The Personal Life of David Livingstone/CHAPTER XV
CHAPTER XV.
LAST TWO YEARS OF THE EXPEDITION.
A.D. 1862-1863.
Livingstone again buckles on his armor--Letter to Waller--Launch of "Lady Nyassa"--Too late for season--He explores the Rovuma--Fresh activity of the slave-trade--Letter to Governor of Mozambique about his discoveries--Letter to Sir Thomas Maclear--Generous offer of a party of Scotchmen--The Expedition proceeds up Zambesi with "Lady Nyassa" in tow--Appalling desolations of Marianne--Tidings of the Mission--Death of Scudamore--of Dickenson--of Thornton--Illness of Livingstone--Dr. Kirk and Charles Livingstone go home--He proceeds northward with Mr. Rae and Mr. E.D. Young of the "Gorgon"--Attempt to carry a boat over the rapids--Defeated--Recall of the Expedition--Livingstone's views--Letter to Mr. James Young--to Mr. Waller--Feeling of the Portuguese Government--Offer to the Rev. Dr. Stewart--Great discouragements--Why did he not go home?--Proceeds to explore Nyassa--Risks and sufferings--Occupation of his mind--Natural History--Obliged to turn back--More desolation--Report of his murder--Kindness of Chinsamba--Reaches the ship--Letter from Bishop Tozer, abandoning the Mission--Distress of Livingstone--Letter to Sir Thomas Maclear--Progress of Dr. Stewart--Livingstonia--Livingstone takes charge of the children of the Universities Mission--Letter to his daughter--Retrospect--The work of the Expedition--Livingstone's plans for the future.
It could not have been easy for Livingstone to buckle on his armor anew.
How he was able to do it at all may be inferred from some words of cheer
written by him at the time to his friend Mr. Waller: "Thanks for your
kind sympathy. In return, I say, Cherish exalted thoughts of the great
work you have undertaken. It is a work which, if faithful, you will look
back on with satisfaction while the eternal ages roll on their
everlasting course. The devil will do all he can to hinder you by
efforts from without and from within; but remember Him who is with you,
and will be with you alway."
As soon as he was able to brace himself, he was again at his post, helping to put the "Lady Nyassa" together and launch her. This was achieved by the end of June, greatly to the wonder of the natives, who could not understand how iron should swim. The "Nyassa" was an excellent steamboat, and could she have been got to the lake would have done well. But, alas! the rainy season had passed, and until December this could not be done. Here was another great disappointment. Meanwhile, Dr. Livingstone resolved to renew the exploration of the Rovuma, in the hope of finding a way to Nyassa beyond the dominion of the Portuguese. This was the work in which he had been engaged at the time when he went with Bishop Mackenzie to help him to settle.
The voyage up the Rovuma did not lead to much. On one occasion they were attacked, fiercely and treacherously, by the natives. Cataracts occurred about 156 miles from the mouth, and the report was that farther up they were worse. The explorers did not venture beyond the banks of the rivers, but so far as they saw, the people were industrious, and the country fertile, and a steamer of light draft might carry on a very profitable trade among them. But there was no water-way to Nyassa. The Rovuma came from mountains to the west, having only a very minute connection with Nyassa. It seemed that it would be better in the meantime to reach the lake by the Zambesi and the Shiré, so the party returned. It was not till the beginning of 1863 that they were able to renew the ascent of these rivers. Livingstone writes touchingly to Sir Roderick, in reference to his returning to the Zambesi: "It may seem to some persons weak to feel a chord vibrating to the dust of her who rests on the banks of the Zambesi, and think that the path by that river is consecrated by her remains."
Meanwhile, Dr. Livingstone was busy with his pen. A new energy had been imparted to him by the appalling facts now fully apparent, that his discoveries had only stimulated the activity of the slave-traders, that the Portuguese local authorities really promoted slave-trading, with its inevitable concomitant slave-hunting, and that the horror and desolation to which the country bore such frightful testimony was the result. It seemed as if the duel he had fought with the Boers when they determined to close Africa, and he determined to open it, had now to be repeated with the Portuguese. The attention of Dr. Livingstone is more and more concentrated on this terrible topic. Dr. Kirk writes to him that when at Tette he had heard that the Portuguese Governor-General at Mozambique had instructed his brother, the Governor of that town, to act on the principle that the slave-trade, though prohibited on the ocean, was still lawful on the land, and that any persons interfering with slave-traders, by liberating their slaves, would be counted robbers. An energetic despatch to Earl Russell, then Foreign Secretary, calls attention to this outrage.
