The Personal Life of David Livingstone
by William Garden Blaikie · English · Gutenberg #13262 · 1,112,073 chars · public domain (US)
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Title: The Personal Life of David Livingstone
Author: William Garden Blaikie
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Most recently updated: October 28, 2024
Language: English
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*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE PERSONAL LIFE OF DAVID LIVINGSTONE ***
THE PERSONAL LIFE
OF
DAVID LIVINGSTONE
LL.D., D.C.L.
CHIEFLY FROM HIS UNPUBLISHED
JOURNALS AND CORRESPONDENCE
IN THE POSSESSION OF HIS FAMILY
BY
W. GARDEN BLAIKIE, D.D., LLD.
_Author of "Heroes of Israel," etc._
PREFACE.
The purpose of this work is to make the world better acquainted with the
character of Livingstone. His discoveries and researches have been given
to the public in his own books, but his modesty led him to say little in
these of himself, and those who knew him best feel that little is known
of the strength of his affections, the depth and purity of his devotion,
or the intensity of his aspirations as a Christian missionary. The
growth of his character and the providential shaping of his career are
also matters of remarkable interest, of which not much has yet been
made known.
An attempt has been made in this volume, likewise, to present a more
complete history of his life than has yet appeared. Many chapters of it
are opened up of which the public have hitherto known little or nothing.
It has not been deemed necessary to dwell on events recorded in his
published Travels, except for the purpose of connecting the narrative
and making it complete. Even on these, however, it has been found that
not a little new light and color may be thrown from his correspondence
with his friends and his unpublished Journals.
Much pains has been taken to show the unity and symmetry of his
character. As a man, a Christian, a missionary, a philanthropist, and a
scientist, Livingstone ranks with the greatest of our race, and shows
the minimum of infirmity in connection with the maximum of goodness.
Nothing can be more telling than his life as an evidence of the truth
and power of Christianity, as a plea for Christian Missions and
civilization, or as a demonstration of the true connection between
religion and science.
So many friends have helped in this book that it is impossible to thank
all in a preface. Most of them are named in the body of the work.
Special acknowledgments, however, are due to the more immediate members
of Dr. Livingstone's family, at whose request the work was undertaken;
also to his sisters, the Misses Livingstone, of Hamilton, to Mr. Young,
of Kelley, to the venerable Dr. Moffat, and Mrs. Vavasseur, his
daughter. The use of valuable collections of letters has been given by
the following (in addition to the friends already named): The Directors
of the London Missionary Society; Dr. Risdon Bennett; Rev. G.D. Watt;
Rev. Joseph Moore; Rev. W. Thompson, Cape Town; J.B. Braithwaite, Esq.;
representatives of the late Sir R.I. Murchison, Bart., and of the late
Sir Thomas Maclear; Rev. Horace Waller, Mr. and Mrs. Webb, of Newstead
Abbey, Mr. P. Fitch, of London, Rev. Dr. Stewart, of Lovedale, and
Senhor Nunes, of Quilimane. Other friends have forwarded letters of less
importance. Some of the letters have reached the hands of the writer
after the completion of the book, and have therefore been used but
sparingly.
The recovery of an important private journal of Dr. Livingstone, which
had been lost at the time when the _Missionary Travels_ was published,
has thrown much new light on the part of his life immediately preceding
his first great journey.
In the spelling of African proper names, Dr. Moffat has given valuable
help. Usually Livingstone's own spelling has been followed.
A Map has been specially prepared, in which the geographical references
in the volume are shown, which will enable the reader to follow
Livingstone's movements from place to place.
With so much material, it would have been easier to write a life in two
volumes than in one; but for obvious reasons it has been deemed
desirable to restrict it to the present limits. The author could wish
for no higher honor than to have his name associated with that of
Livingstone, and can desire no greater pleasure than that of conveying
to other minds the impressions that have been left on his own.
W.G. BLAIKIE.
EDINBUBGH, 9 PALMERSTON BOAD.
1880
CONTENTS.
* * * * *
CHAPTER I.
EARLY YEARS.
A.D. 1813-1836.
Ulva--The Livingstones--Traditions of Ulva life--The
"Baughting-time"--"Kirsty's Rock"--Removal of Livingstone's grandfather
to Blantyre--Highland blood--Neil Livingstone--His marriage to Agnes
Hunter--Her grandfather and father--Monument to Neil and Agnes
Livingstone in Hamilton Cemetery--David Livingstone born 19th March,
1813--Boyhood--At home--In school--David goes into Blantyre Mill--First
earnings--Night-school--His habits of reading--Natural-history
expeditions--Great spiritual changes in his twentieth year--Dick's
_Philosophy of a Future State_--He resolves to be a
missionary--Influence of occupation of Blantyre--Sympathy with
People--Thomas Burke and David Hogg--Practical character of
his religion.
CHAPTER II.
MISSIONARY PREPARATION.
A.D. 1836-1840.
His desire to be a missionary to China--Medical missions--He studies at
Glasgow--Classmates and teachers--He applies to London Missionary
Society--His ideas of mission-work--He is accepted provisionally--He
goes to London--to Ongar--Reminiscences by Rev. Joseph Moore--by Mrs.
Gilbert--by Rev. Isaac Taylor--Nearly rejected by the Directors--Returns
to Ongar--to London--Letter to his sister--Reminiscences by Dr. Risdon
Bennett--Promise to Professor Owen--Impression of his character on his
friends and fellow-students--Rev R. Moffat in England--Livingstone
interested--Could not be sent to China--Is appointed to
Africa--Providential links in his history--Illness--Last visits to his
home--Receives Medical diploma--Parts from his family.
CHAPTER III.
FIRST TWO YEARS IN AFRICA.
A.D. 1842-1843.
His ordination--Voyage out--At Rio de Janeiro--At the Cape--He proceeds
to Kuruman--Letters--Journey of 700 miles to Bechuana
country--Selection of site for new station--Second excursion to
Bechuana country--Letter to his sister--Influence with
chiefs--Bubi--Construction of a water-dam--Sekomi--Woman seized by a
lion--The Bakaa--Sebehwe--Letter to Dr. Risdon Bennett--Detention at
Kuruman--He visits Sebehwe's village--Bakhatlas--Sechéle, chief of
Bakwains--Livingstone translates hymns--Travels 400 miles on
oxback--Returns to Kuruman--Is authorized to form new station--Receives
contributions for native missionary--Letters to Directors on their
Mission policy--He goes to new station--Fellow-travelers--Purchase of
site--Letter to Dr. Bennett--Desiccation of South Africa--Death of a
servant, Sehamy--Letter to his parents.
CHAPTER IV.
FIRST TWO STATIONS--MABOTSA AND CHONUANE.
A.D. 1843-1847.
Description of Mabotsa--A favorite hymn--General reading--Mabotsa
infested with lions--Livingstone's encounter--The native deacon who
saved him--His Sunday-school--Marriage to Mary Moffat--Work at
Mabotsa--Proposed institution for training native agents--Letter to his
mother--Trouble at Mabotsa--Noble sacrifice of Livingstone--Goes to
Sechéle and the Bakwains--New station at Chonuane--Interest shown by
Sechéle--Journeys eastward--The Boers and the Transvaal--Their
occupation of the country, and treatment of the natives--Work among the
Bakwains--Livingstone's desire to move on--Theological conflict at
home--His view of it--His scientific labors and miscellaneous
employments.
CHAPTER V.
THIRD STATION--KOLOBENG.
A.D. 1847-1852.
Want of rain at Chonuane--Removal to Kolobeng--House-building and public
works--Hopeful prospects--Letters to Mr. Watt, his sister, and Dr.
Bennett--The church at Kolobeng--Pure communion--Conversion of
Sechéle--Letter from his brother Charles--His history--Livingstone's
relations with the Boers--He cannot get native teachers planted in the
east--Resolves to explore northward--Extracts from Journal--Scarcity of
water--Wild animals, and other risks--Custom-house robberies and
annoyances--Visit from Secretary of London Missionary Society--Manifold
employments of Livingstone--Studies in Sichuana--His reflection on this
period of his life while detained at Manyuema in 1870.
CHAPTER VI.
KOLOBENG _continued_--LAKE 'NGAMI.
A.D. 1849-1852.
Koboleng failing through drought--Sebituane's country and the Lake
'Ngami--Livingstone sets out with Messrs. Oswell and Murray--Rivers
Zouga and Tamanak'le--Old ideas of the interior
revolutionized--Enthusiasm of Livingstone--Discovers Lake
'Ngami--Obliged to return--Prize from Royal Geographical Society--Second
expedition to the lake, with wife and children--Children attacked by
fever--Again obliged to return--Conviction as to healthier spot
beyond--Idea of finding passage to sea either west or east--Birth and
death of a child--Family visits Kuruman--Third expedition, again with
family--He hopes to find a new locality--Perils of the journey--He
reaches Sebituane--The Chief's illness and death--Distress of
Livingstone--Mr. Oswell and he go on to Linyanti--Discovery of the Upper
Zambesi--No locality found for settlement--More extended journey
necessary--He returns--Birth of Oswell Livingstone--Crisis in
Livingstone's life--His guiding principles--New plans--The Makololo
begin to practice slave-trade--New thoughts about commerce--Letters to
Directors--The Bakwains--_Pros_ and _cons_ of his new plan--His unabated
missionary zeal--He goes with his family to the Cape--His
literary activity.
CHAPTER VII.
FROM THE CAPE TO LINYANTI.
A.D. 1852-1853.
Unfavorable feeling at Cape Town--Departure of Mrs. Livingstone and
children--Livingstone's detention and difficulties--Letter to his
wife--to Agnes--Occupations at Cape Town--The
Astronomer-Royal--Livingstone leaves the Cape and reaches
Kuruman--Destruction of Kolobeng by the Boers--Letters to his wife and
Rev. J. Moore--His resolution to open up Africa _or perish_--Arrival at
Linyanti--Unhealthiness of the country--Thoughts on setting out for
coast--Sekelétu's kindness--Livingstone's missionary activity--Death of
Mpepe, and of his father--Meeting with Ma-mochisane--Barotse
country--Determines to go to Loanda--Heathenism unadulterated--Taste for
the beautiful--Letter to his children--to his father--Last Sunday at
Linyanti--Prospect of his failing.
CHAPTER VIII.
FROM LINYANTI TO LOANDA.
A.D. 1853-1854.
Difficulties and hardships of journey--His traveling kit--Four
books--His Journal--Mode of traveling--Beauty of country--Repulsiveness
of the people--Their religious belief--The negro--Preaching--The
magic-lantern--Loneliness of feeling--Slave-trade--Management of the
natives--Danger from Chiboque--from another chief--Livingstone ill of
fever--At the Quango--Attachment of followers--"The good time
coming"--Portuguese settlements--Great kindness of the
Portuguese--Arrives at Loanda--Received by Mr. Gabriel--His great
friendship--No letters--News through Mr. Gabriel--Livingstone becomes
acquainted with naval officers--Resolves to go back to Linyanti and make
for East Coast--Letter to his wife--Correspondence with Mr.
Maclear--Accuracy of his observations--Sir John Herschel--Geographical
Society award their gold medal--Remarks of Lord Ellesmere.
CHAPTER IX.
FROM LOANDA TO QUILIMANE.
A.D. 1854-1856.
Livingstone sets out from Loanda--Journey back--Effects of
slavery--Letter to his wife--Severe attack of fever--He reaches the
Barotse country--Day of thanksgiving--His efforts for the good of his
men--Anxieties of the Moffats--Mr. Moffat's journey to Mosilikatse--Box
at Linyanti--Letter from Mrs. Moffat--Letters to Mrs. Livingstone, Mr.
Moffat, and Mrs. Moffat--Kindness of Sekelétu--New escort--He sets out
for the East Coast--Discovers the Victoria Falls--The healthy
longitudinal ridges--Pedestrianism--Great dangers--Narrow
escapes--Triumph of the spirit of trust in God--Favorite
texts--Reference to Captain McClure's experience--Chief subjects of
thought--Structure of the continent--Sir Roderick Murchison anticipates
his discovery--Letters to Geographical Society--First letter from Sir
Roderick Murchison--Missionary labor--Monasteries--Protestant
mission-stations wanting in self-support--Letter to Directors--Fever not
so serious an obstruction as it seemed--His own hardships--Theories of
mission-work--Expansion _v_. Concentration--Views of a missionary
statesman--He reaches Tette--Letter to King of Portugal--to Sir Roderick
Murchison--Reaches Senna--Quilimane--Retrospect--Letter from
Directors--Goes to Mauritius--Voyage home--Narrow escape from shipwreck
in Bay of Tunis--He reaches England, Dec. 1856--News of his
father's death.
CHAPTER X.
FIRST VISIT HOME.
A.D. 1856-1857.
Mrs. Livingstone--Her intense anxieties--Her poetical
welcome--Congratulatory letters from Mrs. and Dr. Moffat--Meeting of
welcome of Royal Geographical Society--of London Missionary
Society--Meeting in Mansion House--Enthusiastic public meeting at Cape
Town--Livingstone visits Hamilton--Returns to London to write his
book--Letter to Mr. Maclear--Dr. Risdon Bennett's reminiscences of this
period--Mr. Frederick Fitch's--Interview with Prince
Consort--Honors--Publication and great success of _Missionary
Travels_--Character and design of the book--Why it was not more of a
missionary record--Handsome conduct of publisher--Generous use of the
profits--Letter to a lady in Carlisle vindicating the-character of
his speeches.
CHAPTER XI.
FIEST VISIT HOME--_continued_.
A.D. 1857-1858.
