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Title: The story of David Livingstone
Author: Vautier Golding
Release date: March 9, 2026 [eBook #78151]
Language: English
Original publication: London: T.C. & E.C. Jack, 1924
Other information and formats: www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/78151
Credits: Al Haines
*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE STORY OF DAVID LIVINGSTONE ***
[Illustration: Cover art]
[Frontispiece: DAVID LIVINGSTONE]
THE STORY OF
DAVID
LIVINGSTONE
BY
VAUTIER GOLDING
LONDON: T. C. & E. C. JACK
TORONTO: THE COPP, CLARK CO. LTD.
PROEM
_To little Ardale and all his merry kind_
LIGHTS OF LIFE
The dew stands on the dormer panes,
The cross November sun
Has sent the daylight off to bed
Before the night's begun;
The dull red embers, half aglow,
Are sulking in the grate,
And let the lonely shadows grow
All dark and desolate;
Shadows of things that go awry,
Or waver to and fro;
Shadows of playthings bought so dear
And broken long ago;
Shadows of friends who played till mirth
Grew sad and went in pain:--
Where is the merry light that makes
Old shadows smile again?
Hark! little sandals softly beat
Upon the attic stair,
And truant mischief breathless creeps
With whispered, "Is he there?"
A story? 'Tis a fateful task
To fill the open brow:
Who knows what plans of God depend
On all it garners now?
Where shall we lead the clambering limbs,
The big blue fearless eyes?
Down to the gold mine's narrowing drift,
Or to the widening skies
Where, in the space around the stars,
Are countless worlds astray,
Whose peoples call for pioneers
To find the safer way?
Ay, let us tell the generous tale
Of giants real and bold,
Who grew so great they would not stoop
To gather fame and gold;
But hurled the mountains from our path,
And drained our quagmires dry,
And held our foes at bay the while
They bore our weaklings by;
Giants by whose unselfish toil
Our land was first begun,
Where good and useful men and maids
Make merry as they run.
Ah, may you miss the dismal tracks
That aimless feet have trod,
And follow where our pioneers
Make open ways to God.
VAUTIER GOLDING.
CONTENTS
Chapter
I. Early Life
II. First Years in Africa
III. Beyond the Kalahari Desert
IV. From Coast to Coast
V. The Zambesi Expedition
VI. The Upper Shiré and Lake Nyassa
VII. Foiled by the Slavers
VIII. In the Heart of Africa
IX. A Death-blow to Slavery
X. The Last Journey
LIST OF PICTURES
Portrait of Livingstone .... Frontispiece
The brute charged full tilt at his waggon
The lion began to crunch the bone of his arm
The Victoria Falls
A long file of slaves
They burnt the village
Often he had to wade through marshes up to the waist
They saw him dead on his knees
[Illustration: (map of Central Africa and Cape Colony)]
THE STORY OF DAVID LIVINGSTONE
CHAPTER I
EARLY LIFE
The story of this brave and gentle hero, and of his noble toil for
the sake of other men, is truly a tale of more than ordinary wonder.
Few men's lives can better show how even the poorest and weakest can
gain for themselves the power to do great things, and to make the
harder paths of life more easy for those who follow. For David
Livingstone began life in a workman's cottage, without knowledge or
skill, and without money to obtain them. Yet, when he died, the
world was so full of praise and wonder at his work that his body was
brought from Africa to rest in Westminster Abbey among the graves of
his country's greatest men. He had grown to be a great pioneer, an
explorer, a scientist, a doctor, a missioner, and a freer of slaves.
In thirty years he travelled 29,000 miles, through the wild and
unknown parts of Africa, exploring rivers, lakes, plains, forests,
and mountains. He found out places where white settlers might make
farms and plantations in health and safety. He sought for paths and
waterways by which they might bring their cotton, grain, coffee,
sugar, ivory, and skins to the seaports for sale. Among the black
tribes he made many friends, doctored their sick, and lost no chance
of showing them how to do their duty to God and make better use of
their lives.
But his last and greatest work was to follow up the slave-hunters,
and make known in England all the brutal and wicked horrors of the
slave-trade. This was the work that wore him to death, but his noble
self-sacrifice roused his countrymen to take possession of Central
Africa and put an end to slavery. And if we look into his life, we
shall find that the power to do all this came little by little, and
day by day, from one simple source, namely, his earnest and unselfish
desire to show his love for God by doing good to men. He was always
trying to help and befriend others, and this made other men befriend
him and give him the means of carrying on his work.
Livingstone's forefathers were Highlanders, and lived in the wild and
lonely island of Ulva, till hard times drove the family to settle in
the village of Blantyre, among the Lanarkshire cotton-mills, where
work was more plentiful.
Here David was born in the year 1813. His father, Neil Livingstone,
an honest, steady, and hard-working man, took a great interest in all
that was going on in the world. He was a great reader in many
subjects, but was especially fond of books on missionary work. From
him David inherited his Highland pluck and hardihood, and also his
thirst for every kind of knowledge.
His mother, Agnes Hunter, came of an old family which, in the days of
the Covenanter persecution, had been driven from home to the hills,
and had risked torture and death rather than do what they believed to
be wrong. She gave him her gentle and kindly nature, and taught him
to be neat, orderly, and exact. From her tender but firm upbringing
also, he gained the brave grip of truth, honour, and justice that
makes men do and dare all things for duty's sake.
This was his heritage from his parents, and it proved of more value
to him than all the money on earth.
At the village school of Blantyre David soon learnt to read and
write. So poor, however, were his parents, that they had to take him
away from his lessons at the early age of ten, and set him to work in
a cotton-mill. Summer and winter, wet or fine, he had to appear at
the factory at six in the morning, and stay there till eight at
night, with short spaces allowed him for meals. Fourteen hours a day
at the mill might well have broken his pluck and ruined his health,
as, indeed, happened to many poor children, but David was made of
harder stuff. He was bent on getting knowledge by some means or
other. Very quickly he learnt to work the machine called the
"spinning jenny," and was then raised to be a spinner with a small
wage.
The first half-crown of his earning he took home, and slipped it into
his mother's lap. To him it was a small fortune, and would have
bought him many coveted things, but he thought of his mother's wants
before his own. Later on, as he earned more wage, he bought himself
books, and these he used to fix on the "jenny," snatching a few lines
from them whenever he could spare an eye from his work. His hard and
tiring day at the mill was long enough for any one, but in spite of
this he joined night classes and sat up reading till sometimes his
mother took away his books and drove him to bed.
His holidays were spent in ranging over the countryside with his
brothers and sisters, and here too nothing escaped his keen eye and
love of knowledge. Every animal, bird, insect, and plant was an
interest to him, and he studied them closely, trying to find out all
he could about their forms and habits. And while he thus began to
learn the wonderful science of nature, he never dreamt that one day
in the wilds of Africa he would use his knowledge in digging roots
for his supper, or in avoiding vicious beasts and poisonous snakes.
As the years went on he grew restless, and was sometimes not very
happy, without quite knowing why. In reality his mind was growing
very fast, and wanted bigger and better work than watching the
mill-wheels. Spinning cotton was useful enough in its way, but he
wanted to do for mankind something greater and more lasting than that.
His father had many books and papers on mission work in China and
India, and as David read of the wonderful beauty of these countries,
and the ignorance and cruelty of their peoples, he sometimes thought
he would like to be a missionary. The idea returned to him again and
again, but he kept doubting whether he was the right person for the
work. One day, however, when he was twenty years old, he happened to
read a booklet that told such sad tales about the poor of China that
his mind was troubled and stirred. So heavily did the story of human
suffering and wrong weigh upon him that he began to take his country
walks alone, in order to think the matter over undisturbed. Every
morning he asked himself if he could do nothing to help, and every
night he went to bed with the question still unanswered.
But at last there came an evening when he found an answer that made
his way quite clear. He watched the sunset lights creep off the
hills and clouds and die away in the growing: starlight. He heard
the thrush, all grateful for the joy of life, sing out its evensong
till the calm hush of night stole over the tired world. The peace
and beauty of it all seemed to make him sadder than ever. In such a
lovely world, where there was room for all, food for all, and joy
enough for all, it seemed to him so utterly strange that men could
ever even want to cheat, rob, bully, and kill each other, and grab
for themselves more than they could possibly use. The depth of his
own sadness made him remember how once, in the stillness of the
sunset hour, Jesus of Nazareth had wandered into an olive grove, and
there had wept in bitter grief over the troubles of men.
Then suddenly the idea flashed into his mind that at least he could
try and imitate the life of Christ as far as lay in his power. In a
moment his mind was made up. He walked home with a brisk step and
light heart, and told his parents that he was going to college at
Glasgow to learn to be a doctor; and then he would go out to the far
East to help the sick, and to tell men how they could make the world
better and happier by imitating the life of Christ.
David lost no time in carrying out his plan, and at once began to put
by all he could from his earnings at the cotton-mill. Want of money
was his chief difficulty. Indeed, when at last he went up to
Glasgow, he and his father walked all the way, and then had to trudge
the streets till they found a lodging for David that cost no more
than two shillings a week.
It was a hard struggle for young Livingstone, but still, by spending
his savings very carefully, he managed to keep at his studies for a
whole winter. Then he was forced to go back to the cotton-mills in
order to save more money to pay for another winter's training. He
was a quick and thorough learner, and at once it became quite clear
to those who taught him that he would soon be fit for the life he had
chosen.
Livingstone did not want to be ordained a regular missionary and take
the title of "Reverend" before his name, for he did not wish to teach
the special creed and services of any one particular set of
Christians. His own idea was to go among the natives as a plain and
simple man, trying every hour and minute of his daily life to do as
Christ had done; and in this way he hoped to win their love and
respect, and to lead them towards a nobler life of duty to God and
man. But his family and friends so strongly advised him to be made a
missionary in the usual way that he yielded to their wishes, and
offered himself to the London Missionary Society. His offer was
accepted, and after a short examination in London before the
governors of the Society, he was sent to Ongar, in Essex, for a three
months' training among the other missionary students.
Here, with his usual care and thoroughness, he quickly learnt all
that was set before him, but there was one thing he never could
master: do what he would, he never could learn to preach. Once he
was sent to a neighbouring parish with a most carefully prepared
sermon; but he could get no further than the text, and so with a
hasty apology he fled from the pulpit. Probably that was the only
time in his life that he ran away from anything, but the event nearly
ended his career.
His failure in preaching vexed the soul of his pastor so much, that
Livingstone was sent back to the governors at the end of the three
months with a bad report of his powers as a missionary. On the
strength of this report he was nearly sent away as useless. One of
the governors, however, who was wiser than his fellows, saw that
Livingstone could both think well and do well, although he could not
talk well. He accordingly took the young student's part, and
insisted that he should have a further trial at Ongar. The result of
this timely aid was that, after three more months of study, no one
doubted Livingstone's fitness, and so in the year 1840 he was
formally ordained a missionary.
Meanwhile, war had broken out in China, and no one could go there in
safety. This was a disappointment to Livingstone, but while waiting
for peace he would not be idle, so he went on with his medical
studies at London, and also took his degree as a physician and
surgeon at Glasgow. But the war still dragged on, and rather than
waste any time, he decided to go to Africa; and accordingly, on 8th
December 1840, he set sail for that vast and unknown continent, into
which he was one day to bring new light, new hope, and new freedom.