A few days after, a strong but polite letter is sent to the Governor of Tette, calling attention to the forays of a man named Belshore, in the Chibisa country, and entreating him to stop them. About the same time he writes to the Governor-General of Mozambique in reply to a paper by the Viscount de Sa da Bandeira, published in the Almanac by the Government press, in which the common charge was made against him of arrogating to himself the glory of discoveries which belonged to Senhor Candido and other Portuguese. He affirms that before publishing his book he examined all Portuguese books of travels he could find; that he had actually shown Senhor Candido to have been a discoverer before any Portuguese hinted that he was such; that the lake which Candido spoke of as northwest of Tette could not be Nyassa, which was northeast of it; that he did full justice to all the Portuguese explorers, and that what he claimed as own discoveries were certainly not the discoveries of the Portuguese. A few days after, he writes to Mr. Layard, then our Portuguese Minister, and comments on the map published by the Viscount as representing Portuguese geography,--pointing out such blunders as that which made the Zambesi enter the sea at Quilimane, proving that by their map the Portuguese claimed territory that was certainly not theirs; adverting to their utter ignorance of the Victoria Falls, the most remarkable phenomenon in Africa; affirming that many so-called discoveries were mere vague rumors, heard by travelers; and showing the use that had been made of his own maps, the names being changed to suit the Portuguese orthography.
Livingstone had the satisfaction of knowing that his account of the trip to Lake Nyassa had excited much interest in the Cabinet at home, and that a strong remonstrance had been addressed to the Portuguese Government against slave-hunting. But it does not appear that this led to any improvement at the time.
While stung into more than ordinary energy by the atrocious deeds he witnessed around him, Livingstone was living near the borders of the unseen world. He writes to Sir Thomas Maclear on the 27th October, 1862:
"I suppose that I shall die in these uplands, and somebody
will carry, out the plan I have longed to put into practice.
I have been thinking a great deal since the departure of my
beloved one about the regions whither she has gone, and
imagine from the manner the Bible describes it we have got
too much monkery in our ideas. There will be work there as
well as here, and possibly not such a vast difference in our
being as is expected. But a short time there will give more
insight than a thousand musings. We shall see Him by whose
inexpressible love and mercy we get there, and all whom we
loved, and all the lovable. I can sympathize with you now
more fully than I did before. I work with as much vigor as I
can; and mean to do so till the change comes; but his
prospect of a home is all dispelled."
In one of his despatches to Lord Russell, Livingstone reports an offer that had been made by a party consisting of an Englishman and five Scotch working men at the Cape, which must have been extremely gratifying to him, and served to deepen his conviction that sooner or later his plan of colonization would certainly be carried into effect. The leader of the party, John Jehan, formerly of the London City Mission, in reading Dr. Livingstone's book, became convinced that if a few mechanics could be induced to take a journey of exploration it would prove very useful. His views being communicated to five other young men (two masons, two carpenters, one smith), they formed themselves into a company in July, 1861, and had been working together, throwing their earnings into a common fund, and now they had arms, two wagons, two spans of oxen, and means of procuring outfits. In September, 1862, they were ready to start from Aliwal in South Africa[66].
[Footnote 66: The recall of Livingstone's Expedition and the removal of the Universities Mission seem to have knocked this most promising scheme on the head. Writing of it to Sir Roderick Murchison on the 14th December, 1862, he says: "I like the Scotchmen, and think them much better adapted for our plans than those on whom the Universities Mission has lighted. If employed as I shall wish them to be in trade, and setting an example of industry in cotton or coffee planting, I think they are just the men I need brought to my band. Don't you think this sensible?"]
