The Gods of War

by Christopher Stasheff

  "All?" Tyr looked back over his shoulder at the Celtic gods and, beyond them, the dim and distant elder gods of Britain. He turned back to Shang-Ti. "There are many of us, Old One. But there are many of yours, too. Call up your vast array of deities."

  "I cannot!" Shang-Ti said bitterly. "This dunce of a school teacher has bound me into a religion in which there is only one God. I am bereft of my entourage."

  Tyr raised an eyebrow. "Then you stand alone against us?"

  "Let your puny Englishmen come!" Shang-Ti blustered. "My people shall swallow them, chew them up, and spit them out, as they have done to so many before!"

  "They have not chewed me, Ancient One." The Manchu war-god stepped up beside Tyr and Odin. "And my lance is still in your heart."

  But Shang-Ti wrenched out the lance and threw it back with contempt. "They have swallowed you, they have chewed you—and even now prepare to eject you. You, and all who are yours!"

  "Indeed?" The Manchus eyes glittered dangerously. "Then I must rip out their bellies while I am still within them!"

  England had forced a new treaty on the Chinese and withdrawn her gunboats, but the Emperor refused to sign it. Well, not refused, exactly, but there was one delay after another, cavil after cavil, excuse after excuse. Finally, in exasperation, England had sent Lord Elgin to make sure the treaty was signed—and Sir Hope Grant, with 15,000 soldiers, to clear his way.

  It was late, very late, when Gordon received his orders. He strode the decks with impatience; he barely restrained himself from blowing into the sail, to try to hurry the ship faster. When they were becalmed and the great paddlewheels alone drove them, he stood calm and still on the outside, but was almost feverish with anxiety inside.

  And sure enough, by the time he came to the China coast, the first few battles had been won; the Union Jack flew over the Taku Forts. But Lord Elgin and the army had advanced only as far as Tientsin, and Gordon joined them there.

  Elgin gave the signal, and Sir Grant moved his troops northward. An Imperial army blocked his way, with Manchu bannermen at its center, tall and burly in bright half-armor, banners fluttering overhead. Almost as intimidating were the troops of Mongol cavalry on the wings, sturdy men with pointed, fur-trimmed caps who rode tough little ponies. Gordon looked upon them and felt an echo of the dread that Europe had felt when Genghis Khan's horde had ridden in from the steppe.

  But the Europeans had fast-moving cavalry of their own now, and cannon and grapeshot, as well as a musket for every infantryman—and they blasted by the numbers, laying down a continuous field of fire while they advanced, row upon row, volley upon volley. The Mongol cavalry rode as a mob, and broke upon the wave of bullets; the proud Manchu bannermen charged and stumbled as the grapeshot hit them. The Manchu cannons boomed in reply, but the stone balls fell short, or flew wide.

  To Gordon, in the thick of it, the battle seemed interminable, as all battles did; time stopped as he urged his troop on, seeming to ignoring the hail of musket balls about him—though secretly hoping one would strike him. But none did, and suddenly it was all over; the bannermen and the Chinese infantry were in full retreat, the Mongols were galloping away. Sir Grant would not let his men follow; their mission was to bring Elgin to Peking, not to conquer China.

  But his strategy seemed odd; they swung north of Peking, and came down through the Summer Palace. Gordon stared in awe at mile after mile of perfectly manicured garden, of dainty dells and miniature pagodas next to ponds that were expanded to lakes by the scale of the models. There was not one palace, but two hundred, some with scores of rooms, some of merely a dozen—pavilions and summerhouses and arbors, made of precious woods and decorated with jewels.

  But there was litter on the grass, and cups and plates left on the tables, for the Emperor and his household had fled in frenzy, farther north to Jehol, only days before the French and English came.

  So the guns rained cannon balls and grapeshot on Peking, and Prince Kung graciously agreed to discuss terms. An agreement was signed—by the Prince, not the Emperor, but Kung was his brother and regent, and the Emperor was reputed to be ill. Elgin declared amity, and demanded that the prisoners the Manchus had taken be returned.

  They came in bullock carts—carts carrying wooden boxes. The English and French looked upon the remains of their countrymen and their loyal Sikh troops, and paled, and trembled.