Livingstone at Dublin, at British Association--Letter to his wife--He
meets the chamber of commerce at Manchester--At Glasgow, receives honors
from Corporation, University, Faculty of Physicians and Surgeons, United
Presbyterians, Cotton-spinners--His speeches in reply--His brother
Charles joins him--Interesting meeting and speech at Hamilton--Reception
from "Literary and Scientific Institute of Blantyre"--Sympathy with
operatives--Quick apprehension of all public questions--His social views
in advance of the age--He plans a People's Café--Visit to
Edinburgh--More honors--Letter to Mr. Maclear--Interesting visit to
Cambridge--Lectures there--Professor Sedgwick's remarks on his
visit--Livingstone's great satisfaction--Relations to London Missionary
Society--He severs his connection--Proposal of Government expedition--He
accepts consulship and command of Expedition--Kindness of Lords
Palmerston and Clarendon--The Portuguese Ambassador--Livingstone
proposes to go to Portugal--Is dissuaded--Lord Clarendon's letter to
Sekelétu--Results of Livingstone's visit to England--Farewell banquet,
February, 1858--Interview with the Queen--Veledictory letters--Professor
Sedgwick and Sir Roderick Murchison--Arrangements for Expedition--Dr.,
Mrs., and Oswald Livingstone set sail from Liverpool--Letters to
children.
CHAPTER XII.
THE ZAMBESI, AND FIRST EXPLORATIONS OF THE SHIRÉ.
A.D. 1858-1859.
Dr. and Mrs. Livingstone sail in the "Pearl"--Characteristic
instructions to members of Expedition--Dr. Livingstone conscious of
difficult position--Letter to Robert--Sierra Leone--Effects of British
Squadron and of Christian Missions--Dr. and Mrs. Moffat at Cape
Town--Splendid reception there--Illness of Mrs. Livingstone--She remains
behind--The five years of the Expedition--Letter to Mr. James Young--to
Dr. Moffat--Kongone entrance to Zambesi--Collision with Naval
Officer--Disturbed state of the country--Trip to Kebrabasa Rapids--Dr.
Livingstone applies for new steamer--Willing to pay for one
himself--Exploration of the Shiré--Murchison Cataracts--Extracts from
private Journal--Discovery of Lake Shirwa--Correspondence--Letter to
Agnes Livingstone--Trip to Tette--Kroomen and two members of Expedition
dismissed--Livingstone's vindication--Discovery of Lake Nyassa--Bright
hopes for the future--Idea of a colony--Generosity of
Livingstone--Letters to Mr. Maclear, Mr. Young, and Sir Roderick
Murchison--His sympathy with the "honest poor"--He hears of the birth of
his youngest daughter.
CHAPTER XIII.
GOING HOME WITH THE MAKOLOLO.
A.D. 1860.
Down to Kongone--State of the ship--Further delay--Letter to Secretary
of Universities Mission--Letter to Mr. Braithwaite--At Tette--Miss
Whately's sugar-mill--With his brother and Kirk at Kebrabasa--Mode of
traveling--Reappearance of old friends--African warfare and its
effects--Desolation--A European colony desirable--Escape from
rhinoceros--Rumors of Moffat--The Portuguese local Governors oppose
Livingstone--He becomes unpopular with them--Letter to Mr. Young--Wants
of the country--The Makololo--Approach home--Some are disappointed--News
of the death of the London missionaries, the Helmores and others--Letter
to Dr. Moffat--The Victoria Falls re-examined--Sekelétu ill of
leprosy--Treatment and recovery--His disappointment at not seeing Mrs.
Livingstone--Efforts for the spiritual good of the Makololo--Careful
observations in Natural History--The last of the "Ma-Robert"--Cheering
prospect of the Universities Mission--Letter to Mr. Moore--to Mr.
Young--He wishes another ship--Letter to Sir Roderick Murchison on the
rumored journey of Silva Porto.
CHAPTER XIV.
ROVUMA AND NYASSA--UNIVERSITIES MISSION.
A.D. 1861-1862.
Beginning of 1861--Arrival of the "Pioneer," and of the agents of
Universities Mission--Cordial welcome--Livingstone's catholic
feelings--Ordered to explore the Rovuma--Bishop Mackenzie goes with
him--Returns to the Shiré--Turning-point of prosperity past--Difficult
navigation--The slave-sticks--Bishop settles at Magomero--Hostilities
between Manganja and Ajawa--Attack of Mission party by
Ajawa--Livingstone's advice to Bishop regardin them--Letter to his son
Robert--Livingstone, Kirk, and Charles start for Lake Nyassa--Party
robbed at north of Lake--Dismal activity of the slave-trade--Awful
mortality in the process--Livingstone's fondness for _Punch_--Letter to
Mr. Young--Joy at departure of new steamer "Lady Nyassa"--Colonization
project--Letter against it from Sir R. Murchison--Hears of Dr. Stewart
coming out from Free Church of Scotland--Visit at the ship from Bishop
Mackenzie--News of defeat of Ajawa by missionaries--Anxiety of
Livingstone--Arrangements for "Pioneer" to go to Kongone for new steamer
and friends from home, then go to Ruo to meet Bishop--"Pioneer"
detained--Dr. Livingstone's anxieties and depression at New
Year--"Pioneer" misses man-of-war "Gorgon"--At length "Gorgon" appears
with brig from England and "Lady Nyassa"--Mrs. Livingstone and other
ladies on board--Livingstone's meeting with his wife, and with Dr.
Stewart--Stewart's recollections--Difficulties of navigation--Captain
Wilson of "Gorgon" goes up river and hears of death of Bishop Mackenzie
and Mr. Burrup--Great distress--Misrepresentations about Universities
Mission--Miss Mackenzie and Mrs. Burrup taken to "Gorgon"--Dr. and Mrs.
Livingstone return to Shupanga--Illness and death of Mrs. Livingstone
there--Extracts from Livingstone's Journal, and letters to the Moffats,
Agnes, and the Murchisons.
CHAPTER XV.
LAST TWO YEARS OF THE EXPEDITION.
A.D. 1862-1863.
Livingstone again buckles on his armor--Letter to Waller--Launch of
"Lady Nyassa"--Too late for season--He explores the Rovuma--Fresh
activity of the slave-trade--Letter to Governor of Mozambique about his
discoveries--Letter to Sir Thomas Maclear--Generous offer of a party of
Scotchmen--The Expedition proceeds up Zambesi with "Lady Nyassa" in
tow--Appalling desolations of Marianno--Tidings of the Mission--Death of
Scudamore--of Dickenson--of Thorton--Illness of Livingstone--Dr. Kirk
and Charles Livingstone go home--He proceeds northward with Mr. Rae and
Mr. E. D. Young of the "Gorgon"--Attempt to carry a boat over the
rapids--Defeated--Recall of the Expedition--Livingstone's views--Letter
to Mr. James Young--to Mr. Waller--Feeling of the Portuguese
Government--Offer to the Rev. Dr. Stewart--Great discouragements--Why
did he not go home?--Proceeds to explore Nyassa--Risks and
sufferings--Occupation of his mind--Natural History--Obliged to turn
back--More desolation--Report of his murder--Kindness of
Chinsamba--Reaches the ship--Letter from Bishop Tozer, abandoning the
Mission--Distress of Livingstone--Letter to Sir Thomas Maclear--Progress
of Dr. Stewart--Livingstonia--Livingstone takes charge of the children
of the Universities Mission--Letter to his daughter--Retrospect--The
work of the Expedition--Livingstone's plans for the future.
CHAPTER XVI.
QUILIMANE TO BOMBAY AND ENGLAND.
A.D. 1864.
Livingstone returns the "Pioneer" to the Navy, and is to sail in the
"Nyassa" to Bombay--Terrific circular storm--Imminent peril of the
"Nyassa"--He reaches Mozambique--Letter to his daughter--Proceeds to
Zanzibar--His engineer leaves him--Scanty crew of "Nyassa"--Livingstone
captain and engineer--Peril of the voyage of 2500 miles--Risk of the
monsoons--The "Nyassa" becalmed--Illness of the men--Remarks on African
travel--Flying-fish--Dolphins--Curiosities of his Journal--Idea of a
colony--Furious squall--Two sea-serpents seen--More squalls--The
"Nyassa" enters Bombay harbor--Is unnoticed--First visit from officer
with Custom-house schedules--How filled up--Attention of Sir Bartle
Frere and others--Livingstone goes with the Governor to Dapuri--His
feelings on landing in India--Letter to Sir Thomas Maclear--He visits
mission-schools, etc., at Poonah--Slaving in Persian Gulf--Returns to
Bombay--Leaves two boys with Dr. Wilson--Borrows passage-money and sails
for England--At Aden--At Alexandria--Reaches Charing
Cross--Encouragement derived from his Bombay visit--Two projects
contemplated on his way home.
CHAPTER XVII.
SECOND VISIT HOME.
A.D. 1864-1865.
Dr. Livingstone and Sir R. Murchison--At Lady Palmerston's reception--at
other places in London--Sad news of his son Robert--His early death--Dr.
Livingstone goes to Scotland--Pays visits--Consultation with Professor
Syme as to operation--Visit to Duke Argyll--to Ulva--He meets Dr.
Duff--At launch of a Turkish frigate--At Hamilton--Goes to Bath to
British Association--Delivers an address--Dr. Colenso--At funeral of
Captain Speke--Bath speech offends the Portuguese--Charges of
Lacerda--He visits Mr. and Mrs. Webb at Newstead--Their great
hospitality--Livingstone room--He spends eight months there writing his
book--He regains elasticity and playfulness--His book--Charles
Livingstone's share--He uses his influence for Dr. Kirk--Delivers a
lecture at Mansfield--Proposal made to him by Sir R. Murchison to return
to Africa--Letter from Sir Roderick--His reply--He will not cease to be
a missionary--Letter to Mr. James Young--Overtures from Foreign
Office--Livingstone displeased--At dinner of Royal Academy--His speech
not reported--President Lincoln's assassination--Examination by
Committee of House of Commons--His opinion on the capacity of the
negro--He goes down to Scotland--_Tom Brown's School Days_--His mother
very ill--She rallies--He goes to Oxford--Hears of his mother's
death--Returns--He attends examination of Oswell's school--His
speech--Goes to London, preparing to leave--Parts from Mr. and Mrs.
Webb--Stays with Dr. and Mrs. Hamilton--Last days in England.
CHAPTER XVIII.
FROM ENGLAND TO BOMBAY AND ZANZIBAR.
A.D. 1865-1866.
Object of new journey--Double scheme--He goes to Paris with Agnes--Baron
Hausmann--Anecdote at Marseilles--He reaches Bombay--Letter to
Agnes--Reminiscences of Dr. Livingstone at Bombay by Rev. D.C. Boyd--by
Alex. Brown, Esq.--Livingstone's dress--He visits the caves of
Kenhari--Rumors of murder of Baron van der Decken--He delivers a lecture
at Bombay--Great success--He sells the "Lady Nyassa"--Letter to Mr.
James Young--Letter to Anna Mary--Hears that Dr. Kirk has got an
appointment--Sets out for Zanzibar in "Thule"--Letter to Mr. James
Young--His experience at sea--Letter to Agnes--He reaches
Zanzibar--Calls on Sultan--Presents the "Thule" to him from Bombay
Government--Monotony of Zanzibar life--Leaves in "Penguin" for the
continent.
CHAPTER XIX.
FROM ZANZIBAR TO UJIJI.
A.D. 1866-1869.
Dr. Livingstone goes to mouth of Rovuma--His prayer--His company--His
herd of animals--Loss of his buffaloes--Good spirits when setting
put--Difficulties at Rovuma--Bad conduct of Johanna men--Dismissal of
his Sepoys--Fresh horrors of slave-trade--Uninhabited tract--He reaches
Lake Nyassa--Letter to his son Thomas--Disappointed hopes--His double
aim, to teach natives and rouse horror of slave-trade--Tenor of
religious addresses--Wikatami remains behind--Livingstone finds no
altogether satisfactory station for commerce and missions--Question of
the watershed--Was it worth the trouble?--Overruled for good to
Africa--Opinion of Sir Bartle Frere--At Marenga's--The Johanna men leave
in a body--Circulate rumor of his murder--Sir Roderick disbelieves
it--Mr. E.D. Young sent out with Search Expedition--Finds proof against
rumor--Livingstone half-starved--Loss of his goats--Review of
1866--Reflections on Divine Providence--Letter to Thomas--His dog
drowned--Loss of his medicine-chest--He feels sentence of death passed
on him--First sight of Lake Tanganyika--Detained at
Chitimba's--Discovery of Lake Moero--Occupations during detention of
1867--Great privations and difficulties--Illness--Rebellion among his
men--Discovery of Lake Bangweolo--Its oozy
banks--Detention--Sufferings--He makes for Ujiji--Very severe illness in
beginning of 1869--Reaches Ujiji--Finds his goods have been wasted and
stolen--Most bitter disappointment--His medicines, etc., at
Unyanyembe--Letter to Sultan of Zanzibar--Letters to Dr. Moffat and
his daughter.
CHAPTER XX.
MANYUEMA.
A.D. 1869-1871.
He sets out to explore Manyuema and the river Lualaba--Loss of forty-two
letters--His feebleness through illness--He arrives at Bambarré--Becomes
acquainted with the soko or gorilla--Reaches the Luama
River--Magnificence of the country--Repulsiveness of the people--Cannot
get a canoe to explore the Lualaba--Has to return to Bambarré--Letter to
Thomas, and retrospect of his life--Letter to Sir Thomas Maclear and Mr.