After going to Johanna for provisions, and to discharge the crew of Johanna men whose term of service had expired, the Expedition returned to Tette. On the 10th January, 1863, they steamed off with the "Lady Nyassa" in tow. The desolation that had been caused by Marianno, the Portuguese slave-agent, was heart-breaking. Corpses floated past them. In the morning the paddles had to be cleared of corpses caught by the floats during the night. Livingstone summed up his impressions in one terrible sentence:
"Wherever we took a walk, human skeletons were seen in every direction, and it was painfully interesting to observe the different postures in which the poor wretches had breathed their last. A whole heap had been thrown down a slope behind a village, where the fugitives often crossed the river from the east; and in one hut of the same village no fewer than twenty drums had been collected, probably the ferryman's fees. Many had ended their misery under shady trees, others under projecting crags in the hills, while others lay in their huts with closed doors, which when opened disclosed the mouldering corpse with the poor rags round the loins, the skull fallen off the pillow, the little skeleton of the child, that had perished first, rolled up in a mat between two large skeletons. The sight of this desert, but eighteen months ago a well-peopled valley, now literally strewn with human bones, forced the conviction upon us that the destruction of human life in the middle passage, however great, constitutes but a small portion of the waste, and made us feel that unless the slave-trade--that monster iniquity which has so long brooded over Africa--is put down, lawful commerce cannot be established."
In passing up, Livingstone's heart was saddened as he visited the Bishop's grave, and still more by the tidings which he got of the Mission, which had now removed from Magomero to the low lands of Chibisa. Some time before, Mr. Scudamore, a man greatly beloved, had succumbed, and now Mr. Dickenson was added to the number of victims. Mr. Thornton, too, who left the Expedition in 1859, but returned to it, died under an attack of fever, consequent on too violent exertion undertaken in order to be of service to the Mission party. Dr. Kirk and Mr. C. Livingstone were so much reduced by illness that it was deemed necessary for them to return to England. Livingstone himself had a most serious attack of fever, which lasted all the month of May, Dr. Kirk remaining with him till he got over it. When his brother and Dr. Kirk left, the only Europeans remaining with him were Mr. Rae, the ship's engineer, and Mr. Edward D. Young, formerly of the "Gorgon," who had volunteered to join the Expedition, and whose after services, both in the search for Livingstone and in establishing the mission of Livingstonia, were so valuable. On the noble spirit shown by Livingstone in remaining in the country after all his early companions had left, and amid such appalling scenes as everywhere met him, we do not need to dwell.
Here are glimpses of the inner heart of Livingstone about this time:
"1_st March_, 1863.--I feel very often that I have not long
to live, and say, 'My dear children, I leave you. Be manly
Christians, and never do a mean thing. Be honest to men, and
to the Almighty One.'"
"10_th April_.--Reached the Cataracts. Very thankful indeed
after our three months' toil from Shupanga."
"27_th April_.--On this day twelvemonths my beloved Mary
Moffat was removed from me by death.
"'If I can, I'll come again, mother, from out my resting-place;
Though you'll not see me, mother, I shall look upon your face;
Though I cannot speak a word, I shall hearken what you say,
And be often, often with you when you think I'm far away.'
"TENNYSON."
The "Lady Nyassa" being taken to pieces, the party began to construct a road over the thirty-five or forty miles of the rapids, in order to convey the steamer to the lake. After a few miles of the road had been completed, it was thought desirable to ascertain whether the boat left near the lake two years before was fit for service, so as to avoid the necessity of carrying another boat past the rapids. On reaching it the boat was found to have been burnt. The party therefore returned to carry up another. They had got to the very last rapid, and had placed the boat for a short space in the water, when, through the carelessness of five Zambesi men, she was overturned, and away she went like an arrow down the rapids. To keep calm under such a crowning disappointment must have I taxed Livingstone's self-control to the very utmost.
It was now that he received a despatch from Earl Russell intimating that the Expedition was recalled. This, though a great disappointment, was not altogether a surprise. On the 24th April he had written to Mr. Waller "I should not wonder in the least to be recalled, for should the Portuguese persist in keeping the rivers shut, there would be no use in trying to develop trade," He states his views on the recall calmly in a letter to Mr. James Young:
"_Murchison Cataracts_, 3_d July_, 1863.--... Got
instructions for our recall yesterday, at which I do not
wonder. The Government has behaved well to us throughout, and
I feel abundantly thankful to H.M.'s ministers for enabling
me so far to carry on the experiment of turning the
industrial and trading propensities of the natives to good
account, with a view of thereby eradicating the trade in
slaves. But the Portuguese dogged our footsteps, and, as is
generally understood, with the approbation of their Home
Government, neutralized our labors. Not that the Portuguese
statesmen approved of slaving, but being enormously jealous
lest their pretended dominion from sea to sea and elsewhere
should in the least degree, now or any future time, become
aught else than a slave 'preserve,' the Governors have been
instructed, and have carried out their instructions further
than their employers intended. Major Sicard was removed from
Tette as too friendly, and his successor had emmissaries in
the Ajawa camp. Well, he saw their policy, and regretted that
they should be allowed to follow us into perfectly new
regions. The regret was the more poignant, inasmuch as but
for our entering in by gentleness, they durst not have gone.