CHAPTER II
FIRST YEARS IN AFRICA
The sea voyage out to the Cape was a new life to Livingstone, and he
made the most of it. With his usual determination to know all about
everything, he made friends with the ship's captain, and soon began
to learn how to manage the ship.
The captain taught him how to use a sextant and chronometer, two most
important instruments, by whose help voyagers can tell exactly how
far they are to the north or south, to the east or west. To "take an
observation," as it is called, is no easy matter; but by hard and
steady practice Livingstone in time became able to find out the
ship's exact position and to mark it down neatly on the chart. And
often in after life the captain's kindly teaching came to his aid
when he lost his way in the wilds, or when he marked some new
discovery on the map.
In his spare half-hours Livingstone would enjoy the many delights and
wonders of the southern sea. He watched the dazzling little
flying-fish dart like tiny rainbows from beneath the bows, glimmer
over the water, and flash into the white comb of a wave. The
dolphins, too, like clowns of the sea, amused him with their antics
as they leapt and turned somersaults over the waves or sportively
raced, two or three abreast, close ahead of the cut-water.
Occasionally a monster sperm-whale would rise to the surface like a
floating islet, spout his double fountain into the air, and plunge
down again into his home. Sometimes, also, a grim and wicked-looking
shark would prowl about the ship's wake in the greedy hope of human
prey.
When at last the long voyage was over and Livingstone landed at Cape
Town, he found more sights and wonders awaiting him; but he had not
been very long ashore before he also found a very great
disappointment. He had quite supposed that all missionaries were of
course doing their best to help forward the work among the natives,
and it was an unpleasant surprise to him when he saw that, in spite
of the noble efforts of many good men, mission work in South Africa
was almost at a standstill.
From want of more careful planning, the mission stations were mostly
clustered around the Cape instead of being dotted about far into the
continent, where black men were much more numerous. This was a great
waste of strength and time, for hard-working missionaries had not
enough to do, while the idlers could so easily neglect their duty for
the pleasures and amusements of white society.
Amongst the missionaries there was much disagreement and petty
jealousy over their work, and many were full of complaint about
trifling matters, while a few, but only a few, led such unworthy and
contemptible lives that they often brought the good fame of mission
work into bad report.
Livingstone soon made up his mind that the only remedy lay in two new
plans: first, to make mission stations far up in the thickly-peopled
native districts and win over the most powerful chiefs; next, to make
a training college whence native teachers could afterwards be sent to
educate the many tribes. It was the first of these plans that
decided the course of his after life, for he now saw that he might do
better service to his cause by pioneering Central Africa than by
settling down in comfort to preach.
After a short stay at the Cape, Livingstone was sent into
Bechuanaland to Kuruman, the most northern of all the mission
settlements in South Africa. This station was worked by a good and
capable missionary, Dr. Moffat, who was then away in England, and
Livingstone had been ordered to await his return. Livingstone,
however, did not mean to be idle, so he decided to spend the time in
exploring the almost unknown country to the north of the station.
Accordingly he made a number of journeys in many directions,
travelling about from tribe to tribe until he had thoroughly learnt
the nature and resources of the country, and also the language and
character of the natives.
On the first of these journeys Livingstone had an object-lesson in
slavery that set his noble heart aching for the freedom of Africa.
One day when he had outspanned his oxen for rest and food, he
suddenly noticed that a young native girl had crept into camp, and
was hiding under his waggon. He gave her some food, and in answer to
his questions she told him her story. She and her sister had been
left orphans, and they had lived happily together till the latter
died. Then she was taken by another family, who kept her, not out of
kindness, but with the cruel intention of selling her to some chief
as a slave wife. On learning what was in store for her she ran away,
meaning to trudge behind the waggon all the way to Kuruman, where she
had friends.
While thus telling her tale, her face suddenly fell with fear, and
she burst into tears. Livingstone looked up and saw that a native,
armed with a rifle, had come to claim the poor child and take her
back to slavery.
Livingstone could not bear the thought of giving her up, but he was
at his wits' end to know the best way of saving her, till one of his
native teachers, named Pomari, came to the rescue. The girl was
attractive enough, with her bright eyes, white teeth, and soft,
healthy skin, and her captors had loaded her in savage fashion with
strings of beads. Pomari stripped the beads off the girl, and gave
them to the man, who, after a little persuasion, took the bribe and
went his way. Livingstone took care to keep the girl out of sight
till they were safe out of the district.
Many other adventures befell the missionary on his travels; for wild
animals, drought, fever, cattle-sickness, and the deadly tsetse-fly,
whose bite kills oxen and horses in a few hours, always bring risk
and excitement to an African journey. Once, when he was "trekking"
several hundred miles through Bechuanaland in an ox-waggon, the fatal
cattle-sickness fell like a plague upon his oxen and killed them all.
There was nothing to be done but to desert the waggon and tramp home.
Livingstone's native servants were afraid that their master would
never be able to do it. One of them pointed to his trousers and
said, half in anxiety, half in scorn, that he was not really strong
enough, and only put his legs into those bags to make them look
stout. Livingstone, however, proved their fears groundless, and won
their respect by walking them nearly to a standstill.
Once, too, he travelled 400 miles on ox-back, and found it awkward
and uneasy work to keep his seat and avoid the sweep of the poor
beast's horns as it shook off the flies that clustered round its eyes
and nostrils. During this journey he fell down and broke his finger,
and set the bone with his other hand. Not long after, a lion sprang
out of the bush and raided their camp. Livingstone frightened the
animal away by firing his revolver, but the kick of the weapon broke
his finger anew.
Another time he had to fly for his life and hide from an angry
rhinoceros which he had disturbed while she was feeding her calf.
Upon missing him, the vicious brute charged full tilt at his waggon,
and with the deadly upward stroke of her horn (a stroke which has
been known to kill an elephant), splintered the wheel like matchwood.
[Illustration: The brute charged full tilt at his waggon]
All this while Livingstone was making friends of the tribes along his
track. His manly fearlessness, his good humour and keen sympathy,
his kindly eyes full of honesty and truth, soon showed the natives
that there was nothing to fear from him. His medical skill got him
the fame of a wizard, and black patients from far and near thronged
his waggon to be cured of their ills, while some spread the report
that he had brought dead men back to life.
Apart from this, he had a most wonderful gift of finding his way into
the hearts of men; and though the natives could not understand the
reason of his coming, yet they soon saw that he had not come, like
some of the Transvaal Boers, to shoot them down, plunder their
cattle, and carry off their children to a life of unpaid labour.
One chief, Bubé, was in difficulty for want of water for his crops.
Every tribe had a sorcerer, who was supposed to have the power of
bringing down rain when required; but Bubé's rainmaker had failed to
supply him. Livingstone, however, taught them a surer way than
sorcery, for he induced the whole tribe to turn out and dig a ditch
from the river to their village, and by thus saving them from famine
he won their love and respect. Bubé's faith in witchcraft afterwards
cost him his life. His sorcerer vowed he could take the devil out of
some gunpowder by the use of certain burning roots. Poor Bubé
innocently went to watch the performance, and both were blown out of
existence.
At last, after long waiting, Livingstone got leave from the governors
to start a new mission-station, and this he did with the help of a
brother missionary at Mabotsa, a place 250 miles north of Kuruman.
Here Livingstone had to build a house for himself at his own expense,
and as his income was only £100 a year, he built it with his own
hands.
His work, however, was delayed by a misadventure that left him with a
weak arm for all his days. A lion one day fell upon a flock of sheep
near the village and began to kill them right and left. Livingstone
went out for a little while to encourage the natives to surround it.
The lion, however, broke away from its pursuers, and suddenly sprang
out of the bush upon Livingstone: then, pinning him down with a paw
on his head, it began to crunch the bone of his arm. A faithful
follower, Mebalwé, diverted the beast from his master, and was
himself attacked, but was saved by the lion falling dead of its
wounds.
[Illustration: The lion began to crunch the bone of his arm]
As soon as his arm was well enough, Livingstone finished his house,
and then he brought home Mary Moffat from Kuruman to be his wife.
The two were together so successful in their work that the jealousy
of some of their fellow-missionaries was aroused, and Livingstone was
accused of taking more than his share of credit so as to gain the
favour of the governors in London.
Rather than live as a source of envy to a fellow-worker, Livingstone
left Mabotsa, and went to all the labour and expense of building a
new mission-house at Chonuane, 40 miles farther north, in the country
of a chief called Sechélé. Water, however, was so scarce at Chonuane
that Livingstone persuaded Sechélé's people to move with him still
farther north, to Kolobeng. Here, for the third time, he built
himself a house, but he did not dwell there for many years. His
great mind ran continually upon the welfare of Africa, and he was
losing faith in the missionary methods that were then practised.
He now believed the best plan would be for Christian emigrants to
come and teach the natives useful arts and industries, and to show
them by example how to lead better lives.
But where was he to make his first little colony? East of Kolobeng
lay the Transvaal, and the Boers, who hated him for his efforts
against slavery, kept sending him threatening messages. North and
west of him was the dry and trackless Kalahari Desert. He had heard
native rumours about a large lake beyond the desert. There he might
find a place suitable for his purpose; but he could not afford to pay
for the waggons, cattle, native servants, and stores necessary for
the journey across the desert. House-building had already cost him
beyond his means. What was he to do?
The matter was settled for him by the generosity of an English
gentleman, William Cotton Oswell, who had made several hunting trips
in South Africa after big game, and had often been helped by
Livingstone's knowledge of the country and language. Noble,
fearless, and unselfish himself, Oswell had been from the first drawn
into fast friendship with Livingstone; and now he offered to pay the
cost of the expedition. Livingstone was overjoyed at his goodness,
and on May 27, 1849, the expedition left Kolobeng. They had with
them eighty oxen, twenty horses, and about twenty-five natives, and
the fact that a waggon and span of oxen costs about £125 will give
some idea of Oswell's generosity.
CHAPTER III
BEYOND THE KALAHARI DESERT
A glance at the maps of Africa published before the year 1850 will
show how little was known about the middle of the continent. All
round the coast and a few hundred miles up the rivers there were
plenty of names, but the centre was left almost blank. Most people
supposed that the Great Sahara Desert in the north stretched down to
the Kalahari Desert in the south. Cleverer men, however, thought of
the enormous flow of water in the Nile, Congo, and Zambesi, and felt
sure that somewhere there must be a land of streams, forests, and
hills, vast enough to feed such mighty rivers.
In the exciting hope of pioneering this new land, and in the noble
desire of bringing a better way of life to its peoples, Oswell and
Livingstone dared the hardship and danger of the Kalahari. Oswell
was to manage the trek, and the hard and tiring task of shooting
enough game for the camp pot depended upon his quick eye, cool head,
and steady hand. Livingstone was to be interpreter and scientific
observer, while the party relied upon his wonderful power of gaining
the goodwill of the natives.
They started from Kolobeng in a north-easterly direction, and for the
first 120 miles their track lay through country they had passed
before. Then they struck north towards the desert, and from this
point they knew nothing of the country before them. One of the
natives with them had crossed many years ago, and _thought_ he could
remember his route, but his memory proved very hazy.