Mann--Miss Tinné--He is worse in health than ever, yet resolves to add
to his programme and go round Lake Bangweolo--Letter to Agnes--Review of
the past--He sets out anew in a more northerly direction--Overpowered by
constant wet--Reaches Nyangwe, the farthest point northward in his last
Expedition--Long detention--Letter to his brother John--Sense of
difficulties and troubles--Nobility of his spirit--He sets off with only
three attendants for the Lualaba--Suspicions of the natives--Influence
of Arab traders--Frightful difficulties of the way--Lamed by
footsores--Has to return to Bambarré--Long and wearisome
detention--Occupations--Meditations and reveries--Death no
terror--Unparalleled position and trials--He reads his Bible from
beginning to end four times--Letter to Sir Thomas Maclear--To Agnes--His
delight at her sentiments about his coming home--Account of the
soko--Grief to heat of death of Lady Murchison--Wretched character of
men sent from Zanzibar--At last sets out with
Mohamad--Difficulties--Slave-trade most horrible--Cannot get canoes for
Lualaba--Long waiting--New plan--Frustrated by horrible massacre on
banks of Lualaba--Frightful scene--He must return to Ujiji--New
illness--Perils of journey to Ujiji--Life three times endangered in one
day--Reaches Ujiji--Shereef has sold off his goods--He is almost in
despair--Meets Henry M. Stanley and is relieved--His contributions to
Natural Science during last journeys--Professor Owen in the
_Quarterly Review_.
CHAPTER XXI.
LIVINGSTONE AND STANLEY.
A.D. 1871-1872.
Mr. Gordon Bennett sends Stanley in search of Livingstone--Stanley at
Zanzibar--Starts for Ujiji--Reaches Unyanyembe--Dangerous illness--War
between Arabs and natives--Narrow escape of Stanley--Approach to
Ujiji--Meeting with Livingstone--Livingstone's story--Stanley's
news--Livingstone's goods and men at Bagamoio--Stanley's account of
Livingstone--Refutation of foolish and calumnious charges--They go to
the north of the lake--Livingstone resolves not to go home, but to get
fresh men and return to the sources--Letter to Agnes--to Sir Thomas
Maclear--The travelers go to Unyanyembe--More plundering of
stores--Stanley leaves for Zanzibar--Stanley's bitterness of heart at
parting--Livingstone's intense gratitude to Stanley--He intrusts his
Journal to him, and commissions him to send servants and stores from
Zanzibar--Stanley's journey to the coast--Finds Search Expedition at
Bagamoio--Proceeds to England--Stanley's reception--Unpleasant
feelings--Éclaircissement--England grateful to Stanley.
CHAPTER XXII.
FROM UNYANYEMBE TO BANGWEOLO.
A.D. 1872-1873.
Livingstone's long wait at Unyanyembe--His plan of operations--His
fifty-ninth birthday--Renewal of self-dedication--Letters to Agnes--to
_New York Herald_--Hardness of the African battle--Waverings of
judgment, whether Lualaba was the Nile or the Congo--Extracts from
Journal--Gleams of humor--Natural history--His distress on hearing of
the death of Sir Roderick Murchison--Thoughts on mission-work--Arrival
of his escort--His happiness in his new men--He starts from
Unyanyembe--Illness--Great amount of rain--Near Bangweolo--Incessant
moisture--Flowers of the forest--Taking of observations regularly
prosecuted--Dreadful state of the country from rain--Hunger--Furious
attack of ants--Greatness of Livingstone's sufferings--Letters to Sir
Thomas Maclear, Mr. Young, his brother, and Agnes--His sixtieth
birthday--Great weakness in April--Sunday services and observations
continued--Increasing illness--The end approaching--Last written
words--Last day of his travels--He reaches Chitambo's village, in
Ilala--Is found on his knees dead, on morning of 1st May--Courage and
affection of his attendants--His body embalmed--Carried toward
shore--Dangers and sufferings during the march--The party meet
Lieutenant Cameron at Unyanyembe--Determine to go on--_Ruse_ at
Kasekéra--Death of Dr. Dillon--The party reach Bagamoio, and the remains
are placed on board a cruiser--The Search Expeditions from England--to
East Coast under Cameron--to West Coast under Grandy--Explanation of
Expeditions by Sir Henry Rawlinson--Livingstone's remains brought to
England--Examined by Sir W. Fergusson and others--Buried in Westminster
Abbey--Inscription on slab--Livingstone's wish for a forest grave--Lines
from _Punch_--Tributes to his memory--Sir Bartle Frere--The
_Lancet_--Lord Polwarth--Florence Nightingale.
CHAPTER XXIII.
POSTHUMOUS INFLUENCE.
History of his life not completed at his death--Thrilling effect of the
tragedy of Ilala--Livingstone's influence on the slave-trade--His
letters from Manyuema--Sir Bartle Frere's mission to
Zanzibar--Successful efforts of Dr. Kirk with Sultan of Zanzibar--The
land route--The sea route--Slave-trade declared illegal--Egypt--The
Soudan--Colonel Gordon--Conventions with Turkey--King Mtesa of
Uganda--Nyassa district--Introduction of lawful commerce--Various
commercial enterprises in progress--Influence of Livingstone on
exploration--Enterprise of newspapers--Exploring undertakings of various
nations--Livingstone's personal service to science--His hard work in
science the cause of respect--His influence on missionary
enterprise--Livingstonia--Dr. Stewart--Mr. E.D. Young--Blantyre--The
Universities Mission under Bishop Steere--Its return to the mainland and
to Nyassa district--Church Missionary Society at Nyanza--London
Missionary Society at Tanganyika--French, Inland, Baptist, and American
missions--Medical missions--The Fisk Livingstone hall--Livingstone's
great legacy to Africa, a spotless Christian name and character--Honors
of the future.
APPENDIX.
I. Extracts from paper on "Missionary Sacrifices".
II. Treatment of African Fever.
III. Letter to Dr. Tidman, as to future operations.
IV. Lord Clarendon's Letter to Sekelétu.
V. Public Honors awarded to Dr. Livingstone.
DAYID LIVINGSTONE.
CHAPTER I.
EARLY YEARS.
A.D. 1813-1836.
Ulva--The Livingstones--Traditions of Ulva life--The
"baughting-time"--"Kirsty's Rock"--Removal of Livingstone's grandfather
to Blantyre--Highland blood--Neil Livingstone--His marriage to Agnes
Hunter--Her grandfather and father--Monument to Neil and Agnes
Livingstone in Hamilton Cemetery--David Livingstone, born 19th March,
1813--Boyhood--At home--In school--David goes into Blantyre Mill--First
Earnings--Night-school--His habits of reading--Natural-history
expeditions--Great spiritual change in his twentieth year--Dick's
_Philosophy of a Future State_--He resolves to be a
missionary--Influence of occupation at Blantyre--Sympathy with the
people--Thomas Burk and David Hogg--Practical character of his religion.
The family of David Livingstone sprang, as he has himself recorded, from
the island of Ulva, on the west coast of Mull, in Argyllshire. Ulva,
"the island of wolves," is of the same group as Staffa, and, like it,
remarkable for its basaltic columns, which, according to MacCulloch, are
more deserving of admiration than those of the Giant's Causeway, and
have missed being famous only from being eclipsed by the greater glory
of Staffa. The island belonged for many generations to the Macquaires, a
name distinguished in our home annals, as well as in those of Australia.
The Celtic name of the Livingstones was M'Leay, which, according to Dr.
Livingstone's own idea, means "son of the gray-headed," but according to
another derivation, "son of the physician." It has been surmised that
the name may have been given to some son of the famous Beatoun, who held
the post of physician to the Lord of the Isles. Probably Dr. Livingstone
never heard of this derivation; if he had, he would have shown it some
favor, for he had a singularly high opinion of the physician's office.
The Saxon name of the family was originally spelt Livingstone, but the
Doctor's father had shortened it by the omission of the final "e." David
wrote it for many years in the abbreviated form, but about 1857, at his
father's request, he restored the original spelling[1]. The significance
of the original form of the name was not without its influence on him.
He used to refer with great pleasure to a note from an old friend and
fellow-student, the late Professor George Wilson, of Edinburgh,
acknowledging a copy of his book in 1857: "Meanwhile, may your name be
propitious; in all your long and weary journeys may the _Living_ half of
your title outweigh the other; till after long and blessed labors, the
white _stone_ is given you in the happy land."
[Footnote 1: See Journal of Geographical Society, 1857, p. clxviii.]
Livingstone has told us most that is known of his forefathers; how his
great-grandfather fell at Culloden, fighting for the old line of kings;
how his grandfather could go back for six generations of his family
before him, giving the particulars of each; and how the only tradition
he himself felt proud of was that of the old man who had never heard of
any person in the family being guilty of dishonesty, and who charged his
children never to introduce the vice. He used also to tell his children,
when spurring them to diligence at school, that neither had he ever
heard of a Livingstone who was a donkey. He has also recorded a
tradition that the people of the island were converted from being Roman
Catholics "by the laird coming round with a man having a yellow staff,
which would seem to have attracted more attention than his teaching,
for the new religion went long afterward--perhaps it does so still--by
the name of the religion of the yellow stick." The same story is told of
perhaps a dozen other places in the Highlands; the "yellow stick" seems
to have done duty on a considerable scale.
There were traditions of Ulva life that must have been very congenial to
the temperament of David Livingstone. In the "Statistical Account" of
the parish to which it belongs[2] we read of an old custom among the
inhabitants, to remove with their flocks in the beginning of each summer
to the upland pastures, and bivouac there till they were obliged to
descend in the month of August. The open-air life, the free intercourse
of families, the roaming frolics of the young men, the songs and
merriment of young and old, seem to have made this a singularly happy
time. The writer of the account (Mr. Clark, of Ulva) says that he had
frequently listened with delight to the tales of pastoral life led by
the people on these occasions; it was indeed a relic of Arcadia. There
were tragic traditions, too, of Ulva; notably that of Kirsty's Rock, an
awful place where the islanders are said to have administered Lynch law
to a woman who had unwittingly killed a girl she meant only to frighten,
for the alleged crime--denied by the girl--of stealing a cheese. The
poor woman was broken-hearted when she saw what she had done; but the
neighbors, filled with horror, and deaf to her remonstrances, placed her
in a sack, which they laid upon a rock covered by the sea at high water,
where the rising tide slowly terminated her existence. Livingstone
quotes Macaulay's remark on the extreme savagery of the Highlanders of
those days, like the Cape Caffres, as he says; and the tradition of
Kirsty's Rock would seem to confirm it. But the stories of the
"baughting-time" presented a fairer aspect of Ulva life, and no doubt
left happier impressions on his mind. His grandfather, as he tells us,
had an almost unlimited stock of such stories, which he was wont to
rehearse to his grandchildren and other rapt listeners.
[Footnote 2: Kilninian and Kilmore. See _New Statistical Account of
Scotland_, Argyllshire, p. 345]
When, for the first and last time in his life, David Livingstone visited
Ulva, in 1864, in a friend's yacht, he could hear little or nothing of
his relatives. In 1792, his grandfather, as he tells us, left it for
Blantyre, in Lanarkshire, about seven miles from Glasgow, on the banks
of the Clyde, where he found employment in a cotton factory. The dying
charge of the unnamed ancestor must have sunk into the heart of his
descendant, for, being a God-fearing man and of sterling honesty, he was
employed in the conveyance of large sums of money from Glasgow to the
works, and in his old age was pensioned off, so as to spend his
declining years in ease and comfort. There is a tradition in the family,
showing his sense of the value of education, that he was complimented by
the Blantyre school-master for never grudging the price of a school-book
for any of his children--a compliment, we fear, not often won at the
present day. The other near relations of Livingstone seem to have left
the island at the same time, and settled in Canada, Prince Edward's
Isle, and the United States.
The influence of his Highland blood was apparent in many ways in David
Livingstone's character. It modified the democratic influences of his
earlier years, when he lived among the cotton spinners of Lanarkshire.
It enabled him to enter more readily into the relation of the African
tribes to their chiefs, which, unlike some other missionaries, he sought
to conserve, while purifying it by Christian influence. It showed itself
in the dash and daring which were so remarkbly combined in him with
Saxon forethought and perseverance. We are not sure but it gave a tinge
to his affections, intensifying his likes, and some of his dislikes too.
His attachment to Sir Roderick Murchison was quite that of a Highlander,
and hardly less so was his feeling toward the Duke of Argyll,--a man
whom he had no doubt many grounds for esteeming highly, but of whom,
after visiting him at Inveraray, he spoke with all the enthusiasm of a
Highlander for his chief.
The Ulva emigrant had several sons, all of whom but one eventually
entered the King's service during the French war, either as soldiers or
sailors. The old man was somewhat disheartened by this circumstance, and
especially by the fate of Charles, head-clerk in the office of Mr. Henry
Monteith, in Glasgow, who was pressed on board a man-of-war, and died
soon after in the Mediterranean. Only one son remained at home, Neil,
the father of David, who eventually became a tea-dealer, and spent his
life at Blantyre and Hamilton. David Livingstone has told us that his
father was of the high type of character portrayed in the _Cottar's
Saturday Night_. There are friends still alive who remember him well,
and on whom he made a deep impression. He was a great reader from his
youth upward, especially of religious works. His reading and his
religion refined his character, and made him a most pleasant and
instructive companion. His conversational powers were remarkable, and he
could pour out in a most interesting way the stores of his reading and
observation.
Neil Livingstone was a man of great spiritual earnestness, and his whole
life was consecrated to duty and the fear of God, In many ways he was
remarkable, being in some things before his time. In his boyhood he had
seen the evil effects of convivial habits in his immediate circle, and
in order to fortify others by his example he became a strict teetotaler,
suffering not a little ridicule and opposition from the firmness with
which he carried out his resolution. He was a Sunday-school teacher, an
ardent member of a missionary society, and a promoter of meetings for
prayer and fellowship, before such things had ceased to be regarded as
badges of fanaticism. While traveling through the neighboring parishes
in his vocation of tea-merchant, he acted also as colporteur,
distributing tracts and encouraging the reading of useful books. He took
suitable opportunities when they came to him of speaking to young men
and others on the most important of all subjects, and not without
effect. He learned Gaelic that he might be able to read the Bible to his
mother, who knew that language best. He had indeed the very soul of a
missionary. Withal he was kindly and affable, though very particular in
enforcing what he believed to be right. He was quick of temper, but of
tender heart and gentle ways; anything that had the look of sternness
was the result not of harshness but of high principle. By this means he
commanded the affection as well as the respect of his family. It was a
great blow to his distinguished son, to whom in his character and ways
he bore a great resemblance, to get news of his death, on his way home
after his great journey, dissipating the cherished pleasure of sitting
at the fireside and telling him all his adventures in Africa.