No Portuguese dared, for instance, to come up this Shiré
Valley; but after our dispelling the fear of the natives by
fair treatment, they came in calling themselves our
'children.' The whole thing culminated when this quarter was
inundated with Tette slavers, whose operations, with a
marauding tribe of Ajawas, and a drought, completely
depopulated the country. The sight of this made me conclude
that unless something could be done to prevent these raids,
and take off their foolish obstructions on the rivers, which
they never use, our work in this region was at an end....
Please the Supreme, I shall work some other point yet. In
leaving, it is bitter to see some 900 miles of coast
abandoned to those who were the first to begin the
slave-trade, and seem determined to be the last to abandon
it."
Writing to Mr. Waller at this time he said: "I don't know whether I am to go on the shelf or not. If I do, I make Africa the shelf. If the 'Lady Nyassa' is well sold, I shall manage. There is a Ruler above, and his providence guides all things. He is our Friend, and has plenty of work for all his people to do. Don't fear of being left idle, if willing to work for Him. I am glad to her of Alington. If the work is of God it will came out all right at last. To Him shall be given of the gold of Sheba, and daily shall He be praised. I always think it was such a blessing and privilege to be led into his work instead of into the service of the hard taskmasters--the Devil and Sin."
The reason assigned by Earl Russell for the recall of the Expedition were, that, not through any fault of Dr. Livingstone's, it had not accomplished the objects for which it had been designed, and that it had proved much more costly than was originally expected. Probably the Government felt likewise that their remonstrances with the Portuguese Government were unavailing, and that their relations were becoming too uncomfortable. Even among those most friendly to Dr. Livingstone's great aim, and most opposed to the slave-trade, and to the Portuguese policy in Africa, there were some who doubted whether his proposed methods of procedure were quite consistent with the rights of the Portuguese Government. His Royal Highness the Prince-Consort indicated some feeling of this kind in his interview with Livingstone in 1857. He expressed the feeling more strongly when he declined the request, made to him through Professor Sedgwick of Cambridge, that he would allow himself to be Patron of the Universities Mission. Dr. Livingstone knew well that from that exalted quarter his plans would receive no active support. That he should have obtained the support he did from successive Governments and successive Foreign Secretaries, Liberal and Conservative, was a great gratification, if not something of a surprise. Hence the calmness with which he received the intelligence of the recall. Toward the Portuguese Government his feelings were not very sweet. On them lay the guilt of arresting a work that would have conferred untold blessing on Africa. He determined to make this known very clearly when he should return to England. At a future period of his life, he purposed, if spared, to go more fully into the reasons of his recall. Meanwhile, his course was simply to acquiesce in the resolution of the British Government.
It was unfortunate that the recall took place before he had been able to carry into effect his favorite scheme of placing a steamer on Lake Nyassa; nor could he do this now, although the vessel on which he had spent half his fortune lay at the Murchison Cataracts. He had always cherished the hope that the Government would repay him at least a part of the outlay, which, instead of £3000, as he had intended, had mounted up to £6000. He had very generously told Dr. Stewart that if this should be done, and if he should be willing to return from Scotland to labor on the shores of Nyassa, he would pay him his expenses out, and £150 yearly, so anxious was he that he should begin the work. On the recall of the Expedition, without any allowance for the ship, or even mention of it, all these expectations and intentions came abruptly to an end.
At no previous time had Dr. Livingstone been under greater discouragements than now. The Expedition had been recalled; his heart had not recovered from the desolation caused by the death of the Bishop and his brethren, as well as the Helmores in the Makololo country, and still more by the removal of Mrs. Livingstone, and the thought of his motherless children; the most heart-rending scenes had been witnessed everywhere in regions that a short time ago had been so bright; all his efforts to do good had been turned to evil, every new path he had opened having been seized as it were by the devil and turned to the most diabolical ends; his countrymen were nearly all away from him; the most depressing of diseases had produced its natural effect; he had had worries, delays, and disappointments about ships and boats of the most harrassing kind; and now the "Lady Nyassa" could not be floated in the waters of which he had fondly hoped to see her the angel and the queen. It is hardly possible to exaggerate the noble quality of the heart that, undeterred by all these troubles, resolved to take this last chance of exploring the banks of Nyassa, although it could only be by the weary process of trudge, trudge, trudging; although hunger, if not starvation, blocked the path, and fever and dysentery flitted around it like imps of darkness; although tribes, demoralized by the slave-trade, might at any moment put an end to him and his enterprise;--not to speak of the ordinary risks of travel, the difficulty of finding guides, the liability to bodily hurt, the scarcity of food, the perils from wild beasts by night Und by day,--risks which no ordinary traveler could think of lightly, but which in Livingstone's journeys drop out of sight, because they are so overtopped and dwarfed by risks that ordinary travelers never know.
