I
THURSDAY, Oct. 11, 1900.
At noon, on a beautiful calm day that is almost warm and very luminous
on the water, I leave the admiral's ship, the _Redoutable_, to go on a
mission to Pekin.
We are in the gulf of Petchili on the road to Taku, but at such
a distance from the shore that it is not visible, so there is no
indication of China anywhere.
The trip begins with a short ride on a steam launch, which takes us out
to the _Bengali_, the little despatch-boat which will bring me to land
by to-night.
The water is softly blue in the autumn sunshine, which is always
bright in this part of the world. To-day, by chance, the wind and the
waves seem to sleep. As far as one can see, great warships succeed
one another, motionless and menacing. As far as the horizon there are
the turrets, the masts, the smoke of the astonishing international
squadron with all its train of satellites, torpedo boats, transports,
and a legion of packet-boats.
The _Bengali_, upon which I am about to embark for a day, is one of
the little French ships carrying troops and war supplies, which for a
month past has been painfully and wearisomely going and coming between
the transports or freighters arriving from France, and the port of Taku
beyond the Pei-Ho bar.
To-day it is full of Zouaves,--brave Zouaves who arrived yesterday from
Tunis, careless and happy, bound for this ominous Chinese land. They
are crowded on the bridge, packed together, their faces gay and their
eyes wide open for a glimpse of China, which has filled their thoughts
for weeks and which is now near at hand, just over the horizon.
According to ceremonial custom, the _Bengali_, when it appears,
must pass the stern of the _Redoutable_ to salute the admiral. The
music waits behind the armor, ready to play one of those marches so
intoxicating to the sailor. And when we come up close to the big ship,
almost under its shadow, all the Zouaves--those destined to return as
well as those who must perish--wave their red caps to the sound of the
bugle, with hurrahs for the ship, which here represents France to
their eyes, and for the admiral, who from the bridge raises his cap in
their honor.
At the end of half an hour China appears.
Never has an uglier and more forbidding shore surprised and congealed
poor newly arrived soldiers. A low shore, a gray barren land without
tree or grass. Everywhere there are forts of colossal size of the same
gray as the earth, masses of geometrical outline pierced by embrasures
for guns. Never has the approach to a country presented a more
extensive or aggressive military array; on both sides of the horrible
stream with its muddy waters loom similar forts, giving the impression
of a place both terrible and impregnable, giving the impression also
that this harbor, in spite of its wretched surroundings, is of the
first order of importance, is the key to a great country, and gives
access to a city large, rich, and powerful--as Pekin must have been.
From a nearer view the walls of the first two forts, stained, full of
holes, and ravaged by cannon-balls, bear witness to furious and recent
battles.
We know how, on the day Taku was taken, they exhausted their strength
on one another. By a miracle, a French shell from the _Lion_ fell
right into one of them, causing the explosion of its enormous powder
magazine so that the yellow gunners lost their heads. The Japanese then
seized this fort and opened an unexpected fire on the one opposite,
and immediately the overthrow of the Chinese began. Had it not been
for this chance, for this shell, and for this panic, all the European
gunners anchored in the Pei-Ho would inevitably have been lost; the
landing of the Allies would have been impossible or problematical, and
the whole face of the war changed.
[Illustration: TRANSPORTS ON THE PEI-HO]
We now move up the river through the muddy infected water where
impurities of all sorts are floating, as well as the bodies of men
and animals. On both of the sombre shores we see by the light of
the declining sun a procession of ruins, a uniform black and gray
desolation of earth, ashes, and calcined slopes, tumbled walls, and
ruins.
On this pestilential river a feverish animation reigns, so that it is
difficult for us to make our way through the obstructions. Junks by
the hundreds, each flying the colors and having at the stern the name
of the nation by whom it is employed--France, Italy, United States,
etc.--in big letters above the devilry of the Chinese inscription,
besides a numberless flotilla of towing vessels, lighters, colliers,
and packets.
On the terrible, steep, muddy banks, amongst filth and dead animals,
there is an ant-like activity. Soldiers of all the armies of Europe
mingle with coolies driven with sticks, unpacking military stores,
tents, guns, wagons, mules, horses. Such a confusion as never was of
uniforms, rubbish, cannons, débris, and provisions of all kinds. An icy
wind which rises toward evening makes us shiver after the hot sun of
the day and brings with it the gloom of winter.
Before the ruins of a quarter where the flag of France is floating, the
_Bengali_ approaches the lugubrious shore, and our Zouaves disembark
rather discountenanced by the sombre reception given them by China.
While waiting for some sort of a shelter to be provided, they light
fires on the shore which the wind fans into flame, and there they heat
their evening meal in darkness and silence and in the midst of clouds
of infected dust.
On the deserted plain from which the dust, the cold, and the squalls
come, the black devastated town, overrun with soldiers, extends,
breathing pestilence and death.
A small street through its centre, hastily rebuilt in a few days' time
with mud, broken timbers, and iron, is lined with dubious-looking
taverns. Men from I don't know where, mongrels of every race, sell
absinthe, salt-fish, and deadly liquors to the soldiers. There is some
drunkenness, and occasionally knives are drawn.