With this man as guide, they came to the wells of Serotli, on the
edge of the desert, and found that the place was just a dip in the
sand, surrounded by low scrub and a few stunted trees. In the dip,
however, were several little hollows, as though a rhinoceros had been
rolling in the sand; and in one of these hollows lay about a quart of
water.
Oswell at once set the party to work with spades and land
turtle-shells to deepen the holes, but hard toil till nightfall only
brought enough water to give the horses a mouthful or two each.
Their guide told them that this was their last chance of water for 70
miles, so Oswell sent the oxen back to their last watering-place.
Bellowing and moaning with disappointment and distress, the poor
beasts crawled back 25 miles, and at last found relief from the
terrible thirst they had suffered for ninety-six hours.
Meanwhile four of the Serotli pits were dug out to the depth of 8
feet, and water trickled into them so plentifully that Oswell sent
for the oxen. On their arrival they were at once watered, inspanned,
and headed across the desert. The heat was very great, and the
wheels sank so deep into the loose sand that their utmost efforts
only dragged the waggons 6 miles before sundown. On the following
day they covered 19 miles without water. On the third day again
these gallant beasts struggled 19 miles through the heavy sand in the
smiting heat without a drop to drink.
That night was a bad one for the leaders of the expedition. They had
now come 44 miles from Serotli at a rate of only 2 miles an hour, and
the guide told them they were still 30 miles from the next water,
which was at a place called Mokokonyani by the bushmen of the desert.
The oxen were spent with toil and thirst, and all night lay moaning
out to their masters a piteous appeal for drink. No one knew for
certain what lay before them, or whether they were in the right
direction. Failure seemed more than likely, but Oswell and
Livingstone were not the men to know despair. At the first sign of
daybreak they sent the horses forward with the guide to try and find
Mokokonyani. With the horses safe, the men could cover the ground in
safety, and hunt for food on the way.
Oswell and Livingstone intended to follow with the waggons as long as
the oxen could hold out; then they would loose the oxen on the trail
of the horses in the hope that, without their burdens, they would
mostly reach water alive. Half an hour after starting, the waggons
passed through a belt of scrub, and came suddenly upon the horses at
a dead halt. "Is it water?" was on every lip. No such luck was in
store for them: the guide had lost his way.
Soon the weary oxen staggered in distress, and were outspanned to
rest while the leaders took counsel for the future. Meanwhile the
natives scattered through the scrub in a forlorn hope of finding
water. Presently one of them heard the harsh croaking of a frog. No
sweet music could fall softer on his ear, for where there is a frog
there is always water close by. He ran back, and reported the
discovery of a patch of marsh. Once more the jaded oxen were
inspanned. The sense of water in the air seemed to revive them, and
in two brisk miles they reached relief.
For the present, at all events, the expedition was saved. And it was
well for them that they came upon the marsh, for it took them four
more days to reach Mokokonyani, though on the first and third days
they were luckily able to find water by digging. It turned out that
they were in the bed of a "sand river" called the Mokokoong by the
bushmen. Deep down below their feet a constant flow of water crept
at a snail's pace through the sand. The course of the stream could
be roughly traced like the long-dried bed of an ancient river.
Sometimes it lay tween ridges of naked limestone or banks of sand;
sometimes it was lost in the level plain. In a very few places there
were sand-holes deep enough to reach the stream, and here patches of
marsh formed, or water showed in plenty, as at Mokokonyani.
Otherwise there was no sign of water, though the bushmen get enough
to quench their thirst by sucking through a long reed thrust down
into the sand.
The party now tried to follow the sand river, but soon lost it for
two waterless days. Then they found and followed it once more, until
the underground stream disappeared in a marsh. At this point their
guide again failed them, and they went many miles out of their course
without water for three days. Here again fortune favoured them, for
Oswell's eagle eye spied a bushwoman lurking in the thick scrub. He
gave chase and captured her, and for a few beads she led them to a
water-hole.
And now from a hillock they could see new and fertile country in the
distance, with thick smoke rising beyond. It must be reeds burning
on the shore of the great lake, they thought, and so pushed onward.
In a few more days they suddenly burst through the thick bush upon a
wide and deep river, and from the natives on its banks they learnt
that this was the Zouga, flowing from the great Lake Ngami, 250 miles
up stream. It was now 4th July and late in the season, but for
twelve more days they forced and jolted their waggons along the river
bank until the oxen were nearly spent. Then Oswell and Livingstone
picked out a span of the fittest, and pressed forward with a light
waggon. As they neared the lake the bush grew denser, and in the
space of 5 miles they cut down more than one hundred small trees to
let the waggon pass. At last, on 28th July, they reached Lake Ngami,
having taken nine weeks to cover the 600 miles between them and
Kolobeng.
Beyond the Zouga lay a fertile land of forest and plains, but the
failure to reach it took away half the joy of their discovery. They
could not get the waggons across, though Livingstone, at the risk of
his life from alligators, spent many hours in the water vainly trying
to make a raft. They were forced to return--Livingstone to Kolobeng,
and Oswell to England; but they made plans to come again the next
year, and Oswell promised to bring up a boat.
Next year, however, their plans failed, for Oswell was delayed, and
Livingstone started without him. He took with him his wife and
children, and, in spite of the hardships of the desert, they reached
the Zouga and Lake Ngami in safety. Here fever fell upon the
children, and he was forced to return. On the way back he met
Oswell, who had followed only a few weeks' march behind.
Nothing could be done that year, but in 1851 these two great men
again crossed the Kalahari Desert, taking with them Mrs. Livingstone
and the children. This time Oswell, with his usual unselfish care
for others, went a day in advance and dug out the wells, and thus the
rest of the party were saved from delay and thirst.
They passed the Zouga in safety, and then, in a lovely land of
fruits, flowers, and herds, they crossed stream after stream until
they came to a point on the River Chobi 400 miles from Linyanté.
Linyanté was the headquarters of the Makololo tribe, and their wise
and powerful chief hurried to meet the travellers. He was quite
overcome by his first sight of white men, but Livingstone's genial
kindness soon set him at his ease, and then no one could have done
more to help them. Sebituani told them all he knew about the country
in and around his borders. Far to the north-west, he said, there
lived a tribe who once sent back to him his present of an ox, and
asked for a man to eat instead. From the east there came black
messengers from the Portuguese with calico and beads and guns in
exchange for slaves.
He promised to take his white friends ten days north of Linyanté to
the mighty River Seshéké, which fell, men said, over a cliff into a
chasm with a smoke and thunder that sounded many miles.
Unfortunately this noble chief, whom Oswell described as a "gentleman
in thought and manner," died of pneumonia a few days after; but his
tribe kept all his promises to the explorers.
Leaving Mrs. Livingstone with the waggons in camp at the Chobi, the
two friends went by canoe to Linyanté, and thence on horseback to the
Seshéké. Here they indeed saw a mighty river, which proved to be the
great Zambesi; but the waterfall was said to be far off, and the
season was so late that once more they turned homewards.
On the way back many new plans were made. They had just been on the
southern border of a country whence vile and brutal white men were
getting slaves at the rate of eighteenpence apiece. If only they
could find a good road into this country, honest trade might put an
end to this wicked robbery of human lives. The road they had already
found was too long and difficult, so Livingstone determined to
revisit Linyanté the next year, and then seek a possible path to the
sea-coast. It would be impossible for his family to go with him, and
the thought of leaving them to the risks and dangers of Kolobeng was
a great trouble to his mind.
Once more the goodness of his companion came to his aid. For Oswell
persuaded Livingstone to send his wife and children to England, and
also gave him the money for their outfit and expenses. He sold the
ivory that had fallen to his rifle, and handed the price of it to his
friend as a share of the game on their new preserves.
CHAPTER IV
FROM COAST TO COAST
Livingstone took his family to Capetown, and saw them safely on board
a ship bound for England. War was going on at the time with the
Kaffirs, and he soon found that the white folk at the Cape looked on
him with mistrust and dislike. They accused him and other
missionaries of stirring up and helping the natives to rebel, and
they even tried to prevent him from buying gunpowder for use on his
journeys.
There were many, however, who believed in him, and amongst these was
Maclear, the Astronomer-Royal. From him Livingstone had more lessons
on "taking his bearings," and also learnt the use of an instrument
for telling exactly how many feet any place stood above the level of
the sea.
On his return northwards Livingstone was delayed by feeble oxen and a
broken wheel, and thus he reached Kuruman only in time to learn that
his home, the last he ever had, was in hopeless ruin.
Six hundred Boers under Pretorius came to Kolobeng, carried off
everything of value in his house, and wrecked the rest. Even the
leaves of his precious diaries and notebooks were torn and scattered
to the winds. Moving onward to the native village, the Boers went
morning and afternoon to the mission service and heard Mebalwé
preach. After service they told Sechélé, the chief, that they had
come to fight because he let Englishmen pass through his country.
Surrounding the village, they fired the huts, and with long-range
swivel-guns shot down sixty of the men, women, and children, who were
huddled together on a hillock in the blinding smoke.
When the flames were spent the Boers closed in to finish their brutal
work; but Sechélé held them at bay till nightfall, and sent them back
to count their dead. Thirty-five Boers paid the price of this
needless cruelty, while Sechélé and his remnant escaped under cover
of the night.
To avoid the Boers, Livingstone passed well to the west of Kolobeng,
and reached Linyanté after much hardship. The rainy season had
flooded the land between the rivers, and his hands and knees were cut
and torn from wading through reeds and pushing his way through the
thorny bush. Sekelétu, the son of Sebituani, was now chief of the
Makololo, and he soon grew fond enough of Livingstone to say "he had
found a new father." With an escort and supplies from his "new son,"
the missionary made a tour through the Barotsi country, but could
find no place fit for a settlement. The whole district was too
unhealthy for white men, and the natives were unpromising.
Plunder and tyranny seemed the custom of the country. Here, for the
first time in his life, Livingstone saw a string of slaves trudging
along in hopeless misery beneath their chains. Once a mother was
leading her little boy by the hand along the track, when suddenly a
man pounced upon the child, and dragged him away shrieking to
lifelong slavery.
Accordingly, in November 1853, Livingstone left Linyanté to carry out
his plan of finding a way to the west coast. He set out with an
escort of twenty-seven Makololo, and went by canoe up the Zambesi and
Leeba, till some falls in the latter stopped him. From this point he
went forward on ox-back, and, steering by compass as best he could,
reached Loanda, in Portuguese country, in May 1854.
The troubles and difficulties of the journey were great. His
medicine-chest was plundered, and his portable boat was lost. He was
twice thrown from his ox, once on his head upon the hard ground, and
once in the middle of a ford. He had thirty-one attacks of fever,
and had to be his own doctor and nurse. His Makololo were cowards,
and often wanted to go back, but Livingstone's patient courage turned
them into men. Many of the tribes were very troublesome when he
asked leave to pass their borders. One chief refused to let him go
by unless he gave up a riding-ox, a gun, or a male slave; but
Livingstone's wonderful force of character overcame his demand. At
Chiboqué the natives refused to sell him food, and threatened to kill
him if he did not give them an ox. They crowded round him, yelling
and waving their spears and clubs over his head. Livingstone stood
his ground with unflinching eye, and his fearless spirit utterly
quelled them.