Why did not Livingstone go home? A single sentence in a letter to Mr. Waller, while the recall was only in contemplation, explains: "In my case, duty would not lead me home, and home therefore I would not go." Away then goes Livingstone, accompanied by the steward of the "Pioneer" and a handful of native servants (Mr. Young being left in charge of the vessel), to get to the northern end of the lake, and ascertain whether any large river flowed into it from the west, and if possible to visit Lake Moero, of which he had heard, lying a considerable way to the west. For the first time in his travels he carried some bottles of wine,--a present from the missionaries Waller and Alington; for water had hitherto been his only drink, with a little hot coffee in the mornings to warm the stomach and ward off the feeling of sinking. At one time the two white men are lost three days in the woods, without food or the means of purchasing it; but some poor natives out of their poverty show them kindness. At another they can procure no guides, though the country is difficult and the way intersected by deep gullies that can only be scaled at certain known parts; anon they are taken for slave-dealers, and make a narrow escape of a night attack. Another time, the cries of children remind Livingstone of his own home and family, where the very same tones of sorrow had often been heard; the thought brought its own pang, only he could feel thankful that in the case of his children the woes of the slave-trade would never be added to the ordinary sorrows of childhood. Then he would enjoy the joyous laugh of some Manganja women, and think of the good influence of a merry heart, and remember that whenever he had observed a chief with a joyous twinkle of the eye accompanying his laugh, he had always set him down as a good fellow, and had never been disappointed in him afterward. Then he would cheer his monotony by making some researches into the origin of civilization, coming to the clear conclusion that born savages must die out, because they could devise no means of living through disease. By and by he would examine the Arab character, and find Mahometanism as it now is in Africa worse than African heathenism, and remark on the callousness of the Mahometans to the welfare of one another, and on the especial glory of Christianity, the only religion that seeks to propagate itself, and through the influence of love share its blessings with others. Anon he would dwell on the primitive African faith; its recognition of one Almighty Creator, its moral code, so like our own, save in the one article of polygamy; its pious recognition of a future life, though the element of punishment is not very conspicuous; its mild character generally, notwithstanding the bloodthirstiness sometimes ascribed to it, which, however, Livingstone held to be, at Dahomey for example, purely exceptional.
Another subject that occupied him was the natural history of the country. He would account for desert tracts like Kalahari by the fact that the east and southeast winds, laden with moisture from the Indian Ocean, get cooled over the coast ranges of mountains, and having discharged their vapor there had no spare moisture to deposit over the regions that for want of it became deserts. The geology of Southern Africa was peculiar; the geographical series described in books was not to be found here, for, as Sir Roderick Murchison had shown, the great submarine depressions and elevations that had so greatly affected the other continents during the secondary, tertiary, and more recent periods, had not affected Africa. It had preserved its terrestrial conditions during a long period, unaffected by any changes save those dependent on atmospheric influences. There was also a peculiarity in prehistoric Africa--it had no stone period; at least no flint weapons had been found, and the familiarity and skill of the natives with the manufacture of iron seemed to indicate that they had used iron weapons from the first.
