To
Her who shared my life and
suffered in the Beautiful Isle

FOREWORD

In every port of the Orient the outposts of the restless, aggressive West touch the lines of the impassive East. Consuls, military and naval officers, merchants, missionaries force the ideas and ideals of the West upon the reluctant East. Many of these representatives of western civilization are true to the high standards of the nations and religions from which they come. Many others fall to the level, and below the level, of those they live among.

This story is an attempt to picture this life where the East meets the West, in one small port and for the one short period covered by the Franco-Chinese War of 1884-85. Of the characters one, Dr. MacKay, is unhesitatingly called by his own name. Sergeant Gorman and one or two others of the subordinate figures are drawn from life. The rest, including the principal actors, are purely imaginary.

T. F.
OWEN SOUND, ONT.

CONTENTS

  1. [Storm Signals]
  2. [A Lull]
  3. [The Typhoon]
  4. [Parried]
  5. [Introductions]
  6. [On the Defensive]
  7. [Sparring for Advantage]
  8. [Sinclair's Opportunity]
  9. [A Quiet Life]
  10. [Glorious War]
  11. [The Life-Healer Is Come]
  12. [Matutinal Confidences]
  13. [More Confidences]
  14. [The Appeal of the Heroic]
  15. [The Lure Of The East]
  16. [Sergeant Whatisname]
  17. [Wolves and Their Prey]
  18. [To the Rescue]
  19. [Allister]
  20. [The Infallible Experts]
  21. [The Language of Song]
  22. [Halcyon Days]
  23. [Impending Storms]
  24. [The Ball Begins]
  25. [The Ball Proceeds]
  26. [A Game of Ball]
  27. [The Charge of the Tamsui Blues]
  28. [Unholy Confessors]
  29. [Flags of Truce]
  30. [The Mystery of Love]
  31. [Ancestors and Pedigrees]
  32. [A Man and a Woman]
  33. [My Children in the Lord]
  34. [The Soldier of the Legion]
  35. [The Language of Paradise]
  36. [An Apparition]
  37. ["My Son! My Son!"]
  38. [Rejected]
  39. [A Realized Dream]
  40. [The Coward]
  41. ["Good Will Toward Men"]

ILLUSTRATIONS

[They came over the last bluff] . . . . . . Frontispiece

[Sinclair threw off his coat, rolled up his sleeves, and went to work]