The wife of Neil Livingstone was Agnes Hunter, a member of a family of
the same humble rank and the same estimable character as his own. Her
grandfather, Gavin Hunter, of the parish of Shotts, was a doughty
Covenanter, who might have sat for the portrait of David Deans. His son
David (after whom the traveler was named) was a man of the same type,
who got his first religious impressions in his eighteenth year, at an
open-air service conducted by one of the Secession Erskines. Snow was
falling at the time, and before the end of the sermon the people were
standing in snow up to the ankles; but David Hunter used to say he had
no feeling of cold that day. He married Janet Moffat, and lived at first
in comfortable circumstances at Airdrie, where he owned a cottage and a
croft. Mrs. Hunter died, when her daughter Agnes, afterward Mrs. Neil
Livingstone, was but fifteen. Agnes was her mother's only nurse during a
long illness, and attended so carefully to her wants that the minister
of the family laid his hand on her head, and said, "A blessing will
follow you, my lassie, for your duty to your mother." Soon after Mrs.
Hunter's death a reverse of fortune overtook her husband, who had been
too good-natured in accommodating his neighbors. He removed to Blantyre,
where he worked as a tailor. Neil Livingstone was apprenticed to him by
his father, much against his will; but it was by this means that he
became acquainted with Agnes Hunter, his future wife. David Hunter,
whose devout and intelligent character procured for him great respect,
died at Blantyre in 1834, at the age of eighty-seven. He was a great
favorite with his grandchildren, to whom he was always kind, and whom he
allowed to rummage freely among his books, of which he had a
considerable collection, chiefly theological.
Neil Livingstone and Agnes Hunter were married in 1810, and took up
house at first in Glasgow. The furnishing of their house indicated the
frugal character and self-respect of the occupants; it included a
handsome chest of drawers, and other traditional marks of
respectability. Not liking Glasgow, they returned to Blantyre. In a
humble home there, five sons and two daughters were born. Two of the
sons died in infancy, to the great sorrow of the parents. Mrs.
Livingstone's family spoke and speak of her as a very loving mother, one
who contributed to their home a remarkable element of brightness and
serenity. Active, orderly, and of thorough cleanliness, she trained her
family in the same virtues, exemplifying their value in their own home.
She was a delicate little woman, with a wonderful flow of good spirits,
and remarkable for the beauty of her eyes, to which those of her son
David bore a strong resemblance. She was most careful of household
duties, and attentive to her children. Her love had no crust to
penetrate, but came beaming out freely like the light of the sun. Her
son loved her, and in many ways followed her. It was the genial, gentle
influences that had moved him under his mother's training that enabled
him to move the savages of Africa.
She, too, had a great store of family traditions, and, like the mother
of Sir Walter Scott, she retained the power of telling them with the
utmost accuracy to a very old age. In one of Livingstone's private
journals, written in 1864, during his second visit home, he gives at
full length one of his mother's stories, which some future Macaulay may
find useful as an illustration of the social condition of Scotland in
the early part of the eighteenth century:
"Mother told me stories of her youth: they seem to come back to her in
her eighty-second year very vividly. Her grandfather, Gavin Hunter,
could write, while most common people were ignorant of the art. A poor
woman got him to write a petition to the minister of Shotts parish to
augment her monthly allowance of sixpence, as she could not live on it.
He was taken to Hamilton jail for this, and having a wife and three
children at home, who without him would certainly starve, he thought of
David's feigning madness before the Philistines, and beslabbered his
beard with saliva. All who were found guilty were sent to the army in
America, or the plantations. A sergeant had compassion on him, and said,
'Tell me, gudeman, if you are really out of your mind. I'll befriend
you.' He confessed that he only feigned insanity, because he had a wife
and three bairns at home who would starve if he were sent to the army.
'Dinna say onything mair to ony body,' said the kind-hearted sergeant.
He then said to the commanding officer, 'They have given us a man clean
out of his mind: I can do nothing with the like o' him,' The officer
went to him and gave him three shillings, saying, 'Tak' that, gudeman,
and gang awa' hame to your wife and weans, 'Ay,' said mother, 'mony a
prayer went up for that sergeant, for my grandfather was an unco godly
man. He had never had so much money in his life before, for his wages
were only threepence a day."
Mrs. Livingstone, to whom David had always been a most dutiful son, died
on the 18th June, 1865, after a lingering illness which had confined her
to bed for several years. A telegram received by him at Oxford announced
her death; that telegram had been stowed away in one of his traveling
cases, for a year after (19th June, 1866), in his _Last Journals_, he
wrote this entry: "I lighted on a telegram to-day:
'Your mother died at noon on the 18th June.
This was in 1865; it affected me not a little[3]."
[Footnote 3: _Last Journals_ vol. i. p. 55]
The home in which David Livingstone grew up was bright and happy, and
presented a remarkable example of all the domestic virtues. It was ruled
by an industry that never lost an hour of the six days, and that
welcomed and honored the day of rest; a thrift that made the most of
everything, though it never got far beyond the bare necessaries of life;
a self-restraint that admitted no stimulant within the door, and that
faced bravely and steadily all the burdens of life; a love of books that
showed the presence of a cultivated taste, with a fear of God that
dignified the life which it moulded and controlled. To the last David
Livingstone was proud of the class from which he sprang. When the
highest in the land were showering compliments on him, he was writing to
his old friends of "my own order, the honest poor," and trying, by
schemes of colonization and otherwise, to promote their benefit. He
never had the least hankering for any title or distinction that would
have seemed to lift him out of his own class; and it was with perfect
sincerity that on the tombstone which he placed over the resting-place
of his parents in the cemetery of Hamilton, he expressed his feelings in
these words, deliberately refusing to change the "and" of the last line
into "but":
TO SHOW THE RESTING-PLACE OF
NEIL LIVINGSTONE,
AND AGNES HUNTER, HIS WIFE,
AND TO EXPEESS THE THANKFULNESS TO GOD
OF THEIR CHILDREN,
JOHN, DAVID, JANET, CHARLES, AND AGNES,
FOR POOR AND PIOUS PARENTS.
David Livingstone's birthday was the 19th March, 1813. Of his early
boyhood there is little to say, except that he was a favorite at home.
The children's games were merrier when he was among them, and the
fireside brighter. He contributed constantly to the happiness of the
family. Anything of interest that happened to him he was always ready to
tell them. The habit was kept up in after-years. When he went to study
in Glasgow, returning on the Saturday evenings, he would take his place
by the fireside and tell them all that had occurred during the week,
thus sharing his life with them. His sisters still remember how they
longed for these Saturday evenings. At the village school he received
his early education. He seems from his earliest childhood to have been
of a calm, self-reliant nature. It was his father's habit to lock the
door at dusk, by which time all the children were expected to be in the
house. One evening David had infringed this rule, and when he reached
the door it was barred. He made no cry nor disturbance, but having
procured a piece of bread, sat down contentedly to pass the night on the
doorstep. There, on looking out, his mother found him. It was an early
application of the rule which did him such service in later days, to
make the best of the least pleasant situations. But no one could yet
have thought how the rule was to be afterward applied. Looking back to
this period, Livingstone might have said, in the words of the old
Scotch ballad:
"O little knew my mother,
The day she cradled me,
The lands that I should wander o'er,
The death that I should dee."
At the age of nine he got a New Testament from his Sunday-school teacher
for repeating the 119th Psalm on two successive evenings with only five
errors, a proof that perseverance was bred in his very bone.
His parents were poor, and at the age of ten he was put to work in the
factory as a piecer, that his earnings might aid his mother in the
struggle with the wolf which had followed the family from the island
that bore its name. After serving a number of years as a piecer, he was
promoted to be a spinner. Greatly to his mother's delight, the first
half crown he ever earned was laid by him in her lap. Livingstone has
told us that with a part of his first week's wages he purchased
Ruddiman's Rudiments of Latin, and pursued the study of that language
with unabated ardor for many years afterward at an evening class which
had been opened between the hours of eight and ten. "The dictionary part
of my labors was followed up till twelve o'clock, or later, if my mother
did not interfere by jumping up and snatching the books out of my hands.
I had to be back in the factory by six in the morning, and continue my
work, with intervals for breakfast and dinner, till eight o'clock at
night. I read in this way many of the classical authors, and knew Virgil
and Horace better at sixteen than I do now[4]."
[Footnote 4: _Missionary Travels_, p. 8.]
In his reading, he tells us that he devoured all the books that came
into his hands but novels, and that his plan was to place the book on a
portion of the spinning-jenny, so that he could catch sentence after
sentence as he passed at his work. The labor of attending to the wheels
was great, for the improvements in spinning machinery that have made it
self-acting had not then been introduced. The utmost interval that
Livingstone could have for reading at one time was less than a minute.
The thirst for reading so early shown was greatly stimulated by his
father's example. Neil Livingstone, while fond of the old Scottish
theology, was deeply interested in the enterprise of the nineteenth
century, or, as he called it, "the progress of the world," and
endeavored to interest his family in it too. Any books of travel, and
especially of missionary enterprise, that he could lay his hands on, he
eagerly read. Some publications of the Tract Society, called the _Weekly
Visitor_, the _Child's Companion and Teacher's Offering,_ were taken in,
and were much enjoyed by his son David, especially the papers of "Old
Humphrey." Novels were not admitted into the house, in accordance with
the feeling prevalent in religious circles. Neil Livingstone had also a
fear of books of science, deeming them unfriendly to Christianity; his
son instinctively repudiated that feeling, though it was some time
before the works of Thomas Dick, of Broughty-Ferry, enabled him to see
clearly, what to him was of vital significance, that religion and
science were not necessarily hostile, but rather friendly to each other.
The many-sidedness of his character showed itself early; for not content
with reading, he used to scour the country, accompanied by his brothers,
in search of botanical, geological, and zoological specimens.
Culpepper's _Herbal_ was a favorite book, and it set him to look in
every direction for as many of the plants described in it as the
countryside could supply. A story has been circulated that on these
occasions he did not always confine his researches in zoology to fossil
animals. That Livingstone was a poacher in the grosser sense of the term
seems hardly credible, though with the Radical opinions which he held at
the time it may readily be believed that he had no respect for the
sanctity of game. If a salmon came in his way while he was fishing for
trout, he made no scruple of bagging it. The bag on such occasions was
not always made for the purpose, for there is a story that once when he
had captured a fish in the "salmon pool," and was not prepared to
transport such a prize, he deposited it in the leg of his brother
Charles's trousers, creating no little sympathy for the boy as he passed
through the village with his sadly swollen leg!
It was about his twentieth year that the great spiritual change took
place which determined the course of Livingstone's future life. But
before this time he had earnest thoughts on religion. "Great pains," he
says in his first book, "had been taken by my parents to instill the
doctrines of Christianity into my mind, and I had no difficulty in
understanding the theory of a free salvation by the atonement of our
Saviour; but it was only about this time that I began to feel the
necessity and value of a personal application of the provisions of that
atonement to my own case[5]." Some light is thrown on this brief account
in a paper submitted by him to the Directors of the London Missionary
Society in 1838, in answer to a schedule of queries sent down by them
when he offered himself as a missionary for their service. He says that
about his twelfth year he began to reflect on his state as a sinner, and
became anxious to realize the state of mind that flows from the
reception of the truth into the heart. He was deterred, however, from
embracing the free offer of mercy in the gospel, by a sense of
unworthiness to receive so great a blessing, till a supernatural change
should be effected in him by the Holy Spirit. Conceiving it to be his
duty to wait for this, he continued expecting a ground of hope within,
rejecting meanwhile the only true hope of the sinner, the finished work
of Christ, till at length his convictions were effaced, and his feelings
blunted. Still his heart was not at rest; an unappeased hunger remained,
which no other pursuit could satisfy.
[Footnote 5: _Missionary Travels_, p.4]
In these circumstances he fell in with Dick's _Philosophy of a Future
State_. The book corrected his error, and showed him the truth. "I saw
the duty and inestimable privilege _immediately_ to accept salvation by
Christ. Humbly believing that through sovereign mercy and grace I have
been enabled so to do, and having felt in some measure its effects on my
still depraved and deceitful heart, it is my desire to show my
attachment to the cause of Him who died for me by devoting my life to
his service."
There can be no doubt that David Livingstone's heart was very thoroughly
penetrated by the new life that now flowed into it. He did not merely
apprehend the truth--the truth laid hold of him. The divine blessing
flowed into him as it flowed into the heart of St. Paul, St. Augustine,
and others of that type, subduing all earthly desires and wishes. What
he says in his book about the freeness of God's grace drawing forth
feelings of affectionate love to Him who bought him with his blood, and
the sense of deep obligation to Him for his mercy, that had influenced,
in some small measure, his conduct ever since, is from him most
significant. Accustomed to suppress all spiritual emotion in his public
writings, he would not have used these words if they had not been very
real. They give us the secret of his life. Acts of self-denial that are
very hard to do under the iron law of conscience, become a willing
service under the glow of divine love. It was the glow of divine love as
well as the power of conscience that moved Livingstone. Though he seldom
revealed his inner feelings, and hardly ever in the language of ecstasy,
it is plain that he was moved by a calm but mighty inward power to the
very end of his life. The love that began to stir his heart in his
father's house continued to move him all through his dreary African
journeys, and was still in full play on that lonely midnight when he
knelt at his bedside in the hut in Ilala, and his spirit returned to his
God and Saviour.