  The Army screamed for blood to answer the blood that had been shed, the tortures that had been visited on their men. A few were still alive, and told of the pains inflicted by the Board of Punishments. But the treaty had been signed anew; Britain and France had pledged amity again; they could not strike through to conquer Peking and punish Prince Kung and his torturers, nor march north to capture the ailing Emperor himself. Lord Elgin strode through the Summer Palace, sunk in brooding thought, then emerged to announce the punishment to be visited on the Manchus—a punishment that would smite only the Emperor and his nobles, by destroying a treasure that had been reserved to them alone:

  The Summer Palace.

  The French diplomat protested at the destruction of such beauty, that had taken centuries in the building, but Elgin stood firm. His own officers warned that by destroying the Emperor's private pleasure-park, he would undermine Chinese respect for the Manchu regime; he would strike at its foundations, and the government of China might crumble. Elgin stood firm.

  "Begone, you barbarian monkeys!" The Manchu gods were drawn up in a wedge. "If your hairy devil-people dare to seek to strike at our Emperor, you shall die on our spears!"

  But Tyr stood between Thor and Lugh, his own spear poised in his palm, a shield fastened to his hand-less arm. Behind him, in array, stood the gods of the Danes and the Angles and Saxons; beyond them stood the gods of the Celts. Even farther back stood the shadowed gods of the Elder Britons, and in the distance, dim but menacing, hulked the gods to whom Stonehenge had been erected.

  "We are far more in number than you," Tyr informed the Manchu gods, "but that matters far less than our strength; for your people have begun to turn away from you, to forget you—and the Chinese gods have never stood with you. Give way, or perish."

  The old gods of Great Britain began to march.

  "You are an engineer," the major told him, for he was an officer in the Engineers, truly enough. "You shall destroy the Birthday Garden—the Wang-shaw-ewen, as they call it—destroy it, and all its buildings."

  Gordon had little use for art and sculpture, but even he could appreciate the beauty he had been sent to destroy. An order was an order, though, especially when he could see the sense of it—and he had seen the bodies of the tortured British. He led his men out on an overcast morning, the air heavy and oppressive. They broke into a palace, and Gordon stopped, amazed at the wealth of china and porcelain and gold and jade—the statues, the tea sets, the chess sets, the accumulated bric-a-brac of two hundred years, but all made of precious metals or stones, or of fragrant woods inlaid with gems.

  He could not stand to see it all go up in flames. "Take what you can," he told his men—then, as though the words were dragged out of him: "and break the rest."

  Hundred-year-old vases of eggshell porcelain shivered into a thousand slivers; delicate cups and teapots shattered. Finally the soldiers went through the palace with their torches . . .

  And through the groves of fruit trees, and the sculptured bushes.

  In other gardens, other English and Indian troops were doing the same; in still others, French troops looted what they could and broke what they could not carry. The accumulated loot was divided up, and the smoke of the fairyland-made-real ascended into the sky, a pillar of darkness that proclaimed the Emperor's weakness. The citizens of Peking looked up, and took note; in the months that followed, merchants brought the tale outside the city, and it spread through all of China. The Chinese learned of the Manchu Emperor's humiliation . . .

  And the sheer brute power of those uncultured barbarians, the Foreign Devils who could break priceless beauties bene
ath their heavy boots, and scarcely notice.

  But Gordon was restless. He had come to China to find death, not to destroy a beautiful garden. The English and French troops had withdrawn, but 3000 British soldiers stayed behind at Tientsin, to make sure the Chinese paid the indemnity specified in the treaty. The force was commanded by General Stavely, whose sister had married Gordon's eldest brother Henry. Impatient, Gordon filled his time by surveying the country around Tientsin when on duty, and riding long distances to keep fit, when off-duty—seventy miles at a stretch. He explored the region of the Great Wall, seeking passes by which Russia might attack China. Restless or not, he found himself almost at peace, almost happy, for the scenery and the strangeness of it all held him entranced, and he thrived on the work.

  After a year and a half, though, the Taiping rebels in the Yangtze valley began to move again toward the treaty port of Shanghai, and the international trading community settled there became nervous. Stavely decided to reinforce the garrison, sending two regiments and a group of Engineers—commanded by Gordon.

