The Watertown weekly leader. [volume] (Watertown, Jefferson County, Wis.) 1912-1917, 1912-08-16

NN n interested him curiously 1t was
. 5000 % from an old friend and associate,
u kaaAzZ2 whom he had believed to be
another example of unaccountable disappearance.
Frederick townsend Ward had gone TO Mexico
more than two wears before to sell some old ord
nance to the government. Having accomplished
this in due season, he had suddenly dropped out
of ken, on the of supposedly returning nome
Fancy then the surprise which greeted these words
81 any art NJ so cratic a person could amaze.
4 have entered into the Chinese service, have
l.ery fine prospects at present and hope soon TO
ave comfortable fortune. l have been trans
formed from Yankee into Chtnaman in good
style with a good establishment /. few days
ago took the city of importance in the vice
Eroyaty from the rebels. / have made a pretty
good thing Of it and hope in few weeks to take
another city"
This communication was a veritable bolt from
the blue. restless almost penniless vagabond
of a man. whom his friends had given up as lost
suddenly emerging in China as master OF men anu
a conqueror of citiesi Our own bloody slaughter
house had not yet opened its shambles, but the
newspapers absorbed in an extraordinary
political situation that they gave scarcely a para
graph to such a curious piece OF news When II was
made known to them.
A few weeks later another similar letter Ie"on'
the staid merchant:
Il was then referring to his first letter1 about
starting up country but l have since lreturheu'
having been badly wounded while attempting "
scale the walls Of Sing Poo City, and was com
PEELED to return to Shanghai for treatment
got several shot wounds, the worst one "e"
through the cheek and down through the rool
of the mouth. They, that is, the missionaries
and some English and Dutch merchants Jain
very badly about me and my measures, having
used both rather unceremoniously when louno
having connections with the rebels; but JACK
] independent of them all and consequently
do not care - for them.
China is the country for a man VINO Is
able to take risks and Is gifted with good com
mon sense. / have made more money IN Re"
weeks than ] could at brokerage in New YORK III
twenty years"
Sixty years ago American pulpts and church
conventions rang with the glad tdings that
Christian movement had sprung, spontaneously
as it were out of Chinese soil. The future or
missionary effort thus assured, 1t was hoPed,
in the bossoming of a far-reaching native force
that would speedily win the heather to the pan
of the These hopes, however were
blasted as the rise of the religious cult OF
Makka schoolmaster developed into one of the
most ruthless and devastating civil wars of his
tory and the nature Of the outrageous traVesty,
which had perverted few Christian doctrines
into a grotesque basphemy, came to be under
stood
Hung Su Tsuen had sought in vain for that
recognition before the literary boards at Canton
which was the passport of official ambition. In
Canton he had absorbed crude notion of
Christian doctrine from Methodist missionary
and when he returned home, crazed by disap
pointment, to live a humble pedagogue, he
began to dream dreams and speak prophecies as
went on, his propagandism drew to its banner
hordes from the ranks of discomfort and crime,
and army of ragged desperadoes began to
move from west to east in the early ffties to
establish the claim Of the crazy fanatic (who
professed to be the younger brother of Jesus
Christ and directly consecrated by the Holy
Ghost) to be the imperial head of the empire.
the annals of Oriental barbarism. 1t esti-
mated by conservative opinion that in ten years
this Internal regime known the TAPPING rebel
lion had cost the empire some two and half
billions of dollars and the destruction of several
millions of lives by war, starvation and whole
sale massacres.
Hung Su Tsuen, as Tien Wang or Heavenly
King" was enthroned at Marking and he prac-
tically controlled the great provinces of Kiang-
Su and Sheh-Kiang, the heart of the richest
tea and silk production of China. His robber
bands indeed raided down to the very gates of
Shanghai, and the foreign merchants there were
sometimes hard put to it TO defend the city,
though nominaly amicabe terms with the
Marking despot, whom their trade so largely
depended.
One autumn morning at Shanghai in 1859
slight. darkcompexioned Notwithstanding
man called at the office of Tah-ke mandarin
of the third button, banker and merchant we'll
regarded by the foreign residents.
1t was Frederick Townsend Ward, who had
just landed in Shanghai from San Francisco He
was rough and seedy-ooking, with a sailors roll
In his gait but with glance of fire and solid
squareset jawbone to redeem his face. Tah-ke
not encouraging when Ward spoke of his
desire to enter the Chinese service as free
lance. and answered that he could get a belly
full Of fighting by Joining the Shanghai volun-
teers
Thank you FOR nothing" said Ward but
can do that without your help. l didn't come
for that sort of advice. 1 could make you help
me and help yourself at the same time You
don't 1t now. but you will"
Who then Ward? Born at Salem, Mass
about thirty-two years before his arrival in
China he of race of deep-sea shippers
who had sailed all oceans, arctic and tropi-
cal and been noted for their handspke and be-
layfng-pn discipline. Daring and resolution ran
In his blood.
At the age of nineteen he had his first