At first he had no thought of being himself a missionary. Feeling "that
the salvation of men ought to be the chief desire and aim of every
Christian," he had made a resolution "that he would give to the cause of
missions all that he might earn beyond what was required for his
subsistence[6]." The resolution to give himself came from his reading an
Appeal by Mr. Gutzlaff to the Churches of Britain and America on behalf
of China. It was "the claims of so many millions of his
fellow-creatures, and the complaints of the scarcity, of the want of
qualified missionaries," that led him to aspire to the office. From that
time--apparently his twenty-first year--his "efforts were constantly
directed toward that object without any fluctuation."
[Footnote 6: Statement to Directors of London Missionary Society.]
The years of monotonous toil spent in the factory were never regretted
by Livingstone. On the contrary, he regarded his experience there as an
important part of his education, and had it been possible, he would have
liked "to begin life over again in the same lowly style, and to pass
through the same hardy training[7]." The fellow-feeling he acquired for
the children of labor was invaluable for enabling him to gain influence
with the same class, whether in Scotland or in Africa. As we have
already seen, he was essentially a man of the people. Not that he looked
unkindly on the richer classes,--he used to say in his later years, that
he liked to see people in comfort and at leisure, enjoying the good
things of life,--but he felt that the burden-bearing multitude claimed
his sympathy most. How quick the people are, whether in England or in
Africa, to find out this sympathetic spirit, and how powerful is the
hold of their hearts which those who have it gain! In poetic feeling, or
at least in the power of expressing it, as in many other things, David
Livingstone and Robert Burns were a great contrast; but in sympathy with
the people they were alike, and in both cases the people felt it. Away
and alone, in the heart of Africa, when mourning "the pride and avarice
that make man a wolf to man," Livingstone would welcome the "good time
coming," humming the words of Burns:
[Footnote 7: _Missionary Travels_, p. 6.]
"When man to man, the world o'er,
Shall brothers be for a' that."
In all the toils and trials of his life, he found the good of that
early Blantyre discipline, which had forced him to bear irksome toil
with patience, until the toil ceased to be irksome, and even became
a pleasure.
Livingstone has told us that the village of Blantyre, with its
population of two thousand souls, contained some characters of sterling
worth and ability, who exerted a most beneficial influence on the
children and youth of the place by imparting gratuitous religious
instruction. The names of two of the worthiest of these are given,
probably because they stood highest in his esteem, and he owed most to
them, Thomas Burke and David Hogg. Essentially alike, they seem to have
been outwardly very different. Thomas Burke, a somewhat wild youth, had
enlisted early in the army. His adventures and hairbreadth escapes in
the Forty-second, during the Peninsular and other wars, were marvelous,
and used to be told in after-years to crowds of wondering listeners. But
most marvelous was the change of heart that brought him back an intense
Christian evangelist, who, in season, and out of season, never ceased to
beseech the people of Blantyre to yield themselves to God. Early on
Sunday mornings he would go through the village ringing a bell to rouse
the people that they might attend an early prayer-meeting which he had
established. His temperament was far too high for most even of the
well-disposed people of Blantyre, but Neil Livingstone appreciated his
genuine worth, and so did his son. David says of him that "for about
forty years he had been incessant and never weary in good works, and
that such men were an honor to their country and their profession." Yet
it was not after the model of Thomas Burke that Livingstone's own
religious life was fashioned. It had a greater resemblance to that of
David Hogg, the other of the two Blantyre patriarchs of whom he makes
special mention, under whose instructions he had sat in the
Sunday-school, and whose spirit may be gathered from his death-bed
advice to him: "Now, lad, make religion the every-day business of your
life, and not a thing of fits and starts; for if you do, temptation and
other things will get the better of you." It would hardly be possible to
give a better account of Livingstone's religion than that he did make it
quietly, but very really, the every-day business of his life. From the
first he disliked men of much profession and little performance; the
aversion grew as he advanced in years; and by the end of his life, in
judging of men, he had come to make somewhat light both of profession
and of formal creed, retaining and cherishing more and more firmly the
one great test of the Saviour--"By their fruits ye shall know them."
CHAPTER II.
MISSIONARY PREPARATION.
A.D. 1836--1840.
His desire to be a missionary to China--Medical missions--He studies at
Glasgow--Classmates and teachers--He applies to London Missionary
Society--His ideas of mission work--He is accepted provisionally--He
goes to London--to Ongar--Reminiscences by Rev. Joseph Moore--by Mrs.
Gilbert--by Rev. Isaac Taylor--Nearly rejected by the Directors--Returns
to Ongar--to London--Letter to his sister--Reminiscences by Dr. Risdon
Bennett--Promise to Professor Owen--Impression of his character on his
friends and fellow-students--Rev. R. Moffat in England--Livingstone
interested--Could not be sent to China--Is appointed to
Africa--Providential links in his history--Illness--Last visits to his
home--Receives Medical diploma--Parts from his family.
It was the appeal of Gutzlaff for China, as we have seen, that inspired
Livingstone with the desire to be a missionary; and China was the
country to which his heart turned. The noble faith and dauntless
enterprise of Gutzlaff, pressing into China over obstacles apparently
insurmountable, aided by his medical skill and other unusual
qualifications, must have served to shape Livingstone's ideal of a
missionary, as well as to attract him to the country where Gutzlaff
labored. It was so ordered, however, that in consequence of the opium
war shutting China, as it seemed, to the English, his lot was not cast
there; but throughout his whole life he had a peculiarly lively interest
in the country that had been the object of his first love. Afterward,
when his brother Charles, then in America, wrote to him that he, too,
felt called to the missionary office, China was the sphere which David
pointed out to him, in the hope that the door which had been closed to
the one brother might be opened to the other.
When he determined to be a missionary, the only persons to whom he
communicated his purpose were his minister and his parents, from all of
whom he received great encouragement[8]. He hoped that he would be able
to go through the necessary preparation without help from any quarter.
This was the more commendable, because in addition to the theological
qualifications of a missionary, he determined to aquire those of a
medical practitioner. The idea of medical missions was at that time
comparatively new. It had been started in connection with missions to
China, and it was in the prospect of going to that country that
Livingstone resolved to obtain a medical education. It would have been
comparatively easy for him, in a financial sense, to get the theological
training, but the medical education was a costly affair. To a man of
ordinary ideas, it would have seemed impossible to make the wages earned
during the six months of summer avail not merely for his support then,
but for winter too, and for lodgings, fees, and books besides. Scotch
students have often done wonders in this way, notably the late Dr. John
Henderson, a medical missionary to China, who actually lived on
half-a-crown a week, while attending medical classes in Edinburgh.
Livingstone followed the same self-denying course. If we had a note of
his house-keeping in his Glasgow lodging, we should wonder less at his
ability to live on the fare to which he was often reduced in Africa.
But the importance of the medical qualification had taken a firm hold of
his mind, and he persevered in spite of difficulties. Though it was
never his lot to exercise the healing art in China, his medical training
was of the highest use in Africa, and it developed wonderfully his
strong scientific turn.
[Footnote 8: Livingstone's minister at this time was the Rev. John Moir,
of the Congregational church, Hamilton, who afterward joined the Free
Church of Scotland, and is now Presbyterian minister in Wellington, New
Zealand. Mr. Moir has furnished us with some recollections of
Livingstone, which reached us after the completion of this narrative. He
particularly notes that when Livingstone expressed his desire to be a
missionary, it was a missionary out and out, a missionary to the
heathen, not the minister of a congregation. Mr. Moir kindly lent him
some books when he went to London, all of which were conscientiously
returned before he left the country. A Greek Lexicon, with only cloth
boards when lent, was returned in substantial calf. He was ever careful,
conscientious, and honorable in all his dealings, as his father had been
before him.]
It was in the winter of 1836-37 that he spent his first session in
Glasgow. Furnished by a friend with a list of lodgings, Livingstone and
his father set out from Blantyre one wintry day, while the snow was on
the ground, and walked to Glasgow. The lodgings were all too expensive.
All day they searched for a cheaper apartment, and at last in Rotten Row
they found a room at two shillings a week. Next evening David wrote to
his friends that he had entered in the various classes, and spent twelve
pounds in fees; that he felt very lonely after his father left, but
would put "a stout heart to a stey brae," and "either mak' a spune or
spoil a horn." At Rotten Row he found that his landlady held rather
communistic views in regard to his tea and sugar; so another search had
to be made, and this time he found a room in the High street, where he
was very comfortable, at half-a-crown a week.
At the close of the session in April he returned to Blantyre and resumed
work at the mill. He was unable to save quite enough for his second
session, and found it necessary to borrow a little from his elder
brother[9]. The classes he attended during these two sessions were the
Greek class in Anderson's College, the theological classes of Rev. Dr.
Wardlaw, who trained students for the Independent Churches, and the
medical classes in Anderson's. In the Greek class he seems to have been
entered as a private student exciting little notice[10]. In the same
capacity he attended the lectures of Dr. Wardlaw. He had a great
admiration for that divine, and accepted generally his theological
views. But Livingstone was not much of a scientific theologian.
[Footnote 9: The readiness of elder brothers to advance part of their
hard-won earnings, or otherwise encourage a younger brother to attend
college, is a pleasant feature of family life in the humbler classes of
Scotland. The case of James Beattie, the poet, assisted by his brother
David, and that of Sir James Simpson, who owed so much to his brother
Alexander, will be remembered in this connection.]
[Footnote 10: A very sensational and foolish reminiscence was once
published of a raw country youth coming into the class with his clothes
stained with grease and whitened by cotton-wool. This was Livingstone.
The fact is, nothing could possibly have been more unlike him. At this
time Livingstone was not working at the mill; and, in regard to dress,
however plainly he might be clad, he was never careless, far less
offensive.]
His chief work in Glasgow was the prosecution of medical study. Of his
teachers, two attracted him beyond the rest--the late Dr. Thomas Graham,
the very distinguished Professor of Chemistry, and Dr. Andrew Buchanan,
Professor of the Institutes of Medicine, his life-long and much-attached
friend. While attending Dr. Graham's class he was brought into frequent
contact with the assistant to the Professor, Mr. James Young. Originally
bred to a mechanical employment, this young man had attended the evening
course of Dr. Graham, and having attracted his attention, and done
various pieces of work for him, he became his assistant. The students
used to gather round him, and several met in his room, where there was a
bench, a turning-lathe, and other conveniences for mechanical work.
Livingstone took an interest in the turning-lathe, and increased his
knowledge of tools--a knowledge which proved of the highest service to
him when--as he used to say all missionaries should be ready to do--he
had to become a Jack-of-all-trades in Africa.
Livingstone was not the only man of mark who frequented that room, and
got lessons from Mr. Young "how to use his hands." The Right Hon. Lyon
Playfair, who has had so distinguished a scientific career, was another
of its habitués. A galvanic battery constructed by two young men on a
new principle, under Mr. Young's instructions, became an object of great
attraction, and among those who came to see it and its effects were two
sons of the Professor of Mathematics in the University. Although but
boys, both were fired at this interview with enthusiasm for electric
science. Both have been for many years Professors in the University of
Glasgow. The elder, Professor James Thomson, is well known for his
useful inventions and ingenious papers on many branches of science. The
younger, Sir William Thomson, ranks over the world as prince of
electricians, and second to no living man in scientific reputation.
Dr. Graham's assistant devoted himself to practical chemistry, and made
for himself a brilliant name by the purification of petroleum, adapting
it for use in private houses, and by the manufacture of paraffin and
paraffin-oil. Few men have made the art to which they devoted themselves
more subservient to the use of man than he whom Livingstone first knew
as Graham's assistant, and afterward used to call playfully "Sir
Paraffin." "I have been obliged to knight him," he used to say, "to
distinguish him from the other Young." The "other" Young was Mr. E. D.
Young, of the Search Expedition, and subsequently the very successful
leader of the Scotch Mission at Lake Nyassa. The assistant to Dr. Graham
still survives, and is well known as Mr. Young, of Kelly, LL.D.
and F.R.S.
When Livingstone returned from his first journey his acquaintance with
Mr. Young was resumed, and their friendship continued through life. It
is no slight testimony from one who knew him so long and so intimately,
that, in his judgment, Livingstone was the best man he ever knew, had
more than any other man of true filial trust in God, more of the spirit
of Christ, more of integrity, purity, and simplicity of character, and
of self-denying love for his fellow-men. Livingstone named after him a
river which he supposed might be one of the sources of the Nile, and
used ever to speak with great respect of the chief achievement of Mr.
Young's life,--filling houses with a clear white light at a fraction of
the cost of the smoky article which it displaced.
Beyond their own department, men of science are often as lax and
illogical as any; but when scientific training is duly applied, it
genders a habit of thorough accuracy, inasmuch as in scientific inquiry
the slightest deviation from truth breeds endless mischief. Other
influences had already disposed Livingstone to great exactness of
statement, but along with these his scientific training may be held to
have contributed to that dread of exaggeration and of all inaccuracy
which was so marked a feature of his character through life.
It happened that Livingstone did not part company with Professor Graham
and Mr. Young when he left Glasgow. The same year, Dr. Graham went to
London as Professor in University College, and Livingstone, who also
went to London, had the opportunity of paying occasional visits to his
class. In this way, too, he became acquainted with the late Dr. George
Wilson, afterward Professor of Technology in the University of
Edinburgh, who was then acting as unsalaried assistant in Dr. Graham's
laboratory. Frank, genial, and chivalrous, Wilson and Livingstone had
much in common, and more in after-years, when Wilson, too, became an
earnest Christian. In the simplicity and purity of their character, and
in their devotion to science, not only for its own sake, but as a
department of the kingdom of God, they were brothers indeed. Livingstone
showed his friendship in after-years by collecting and transmitting to
Wilson whatever he could find in Africa worthy of a place in the
Edinburgh Museum of Science and Art, of which his friend was the
first Director.