  Gordon arrived on the scene, his appetite keen for action, only to find that the British were cleaving to a policy of strict neutrality—the international army of Indian, British, and French troops would fight if Shanghai were attacked, or if the Taipings came within thirty miles of the city, but they could not go farther afield; they were to be defensive only. Gordon was put to work constructing new defenses, wondering why his superiors could not see that the best defense was a good offense. He learned something of the Taiping religion, and was fascinated by its strangeness at the same time as he was incensed at its distortions of sound Protestant Christianity. He learned more when he was sent to survey their outpost, Tsingpo, at the very edge of the thirty-mile region that the Western powers regarded as sacrosanct.

  The Chinese merchants, however, were in no mood to wait until the fearsome Taipings should come to them. They had hired an American adventurer, Frederick Townsend Ward, who had put together a small army of a few thousand mercenaries, and had not been too concerned about the honor or legal background of his men. He had lost as many battles as he had won, but was at least doing something to hold the Taipings at bay.

  Then the British took Tsingpo, thanks in no small measure to Gordon's excellent information—and Ward was killed chasing the Taipings as they retreated. His second-in-command, Burgevine, took over—but Burgevine had little respect for law, and less for morality; he was a former gun-runner, and a flagrant opportunist looking for the best deal. He and the polyglot army captured Kahding on the northern edge of the thirty-mile boundary, and he let his men loot their fill—and slaughter the Taiping prisoners.

  General Stavefy was shocked, and determined to remove Burgevine from the command. He would replace the blackguard with a proper soldier, one who was concerned not for riches, but for Right. He looked about him to see what officer he could spare . . .

  And the choice fell on Gordon.

  Tseng-Kuo-Fan was Commander-in-Chief of the Imperial forces against the Taiping rebels, but Li Hung-Chang was governor of Kiangsu Province, and Tseng's general in the east. Li held up the pay for Burgevine and his troops, so Burgevine rounded up a few of his roughest men, marched on the bank, beat up the banker, and took the cash. Li promptly fired him, then accepted Gordon's appointment to command the little army (though he insisted on a Chinese co-commander, to make sure Gordon did as Li wanted).

  Thus Gordon, the regular-army officer, with a tradition of service stretching back three generations, took command of a mercenary army, determined to teach them discipline and end their excesses. He began by renaming them: the Ever-Victorious Army.

  His Chinese soldiers were impressed. His Western bandits were not. They tried to mutiny, twice; Gordon put them down with stern resolve. Half of them deserted; Gordon was just as glad to see them gone. He recruited replacements and trained them, making sure they knew discipline from the beginning. Finally Governor Li gave him his orders, and with 3500 men, two batteries of field artillery, and four batteries of siege artillery, he embarked for the town of Chanzu, which was steadfastly resisting a Taiping siege.

  Gordon had not wasted his five months in and around Shanghai. He had surveyed every acre within the thirty-mile perimeter, and knew the location of every village—but more importantly, he also knew the location of every stream and canal, and how they interconnected to form a network of waterways. He collected a small fleet of river boats, equipped them with cannon fore and aft, and put them under the direction of Yankee skippers who knew river navigation from the United States. The time come, he marched his men on board and cast off to work his way through the canals and rivers of Fushan Creek, which connected Chanzu with the Yangtze.

  As they steamed up Fushan Creek, a party of Taipings appeared out of the rice paddies to either side. They began to lay down a field of fire around the Hyson, Gordon's "flagship." Gordon commanded the gunners to fire; the 32-pounder in the bows boomed, and grapeshot raked the Taiping line. Their fire faltered, but kept up. A second cannon shot silenced their fire, and a third made them retreat—they were an experienced army, and knew the meaning of cannon. However, they had brought none themselves; and as Chanzu came in sight, Gordon saw the Taipings leaving the city.

  Li was delighted, and conferred on him the Order of the Yellow Button. His troops grinned and strutted; they had taken the town without a bit of risk, or a musket fired.

  On the other hand, they weren't allowed to loot. Many deserted.

