By J. WARDLE, C.C., a personal friend . nottingham : Henry B. Saxton , King Street . 1904. The Author...

Nothing but the greatest possible pressure from my many kind friends who have heard my lecture on “General Gordon: Saint and Soldier,” who knew of my intimacy with him, and had seen some of the letters referred to, would have induced me to narrate this little story of a noble life.  I am greatly indebted to many friends, authors, and newspapers, for extracts and incidents, etc., etc.; and to them I beg to offer my best thanks and humble apology.  This book is issued in the hope, that, with all i

“There is nothing purer than honesty; nothing sweeter than charity; nothing warmer than love; nothing richer than wisdom; nothing brighter than virtue; nothing more steadfast than faith.”— Bacon . It has been said that the most interesting study for mankind is man; and surely one of the grandest objects for human contemplation, is a noble character; a lofty type of a truly great and good man is humanity’s richest heritage. The following lines by one of our greatest poets are true— “Lives of grea

“On the eleventh of October,” Gordon relates, “we were sent down in a hurry to throw up earth works against the City; as the Chinese refused to give up the gate we demanded their surrender before we could treat with them.  They were also required to give up the prisoners.  You will be sorry to hear the treatment they have suffered has been very bad.  Poor De Norman, who was with me in Asia, is one of the victims.  It appears they were tied so tight by the wrists that the flesh mortified, and the

“We are to relieve the distressed, to put the wanderer into his way, and to share our bread with the hungry, which is but the doing good to others.”— Seneca . Our hero having returned to his native land, and to settle for a little while at the quiet town of Gravesend, refused to be lionized, and he begged that no publication of his deeds of daring and devotion in China, should be recorded.  His quiet life here as an engineer was not less remarkable, though of a different kind, than life in China

“In the love of a brave and faithful man, there is always a strain of maternal tenderness; he gives out again those beams of protecting fondness, which were shed on him as he lay upon his mother’s knee.”— Geo. Elliott . A son of one of our missionaries (J. Johnson) says of Gordon “he was one of the most unassuming and gentle men I ever met; and I well remember his saintly conversation, as he sat at tea with us.  I also remember, (though only a youth) being struck with his humility, especially fo

“If a man do not erect in this age his own tomb e’er he dies, he shall live no longer in monuments than the bell rings and his widow weeps.”— Shakespeare . A new chapter now opens in our story of Gordon.  Sir Samuel Baker had resigned the honoured position of Governor General of the Soudan.  Gordon was selected as the man who, of all others, was most suitable for such an appointment.  Our Government acquiesced in the Khedive’s offer of this post to Gordon, so he accepted the responsible position

“There is no death, what seems so is transition. This life of mortal breath is but the suburb of the life Elysian,       Whose portals we call Death.”— Longfellow . Gordon had felt for some time uneasy in his position, as the under officials looked upon him as a religious fanatic, and too strict to govern; they tried to annoy him, and they succeeded: so he sent in his resignation to the Khedive, and as soon as he could conveniently, he turned his face homeward. First of course he visited the Khe

“Not all who seem to fail have failed indeed, Not all who fail have therefore worked in vain; There is no failure for the good and wise; What though the seed should fall by the way-side, And the birds snatch it; yet the birds are fed, Or they may bear it far across the tide To give rich harvests after thou art dead.” Kingsley . Sir E. Baring wired to Lord Granville, “The interview between Gordon and the Khedive was very satisfactory.”  Again—“Gordon leaves Cairo in good spirits.” His arrival at

“There is a better thing on earth than wealth, a better thing than life itself, and that is to have done something before you die, for which good men may honour you, and God your Father smile upon your work.” — Geo. Macdonald . The last Arab messenger that came from Khartoum before it fell, said, “Gordon goes every morning at sunrise to the top of his Palace wall, and with his large field glass, sweeps the horizon as far as possible, and notes as clearly as may be the position of the Madhi’s for