In the course of his second session in Glasgow (1837-38) Livingstone
applied to the London Missionary Society, offering his services to them
as a missionary. He had learned that that Society had for its sole
object to send the gospel to the heathen; that it accepted missionaries
from different Churches, and that it did not set up any particular form
of Church, but left it to the converts to choose the form they
considered most in accordance with the Word of God. This agreed with
Livingstone's own notion of what a Missionary Society should do. He had
already connected himself with the Independent communion, but this
preference for it was founded chiefly on his greater regard for the
_personnel_ of the body, and for the spirit in which it was
administered, as compared with the Presbyterian Churches of Scotland. He
had very strong views of the spirituality of the Church of Christ, and
the need of a profound spiritual change as the only true basis of
Christian life and character. He thought that the Presbyterian Churches
were too lax in their communion, and particularly the Established
Church. He was at this time a decided Voluntary, chiefly on the ground
maintained by such men as Vinet, that the connection of Church and State
was hurtful to the spirituality of the Church; and he had a particular
abhorrence of what he called "geographical Christianity,"--which gave
every man within a certain area a right to the sacraments. We shall see
that in his later years Dr. Livingstone saw reason to modify some of
these opinions; surveying the Evangelical Churches from the heart of
Africa, he came to think that, established or non-established, they did
not differ so very much from each other, and that there was much good
and considerable evil in them all.
In his application to the London Missionary Society, Livingstone stated
his ideas of missionary work in comprehensive terms: "The missionary's
object is to endeavor by every means in his power to make known the
gospel by preaching, exhortation, conversation, instruction of the
young; improving, so far as in his power, the temporal condition of
those among whom he labors, by introducing the arts and sciences of
civilization, and doing everything to commend Christianity to their
hearts and consciences. He will be exposed to great trials of his faith
and patience from the indifference, distrust, and even direct opposition
and scorn of those for whose good he is laboring; he may be tempted to
despondency from the little apparent fruit of his exertions, and exposed
to all the contaminating influence of heathenism." He was not about to
undertake this work without counting the cost. "The hardships and
dangers of missionary life, so far as I have had the means of
ascertaining their nature and extent, have been the subject of serious
reflection, and in dependence on the promised assistance of the Holy
Spirit, I have no hesitation in saying that I would willingly submit to
them, considering my constitution capable of enduring any ordinary share
of hardship or fatigue." On one point he was able to give the Directors
very explicit information: he was not married, nor under any engagement
of marriage, nor had he ever made proposals of marriage, nor indeed been
in love! He would prefer to go out unmarried, that he might, like the
great apostle, be without family cares, and give himself entirely to
the work.
His application to the London Missionary Society was provisionally
accepted, and in September, 1838, he was summoned to London to meet the
Directors. A young Englishman came to London on the same errand at the
same time, and a friendship naturally arose between the two.
Livingstone's young friend was the Rev. Joseph Moore, afterwards
missionary at Tahiti; now of Congleton, in Cheshire. Nine years later,
Livingstone, writing to Mr. Moore from Africa, said: "Of all those I
have met since we parted, I have seen no one I can compare to you for
sincere, hearty friendship." Livingstone's family used to speak of them
as Jonathan and David. Mr. Moore has kindly furnished us with his
recollections of Livingstone at this time:--
"I met with Livingstone first in September, 1838, at 57 Aldersgate
street, London. On the same day we had received a letter from the
Secretary informing us severally that our applications had been
received, and that we must appear in London to be examined by the
Mission Board there. On the same day, he from Scotland, and I from the
south of England, arrived in town. On that night we simply accosted each
other, as those who meet at a lodging house might do. After breakfast on
the following day we fell into conversation, and finding that the same
object had brought us to the metropolis, and that the same trial awaited
us, naturally enough we were drawn to each other. Every day, as we had
not been in town before, we visited places of renown in the great city,
and had many a chat about our prospects.
"On Sunday, in the morning, we heard Dr. Leifchild, who was then in his
prime, and in the evening Mr. Sherman, who preached with all his
accustomed persuasiveness and mellifluousness. In the afternoon we
worshiped at St. Paul's, and heard Prebendary Dale.
"On Monday we passed our first examination. On Tuesday we went to
Westminster Abbey. Who that had seen those two young men passing from
monument to monument could have divined that one of them would one day
be buried with a nation's--rather with the civilized world's--lament, in
that sacred shrine? The wildest fancy could not have pictured that such
an honor awaited David Livingstone. I grew daily more attached to him.
If I were asked why, I should be rather at a loss to reply. There was
truly an indescribable charm about him, which, with all his rather
ungainly ways, and by no means winning face, attracted almost every one,
and which helped him so much in his after-wanderings in Africa.
"He won those who came near him by a kind of spell. There happened to be
in the boarding-house at that time a young M.D., a saddler from Hants,
and a bookseller from Scotland. To this hour they all speak of him in
rapturous terms.
"After passing two examinations, we were both so far accepted by the
Society that we were sent to the Rev. Richard Cecil, who resided at
Chipping Ongar, in Essex. Most missionary students were sent to him for
three months' probation, and if a favorable opinion was sent to the
Board of Directors, they went to one of the Independent colleges. The
students did not for the most part live with Mr. Cecil, but took
lodgings in the town, and went to his house for meals and instruction in
classics and theology. Livingstone and I lodged together. We read Latin
and Greek, and began Hebrew together. Every day we took walks, and
visited all the spots of interest in the neighborhood, among them the
country churchyard which was the burial-place of John Locke. In a place
so quiet, and a life so ordinary as that of a student, there did not
occur many events worthy of recital. I will, however, mention one or
two things, because they give an insight--a kind of prophetic
glance--into Livingstone's after-career.
"One foggy November morning, at three o'clock, he set out from Ongar to
walk to London to see a relative of his father's[11]. It was about
twenty-seven miles to the house he sought. After spending a few hours
with his relation, he set out to return on foot to Ongar. Just out of
London, near Edmonton, a lady had been thrown out of a gig. She lay
stunned on the road. Livingston immediately went to her, helped to carry
her into a house close by, and having examined her and found no bones
broken, and recommending a doctor to be called, he resumed his weary
tramp. Weary and footsore, when he reached Stanford Rivers he missed his
way, and finding after some time that he was wrong, he felt so dead-beat
that he was inclined to lie down and sleep; but finding a directing-post
he climbed it, and by the light of the stars deciphered enough to know
his whereabouts. About twelve that Saturday night he reached Ongar,
white as a sheet, and so tired he could hardly utter a word. I gave him
a basin of bread and milk, and I am not exaggerating when I say I put
him to bed. He fell at once asleep, and did not awake till noonday had
passed on Sunday.
[Footnote 11: We learn from the family that the precise object of the
visit was to transact some business for his eldest brother, who had
begun to deal in lace. In the darkness of the morning Livingstone fell
into a ditch, smearing his clothes, and not improving his appearance for
smart business purposes. The day was spent in going about in London from
shop to shop, greatly increasing Livingstone's fatigue.]
"Total abstinence at that time began to be spoken of, and Livingstone
and I, and a Mr. Taylor, who went to India, took a pledge together to
abstain[12]. Of that trio, two, I am sorry to say _(heu me miserum!),_
enfeebled health, after many years, compelled to take a little wine for
our stomachs' sake. Livingstone was one of the two.
[Footnote 12: Livingstone had always practiced total abstinence,
according to the invariable custom of his father's house. The third of
the trio was the Rev. Joseph V.S. Taylor, now of the Irish Presbyterian
Mission, Gujerat, Bombay.]
"One part of our duties was to prepare sermons, which were submitted to
Mr. Cecil, and, when corrected, were committed to memory, and then
repeated to our village congregations. Livingstone prepared one, and one
Sunday the minister of Stamford Rivers; where the celebrated Isaac
Taylor resided, having fallen sick after the morning service,
Livingstone was sent for to preach in the evening. He took his text,
read it out very deliberately, and then--then--his sermon had fled!
Midnight darkness came upon him, and he abruptly said: 'Friends, I have
forgotten all I had to say,' and hurrying out of the pulpit, he left
the chapel.
"He never became a preacher" [we shall see that this does not apply to
his preaching in the Sichuana language], "and in the first letter I
received from him from Elizabeth Town, in Africa, he says: 'I am a very
poor preacher, having a bad delivery, and some of them said if they knew
I was to preach again they would not enter the chapel. Whether this was
all on account of my manner I don't know; but the truth which I uttered
seemed to plague very much the person who supplies the missionaries with
wagons and oxen. (They were bad ones.) My subject was the necessity of
adopting the benevolent spirit of the Son of God, and abandoning the
selfishness of the world.' Each student at Ongar had also to conduct
family worship in rotation. I was much impressed by the fact that
Livingstone never prayed without the petition that we might imitate
Christ in all his imitable perfections[13]."
[Footnote 13: In connection with this prayer, it is interesting to note
the impression made by Livingstone nearly twenty years afterward on one
who saw him but twice--once at a public breakfast in Edinburgh, and
again at the British Association in Dublin in 1857. We refer to Mrs.
Sime, sister of Livingstone's early friend, Professor George Wilson, of
Edinburgh. Mrs. Sime writes; "I never knew any one who gave me more the
idea of power over other men, such power as our Saviour showed while on
earth, the power of love and purity combined."]
In the Autobiography of Mrs. Gilbert, an eminent member of the family of
the Taylors of Ongar, there occur some reminiscenses of Livingstone,
corresponding to those here given by Mr. Moore[14].
[Footnote 14: Page 886, third edition.]
The Rev. Isaac Taylor, LL.D., now rector of Settringham, York, son of
the celebrated author of _The Natural History of Enthusiasm_, and
himself author of _Words and Places, Etruscan Researches_, etc., has
kindly furnished us with the following recollection: "I well remember as
a boy taking country rambles with Livingstone when he was studying at
Ongar. Mr. Cecil had several missionary students, but Livingstone was
the only one whose personality made any impression on my boyish
imagination. I might sum up my impression of him in two
words--simplicity and resolution. Now, after nearly forty years, I
remember his step, the characteristic forward tread, firm, simple,
resolute, neither fast nor slow, no hurry and no dawdle, but which
evidently meant--getting there[15]."
[Footnote 15: On one occasion, in conversation with his former pastor,
the Rev. John Moir, Livingstone spoke of Mr. Isaac Taylor, who had shown
him much kindness, and often invited him to dine in his house. He said
that though Mr. Taylor was connected with the Independents, he was
attached to the principles of the Church of England. Mr. Taylor used to
lay very great stress on acquaintance with the writings of the Fathers
as necessary for meeting the claims of the Tractarians, and did not
think that that study was sufficiently encouraged by the Nonconformists.
Any one who has been in Mr. Taylor's study at Stanford Rivers, and who
remembers the top-heavy row of patristic folios that crowned his
collection of books, and the glance of pride he cast on them as he asked
his visitor whether many men in his Church were well read in the
Fathers, will be at no loss to verify this reminiscence. Certainly
Livingstone had no such qualification, and undoubtedly he never
missed it.]
We resume Mr. Moore's reminiscences:
"When three months had elapsed, Mr. Cecil sent in his report to the
Board. Judging from Livingstone's hesitating manner in conducting family
worship, and while praying on the week-days in the chapel, and also from
his failure so complete in preaching, an unfavorable report was given
in.... Happily, when it was read, and a decision was about to be given
against him, some one pleaded hard that his probation should be
extended, and so he had several months' additional trial granted. I
sailed in the same boat, and was also sent back to Ongar as a naughty
boy.... At last we had so improved that both were fully accepted.
Livingstone went to London to pursue his medical studies, and I went to
Cheshunt College, A day or two after reaching college, I sent to
Livingstone, asking him to purchase a second-hand carpet for my room. He
was quite scandalized at such an exhibition of effeminacy, and
positively refused to gratify my wish.... In the spring of 1840 I met
Livingstone at London in Exeter Hall, when Prince Albert delivered his
maiden speech in England. I remember how nearly he was brought to
silence when the speech, which he had lodged on the brim of his hat,
fell into it, as deafening cheers made it vibrate. A day or two after,
we heard Binney deliver his masterly missionary sermon, 'Christ seeing
of the travail of his soul and being satisfied.'"
The meeting at Exeter Hall was held to inaugurate the Niger Expedition.
It was on this occasion that Samuel Wilberforce became known as a great
platform orator[16]. It must have been pleasant to Livingstone in
after-years to recall the circumstance when he became a friend and
correspondent of the Bishop of Oxford.
[Footnote 16: _Life of Bishop Wilberforce_, vol. i, p. 160.]
Notwithstanding the dear postage of the time, Livingstone wrote
regularly to his friends, but few of his letters have survived. One of
the few, dated 5th May, 1839, is addressed to his sister, and in it he
says that there had been some intention of sending him abroad at once,
but that he was very desirous of getting more education. The letter
contains very little news, but is full of the most devout aspirations
for himself and exhortations to his sister. Alluding to the remark of a
friend that they should seek to be "uncommon Christians, that is,
eminently holy and devoted servants of the Most High," he urges:
"Let us seek--and with the conviction that we cannot do
without it--that all selfishness be extirpated, pride
banished, unbelief driven from the mind, every idol
dethroned, and everything hostile to holiness and opposed to
the divine will crucified; that 'holiness to the Lord' may be
engraven on the heart, and evermore characterize our whole
conduct. This is what we ought to strive after; this is the
way to be happy; this is what our Saviour loves--entire
surrender of the heart. May He enable us by his Spirit to
persevere till we attain it! All comes from Him, the
disposition to ask as well as the blessing itself.
"I hope you improve the talents committed to you whenever
there is an opportunity. You have a class with whom you have
some influence. It requires prudence in the way of managing
it; seek wisdom from above to direct you; _persevere_--don't
be content with once or twice recommending the Saviour to
them--again and again, in as kind a manner as possible,
familiarly, individually, and privately, exhibit to them the
fountain of happiness and joy, never forgetting to implore
divine energy to accompany your endeavors, and you need not
fear that your labor will be unfruitful. If you have the
willing mind, that is accepted; nothing is accepted if that
be wanting. God desires that. He can do all the rest. After
all, He is the sole agent, for the 'willing mind' comes alone
from Him. This is comforting, for when we think of the
feebleness and littleness of all we do, we might despair of
having our services accepted, were we not assured that it is
not these God looks to, except in so far as they are
indications of the state of the heart."