Outside of this improvised quarter Taku no longer exists. Nothing but
ruined walls, burned roofs, piles of ashes, and nameless receptacles
of filth, wherein are huddled together old clothing, dogs, and human
heads covered with hair.
I slept on board the _Bengali_, this hospitality having been extended
to me by the commander. Occasional shots break the nocturnal silence,
and toward morning I hear--although half asleep--horrible cries uttered
by the Chinese on shore.
FRIDAY, October 12.
I rose at daybreak to go and take the train, which still runs as far as
Tien-Tsin and even a little beyond. Farther on, the road having been
destroyed by Boxers, I shall continue I do not yet know how, either
in a Chinese cart, in a junk, or on horseback, and from all accounts
cannot count on seeing the great walls of Pekin for six or seven days.
I have an order which will secure me rations from the posts along the
road, otherwise I should run the risk of dying from hunger in this
ravaged land. I have as little baggage as possible, nothing but a light
canteen, and but one travelling companion, a faithful servant brought
from France.
At the station, where I arrive at sunrise, I find again all yesterday's
Zouaves, their knapsacks on their backs. No tickets are necessary for
this railway, everything military is carried by right of conquest.
Along with Cossack and Japanese soldiers a thousand Zouaves pile into
carriages with broken panes through which the wind whistles. I find a
place with their officers, and very soon we are calling up memories of
Africa, where they have been, and longing for Tunis and Algeria the
White.
We are two hours and a half on the road across the mournful plain. At
first it was only gray earth as at Taku; then there were reeds and
herbage touched with frost. On all sides are immense splashes of red,
like blood stains, due to the autumn flowering of a kind of marsh
plant. On the horizon of this desert myriads of migratory birds may
be seen, rising like clouds, eddying and then falling. The north wind
blows and it is very cold.
Soon the plain is peopled with tombs,--tombs without number, all of the
same shape,--each one a kind of cone of earth piled up and surmounted
by a ball of faience,--some small, like little huts, others as large
as camping tents. They are grouped according to families and they are
legion. The entire country is a burial-place with a gory look resulting
from the splashes of red to which I have referred.
At the stopping-places where the ruined stations are occupied by
Cossacks, there are calcined cars--damaged by fire--and locomotives
riddled with balls. At other places we do not stop because there
is nothing left; the few villages which mark this vicinity are all
destroyed.
* * * * *
Tien-Tsin! It is ten o'clock in the morning. Pierced by the cold, we
step down amid the clouds of dust which the north wind perpetually
scatters over this dried-up country. We are taken in hand by Chinese
scouts, who, without even knowing where we want to go, trot off, at
full speed, with us in their little carriages. The European streets
along which they are running (here called "concessions"), seen through
a cloud of blinding dust, have the look of a big city, but the almost
luxurious houses are riddled with shells, literally ripped open and
without roofs or windows. The shores of the rivers, here as at Taku,
are like a fevered babel; thousands of junks lie there, unloading
troops, horses, guns. In the streets where Chinese workmen are carrying
enormous loads of war supplies, one meets soldiers of all the nations
of Europe, officers in every sort of uniform, on horseback, in chairs,
or on foot. And there is of course a perpetual interchange of military
salutes.
Where are we to lay our heads? Really, we have no idea, in spite of our
desire for a shelter from the icy wind and dust. However, our Chinese
runners keep on like rolling balls.
We knock at the doors of two or three hotels which have risen up among
the ruins out of a confusion of broken furniture. Everything is full,
full to overflowing; gold will not buy a loft with a mattress.
Willy-nilly we must beg our board and lodging from unknown officers,
who give us the most friendly hospitality in houses where the holes
made by shot and shell have been hastily stopped up so that the wind
may no longer enter.
SATURDAY, October 13.
I have chosen to travel by junk as far as the course of the Pei-Ho will
permit, the junk serving as a lodging in this country where I am forced
to dally.
This makes necessary many little preparations.
The first thing is to make a requisition for this junk and to
appropriate this species of sarcophagus where I am to live under a
roof of matting. The next is to buy in the more or less ruined shops
of Tien-Tsin the things necessary for a few days of nomadic life,
from bedding to arms; and lastly, to hire from the Lazarist Fathers a
Chinese person to make tea,--young Toum, aged fourteen, with the face
of a cat and a queue reaching to the ground.
I dined with General Frey, who, with his small French detachment, was,
as every one knows, the first to enter the heart of Pekin, the Imperial
City. He was good enough to relate to me in detail this magnificent
journey, the taking of the Marble Bridge and his final entrance into
the Imperial City,--that mysterious place which I shall soon see, and
into which before him no European had ever penetrated.
As to my own small personal expedition, which in comparison with his
appears so easy and unimportant, the general kindly concerned himself
with what we were to drink _en route_, my servant and I, in this time
of infection, when the water is a constant danger on account of human
remains, thrown there by the Chinese, left lying in all the wells; and
he made me a present of untold value,--a case of eau d'Evian.