  Immediately after, Li summoned Gordon. The summons rankled, but Gordon knew better than to refuse a senior officer, which Li was, in effect. The governor's expression was masked, his face impassive. "I have had a communication from Prince Kung. He commands me to reinstate Burgevine as commander of the Ever-Victorious Army."

  Gordon stared. "What?" Then he recovered his composure. "Surely, sir, I have proved my worth!"

  "Thoroughly," Li agreed, "and it is a hundred times that of Burgevine's. I will not conceal from you, Major Gordon, that I have no use for foreign devils—but you are superior in manner and bearing to any of those with whom I have the ill-fortune to come into contact, and you at least mask that conceit which makes most of them repugnant in my sight. I consider you a direct blessing from Heaven."

  Gordon held his face immobile while he adjusted to the shock and delight, then said, "I thank Your Excellency. But why, then . . ."

  "Burgevine shall remain where he is," said Li, "far from Shanghai. I have been entrusted with the governance of this province, and Prince Kung has no authority to countermand me unless he finds me totally unworthy of my post, whereupon he may replace me. I have refused his request."

  Gordon went back to his tent and wrote to the British Legation in Peking, saying, "I must distinctly decline any further doings with any Chinese forces." Li learned of it, and persuaded him; Gordon changed his mind. Li commanded him to march on Taitsan.

  The Taiping commander there had offered to defect to the Imperialists with all his garrison. Li sent a force to take over the town—and the Taipings fell upon Li's troops, killing thirty and taking three hundred prisoner. Gordon was to avenge this treachery.

  Gordon packed his three thousand remaining men into small gunboats, shepherded by the Hyson. He surrounded the town and blocked all but the Eastern exit, which led towards the sea. Unable to escape and knowing they would be executed for treachery, the Taipings fought with grim desperation. Gordon's cannon pounded their stockade, and in only three hours, had opened a huge breach in the wall. Gordon rushed his infantry forward in their gunboats. The captains brought the vessels as close as they could, then the howling troops poured out to charge the breach. But spears rained from the wall, and musket-fire crackled in an unending series as bullets battered down at them. The charge wavered, then receded.

  Gordon rallied them with shouts and gestures with his cane; they understood few of his words, but comprehended his tone. Gordon held them in position while his howitzers raked the walls and c
ut down the defenders. After a storm of shot, he charged forward, his infantry behind him with muskets, following the madman who threatened the Taipings with nothing but a rattan cane; they could not know that he hoped one of the balls would strike him down as he fought to free the Chinese from a rule more tyrannical than that of the Manchus.

  But as one rank of Taipings fell from the blasting of Gordon's howitzers, another popped up in its place, firing down at the attackers. Still the Ever-Victorious Army came up to the breach—but it filled with Taiping defenders, stabbing with spears and slashing with swords. Gordon's men blocked and thrust in their turn, the clank and clash of steel riding high over the staccato musketry. Incredibly, the Taipings managed to force Gordon's men back from the walls.

  Gordon retreated again and rallied his men while his cannon battered at the defenders atop their wall and by the breach. Then Gordon waved his cane, shouting, and charged out again. Howling, his infantry pelted after him.

  The Taipings filled the breach with steel, but Gordon laid about him with his cane, and his men shot their way in with musket and pistol, then chopped at the ranks with swords and stabbed with bayonets. Taipings died left and right; so did Gordon's men. But, somehow, the Taipings gave way; suddenly, there were no more of the long-haired rebels in front of them, and Gordon and his men surged on into the town.

  The Taiping casualties were great, very great. For his part, Gordon had lost almost one man out of ten. But he was deeply impressed with the courage and loyalty of the Chinese, both the Taipings and those in his own army. He found them quick to learn, and ready and willing to follow him into battle. They were very courageous—in some instances. They would outdo even his Europeans for bravery.

  But again, Gordon prohibited looting, and made it stick. Worse, when the decimated army returned to base, he threw them right into stiff training for the next battle; he'd already been told they were to march on Quinsan. There were rumbles of mutiny when the soldiers found they weren't to have a few weeks of R & R. When he announced the marching orders, every officer resigned. The next morning, when Gordon ordered the army to parade in marching order, no one came, except his own bodyguard.