Dr. Livingstone's sisters have a distinct recollection that the field to
which the Directors intended to send him was the West Indies, and that
he remonstrated on the ground that he had spent two years in medical
study, but in the West Indies, where there were regular practitioners,
his medical knowledge would be of little or no avail. He pleaded with
the Directors, therefore, that he might be allowed to complete his
medical studies, and it was then that Africa was provisionally fixed on
as his destination. It appears, however, that he had not quite abandoned
the thought of China. Mr. Moir, his former pastor, writes that being in
London in May, 1839, he called at the Mission House to make inquiries
about him. He asked whether the Directors did not intend to send him to
the East Indies, where the field was so large and the demand so urgent,
but he was told that though they esteemed him highly, they did not think
that his gifts fitted him for India, and that Africa would be a more
suitable field.
On returning to London, Livingstone devoted himself with special ardor
to medical and scientific study. The church with which he was connected
was that of the late Rev. Dr. Bennett, in Falcon Square. This led to his
becoming intimate with Dr. Bennett's son, now the well-known J. Risdon
Bennett, M.D., LL.D., F.R.S., and President of the Royal College of
Physicians, London. The friendship continued during the whole of Dr.
Livingstone's life. From some recollections with which Dr. Bennett has
kindly furnished us we take the following:
"My acquaintance with David Livingstone was through the
London Missionary Society, when, having offered himself to
that Society, he came to London to carry on those medical and
other studies which he had commenced in Glasgow. From the
first, I became deeply interested in his character, and ever
after maintained a close friendship with him. I entertained
toward him a sincere affection, and had the highest
admiration of his endowments, both of mind and heart, and of
his pure and noble devotion of all his powers to the highest
purposes of life. One could not fail to be impressed with his
simple, loving, Christian spirit, and the combined modest,
unassuming, and self-reliant character of the man.
"He placed himself under my guidance in reference to his
medical studies, and I was struck with the amount of
knowledge that he had already acquired of those subjects
which constitute the foundation of medical science. He had,
however, little or no acquaintance with the practical
departments of medicine, and had had no opportunities of
studying the nature and aspects of disease. Of these
deficiencies he was quite aware, and felt the importance of
acquiring as much practical knowledge as possible during his
stay in London. I was at that time physician to the
Aldersgate Street Dispensary, and was lecturing at the
Charing Cross Hospital on the practice of medicine, and thus
was able to obtain for him free admission to hospital
practice as well as attendance on my lectures and my practice
at the dispensary. I think that I also obtained for him
admission to the opthalmic hospital in Moorfields. With these
sources of information open to him, he obtained a
considerable acquaintance with the more ordinary forms of
disease, both surgical and medical, and an amount of
scientific and practical knowledge that could not fail to be
of the greatest advantage to him in the distant regions to
which he was going, away from all the resources of
civilization. His letters to me, and indeed all the records
of his eventful life, demonstrate how great to him was the
value of the medical knowledge with which he entered on
missionary life. There is abundant evidence that on various
occasions his own life was preserved through his courageous
and sagacious application of his scientific knowledge to his
own needs; and the benefits which he conferred on the natives
to whose welfare he devoted himself, and the wonderful
influence which he exercised over them, were in no small
degree due to the humane and skilled assistance which he was
able to render as a healer of bodily disease. The account
which he gave me of his perilous encounter with the lion, and
the means he adopted for the repair of the serious injuries
which he received, excited the astonishment and admiration of
all the medical friends to whom I related it, as evincing an
amount of courage, sagacity, skill, and endurance that have
scarcely been surpassed in the annals of heroism."
Another distinguished man of science with whom Livingstone became
acquainted in London, and on whom he made an impression similar to that
made on Dr. Bennett, was Professor Owen. Part of the little time at his
disposal was devoted to studying the series of comparative anatomy in
the Hunterian Museum, under Professor Owen's charge. Mr. Owen was
interested to find that the Lanarkshire student was born in the same
neighborhood as Hunter[17], but still more interested in the youth
himself and his great love of natural history. On taking leave,
Livingstone promised to bear his instructor in mind if any curiosity
fell in his way. Years passed, and as no communication reached him, Mr.
Owen was disposed to class the promise with too many others made in the
like circumstances. But on his first return to this country Livingstone
presented himself, bearing the tusk of an elephant with a spiral curve.
He had found it in the heart of Africa, and it was not easy of
transport. "You may recall," said Professor Owen, at the Farewell
Festival in 1858, "the difficulties of the progress of the weary sick
traveler on the bullock's back. Every pound weight was of moment; but
Livingstone said, 'Owen shall have this tusk,' and he placed it in my
hands in London." Professor Owen recorded this as a proof of
Livingstone's inflexible adherence to his word. With equal justice we
may quote it as a proof of his undying gratitude to any one that had
shown him kindness.
[Footnote 17: Not in the same _parish_, as stated afterward by Professor
Owen. Hunter was born in East Kilbride, and Livingstone in Blantyre. The
error is repeated in notices of Livingstone in some other quarters.]
On all his fellow-students and acquaintances the simplicity, frankness,
and kindliness of Livingstone's character made a deep impression. Mr.
J.S. Cook, now of London, who spent three months with him at Ongar,
writes: "He was so kind and gentle in word and deed to all about him
that all loved him. He had always words of sympathy at command, and was
ready to perform acts of sympathy for those who were suffering." The
Rev. G.D. Watt, a brother Scotchman, who went as a missionary to India,
has a vivid remembrance of Livingstone's mode of discussion; he showed
great simplicity of view, along with a certain roughness or bluntness of
manner; great kindliness, and yet great persistence in holding to his
own ideas. But none of his friends seem to have had any foresight of
the eminence he was destined to attain. The Directors of the Society
did not even rank him among their ablest men. It is interesting to
contrast the opinion entertained of him then with that expressed by Sir
Bartle Frere, after much personal intercourse, many years afterward. "Of
his intellectual force and energy," wrote Sir Bartle, "he has given such
proof as few men could afford. Any five years of his life might in any
other occupation have established a character and raised for him a
fortune such as none but the most energetic of our race can
realize[18]."
[Footnote 18: _Good Words_, 1874, p. 285.]
But his early friends were not so much at fault. Livingstone was
somewhat slow of maturing. If we may say so, his intellect hung fire up
to this very time, and it was only during his last year in England that
he came to his intellectual manhood, and showed his real power. His very
handwriting shows the change; from being cramped and feeble it suddenly
becomes clear, firm, and upright, very neat, but quite the hand of a
vigorous, independent man.
Livingstone's prospects of getting to China had been damaged by the
Opium War; while it continued, no new appointments could be made, even
had the Directors wished to send him there. It was in these
circumstances that he came into contact with his countryman, Mr. (now
Dr.) Moffat, who was then in England, creating much interest in his
South African mission. The idea of his going to Africa became a settled
thing, and was soon carried into effect.
"I had occasion" (Dr. Moffat has informed us) "to call for
some one at Mrs. Sewell's, a boarding-house for young
missionaries in Aldersgate street, where Livingstone lived. I
observed soon that this young man was interested in my story,
that he would sometimes come quietly and ask me a question or
two, and that he was always desirous to know where I was to
speak in public, and attended on these occasions. By and by
he asked me whether I thought he would do for Africa. I said
I believed he would, if he would not go to an old station,
but would advance to unoccupied ground, specifying the vast
plain to the north, where I had sometimes seen, in the
morning sun, the smoke of a thousand villages, where no
missionary had ever been. At last Livingstone said: 'What is
the use of my waiting for the end of this abominable opium
war? I will go at once to Africa.' The Directors concurred,
and Africa became his sphere."
It is no wonder that all his life Livingstone had a very strong faith in
Providence, for at every turn of his career up to this point, some
unlooked-for circumstance had come in to give a new direction to his
history. First, his reading Dick's _Philosophy of a Future State_, which
led him to Christ, but did not lead him away from science; then his
falling in with Gutzlaff's _Appeal_, which induced him to become a
medical missionary; the Opium War, which closed China against him; the
friendly word of the Director who procured for him another trial; Mr.
Moffat's visit, which deepened his interest in Africa; and finally, the
issue of a dangerous illness that attacked him in London--all indicated
the unseen hand that was preparing him for his great work.
The meeting of Livingstone with Moffat is far too important an event to
be passed over without remark. Both directly and indirectly Mr. Moffat's
influence on his young brother, afterward to become his son-in-law, was
remarkable. In after-life they had a thorough appreciation of each
other. No family on the face of the globe could have been so helpful to
Livingstone in connection with the great work to which he gave himself.
If the old Roman fashion of surnames still prevailed, there is no
household of which all the members would have been better entitled to
put AFRICANUS after their name. The interests of the great continent
were dear to them all. In 1872, when one of the Search Expeditions for
Livingstone was fitted out, a grandson of Dr. Moffat, another Robert
Moffat, was among those who set out in the hope of relieving him; cut
off at the very beginning, in the flower of his youth, he left his bones
to moulder in African soil.
The illness to which we have alluded was an attack of congestion of the
liver, with an affection of the lungs. It seemed likely to prove fatal,
and the only chance of recovery appeared to be a visit to his home, and
return to his native air. In accompanying him to the steamer, Mr. Moore
found him so weak that he could scarcely walk on board. He parted from
him in tears, fearing that he had but a few days to live. But the voyage
and the visit had a wonderful effect, and very soon Livingstone was in
his usual health. The parting with his father and mother, as they
afterward told Mr. Moore, was very affecting. It happened, however, that
they met once more. It was felt that the possession of a medical diploma
would be of service, and Livingstone returned to Scotland in November,
1840, and passed at Glasgow as Licentiate of the Faculty of Physicians
and Surgeons. It was on this occasion he found it so inconvenient to
have opinions of his own and the knack of sticking to them. It seemed as
if he was going to be rejected for obstinately maintaining his views in
regard to the stethoscope; but he pulled through. A single night was all
that he could spend with his family, and they had so much to speak of
that David proposed they should sit up all night. This, however, his
mother would not hear of. "I remember my father and him," writes his
sister, "talking over the prospects of Christian missions. They agreed
that the time would come when rich men and great men would think it an
honor to support whole stations of missionaries, instead of spending
their money on hounds and horses. On the morning of 17th November we got
up at five o'clock. My mother made coffee. David read the 121st and
135th Psalms, and prayed. My father and he walked to Glasgow to catch
the Liverpool steamer." On the Broomielaw, father and son looked for the
last time on earth on each other's faces. The old man walked back slowly
to Blantyre, with a lonely heart no doubt, yet praising God. David's
face was now set in earnest toward the Dark Continent.
CHAPTER III.
FIRST TWO YEARS IN AFRICA.
A.D. 1841-1843.
His ordination--Voyage out--At Rio de Janeiro--At the Cape--He proceeds
to Kuruman--Letters--Journey of 700 miles to Bechuana country--Selection
of site for new station--Second excursion to Bechuana country--Letter to
his sister--Influence with chiefs--Bubi--Construction of a
water-dam--Sekomi--Woman seized by a lion--The Bakaa--Sebehwe--Letter to
Dr. Risdon Bennett--Detention at Kuruman--He visits Sebehwe's
village--Bakhatlas--Sechéle, chief of Bakwains--Livingstone translates
hymns--Travels 400 miles on oxback--Returns to Kuruman--Is authorized to
form new station--Receives contributions for native missionary--Letters
to Directors on their Mission policy--He goes to new
station--Fellow-travelers--Purchase of site--Letter to Dr.
Bennett--Desiccation of South Africa--Death of a servant, Sehamy--Letter
to his parents.
On the 20th November, 1840, Livingstone was ordained a missionary in
Albion Street Chapel, along with the Rev. William Ross, the service
being conducted by the Rev. J.J. Freeman and the Rev. R. Cecil. On the
8th of December he embarked on board the ship "George," under Captain
Donaldson, and proceeded to the Cape, and thence to Algoa Bay. On the
way the ship had to put in at Rio de Janeiro, and he had a glance at
Brazil, with which he was greatly charmed. It was the only glimpse he
ever got of any part of the great continent of America. Writing to the
Rev. G.D. Watt, with whom he had become intimate in London, and who was
preparing to go as a missionary to India, he says:
"It is certainly the finest place I ever saw; everything
delighted me except man.... We lived in the home of an
American Episcopal Methodist minister--the only Protestant
missionary in Brazil.... Tracts and Bibles are circulated,
and some effects might be expected, were a most injurious
influence not exerted by European visitors. These alike
disgrace themselves and the religion they profess by
drunkenness. All other vices are common in Rio. When will the
rays of Divine light dispel the darkness in this beautiful
empire? The climate is delightful. I wonder if disabled
Indian missionaries could not make themselves useful there."
During the voyage his chief friend was the captain of the ship. "He was
very obliging to me," says Livingstone, "and gave me all the information
respecting the use of the quadrant in his power, frequently sitting up
till twelve o'clock at night for the purpose of taking lunar
observations with me." Thus another qualification was acquired for his
very peculiar life-work. Sundays were not times of refreshing, at least
not beyond his closet. "The captain rigged out the church on Sundays,
and we had service; but I being a poor preacher, and the chaplain
addressing them all as Christians already, no moral influence was
exerted, and even had there been on Sabbath, it would have been
neutralized by the week-day conduct. In fact, no good was done." Neither
at Rio, nor on board ship, nor anywhere, could good be done without the
element of personal character. This was Livingstone's strong conviction
to the end of his life.