Another chief demanded his riding-ox or his life, and got the reply
that he might kill him if he liked, but God would judge. The savage
felt that he was in the presence of a greater chief than himself, and
quailed before him. So great, indeed, was the power of Livingstone's
presence that he once released a string of slaves by merely ordering
their captors to let them go. A magic-lantern, with pictures from
the Bible, helped him much in the management of the natives. They
flocked to see it, though many were in terror lest the figures moving
off the screen should enter into them as evil spirits. Livingstone
humorously said that this was the only service they ever asked him to
repeat.
When almost at his journey's end a party of natives stopped him at a
ford on the Quango, in Portuguese country. Livingstone had little
left to give away, so he handed over his razors and then his shirts,
while the Makololo parted with their copper ornaments. This,
however, was not enough; and Livingstone was just giving up his
blanket and coat when a Portuguese sergeant came up and drove the
natives away.
On his reaching Loanda, the Portuguese treated him with the utmost
kindness, and gave him all he could possibly want, but he afterwards
found to his cost that some of this kindness was humbug. Here he had
the chance of returning to England; but, knowing that the Makololo
could never reach home alone, he sent off his letters and scientific
notes in the _Forerunner_, and then started for Linyanté. The
Portuguese gave him supplies for his party, and presents for the
chiefs on his track. His Makololo bearers were given suits of red
and blue cloth, while the Bishop of Loanda sent a colonel's uniform
for Sekelétu.
He had not gone very far when he was overtaken by the news that all
his letters and scientific notes had been lost in the wreck of the
_Forerunner_. There was nothing to be done but write them all over
again; and this delay, together with an attack of rheumatic fever,
kept him from reaching Linyanté till September 1855. On their
arrival, Sekelétu and his whole tribe turned out to meet them, and
the party entered the town in triumphal procession, with the red and
blue uniforms of the Makololo bearers in the van. Livingstone then
held a service of thanksgiving, but the attention of his congregation
was hopelessly upset by the glory of Sekelétu in the dress of a
Portuguese colonel.
Livingstone did not remain long at Linyanté. The route to Loanda was
too difficult and unhealthy for general trade, so he decided to
follow the Zambesi down to the east coast, in the hope of finding a
better. Sekelétu gave him a new escort of one hundred and twenty
Makololo, and also supplied him with three riding-oxen, and ten more
to be used for food.
In November 1855 he found the waterfall that Oswell and he had marked
on their charts from hearsay, but had never seen. Here the great
Zambesi, more than a mile wide, plunged "like a downward smoke" 300
sheer feet into a chasm, and then went seething and swirling away
through a narrow zigzag rift. Twice as large as the Canadian
Niagara, its spray darkened the sun above it, and its thunder boomed
for miles. And, as in reverent silence he watched this mighty force
flow on, Livingstone felt--
"These are Thy wondrous works, Parent of good,"
and he longed more than ever to see this lovely land in freedom and
at peace.
Before leaving the "Mosi-oa-tunya," or the "Sounding Smoke,"
Livingstone changed its name to the Victoria Falls; but he little
thought that in less than fifty years a railway bridge would span the
gorge down which its waters swept.
[Illustration: The Victoria Falls]
Keeping mainly to the north bank of the Zambesi, he made his way to
Teté, with much the same experience as usual. While his men and
stores were crossing the Loangwé he kept some unfriendly natives
quiet by amusing them with his watch and burning-glass till all were
safe. Once he was mistaken for a half-caste Portuguese slaver, and
only saved his life by showing the colour of his breast and arms.
His riding-ox took a determined dislike to his umbrella, and would
not permit him to use it; so he suffered much from the rain, and even
had to carry his watch in his arm-pit to keep it dry. At Teté he
left his Makololo bearers, and, promising to return to them some day,
made his way on to Quilimane.
In one respect his great journey was a failure: he had not found a
really good route to the sea. Nevertheless he had found out two
facts unknown to the world before. First, Central Africa was not a
desert, but could produce metals, coffee, cotton, oil, sugar, corn,
and many other things needed for the world's use. Second, the
natives were capable of being taught by gentleness and justice to
make good use of their lives.
These facts he wrote to the King of Portugal, telling him also that
canals and roads could be easily made by the natives under good white
leaders: then he set out for England to publish his knowledge in a
book which he called "Missionary Travels."
He reached London in December 1856, and was at once lionised all over
the kingdom. People were so full of encouragement that he felt it
his duty to go on with the career he had begun. Even Queen Victoria,
the Prince Consort, and Lord Palmerston sent for him to praise his
work, while the Royal Geographical Society and other public bodies
held meetings in his honour.
But every great-minded man has to suffer from little-minded critics;
and Livingstone was accused by a few of not being enough of a
missionary. Moreover, at Quilimane he had received a letter from the
London Missionary Society, saying that they could not "aid plans only
remotely connected with the spread of the Gospel." Livingstone took
this to mean that they thought he had not preached enough for his
pay. His own way was quite clear to him. He believed that his first
duty to God was to help in their need the men, women, and children
whom God had caused to live. So, for the sake of the black millions
of Africa, Livingstone gently and courteously withdrew himself from
the Society, and started for Quilimane as Her Majesty's Consul, and
as the leader of a British expedition to explore the valley of the
Zambesi.
CHAPTER V
THE ZAMBESI EXPEDITION
In 1858 Livingstone once more set sail for the Cape, taking his wife
with him, but leaving his children behind. At Cape Town the people
were anxious to make amends for their former unkindness to him, and
now did all they could to give him a happy welcome.
Continuing his voyage in the _Pearl_, up the east coast of Africa, he
reached the mouth of the Zambesi, which enters the sea through many
channels between low and swampy islands covered with thick jungle.
The first thing to be done was to find out the deepest and safest of
these channels, and many days were spent in sounding the depths of
the water by sinking a lump of lead on the end of a line. An outlet
called the Kongoné proved to be the best, and up this channel they
took the _Pearl_.
Left and right the banks lay dark under the dense mangrove thicket,
or shone bright with shrubs and flowers beneath tall palms and
fern-trees, and forest timber laden and twined with creepers.
Strange birds wheeled in bright flocks above them, or flashed in
single brilliance across the stream. Here and there were open
stretches where startled buffalo and zebra made off into the long
grass, or a lazy rhinoceros could be heard wallowing and grunting out
of sight among the giant reeds.
To those who had not seen this country before, it was indeed a new
fairyland of wonders. The native huts were built high in the air
upon long stakes, with ladders reaching from their doorways to the
ground. Down these the natives came scrambling in eager haste to see
the _Pearl_. Some of them took her for a floating village, and
others asked if she was hollowed out of a single tree-trunk like
their own canoes.
When the river became too shallow for so large a ship, Livingstone
landed his stores on an island, and then went forward in a small
steamer sent out by the Government for use on the Zambesi. The
steamer proved to be a failure. She had been built to burn wood
instead of coal; but it took all her crew three days to cut enough
fuel to drive her for two days. She was so slow that native canoes
easily outstripped her; and she snorted, and creaked, and wheezed to
such an extent that she was nicknamed the _Asthmatic_.
This was a most grievous drawback to the expedition, but Livingstone,
as usual, made the best of it. He took his stores to Shupanga, a
Portuguese village near the point where the Zambesi is joined by
another fine river called the Shiré. Then by slow degrees he made
his way up stream to Teté, where he had left his Makololo bearers on
his former visit. They were overjoyed to see him again: some of them
rushed to embrace him, but others cried out, "Don't touch
him,--you'll spoil his new clothes." People had told them that
Livingstone would never return, but the Makololo knew he would never
break his word. "We trusted you," they told him, "and now we shall
sleep."
Twenty miles above Teté the river broke through a chain of hills, and
at this point the _Asthmatic_ was stopped by the Kebrabasa Rapids.
The river ran swiftly down a narrow valley, with the current broken
here and there by jagged rocks or smooth water-worn boulders. At
this season the river was at its lowest, and Livingstone decided to
explore the rapids on foot; for he thought it might yet be possible
for small steamers to pass them when the river was full.
Accordingly, he and his fellow-explorer, Dr. Kirk, set out with a
native guide and some of the Makololo to make the matter sure. They
followed up the bed of the river as best they could, taking
measurements and notes as they went. Sometimes their way was over
smooth terraces of rock, sometimes they scrambled over boulders, and
once they had to wade up to their waists in spite of the risk of
crocodiles. At night they slept under trees, and were lucky enough
to be left alone by wild beasts, though a native across the river was
killed one evening by a leopard.
When at last they reached the head of the rapids, their guide
declared that now there was nothing but smooth water before them.
Thinking their difficult task was at an end, they began to return,
but that night two natives came into camp, and said there was another
rapid a few miles up stream.
Taking three of the Makololo with them, Livingstone and Kirk went
back again to settle the question. They found a narrow gorge, whose
sides rose steeper than a gable roof from the river to the skyline,
2000 feet above them. Up this they scrambled, cutting their way
through the prickly scrub, and crawling over the face of the sloping
cliff. The sun struck into the gorge with such force, that the rocks
reeked like heated steel; and the climbers' hands could hardly bear
their grip long enough to gain firm foothold. Even the Makololo,
whose naked soles were hard and tough as shoe-leather, limped with
the pain of their burnt and blistered feet. They turned to Kirk, and
said that Livingstone no longer had a heart, and must be stark mad to
try and climb where no wild animal would go. Losing all heart, they
wanted to lie down and sleep in the hollows, but Livingstone's pluck
and spirit carried them through.
At last, after a scramble so steep and dangerous that they took three
hours to climb one mile, the party reached a spot overhanging the
rapid. Here the cliff dropped a hundred feet sheer into the stream,
and rose like a wall just a short stone's-throw across it. Into this
narrow pass the whole wide river was crowded, and the current sped
swiftly down, broken here and there into a white fleece by a ridge of
jutting rock. They saw the flood-mark eighty feet up the opposite
cliff. But Livingstone turned away in keen disappointment; for
though a powerful steamer might stem the rapid at high flood, the
river was useless as a waterway for most of the year.
In 1859 Livingstone turned his attention to a branch of the Zambesi,
called the Shiré. This river came slowly winding down a broad and
fertile valley of forest and of plains, which stretched on either
hand towards wooded hills with bare mountain-peaks beyond. Its banks
were thick with leaf and blossom, and the air was filled with the
scent of flowers, the song of birds, and the endless murmur of bees.
Yet, as they passed up stream in the midst of all this beauty, the
explorers could see the savage Manganja natives lurking behind trees,
with bent bows, ready to shoot them down with barbed and poisoned
arrows. Nothing happened, however, till the steamer came opposite
the village of a chief named Tingané, who was a terror to the
Portuguese, and had never yet allowed any man to pass his borders.
Here a crowd of five hundred Manganja lined the bank and ordered them
to stop. Some of the savages even began to take aim with their fatal
arrows, and it looked as though a terrible death would fall upon the
explorers whether they obeyed or not. Livingstone at once went
fearlessly on shore. He knew that he came for love of God, and he
believed that he would not die till God no longer needed him to work
on earth.
Calm and smiling, as if in a playground full of children, he walked
through the bloodthirsty mob to their chief, and told him that the
steamer was English and not Portuguese. Then he explained that the
English wished to put down the cruel slave trade, and make it easier
for black men to sell their cotton and ivory for cloth and beads.
