose he wrote privately, saying that no better choice could have been made, and that he would support him in everything. But by the time the messenger reached Milan, Ambrose had escaped again, and was hiding in the house of a friend outside the walls. However, this effort to avoid the greatness thrust upon him was as vain as the rest, and he saw that he must accept what fate had brought him. Within a week he had been baptized, ordained priest, and consecrated bishop, knowing as little as any man might of the studies hitherto considered necessary for his position. But it is quite possible that his ignorance of these may have been a help instead of a hindrance in the carrying out of his duties.

Now very often, if a man's position is changed, his character seems to change too, and the very qualities which caused him to be chosen for the new appointment sink into the background, while others, far less suitable, take their place. No doubt, during the first days after his election Ambrose must have been watched carefully by many eyes – for no one, however popular, is wholly without enemies – and any alteration in his conduct or way of life would have been noted down. Still, even the most envious could find no difference. Ambrose the bishop was in all respects the same as Ambrose the consul, except that he gave away more money than he had done before, and held himself to a still greater degree at the disposal of the people.

In these days we are so used to reading of the struggle which raged for so many centuries between the Church and the State – the Emperor and the Pope – that it seems quite natural to us that after the death of the emperor Valentinian (which happened a few months later) the bishop should become the adviser and minister of his young son Gratian. To Ambrose, however, the situation was beset with difficulties, and both disagreeable and dangerous. He had not the least desire to meddle in the affairs of the empire – the care of the church in Milan was quite enough for any one man; but when the young emperor Gratian came to him for advice and guidance it was his duty to give it. Soon matters grew worse and worse. The Goths crossed the Danube, and defeated the army of the Eastern Empire near Adrianople; Byzantium, or Constantinople, the city of Constantine, lay at their mercy; and Italy might be entered through Hungary and the Tyrol, or by sea from the south.

The tidings reached Milan through the first of the numerous fugitives who had managed to escape across the Alps. Every day more frightened, starving people arrived, and the city was taxed to the utmost to find them food and shelter. Yet even the lot of these poor creatures was happy in comparison with those who had been taken prisoners by the Goths, and were doomed to spend their lives in slavery unless they were ransomed. Ambrose set the rich citizens an example by giving all the money he had, but after every farthing possible had been raised the unredeemed captives were still many. There only remained the golden vessels of the church, which were the pride of Milan, and these the bishop brought out and melted down, so that as far as in him lay all prisoners might be freed.

In after-years his enemies sought to use the fact as a handle against him. He had no right to give what was not his own, they said; but Ambrose paid little heed to their words; he had done what he knew was just, and the rest did not matter.

With the appointment of the general Theodosius as emperor of the East things began to mend. The Goths began to understand that they had a strong man to deal with, and Ambrose was once more left to act both as bishop and magistrate in his own diocese, and to give constant advice to the well-meaning but weak young Gratian. The legal training that Ambrose had received was now of the highest value, and his experience of men and the world acquired in Rome preserved him from making many mistakes and giving ear to lying stories. The cleverest rogues in Milan knew that the most cunning tale would never deceive the bishop, and would only earn for themselves a heavy fine or imprisonment. 'Some,' he writes, 'say they have debts; make sure that they speak truly. Others declare they have been robbed by brigands; let them prove their words, and show that the injuries were really received by them.' Under Ambrose's rule impostors of all kinds grew scarce.

During these years the bishop's life, except for public anxieties, had been calm and happy, for his brother Satyrus had been with him, and had given him his help in many ways. At length important business took the elder brother to Africa, and on his return the ship in which he was sailing struck on a rock and sank. Luckily, they were not far from land, and Satyrus was a good swimmer, so with great exertions he managed to reach a lonely part of the coast. He was kindly cared for by the people, but there was no means of letting Ambrose hear of his safety, and he had to wait long before another ship passed that way. Then, when his friends had abandoned all hope, he suddenly appeared in Milan, to the speechless joy of the bishop. But not long were they left together. In a little while Satyrus fell ill, and in spite of the constant care that was given him, in a few days he died, leaving Ambrose more lonely than before.