The active life of General Gordon, who is about fifty years old, may be
divided into the following sections: the Crimea and Bessarabia; China
(the suppression of the Taiping rebellion); Gravesend (the making of the
defenses at Tilbury); and the Soudan. A later and shorter episode occurs
in his visit to Mauritius and the Cape, the latter colony being the only
place in which his great capabilities and high character were
unappreciated.
In the Crimea General Gordon worked steadily in the trenches, and won
the praise of his superior officers for his skill in detecting the
movements of the Russians. Indeed, he was specially told off for this
dangerous duty. Lord Wolseley, then a captain, was a fellow-worker with
Gordon before Sebastopol.
In 1856 Gordon was occupied in laying down the boundaries of Russia, in
Turkey and Roumania, for which work he was in a peculiar manner well
fitted, and he resided in the East, principally in Armenia, until the
end of 1858. During this time he ascended both Little and Great Ararat.
In 1860 he was ordered to China, and assisted at the taking of Pekin and
the sacking and burning of the Summer Palace. This work did not seem to
be much to his taste.
China was the country destined to give to the young engineer the
sobriquet by which he is now best known--"Chinese" Gordon. Here he first
developed that marvelous power, which he still holds above all other
men, of engaging the confidence, respect, and love of wild and irregular
soldiery.
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