Tingané liked the idea of this, and wished to hear more. Livingstone
told him how the white man's book said that all men and women were
sons and daughters of God, and therefore must not be treated with
cruelty and unkindness. Thus Tingané was completely won over to
friendship. He called his people together, and told them that the
great white chief and healer of men had come with a good message, and
might pass his borders in peace.
After this there was no more trouble with the Manganja, and the leaky
_Asthmatic_ puffed and panted safely up the river, scaring out of
their wits the wild animals upon its banks. Now and then a clumsy
hippopotamus, startled out of its sleep, would splash out of the
water and tear into the jungle. Antelopes and zebras fled over the
plains, and once the explorers disturbed a herd of more than eight
hundred elephants. Wicked-looking crocodiles would sometimes dash
for the steamer with open jaws; but, on finding that it was not good
to eat, they would dive to the bottom like stones. The river was
deep and free from sandbanks for 200 miles, but here the steamer was
once more stopped by a chain of rapids stretching over 40 miles.
These Livingstone named the Murchison Cataracts, and from this point
he made two journeys on foot.
On the first trip he climbed over the mountains to the eastward, and
found Lake Shirwa, whose waters were stagnant and bitter. His native
guide told him there was a much larger lake to the northward; so
Livingstone, after returning for supplies, once more started from the
Murchison Cataracts in search of it.
The way led over the highlands of the Manganja country towards the
head of the Shiré valley. The natives were warlike, but Livingstone
had no trouble with them, and easily bought all the food he wanted
with a few yards of calico or a handful of beads. The women wore
their hair quite short, and disfigured themselves with a large ring
of ivory or tin through the upper lip. The men kept their hair long,
and did it in as many fashions as white women. Sometimes they
stiffened it with strips of bark into the likeness of a buffalo's
horn or tail; sometimes they shaved off patches in the shape of some
wild animal, and then thought themselves very beautiful.
At last, on September 16, 1859, Livingstone came upon the magnificent
Lake Nyassa, stretching away to the skyline like an inland sea. Out
of its waters the River Shiré ran smooth and deep all down the long
valley to the Murchison Cataracts. Forty miles of road could easily
be made past these falls, and then the great Nyassa would be open to
the sea. The uplands of the Shiré valley were healthy and fertile,
and here at last was the place where a colony of Christian emigrants
might teach and show the Africans a life of righteousness and
industry. Moreover, Livingstone saw that, as all the slave traffic
had to cross the river or the lake, a single small steamer could soon
put an end to the trade.
He therefore wrote home, and promised £2000 from the price of his
book to be spent in sending out suitable emigrants. At the same time
he asked the Government for a new vessel to replace the dying
_Asthmatic_, and he also offered £4000 towards a little steamer for
Lake Nyassa. In the meantime, while waiting their arrival, he kept
his promise to the Makololo, and started up the Zambesi to take them
home to Linyanté.
CHAPTER VI
THE UPPER SHIRÉ AND LAKE NYASSA
On his return from Linyanté to Teté, Livingstone once more went on
board the _Asthmatic_, and started to meet his new steamer at the
mouth of the Zambesi. Some of the Makololo had refused to go back to
their native country, and Livingstone was thus able to have a few of
these faithful men with him still.
The poor _Asthmatic_, however, did not reach her journey's end. Her
steel plates were rotten with rust, and she leaked in all directions.
Her cabin floor was flooded, her bridge was broken down, and her
engines groaned aloud. In this water-logged and rickety state she
touched a sandbank, turned on her side, and sank, after giving her
crew just enough time to save themselves and their stores in canoes.
A few weeks later, in June 1861, the new steamer, called the
_Pioneer_, reached the mouth of the Zambesi. At the same time, there
came a party of missionaries under the brave Bishop Mackenzie, who
had been sent out by the Universities of Oxford and Cambridge to
settle in the Shiré valley. Livingstone would have taken the mission
party up the Shiré at once, but he was ordered by the Government to
look for another way to Lake Nyassa, along the River Rovuma.
Taking the Bishop with him, he started immediately to carry out his
orders, but the new steamer upset all his plans. The _Pioneer_ was a
splendid little vessel, but she lay two feet deeper in the water than
she ought, and so kept running aground on the sandbanks. After
struggling a short distance up the Rovuma, Livingstone gave up the
attempt, and returned with the _Pioneer_ to take the mission party up
the Shiré. Landing at the Murchison Cataracts, they made their way
towards the Manganja highlands on foot.
The party had not gone very far before they learnt from the natives
that gangs of slavers had been seen passing through the country with
their captives. This was distressing news, and Livingstone now found
out how false some of his Portuguese friends had been. The
Portuguese had helped and encouraged Livingstone to make friends of
the natives; then, as soon as he had gone, they had sent their
servants on his tracks to make slaves. These brutal ruffians said
they were "Livingstone's children," and so the natives let them pass
into the heart of the country in peace. Then the slavers bribed a
strong tribe to attack a weak tribe, and after the fight they made
slaves of the captives. Livingstone's unexpected return caught some
of these villains in the very act.
[Illustration: A long file of slaves]
He had halted his party in a village for rest and food, when suddenly
a long file of eighty-four slaves came round the hillside towards
them. The captives, mostly women and children, were roped together
with thongs of raw hide, but some of the men had their necks fixed in
a "goree," or forked slave-stick. The back of the neck was thrust
into the fork, and the two prongs were joined by a bar of iron under
the chin, while a slaver walked behind, holding the shaft of the
stick, ready to wring the poor slave's neck at the first sign of
escape. Worn out with pain, misery, and fatigue, the hapless slaves
limped and staggered beneath their loads. The slavers, decked out
with red caps and gaudy finery, marched jauntily along, blowing tin
horns and shouting as though they had just won a noble victory.
At the first sight of the little English party, these braggarts fled
headlong into the bush; but one of the Makololo was too quick for
their leader, and caught him by the wrist. Dragging him by the arm,
and driving him with the terror of a spear-point, the Makololo
brought the chief of the slave gang to Livingstone, who at once
recognised him as a servant of the Portuguese chief officer at Teté.
The inhuman wretch said he had bought the slaves, but his prisoners
told a different tale. They had been captured in war by the slavers,
who had burnt their village, murdered their tribesmen, and marched
them off in bonds towards Teté. On the way two of the women had
tried to loosen the thongs that cut their flesh, and were instantly
shot by their captors. One of the men sank down with fatigue, and
was killed with an axe as a warning to the others. Another woman
became too exhausted to carry her load as well as her baby. The
heartless slavers tore the child from her arms and killed it with
terrible cruelty.
Livingstone and his friends quickly set themselves to the work of
cutting the thongs and sawing the slave-sticks off the captives, and
while they were thus busy, the chief of the slavers escaped.
Continuing the journey, the Englishmen set free several parties of
slaves in the next few days before reaching the village of Magomero.
Here Chigunda, the chief, invited Bishop Mackenzie to settle; and, as
the spot seemed a good one, Magomero was thus made the station for
the Universities' Mission. All the freed slaves were joined to the
mission, and the work of building was going on quickly, when word
came that a tribe from the neighbouring Ajawa country were raiding
slaves from a village close by. Livingstone and the Bishop thought
that a friendly talk might win the Ajawa over to better ways, and a
small party at once left the mission station to make the attempt. It
was not long before they saw the smoke of a burning village, and
then, hurrying forward over a hillside, they came upon the raiders
making off with plunder and captives.
The Ajawa leader sprang on an ant-hill to count the missionary band,
and Livingstone at once shouted that he had come in peace for a
friendly talk. Unluckily, some Manganja followers called out the
name of their great warrior, Chibisa, foolishly hoping to frighten
the raiders away.
At once the Ajawa leaders raised the cry of "Nkondo! Nkondo!--War!
War!" and all the raiders dashed to the attack. Keeping at a
distance of about a hundred yards, they began to surround the little
band. Some of the Ajawa danced like madmen, with hideous grimaces
meant to strike terror into the white men's hearts. Others played
clownish antics with their weapons to show how they would treat their
foes. Others shot poisoned arrows from shelter behind trunks and
stones, and wounded one man in the arm.
Still Livingstone tried bravely and nobly for peace, but in vain: the
savages were like wild beasts thirsting for prey. Then some more of
the raiders came up and began to fire with muskets. Livingstone was
unarmed, but some of the party had rifles, and fired a few shots in
reply. As soon as the Ajawa heard the sing of the rifle-bullets,
they fled in a panic. Some of them shouted back that they would
track the white men down, and kill them where they slept, but they
never dared to return.
This was the first time that Livingstone had failed to make peace,
and it was through no fault of his own. But for the foolish cry of
the Manganja, he would most probably have succeeded.
He stayed at Magomero till he was obliged to return to the _Pioneer_;
and his parting advice to the Bishop was never to interfere with the
quarrels of the natives, and also to keep on the highlands, so as to
escape the fever near the river.
Livingstone and Kirk now started to explore Lake Nyassa. A
four-oared boat, fitted with a sail, was slung on poles, and carried
to the head of the Murchison Cataracts by native bearers. Here they
launched her, and with oar and sail passed along the smooth waters of
the Upper Shiré, till they reached the lake. Keeping to the eastern
coast, they passed bay after bay on a beautiful and fertile shore,
backed by a grand range of purple hills. Cotton and corn grew well,
and the explorers often saw men spinning, weaving, and sewing in the
huts, while the women hoed the corn. The natives were great
fishermen, and caught all kinds of fish with fine woven nets and
ivory hooks of their own making.
The lake was subject to heavy storms, and once the explorers were
caught a mile from shore by a furious squall. They could not land,
for in a few minutes the billows ran so high, and broke upon the
beach with such force, their little boat would have been dashed to
splinters on the stones. All they could do was to hold her bows to
the wind with their oars and try to outride the fury of the storm.
Up on the crest, down in the trough, they fought it wave by wave for
many hours, while every moment a chance of death went speeding by.
As the white lip of each roller curled over, they held their breath,
in doubt lest the threatening mass should break over the little boat
and swamp her. Yet breaker after breaker went hissing and gurgling
past on either hand, but not a single one struck her. At last, when
the storm sank down, they were able to land with stiff and aching
muscles, but with thankful minds.
After following the shore for nearly two hundred miles, the explorers
were almost at the head of the lake when they had to turn back.
Livingstone had arranged to go down the Zambesi to meet a ship from
England which was bringing his wife to join his labours once more,
and on board the same vessel were supplies for the _Pioneer_, and
also the little steamer he had bought for use in putting down the
slave trade on Lake Nyassa.
On their way down the Shiré, the _Pioneer_ struck on a shoal, and
there she had to stay for five weeks, till the river rose enough to
float her again. At length Livingstone reached the sea, and found
his wife on board the cruiser _Gorgon_, but the joy of their meeting
was not to last long. A few weeks after her arrival, she was seized
by fever at Shupanga. Day and night Livingstone nursed and tended
her with his utmost skill and care, but all in vain. In April 1862
she died, and this was a sorrow that lasted all his days.
CHAPTER VII
FOILED BY THE SLAVERS
Livingstone now made a second attempt to reach Lake Nyassa by the
River Rovuma. The explorers started in rowing-boats with a party
from the cruiser _Gorgon_, and made their way up stream for many days
without much adventure, though twice their right of way was disputed.