The travelers had got as far as the river Loangwa (of Nyassa), when a halt had to be called. Some of the natives had been ill, and indeed one had died in the comparatively cold climate of the highlands. But nothing would have hindered Livingstone from working his way round the head of the lake if only time had been on his side. But time was inexorably against him; the orders from Government were strict. He must get the "Pioneer" down to the sea while the river was in flood. A month or six weeks would have enabled him to finish his researches, but he could not run the risk. It would have been otherwise had he foreseen that when he got to the ship he would be detained two months waiting for the rising of the river. On their way back, they took a nearer cut, but found the villages all deserted. The reeds along the banks of the lake were crowded with fugitives. "In passing mile after mile, marked with the sad proofs that 'man's inhumanity to man makes countless thousands mourn,' one experiences an overpowering sense of helplessness to alleviate human woe, and breathes a silent prayer to the Almighty to hasten the good time coming when 'man to man, the world o'er, shall brothers be for all that.'" Near a village called Bangwé they were pursued by a body of Mazitu, who retired when they came within ear-shot. This little adventure seemed to give rise to the report that Dr. Livingstone had been murdered by the Makololo, which reached England, and created no small alarm. Referring to the report in his jocular way, in a letter to his friend Mr. Fitch, he says, "A report of my having been murdered at the lake has been very industriously circulated by the Portuguese. Don't become so pale on getting a letter from a dead man."
Reaching the stockade of Chinsamba in Mosapo, they were much pleased with that chief's kindness. Dr. Livingstone followed his usual method, and gained his usual influence. "When a chief has made any inquiries of us, we have found that we gave most satisfaction in our answers when we tried to fancy ourselves in the position of the interrogator, and him that of a poor uneducated fellow-countryman in England. The polite, respectful way of speaking, and behavior of what we call 'a thorough gentleman,' almost always secures the friendship and good-will of the Africans."
On 1st November, 1863, the party reached the ship, and found all well. Here, as has been said, two months had to be spent waiting for the flood, to Dr. Livingstone's intense chagrin.
While waiting here he received a letter from Bishop Tozer, the successor of Bishop Mackenzie, informing him that he had resolved to abandon the Mission on the continent and transfer operations to Zanzibar. Dr. Livingstone had very sincerely welcomed the new Bishop, and at first liked him, and thought that his caution would lead to good results. Indeed, when he saw that his own scheme was destroyed by the Portuguese, he had great hopes that what he had been defeated in, the Mission would accomplish. Some time before, his hopes had begun to wane, and now the news conveyed in Bishop Tozer's letter was their death-blow. In his reply he implored the Bishop to reconsider the matter. After urging strongly some considerations bearing on the duty of missionaries, the reputation of Englishmen, and the impression likely to be made on the native mind, he concluded thus: "I hope, dear Bishop, you will not deem me guilty of impertinence in thus writing to you with a sore heart. I see that if you go, the last ray of hope for this wretched, trodden-down people disappears, and I again from the bottom of my heart entreat you to reconsider the matter, and may the All-wise One guide to that decision which will be most for his glory."
And thus, for Livingstone's life-time, ended the Universities Mission to Central Africa, with all the hopes which its bright dawn had inspired, that the great Church of England would bend its strength against the curse of Africa, and sweep it from the face of the earth. Writing to Sir Thomas Maclear, he said that he felt this much more than his own recall. He could hardly write of it; he was more inclined "to sit down and cry." No mission had ever had such bright prospects; notwithstanding all that had been said against it, he stood by the climate as firmly as ever, and if he were only young, he would go himself and plant the gospel there. It would be done one day without fail, though he might not live to see it.
As usual, Livingstone found himself blamed for the removal of the Mission. The Makololo had behaved badly, and they were Livingstone's people. "Isn't it interesting," he writes to Mr. Moore, "to get blamed for everything? But I must be thankful in feeling that I would rather perish than blame another for my misdeeds and deficiencies."
We have lost sight of Dr. Stewart and the projected mission of the Free Church of Scotland. As Dr. Livingstone's arrangements did not admit of his accompanying Dr. Stewart up the Shiré, he set out alone, falling in afterward with the Rev. Mr. Scudamore, a member, and as we have already said ultimately a martyr, of the Universities Mission. The report which Dr. Stewart made of the prospects of a mission was that, owing to the disturbed state of the country, no immediate action could be taken. Livingstone seemed to think him hasty in this conclusion. The scheme continued to be ardently cherished, and some ten or twelve years after--in 1874--in the formation of the "Livingstonia" mission and colony, a most promising and practical step was taken toward the fulfillment of Dr. Livingstone's views. Dr. Stewart has proved one of the best friends and noblest workers for African regeneration both at Lovedale and Livingstonia--a strong man on whom other men may lean, with his whole heart in the cause of Africa.