Once a tribe of natives crowded both banks, and, while fitting
poisoned arrows to their bows, began the hideous antics of their war
dance. Their chief hailed the boats, and ordered the explorers to
stop and pay toll. After a parley, Livingstone gave him thirty yards
of calico, and he promised in return that his tribe would be their
friends. No sooner, however, had the first boat rounded the next
bend of the river, than a cloud of poisoned arrows and a few
musket-balls came whizzing and singing over the heads of her crew.
The sail was cut and torn, but luckily no one was wounded, and a few
rifle-shots from the second boat sent the natives flying through the
bush.
Another time a surly hippopotamus tried to stop their way. He seemed
to think they had no right to cross his favourite bathing-pool, and
wake him out of his mid-day sleep. Diving under the water, he came
up just under the boat, and rocked her to and fro as he tried to lay
hold of her with his clumsy jaws. After grinding away at her planks
for a while with his teeth, he at last made up his mind that she was
too big and too tough for him to swallow, and then he plunged off in
a fit of the sulks.
When Livingstone had taken the boats as far up the Rovuma as
possible, he found that the river was divided into two branches, and
the natives told him that neither of them came from the Lake Nyassa.
Accordingly he returned to Shupanga, and then for the last time
started up the Shiré in the _Pioneer_ with his own little steamer,
the _Lady Nyassa_, in tow.
It was not long before he began to see that, even in the short time
he had been away, the deadly slave trade had come like a blight on
the land. A half-bred Portuguese, named Mariano, and his brutal gang
had deceived Tingané by calling themselves "Livingstone's children,"
and so were treated as friends. Thus, taking him by treachery, they
killed him and many of his tribe, and dragged off all they could to
slavery. Not content with this, they burnt the village and the
stores of corn, destroyed the crops, and drove away the flocks. No
more corn would grow for many months, and those who escaped were thus
left to starve. Many of them clung to life by hunting game and
digging up roots, but far the greater number of them died of famine.
[Illustration: They burnt the village]
When once Tingané was overcome, the work of the slavers was easier;
for his tribe was the strongest, and had been the frontier guard.
Village by village this foul and ruthless piracy spread up the river,
till now Livingstone saw the whole face of the country changed.
The smiling valley he had found four years ago was now a land of
death, strewn with black ruins and whitened skeletons. Even the
song-birds were silent around the wasted homes, as though they could
not bear to sing in the midst of such misery and desolation. Yet the
inhuman Portuguese were paying Mariano for his slaves, and
Livingstone had not the power to stop them. All he could do was to
push on with his work, and publish all he saw, in the hope that the
British Government would interfere.
But fortune was against him completely. On reaching the Murchison
Cataracts the explorers unscrewed the _Lady Nyassa_ to pieces, and
then began to make a road over which they could take her, bit by bit,
to the head of the rapids. Before the first mile of this road was
finished, both Kirk and Livingstone fell dangerously ill, and Kirk
had to return to England.
At the same time a despatch came from the British Government to
recall the expedition. The Portuguese Government had forbidden all
ships but their own to enter the Zambesi, and the British did not
think it worth while to interfere. A bitter disappointment like this
might well have broken his spirit, but Livingstone was too brave and
too faithful to his cause for that. The _Pioneer_ must wait several
months for the floods before she could go down the river, and
meanwhile he would row round Nyassa in search of a way to the sea
outside Portuguese country.
Once more his bearers started to carry a boat past the cataracts, and
all went well till they came to a stretch of smooth but swift water
below the uppermost rapid. Here, to save labour, the boat was
launched and towed up stream with a rope from the bank. All their
stores were put inside her, and also some of the Makololo, who kept
her off the rocks with poles. After two miles the Makololo, who were
splendid canoe-men, said the current was too swift and dangerous, and
they brought the boat to the bank.
Then some conceited Zambesi canoe-men took hold of the poles and
tow-rope, saying they would teach the Makololo how to take her up the
rapid. Livingstone had moved on, away from the bank, and knew
nothing of their intention till he heard loud shouts of distress. He
rushed to the bank just in time to see his stores and the Zambesi men
in the water, and his boat shooting keel uppermost down the river
like a dart.
Some of the party gave chase, but the bank was too difficult for
speed, and they never saw the boat again. The Zambesi men swam to
shore and knelt down, with their foreheads touching the earth, at
Livingstone's feet. He sent them down to the _Pioneer_ for more
stores, and, nothing daunted by this new disappointment, started off
to go round Nyassa on foot. But in spite of all his efforts he did
not reach the end of the lake before it was time to return to the
_Pioneer_ and make his last voyage down the Shiré.
The Universities' Mission also had come to an end for a while. The
brave Bishop Mackenzie had lost his life from fever on a journey down
the Shiré. The rest of the missionaries thought it best to move down
from the highlands to the river bank, and one by one they died of
fever. Livingstone now took the remnant of the mission away with him
on board the _Pioneer_, lest they should again fall into the hands of
the slavers.
In February 1864 he handed the _Pioneer_ over to H.M.S. _Orestes_, at
the mouth of the Zambesi, while his own little steamer was taken in
tow to Zanzibar by the cruiser _Ariel_. Here he learnt that many
people in England and at the Cape were blaming him for the failure of
the Zambesi expedition, and also for the fate of the Universities'
Mission. Livingstone felt this very keenly, for he knew that the
chief blame lay with the slave trade. If the British Government had
forced the Portuguese to put an end to slavery, there would have been
no failure at all.
Defeated and disappointed as he was, Livingstone would not give in,
for he knew that he was working in God's cause. He also firmly
believed that, if he could only make his countrymen really understand
the wicked cruelty and waste in Africa, they would come to the
rescue. Clearly it was his duty to awaken their understanding and
show them the way when they came. He determined to visit England,
and publish all he knew about Africa and the slave trade; then he
would return to his pioneering, and find out more.
To get money for the voyage he now tried to sell the _Lady Nyassa_,
but, on hearing that the Portuguese wanted her for a slave-boat, he
decided to take her to Bombay.
This was one of the boldest feats he ever carried out. Taking with
him a crew of three white men and nine natives, he started in the
tiny little steamer to cross 2500 miles of the Indian Ocean with
fourteen tons of coal. Two of his white sailors fell ill, and so for
many days he and the third man shared the watch in spells of four
hours. Then they lost the wind, and lay becalmed for twenty-five
days, not daring to waste their coal. At last a breeze sprang up,
and they were able to use their sails again; but they had to pass
through two furious storms before their journey's end.
The good little _Lady Nyassa_, however, came safely through
everything, till strands of seaweed and green and yellow sea-serpents
told them they were near the coast of India. They had then only
enough coal to last twenty-eight hours, and their supplies were
nearly done; but still they managed to hold out and reach Bombay
after a voyage of forty-five days. The _Lady Nyassa_ was so small
that no one noticed her arrival till Livingstone went on shore and
made himself known.
In due time Livingstone reached England, and wrote an account of the
expedition in a book called "The Zambesi and its Tributaries." He
was sought out everywhere for speeches, lectures, and entertainments;
but as soon as his work in England was finished he returned to
Zanzibar to carry out the purpose of his life.
Before leaving England the Prime Minister sent to ask him if there
was anything he wanted. Many men would have asked for money or a
title, but Livingstone thought of nothing but his work. His only
request was that the Government would make a treaty with Portugal to
put down slavery and open the Zambesi to honest trade. He was then
called before a committee of the House of Commons, who heard all his
opinions about Africa and the slave trade. Yet all the Government
did at the time was to give him £500 towards his expenses, and to
make him Consul of Central Africa, but without a salary and without a
pension. His friends in the Royal Geographical Society gave £1500
towards the new expedition, and Livingstone promised them to try and
discover the true sources of the Congo and the Nile.
CHAPTER VIII
IN THE HEART OF AFRICA
In March 1866 Livingstone landed near the mouth of the Rovuma, and,
at the age of fifty-three, began the seven long years of hardship,
misery, and pain that wore him to his death. Thirty-six bearers came
with him, of whom thirteen were Sepoys from Bombay, and ten were
natives of Johanna. Livingstone was very anxious to find some beast
of burden which could stand the poison of the tsetse-fly; and for
this experiment he brought with him some camels, Indian buffaloes,
mules, donkeys, and a calf. Carrying stores was the great difficulty
in his travels, and a few hardy beasts of burden, instead of a number
of unruly knaves, would have saved him from the terrible want he
afterwards had to suffer.
It was not long before his troubles began. The Sepoys had charge of
the animals, and neglected them so shamefully that one by one the
poor creatures died. Livingstone found he could not trust one of the
thirteen out of his sight, and at last they grew so troublesome that
he sent them back to the sea. His next discovery was that the ten
natives from Johanna were rascals and thieves; and one of them, Musa,
who had worked in the _Lady Nyassa_, turned out the worst of the lot.
Moreover, the country had been ravaged by slavers, and food grew
scarcer and scarcer, till at length they lived mainly on maize and
the few pigeons and guinea-fowl shot by the way.
The signs of the slave trade were terrible. Here, as in the valley
of the Shiré, nothing seemed too brutal to be done. Even women were
tied to trees and left to starve, because they were too worn out to
trudge any longer.
Most of the slavers in this district were Arabs, and they did all
they could to make trouble for Livingstone. He reached Nyassa in
August, at a point half-way up its eastern shore, and here he wanted
to cross; but all the boats were in the hands of the slavers, and
Livingstone could get nothing to take him over.
Determined not to be beaten, he walked round the south end of the
lake, and, on crossing the Shiré, he came upon ground that he had
passed before. Old times and old friends came into his mind, and he
wondered sadly if all their labour had been wasted. He thought also
of his faithful Makololo, and longed to have them in the place of his
present bearers.
After passing round the south end of Lake Nyassa, he took a
north-westerly direction, and came to the village of a chief named
Marenga. Here they met an Arab slaver, who cunningly invented a
story in the hope of frightening Livingstone's bearers from going any
farther. He told Musa that a savage Mazitu chief was in front of
them, killing all who passed his borders, with great cruelty. Musa
believed this story, and refused to go onward. Livingstone tried to
convince the coward that there were no Mazitu in the district, but
all his efforts were useless. Musa and the other nine Johanna
natives deserted in a body; but the rest of the bearers, much to the
Arab's disappointment, remained faithful.
From Marenga's Livingstone pushed on towards Lake Tanganyika, and his
hardships daily grew greater. Owing to the slave trade, food was
scarce, and the natives had little to sell. For many days the
explorer lived on African maize, helped down with milk from some
goats he had brought for the purpose. The next misfortune was the
loss of his goats, and this left him to break and loosen his teeth on
the tough, hard maize, while he dreamed of delicious and savoury
dinners.
This want of food made him very weak, and, moreover, the toils of the
march were great. Often he had to wade through marshes up to the
waist; and after the burning day, with its clouds of flies, there
came the damp heat of night, with clouds of mosquitoes bringing fever
in their poisonous bite. All this was trouble enough, but worse
still happened.
[Illustration: Often he had to wade through marshes up to the waist.]
One day a native bearer, possibly bribed by a slaver, disappeared
with Livingstone's medicine-chest, and he was now left defenceless
against fever. Soon he became so ill that he sometimes lay
insensible on the ground; but still his pluck carried him through,
and at last, in April 1867, he reached Chitembé's village, on Lake
Tanganyika, where he found rest and better food.
Meanwhile, Musa and the other Johanna natives had gone back to
Zanzibar. They knew they would get no pay if their bad conduct was
found out, so they swore that Livingstone was dead, and therefore
they were obliged to return. Musa made up a clever story describing
how Livingstone had been attacked by natives, and had died fighting
bravely, while the faithful Johanna men, after escaping from the
fight, had returned at nightfall to bury their beloved master. Musa
repeated this lie so skilfully that every one believed him; and even
Dr. Kirk, who was now at Zanzibar, was taken in completely. The tale
was told at home in the papers, and all his countrymen were grieving
for his loss, when an Englishman, Edward Young, began to doubt the
story. Young had been on the _Lady Nyassa_ with Musa, and knew that
the rascal's word could never be trusted. He laughed at the idea of
a coward like Musa returning after a fight to bury any one, and he
found other faults in his story.
At last the Royal Geographical Society sent Young to Africa to find
out the truth. He went up the Shiré in a steel boat called the
_Search_, and his bearers carried her in pieces past the Murchison
Cataracts. Then, launching her again on the Upper Shiré, he made his
way by Lake Nyassa to Marenga's country. Here he found out the utter
falsehood of Musa's story, and learnt that Livingstone had been seen
alive on his way to Tanganyika.
Young now returned to England; and, though his news was mainly good,
yet many people were still very anxious about the explorer's safety.
In one way Musa had done his master a good turn without the least
intention. For so much had been said in the papers about
Livingstone, that people began to see how great was his work and how
noble his life.
All this time Livingstone knew nothing either of Musa's lies or of
Young's gallant search. While at Chitembé's village he heard of a
chain of lakes joined by a big river, and he started westward to find
them. Slave-raiding was going on all over the country that lay
before him; but in spite of this Livingstone discovered Lake Moero,
in November 1867, after suffering terribly from illness and want of
food. A beautiful river, called the Luapula, ran into the lake at
the south, and out again to the north. Down stream, to the
northward, the natives said the Luapula reached a long lake of many
islands; while up stream, to the southward, they said it came from a
large lake, called Bangweolo.
Livingstone decided to look for Bangweolo first. Setting out from
Moero in a southerly course, he came to the village of Kazembé, a
chief who punished his people by cutting off their hands and ears.
At Kazembé's he fell in with an Arab trader, Mohammed Bogharib, who
at once took a great liking to the explorer. Mohammed asked him to
dine, and Livingstone sat down on a mat to a feast of vermicelli and
oil, meal cakes and honey; and then, the first time for many months,
he warmed his heart with a bowl of good coffee and sugar.
From the accounts of the natives, Bangweolo was only ten days' march
from Kazembé's, but now Livingstone's bearers refused to go onward.
Five only remained faithful to the kindest master they ever had, and
with these the journey was begun. It was the same tale of hardship
and toil, want and suffering; and, since the theft of his
medicine-chest, there was nothing to soothe the fever or ease the
pain. Yet through all this his patient faith and quiet valour
carried him on, and, in July 1868, he came upon the beautiful Lake
Bangweolo. There were islands dotted about in it, and Livingstone
visited some of them in a native canoe; but, when he wanted to paddle
across the lake, his canoe-men refused. They were afraid of being
made slaves.
Indeed, the curse of slavery seemed everywhere in the land. On his
way to Bangweolo, Livingstone had passed some slaves trudging along
in their slave-sticks, yet singing as they went. Their only hope was
death; and they were looking forward with revengeful joy, because
they ignorantly believed their spirits could return and kill their
captors. The meaning of their chant was, "Oh, you send me to the
sea-coast, but my yoke is off in death; back I'll come to haunt and
kill you." Then, as a chorus, they hissed between their teeth in
bitter hatred the names of those who had robbed them of their freedom.
Livingstone now struggled back to Kazembé's, utterly worn out with
toil, hunger, and fever. Here he found Mohammed Bogharib on the
point of returning to Ujiji, and he gladly accepted the Arab's kind
offer of an escort thither. Ujiji stood upon the eastern shore of
Tanganyika, and also was on the main slave-route to Zanzibar. Before
leaving Zanzibar, in the February of 1866, Livingstone had arranged
with Dr. Kirk to send stores, medicine, letters, and newspapers to
await him at Ujiji, and now he looked forward to news of his
children, and relief from sickness and pain.
The journey was a terrible one; for Livingstone grew worse and worse,
till at last he grew dazed with fever and pain, and lost count of the
days. Mohammed saved his life by having him carried in a hammock
till they reached the west shore of Tanganyika, and took canoe to
Ujiji. The voyage of eighteen days, and the hope of his letters and
medicine, revived him greatly, and he landed at Ujiji with joy. But
the two men in charge of his stores had sold nearly all of them for
ivory and slaves, and his medicines and mails had been left at
Unyanyembé, thirteen days distant, while the road there was blocked
by a slave war.
It was now March 1869, and he had not seen a white man's face, or
heard of his children, for three years.
CHAPTER IX
A DEATHBLOW TO SLAVERY
Livingstone at once wrote to Kirk at Zanzibar for more stores to be
sent to Ujiji. At the same time he sent a letter to the Sultan of
Zanzibar, asking him for fifteen trustworthy bearers to carry the new
supplies. Then, as soon as could be, he collected the remnant of his
plundered things, and wrote his letters and accounts of his doings.
One or two letters reached him here, but these were nearly three
years old; and very many of his own to his friends never got even as
far as the sea-coast. At a single time he sent off a budget of
forty-two letters and scientific records, but none were heard of
again.
The reason of this was only too plain. Ujiji was like a den of
villains and thieves. All the worst of the slave-trading Arabs
gathered there on their way to and from the coast. They knew that
Livingstone was against their trade, and they hated him accordingly.
Some, like Mohammed Bogharib, had sense enough to see his greatness,
and to help him; but others, though they dared nothing to his face,
did all they could behind his back to ruin his work and thwart his
plans. Wherever they met him on his journeys, they would frighten,
bully, or bribe his bearers to make them rebel. By telling the
natives that Livingstone was really a slaver and a spy, they tried to
make them refuse him food, guides, and canoes. There can be little
doubt that they got hold of his messengers and destroyed his letters.
After a three months' rest at Ujiji, Livingstone felt well enough to
set out again. Leaving orders for the new bearers from Zanzibar to
come after him, he started with his old followers, and with the few
stores he had been able to get together. In July 1869 he crossed
Lake Tanganyika by canoe; then, striking to the north-west, he made
his way on foot to Kabambaré, in the Manyema country. Here the River
Luapula, flowing from Lakes Bangweolo and Moero, was known by the
name of the Lualaba, and Livingstone hoped to explore it. Would the
Lualaba prove to be the Nile or the Congo? That was the question he
wanted to settle.
At Kabambaré the chief was called Moenékoos, a name meaning "Lord of
the light-grey, red-tailed parrot": and he proved so friendly, that
Livingstone rested in his village for ten days. Then, starting again
in November, the explorer went westward, through Manyema, till he
reached the River Luama, at a point ten miles from its junction with
the great Lualaba.
The country through which they passed was wonderful in its beauty.
Tall palms and forest timber crowded the valleys and clothed the
hillsides to the skyline. Giant creepers, as thick as cables, were
twisted round the massive trunks, or hung from limb to limb, and tree
to tree, like the rigging of a ship. Lilies, orchids, clematis, and
marigolds opened their rich colours to the light and poured their
scent into the air; while all kinds of fruit clustered among the
leaves. Gaudy parrots and other gay-feathered birds flashed about in
the brilliant heat, while tribes of monkeys ran up the trunks,
scampered along the branches, or swung themselves on the rope-like
creepers. Sometimes a group of these would get together in a
tree-top, and there they would chatter and grin about the news of the
day, and the latest fashions of the monkey world. Sometimes they
would jabber and grimace more earnestly, as though about monkey
politics; and at times they lost their tempers and pelted each other
with nuts and husks. Now and then one of them, either from annoyance
or for sheer mischief, would take a shot at the travellers.
Villages were very frequent; and many of the natives kept goats,
sheep, and fowls, and also had gardens of maize, bananas, and
sugar-cane. Others were helpless and ignorant, even not knowing how
to light a fire by twirling a pointed stick round and round inside a
hole in a slab of wood.
The natives were not very friendly, for they believed that
Livingstone was a slaver. Some of them said they were cannibals, and
in order to frighten his bearers, showed them the skull of a "soko"
or gorilla, which they had eaten. Livingstone found, however, that
they never ate men; but often enticed a soko with a clump of bananas,
and then speared him for food.
At the Luama, nothing could induce the natives to let Livingstone
have a canoe with which to explore the Lualaba. He found out
afterwards that even his own bearers tried to set the natives against
him; for this, they thought, would force him to give up his journey
and take them home. Indeed, the ceaseless worry of these worthless
rascals did more to wear him out than all the toils of the journey.
Disappointed, but not beaten, Livingstone returned to Kabambaré, and
stayed there for many months till the rainy season was over. Then,
in June 1870, he started with only his three faithful followers,
Susi, Chuma, and Gardner, and again made the attempt to explore the
great river. But the natives, made unfriendly by the Arabs, refused
to sell them food, and they soon grew ill and exhausted. Tramping
through thorns on land, wading among sharp reeds and biting leeches
in the swamps, their feet were cut and torn, and their wounds refused
to heal. There was nothing to be done but to return to Kabambaré:
and this they did, reaching it so worn out and lamed, that they took
three months to recover.
Livingstone was on the point of setting out a third time for the
Lualaba, when he heard that his new bearers from Zanzibar were on
their way towards him. He waited for them a long while, in the hope
of letters, medicines, and stores, but his time and his hope were
wasted. On 4th February 1871, ten worthless slaves came up with only
one letter. Dozens of Livingstone's letters had been lost or
destroyed, and their headman, Shereef, had stayed behind at Ujiji,
spending all Livingstone's stores.
In less than a week the new bearers rebelled, and it took all
Livingstone's powers to make them go forward. But in the end
patience and extra wages persuaded them to go on, and at last
Livingstone reached Nyangwé, on the Lualaba, on 29th March 1871.
Here again the Arab slavers prevented him from getting canoes, so he
could go no farther down the stream. But he heard that the Lualaba
bore round so much to the westward, that he now thought it might
prove to be the Congo.
While Livingstone was thinking what next he should do, there happened
before his eyes a thing so utterly cruel, that it swept all else from
his mind. He was walking in the native market, on the river bank at
Nyangwé, watching the people exchanging their wares. The natives
from the other shore came over in canoes every day to join in the
marketing, and that morning about 1500 of them, mostly women, were
present.
As Livingstone was moving away to his hut, he noticed that many of
the Arabs were about with their rifles; and presently he heard shots
in the market behind him. Turning sharply round, he saw that the
Arabs were firing into the middle of the helpless crowd, who fled
shrieking to their canoes. These were all jammed together in a small
creek, and the natives struggled and fell over each other in the
effort to get them out.
Then a large party of Arabs, concealed near the creek, shot into the
huddled mass, and the slaughter became terrible. Hundreds plunged
into the river, and struck out for the other bank, while the
murderers fired at them in the water. Some of the canoes were
launched, and their crews escaped; others were overloaded and upset.