In the breaking up of the Universities Mission, it was necessary that some arrangement should be made on behalf of about thirty boys and a few helpless old persons and others, a portion of the rescued slaves, who had been taken under the charge of the Mission, and could not be abandoned. The fear of the Portuguese seemed likely to lead to their being left behind. But Livingstone could not bear the idea. He thought it would be highly discreditable to the good name of England, and an affront to the memory of Bishop Mackenzie, to "repudiate" his act in taking them under his protection. Therefore, when Bishop Tozer would not accept the charge, he himself took them in hand, giving orders to Mr. E.D. Young (as he says in his Journal), "in the event of any Portuguese interfering with them in his absence, to pitch him over-board!" Through his influence arrangements were made, as we shall see, for conveying them to the Cape. Mr. R.M. Ballantyne, in his _Six Months at the Cape_, tells us that he found, some years afterward, among the most efficient teachers in St. George's Orphanage, Cape Town, one of these black girls, named Dauma, whom Bishop Mackenzie had personally rescued and carried on his shoulders, and whom Livingstone now rescued a second time.
Livingstone's plan for himself was to sail to Bombay in the "Lady Nyassa," and endeavor to sell her there, before returning home. The Portuguese would have liked to get her, to employ her as a slaver--"But," he wrote to his daughter (10th August, 1863), "I would rather see her go down to the depths of the Indian Ocean than that. We have not been able to do all that we intended for this country, owing to the jealousy and slave-hunting of the Portuguese. They have hindered us effectually by sweeping away the population into slavery. Thousands have perished, and wherever we go human skeletons appear. I suppose that our Government could not prevail on the Portuguese to put a stop to this; so we are recalled. I am only sorry that we ever began near these slavers, but the great men of Portugal professed so loudly their eager desire to help us (and in the case of the late King I think there was sincerity), that I believed them, and now find out that it was all for show in Europe.... If missions were established as we hoped, I should still hope for good being done to this land, but the new Bishop had to pay fourpence for every pound weight of calico he bought, and calico is as much currency here as money is in Glasgow. It looks as if they wished to prohibit any one else coming, and, unfortunately, Bishop Tozer, a good man enough, lacks courage.... What a mission it would be if there were no difficulties--nothing but walking about in slippers made by admiring young ladies! Hey! that would not suit me. It would give me the doldrums; but there are many tastes in the world."
Looking back on the work of the last six years, while deeply grieved that the great object of the Expedition had not been achieved, Dr. Livingstone was able to point to some important results:
1. The discovery of the Kongone harbor, and the ascertaining of the condition of the Zambesi River, and its fitness for navigation.
2. The ascertaining of the capacity of the soil. It was found to be admirably adapted for indigo and cotton, as well as tobacco, castor-oil, and sugar. Its great fertility was shown by its gigantic grasses, and abundant crops of corn and maize. The highlands were free from tsetse and mosquitoes. The drawback to all this was the occurrence of periodical droughts, once every few years.
But every fine feature of the country was bathed in gloom by the slave-trade. The image left in Dr. Livingstone's mind was not that of the rich, sunny, luxuriant country, but that of the woe and wretchedness of the people. The real service of the Expedition was, that it had exposed slavery at its fountain-head, and in all its phases. First, there was the internal slave-trade between hostile native tribes. Then, there were the slave-traders from the coast, Arabs, or half-caste Portuguese, for whom natives were encouraged to collect slaves by all the horrible means of marauding and murder. And further, there were the parties sent out from Portuguese and Arab coast towns, with cloth and beads, muskets and ammunition. The destructive and murderous effects of the last were the climax of the system.
Dr. Livingstone had seen nothing to make him regard the African as of a different species from the rest of the human family. Nor was he the lowest of the species. He had a strong frame and a wonderfully persistent vitality, was free from many European diseases, and could withstand privations with wonderful light-heartedness.
He did not deem it necessary formally to answer a question sometimes put, whether the African had enough of intellect to receive Christianity. The reception of Christianity did not depend on intellect. It depended, as Sir James Stephen had remarked, on a spiritual intuition, which was not the fruit of intellectual culture. But, in fact, the success of missions on the West Coast showed that not only could the African be converted to Christianity, but that Christianity might take root and be cordially supported by the African race.
It was the accursed slave-trade, promoted by the Portuguese, that had frustrated everything. For some time to come his efforts and his prayers must be directed to getting influential men to see to this, so that one way or other the trade might be abolished forever. The hope of obtaining access to the heart of Africa by another route than that through the Portuguese settlements was still in Livingstone's heart. He would go home, but only for a few months; at the earliest possible moment he would return to look for a new route to the interior.