Many of the swimmers were picked up by their friends, but a large
number were overcome by the strong current and sank. In all, about
three or four hundred perished. One Arab took a canoe, and picked up
some of the survivors, but the sight of Livingstone made him ashamed,
and he gave them up to his care. Livingstone managed to save more
than thirty, and he kept them safe till he was able to return them to
their people. While the massacre was going on, the slaves from the
Arab camp carried off all that had been left by the natives in the
terror and tumult of their flight.
Livingstone at once made up his mind to return to Ujiji, and to send
a report of this wicked outrage to England. He felt sure that his
countrymen would now come to the rescue of this unhappy land, and he
was right. His report of the massacre on the Lualaba was the
deathblow to slavery in Central Africa, for it roused the whole
English people. The British Government at once set to work, and,
with the help of other nations, the slave trade was slowly but surely
ended.
The tramp to Ujiji was full of hardship and danger. Livingstone was
very ill, and in pain every step of the way, but the love of his duty
carried him on. The cowardly Arab slavers knew his intention; and,
though they dared not touch him themselves, they tried to persuade
the tribes on his path to murder him. But most of the natives had
now seen for themselves that Livingstone was not a slaver, and they
answered that he was "the good one," and they would not kill him.
Some of them, however, laid in ambush, and threw spears at him as he
passed. He had several narrow escapes, and in one day a spear grazed
his neck and another missed him by only a few inches.
At last, after trudging more than 500 miles in three months of daily
suffering and risk, he crossed Tanganyika, and reached Ujiji at the
end of October. He was worn out and at death's door, and now he
found he was beggared. Shereef had made away with all his stores,
and not an atom was left.
In this terrible need a friend came to him as suddenly as though
dropped from the clouds. One day his followers heard that a white
man was coming into Ujiji, and they rushed at once to tell their
master. Livingstone went out to meet the stranger, and found, to his
surprise, that a young journalist, H. M. Stanley, was coming to his
relief, with a large caravan of stores.
Livingstone's work against the slave trade had made him so much liked
in America, that an American, J. Gordon Bennet, had sent Stanley to
find the great explorer, whom everybody thought to be lost.
This kind and generous act from another nation than his own, touched
Livingstone very much, and he and Stanley became fast friends.
Livingstone in return told all he knew about Africa, and Stanley was
always grateful for this help when it became his turn to be a great
explorer.
CHAPTER X
THE LAST JOURNEY
While Livingstone and Stanley were together, they made a short
journey to the north end of Tanganyika. They wanted to see if any
river ran out of the lake towards the Nile; they found that a river,
the Rusizi, flowed into the lake instead. Had they now crossed the
Rusizi, and gone northwards, they would probably have settled the
question of the Nile in a few months. But Stanley had to return, and
Livingstone went with him.
Four months with Livingstone made Stanley as keen an explorer as his
new friend. On their way back they talked much about the sources of
the great rivers, and they both thought that the Lualaba might still
run into the Nile. Had they only known it, Livingstone had already
discovered enough to prove this quite impossible. At Nyangwé he had
measured the height of the Lualaba above the sea-level, and had sent
the measurements to England. Other people had sent measurements of
the Nile as far as its course was known. Geographers at once saw
from these that the Lualaba could never reach the Nile without
running uphill. The Royal Geographical Society at once wrote this to
Livingstone, and told him the Lualaba must be the Congo. But he
never received the letter.
Stanley now tried to persuade his companion to go with him to
England, but in vain. Livingstone had promised his friends at home
to find the sources of the Nile, and he would not give up his
promise. However, he returned with Stanley as far as Unyanyembé; for
here he expected to find some stores from the British Government, who
now also promised him a salary and a pension.
On their arrival they found that, as usual, the stores had been
plundered and sold. Then Stanley, like a true comrade, shared all
his supplies and spare clothes with Livingstone; and he also promised
to try and find him fifty honest bearers in Zanzibar. On 14th March
1872 they parted in much sorrow, for they had grown to like each
other greatly.
Livingstone waited at Unyanyembé till the end of August, when
fifty-seven new bearers, chosen by Stanley, came up with supplies
from Zanzibar. They were honest and faithful men; and, with them to
help him, Livingstone started in good spirits for his last journey.
He hoped to pass round the south of Lake Bangweolo, then westward of
Lake Moero to the Lualaba; and then he would try and reach the Nile.
In six weeks they were at the south end of Tanganyika; and before
January 1873 they had crossed the valley of the Chambezé, a river
which runs into Bangweolo. They then worked round the south of that
lake; but the rainy season broke early that year, and brought with it
the usual floods and fever.
Livingstone was sixty years old, and the toil and suffering of the
last seven years now told upon him terribly. He again fell very ill,
and daily grew weaker. His faithful bearers, who loved him like a
father, did all they could to take care of him, and carried him
through mile after mile of marsh and flood. If these fine fellows
had been with him six years ago, his work would long have been done.
At times he began to think that he would not finish his task. "I
shall never be able to play," he wrote to a friend who was resting
after a life of hard work.
Day after day, in the pitiless rain, they toiled over the swamp-land,
splashed through the flood, and forded swollen streams, sometimes up
to the neck, with their burdens on their heads. A stretch of hard
ground was a rarity, while food grew scarcer and scarcer, and fever
got worse and worse. The bearers made a kitanda, or stretcher slung
on a pole, for they saw that their Bwana (their master) was no longer
able to sit up. There was no proper food for a sick man--for milk,
the one thing most needed, was not to be had.
For four days Livingstone was too weak to write in his diary anything
but the date. Then, on April 27th, he feebly scrawled, "Knocked up
quite, and remain ... recover..... Sent to buy milch goats." He
still had pluck and hope of recovery, but his men had only grief.
They scoured the country for miles around, but they could not get a
single goat.
They saw the end must now come, and they pushed onward to higher
ground, reaching the village of a chief called Chitambo on April
29th. Here their quick and skilful hands in a few hours built him a
hut, and they laid him, in great pain, on a bed made of boughs and
dried grass, covered with blankets. Susi tended him all next day,
and at nightfall Majwara kept watch outside his master's door. In
the dead of night Majwara came calling, "Come to Bwana, Susi, I am
afraid."
Susi and some others crept reverently into the hut; and, by the
flickering light of a candle, they saw the saviour of Central Africa
dead on his knees at the bedside, with his hands to his face on the
pillow.
[Illustration: They saw him dead on his knees]
It is a brave thing to die for one's fellow-men; it is also brave,
and often far harder, to live for them. Livingstone did both.
Indeed, the humble Blantyre mill-boy had done the noblest and highest
thing that man can do; he had given his whole life to help God's less
happy creatures. And this he had done, not for money nor for fame,
but out of love for God and man.
In the grey dawn of May 1st, his faithful followers clustered round
the camp fire to take counsel. They talked of their beloved Bwana,
the master who never struck his bearers, and who nursed them like his
own children when they fell sick. Had he not come from the far land
of the great Queen, not to make slaves, like the Portuguese, but to
set men free? Yes, he was a great white chief, and he must go home
to the tombs of his fathers: that was certain, and they would see to
it, or die. He had given some of his wisdom to Susi and Chuma, and
they would be head-men.
Then Susi and Chuma made their plans. With reverent care they
counted and packed all their master's things, and carried his body to
an open spot near the village. Here some of them built a new hut,
open to the sun, and began to embalm the body; while others made a
stout wooden stockade around it. Outside all they built a circle of
huts for themselves, and, night and day, they kept watch till the
embalming was done.
They buried his heart beneath a large mvula-tree, and put up two
posts and a cross-bar to mark the spot. A day of mourning was held,
and all Chitambo's people, as is their custom, came with bows and
spears; while the bearers fired volleys with their rifles. At last
the body was wrapped, like a mummy, in bark and sailcloth, and lashed
to a pole; and so the return journey was begun.
No praise is too high for the pluck and hardihood of this little band
of faithful men. Once more they faced all the old risks and
hardships of floods, fever, and want of food. They crossed the
Luapula, and made for the south end of Tanganyika. Their great fear
was about the ignorant fancies of the natives, who dislike a dead
body passing through their villages. Often they had to pay toll, and
once they were forced to fight. They came to a tribe of natives who
had a large stockade, and also two villages close at hand. The
people in the stockade had been drinking palm-wine, and the son of
their chief was drunk. The chief might have proved friendly, but his
son refused to let the travellers pass. He quickly forced on a
quarrel, and his men began to shoot arrows.
Then Susi's party cleared the stockade of natives, and put their
precious burden in one of the huts inside. Then, rifles in hand,
they stormed the two villages, burning the huts and driving the
people to their canoes. After this they lived on their spoil for a
week in the stockade, till its owners came to make peace.
When they reached Unyanyembé, they met an expedition sent from
England to search for Livingstone; and they learnt that another
relief party had started up the Congo from the west coast. The
officer at Unyanyembé wanted to bury the body at once. Susi and his
men, however, stoutly refused to give up their purpose.
So the faithful band went on their work of love; and, after nine
months on foot, reached the sea-coast at Bagamoyo, in February 1874.
Here these black men of honour and ability handed over their master's
body to the British Consul. All his property, too, was there, down
to the last button.
Their task was done, and, with sad faces and heavy hearts, they were
sent away.
Livingstone's body was carried to its grave in Westminster Abbey on
18th April 1874, by Oswell, Kirk, Young, Stanley, and others of his
old friends. But the work of his noble spirit was not ended. All
men hastened to do him honour, and many now began to do his bidding.
He had once said that, if he could only bring about the end of the
slave trade, he would count it "a far greater feat than the discovery
of all the sources together."
The dirge over his grave acted on his country like a bugle-call to
Africa. Other brave men pressed forward to carry on the work that
the unselfish Scotch peasant lad had begun; and now slavery in Africa
is all but ended. Livingstone sawed through the first slave-stick in
the Shiré Valley: Gordon, Kitchener, Macdonald, and Wingate broke up
the last strongholds of slavery on the Nile.
Livingstone just missed the Nile, but he found the source of the
Congo, the third great river of the world. Stanley finished most of
the pioneering that was left.
There is now a good road past the Murchison Cataracts, while Lake
Nyassa floats two British gunboats and a fleet of trading steamers.
The Universities' Mission, too, have their own steamer on the lake;
and others missions also are hard at work on Livingstone's plans.
Lake Tanganyika is joined by a road to Nyassa, and will soon be
reached by railway from the Victoria Falls.
Besides this, the nations of Europe have divided Africa amongst
themselves. We English have taken the land of about thirty million
blacks into our charge, and we are trying to govern them justly.
Livingstone also wanted us to teach them how to make the best use of
their lives; and he proved that gentleness and justice could make
noble men, like Susi and his faithful band. If we do this duty to
the Africans, they will stand by us when we need them; and children
who want to have a British Empire in their old age will do well to
think about this.
There are black men still in Africa whose faces light up with joy at
Livingstone's name. They will answer and ask questions, in their
quaint way, about the great man whom they called the Wise Heart and
Healer of Men. "Yes, we loved him, and we served him too. Was he
not our Bwana, who never struck his bearers? Of course we sent him
back to the great White Queen. Did she not send him to Africa, not
to get ivory and gold and slaves, like the Arabs and Portuguese, but
to give a good message of wisdom, and to set men free? Have you many
like him in your land? Ah, but his heart is still in Africa, under
the mvula-tree at Chitambo's."
THE END
Printed by BALLANTYNE, HANSON & Co.
Edinburgh & London
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