In his first letter to the Directors of the London Missionary Society he
tells them that he had spent most of his time at sea in the study of
theology, and that he was deeply grieved to say that he knew of no
spiritual good having been done in the case of any one on board the
ship. His characteristic honesty thus showed itself in his very
first dispatch.
Arriving at the Cape, where the ship was detained a month, he spent some
time with Dr. Philip, then acting as agent for the Society, with
informal powers as superintendent. Dr. Philip was desirous of returning
home for a time, and very anxious to find some one to take his place as
minister of the congregation of Cape Town, in his absence. This office
was offered to Livingstone, who rejected it with no little
emphasis--not for a moment would he think of it, nor would he preach the
gospel within any other man's line. He had not been long at the Cape
when he found to his surprise and sorrow that the missionaries were not
all at one, either as to the general policy of the mission, or in the
matter of social intercourse and confidence. The shock was a severe one;
it was not lessened by what he came to know of the spirit and life of a
few--happily only a few--of his brethren afterward; and undoubtedly it
had an influence on his future life. It showed him that there were
missionaries whose profession was not supported by a life of consistent
well-doing, although it did not shake his confidence in the character
and the work of missionaries on the whole. He saw that in the mission
there was what might be called a colonial side and a native side; some
sympathizing with the colonists and some with the natives. He had no
difficulty in making up his mind between them; he drew instinctively to
the party that were for protecting the natives against the unrighteous
encroachments of the settlers.
On leaving the ship at Algoa Bay, he proceeded by land to Kuruman or
Lattakoo, in the Bechuana country, the most northerly station of the
Society in South Africa, and the usual residence of Mr. Moffat, who was
still absent in England. In this his first African journey the germ of
the future traveler was apparent. "Crossing the Orange River," he says,
"I got my vehicle aground, and my oxen got out of order, some with their
heads where their tails should be, and others with their heads twisted
round in the yoke so far that they appeared bent on committing suicide,
or overturning the wagon.... I like travelling very much indeed. There
is so much freedom connected with our African manners. We pitch our
tent, make our fire, etc., wherever we choose, walk, ride, or shoot at
abundance of all sorts of game as our inclination leads us; but there
is a great drawback: we can't study or read when we please. I feel this
very much. I have made but very little progress in the language (can
speak a little Dutch), but I long for the time when I shall give my
undivided attention to it, and then be furnished with the means of
making known the truth of the gospel." While at the Cape, Livingstone
had heard something of a fresh-water lake ('Ngami) which all the
missionaries were eager to see. If only they would give him a month or
two to learn the colloquial language, he said they might spare
themselves the pains of being "the first in at the death." It is
interesting to remark further that, in this first journey, science had
begun to receive its share of attention. He is already bent on making a
collection for the use of Professor Owen[19], and is enthusiastic in
describing some agatized trees and other curiosities which he met with.
[Footnote 19: This collection never reached its destination.]
Writing to his parents from Port Elizabeth, 19th May, 1841, he gives his
first impressions of Africa. He had been at a station called Hankey:
"The scenery was very fine. The white sand in some places
near the beach drifted up in large wreaths exactly like snow.
One might imagine himself in Scotland were there not a hot
sun overhead. The woods present an aspect of strangeness, for
everywhere the eye meets the foreign-looking tree from which
the bitter aloes is extracted, popping up its head among the
mimosa bushes and stunted acacias. Beautiful humming-birds
fly about in great numbers, sucking the nectar from the
flowers, which are in great abundance and very beautiful. I
was much pleased with my visit to Hankey.... The state of the
people presents so many features of interest, that one may
talk about it and convey some idea of what the Gospel has
done. The full extent of the benefit received can, however,
be understood only by those who witness it in contrast with
other places that have not been so highly favored. My
expectations have been far exceeded. Everything I witnessed
surpassed my hopes, and if this one station is a fair sample
of the whole, the statements of the missionaries with regard
to their success are far within the mark. The Hottentots of
Hankey appear to be in a state similar to that of our
forefathers in the days immediately preceding the times of
the Covenanters. They have a prayer-meeting every morning at
four o'clock, _and well attended_. They began it during a
visitation of measles among them, and liked it so much that
they still continue."
He goes on to say that as the natives had no clocks or watches, mistakes
sometimes occurred about ringing the bell for this meeting, and
sometimes the people found themselves assembled at twelve or one o'clock
instead of four. The welcome to the missionaries (their own missionary
was returning from the Cape with Livingstone) was wonderful. Muskets
were fired at their approach, then big guns; and then men, women, and
children rushed at the top of their speed to shake hands and welcome
them. The missionary had lost a little boy, and out of respect each of
the people had something black on his head. Both public worship and
family worship were very interesting, the singing of hymns being very
beautiful. The bearing of these Christianized Hottentots was in complete
contrast to that of a Dutch family whom he visited as a medical man one
Sunday. There was no Sunday; the man's wife and daughters were dancing
before the house, while a black played the fiddle.
His instructions from the Directors were to go to Kuruman, remain there
till Mr. Moffat should return from England, and turn his attention to
the formation of a new station farther north, awaiting more specific
instructions, He arrived at Kuruman on the 31st July, 1841, but no
instructions had come from the Directors; his sphere of work was quite
undetermined, and he began to entertain the idea of going to Abyssinia.
There could be no doubt that a Christian missionary was needed there,
for the country had none; but if he should go, he felt that probably he
would never return. In writing of this to his friend Watt, he used words
almost prophetic: "Whatever way my life may be spent so as but to
promote the glory of our gracious God, I feel anxious to do it.... _My
life, may be spent as profitably as a pioneer as in any other way_."
In his next letter to the London Missionary Society, dated Kuruman, 23d
September, 1841, he gives his impressions of the field, and unfolds an
idea which took hold of him at the very beginning, and never lost its
grip. It was, that there was not population enough about the South to
justify a concentration of missionary labor there, and that the policy
of the Society ought to be one of expansion, moving out far and wide
wherever there was an opening, and making the utmost possible use of
native agency, in order to cultivate so wide a field. In England he had
thought that Kuruman might be made a great missionary institute, whence
the beams of divine truth might diverge in every direction, through
native agents supplied from among the converts; but since he came to the
spot he had been obliged to abandon that notion; not that the Kuruman
mission had not been successful, or that the attendance at public
worship was small, but simply because the population was meagre, and
seemed more likely to become smaller than larger. The field from which
native agents might be drawn was thus too small. Farther north there was
a denser population. It was therefore his purpose, along with a brother
missionary, to make an early journey to the interior, and bury himself
among the natives, to learn their language, and slip into their modes of
thinking and feeling. He purposed to take with him two of the best
qualified native Christians of Kuruman, to plant them as teachers in
some promising locality; and in case any difficulty should arise about
their maintenance, he offered, with characteristic generosity, to defray
the cost of one of them from his own resources.
Accordingly, in company with a brother missionary from Kuruman, a
journey of seven hundred miles was performed before the end of the year,
leading chiefly to two results: in the first place, a strong
confirmation of his views on the subject of native agency; and in the
second place, the selection of a station, two hundred and fifty miles
north of Kuruman, as the most suitable for missionary operations. Seven
hundred miles traveled over _more Africano_ seemed to indicate a vast
territory; but on looking at it on the map, it was a mere speck on the
continent of heathenism. How was that continent ever to be evangelized?
He could think of no method except an extensive method of native agency.
And the natives, when qualified, were admirably qualified. Their warm,
affectionate manner of dealing with their fellow-men, their ability to
present the truth to their minds freed from the strangeness of which
foreigners could not divest it, and the eminent success of those
employed by the brethren of Griqua Town, were greatly in their favor.
Two natives had likewise been employed recently by the Kuruman Mission,
and these had been highly efficient and successful. If the Directors
would allow him to employ more of these, conversions would increase in a
compound ratio, and regions not yet explored by Europeans would soon be
supplied with the bread of life.
In regard to the spot selected for a mission, there were many
considerations in its favor. In the immediate neighborhood of Kuruman
the chiefs hated the gospel, because it deprived them of their
supernumerary wives. In the region farther north, this feeling had not
yet established itself; on the contrary, there was an impression
favorable to Europeans, and a desire for their alliance. These Bechuana
tribes had suffered much from the marauding invasions of their
neighbors; and recently, the most terrible marauder of the country,
Mosilikatse, after being driven westward by the Dutch Boers, had taken
up his abode on the banks of a central lake, and resumed his raids,
which were keeping the whole country in alarm. The more peaceful tribes
had heard of the value of the white man, and of the weapons by which a
mere handful of whites had repulsed hordes of marauders. They were
therefore disposed to welcome the stranger, although this state of
feeling could not be relied on as sure to continue, for Griqua hunters
and individuals from tribes hostile to the gospel were moving northward,
and not only circulating rumors unfavorable to missionaries, but by
their wicked lives introducing diseases previously unknown. If these
regions, therefore, were to be taken possession of by the gospel, no
time was to be lost. For himself, Livingstone had no hesitation in going
to reside in the midst of these savages, hundreds of miles away from
civilization, not merely for a visit, but, if necessary, for the whole
of his life.
In writing to his sisters after this journey (8th December, 1841), he
gives a graphic account of the country, and some interesting notices of
the people:
"Janet, I suppose, will feel anxious to know what our dinner
was. We boiled a piece of the flesh of a rhinoceros which was
toughness itself, the night before. The meat was our supper,
and porridge made of Indian corn-meal and gravy of the meat
made a very good dinner next day. When about 150 miles from
home we came to a large village. The chief had sore eyes; I
doctored them, and he fed us pretty well with milk and beans,
and sent a fine buck after me as a present. When we had got
about ten or twelve miles on the way, a little girl about
eleven or twelve years of age came up and sat down under my
wagon, having run away for the purpose of coming with us to
Kuruman. She had lived with a sister whom she had lately lost
by death. Another family took possession of her for the
purpose of selling her as soon as she was old enough for a
wife. But not liking this, she determined to run away from
them and come to some friends near Kuruman. With this
intention she came, and thought of walking all the way behind
my wagon. I was pleased with the determination of the little
creature, and gave her some food. But before we had remained
long there, I heard her sobbing violently, as if her heart
would break. On looking round, I observed the cause. A man
with a gun had been sent after her, and he had just arrived.
I did not know well what to do now, but I was not in
perplexity long, for Pomare, a native convert who accompanied
us, started up and defended her cause. He being the son of a
chief, and possessed of some little authority, managed the
matter nicely. She had been loaded with beads to render her
more attractive, and fetch a higher price. These she stripped
off and gave to the man, and desired him to go away. I
afterward took measures for hiding her, and though fifty men
had come for her, they would not have got her."
The story reads like an allegory or a prophecy. In the person of the
little maid, oppressed and enslaved Africa comes to the good Doctor for
protection; instinctively she knows she may trust him; his heart opens
at once, his ingenuity contrives a way of protection and deliverance,
and he will never give her up. It is a little picture of
Livingstone's life.
In fulfillment of a promise made to the natives in the interior that he
would return to them, Livingstone set out on a second tour into the
interior of the Bechuana country on 10th February, 1842. His objects
were, first, to acquire the native language more perfectly, and second,
by suspending his medical practice, which had become inconveniently
large at Kuruman, to give his undivided attention to the subject of
native agents. He took with him two native members of the Kuruman
church, and two other natives for the management of the wagon.
The first person that specially engaged his interest in this journey was
a chief of the name of Bubi, whose people were Bakwains. With him he
stationed one of the native agents as a teacher, the chief himself
collecting the children and supplying them with food. The honesty of the
people was shown in their leaving untouched all the contents of his
wagon, though crowds of them visited it. Livingstone was already
acquiring a powerful influence, both with chiefs and people, the result
of his considerate and conciliatory treatment of both. He had already
observed the failure of some of his brethren to influence them, and his
sagacity had discerned the cause. His success in inducing Bubi's people
to dig a canal was contrasted in a characteristic passage of a private
letter, with the experience of others.
"The doctor and the rainmaker among these people are one and
the same person. As I did not like to be behind my
professional brethren, I declared I could make rain too, not,
however, by enchantments like them, but by leading out their
river for irrigation. The idea pleased mightily, and to work
we went instanter. Even the chief's own doctor is at it, and
works like a good fellow, laughing heartily at the cunning of
the 'foreigner' who can make rain so. We have only one spade,
and this is without a handle; and yet by means of sticks
sharpened to a point we have performed all the digging of a
pretty long canal. The earth was lifted out in 'gowpens' and
carried to the huge dam we have built in karosses (skin
cloaks), tortoise-shells, or wooden bowls. We intended
nothing of the ornamental in it, but when we came to a huge
stone, we were forced to search for a way round it. The
consequence is, it has assumed a beautifully serpentine
appearance. This is, I believe, the first instance in which
Bechuanas have been got to work without wages. It was with
the utmost difficulty the earlier missionaries got them to do
anything. The missionaries solicited their permission to do
what they did, and this was the very way to make them show
off their airs, for they are so disobliging; if they perceive
any one in the least dependent upon them, they immediately
begin to tyrannize. A more mean and selfish vice certainly
does not exist in the world. I am trying a different plan
with them. I make my presence with any of them a favor, and
when they show any impudence, I threaten to leave them, and
if they don't amend, I put my threat into execution. By a
bold, free course among them I have had not the least
difficulty in managing the most fierce. They are in one sense
fierce, and in another the greatest cowards in the world. A
kick would, I am persuaded, quell the courage of the bravest
of them. Add to this the report which many of them verily
believe, that I am a great wizard, and you will understand
how I can with ease visit any of them. Those who do not love,
fear me, and so truly in their eyes am I possessed of
supernatural power, some have not hesitated to affirm I am
capable of even raising the dead! The people of a village
visited by a French brother actually believed it. Their
belief of my powers, I suppose, accounts, too, for the fact
that I have not missed a single article either from the house
or wagon since I came among them, and this, although all my
things lay scattered about the room, while crammed with
patients."
It was unfortunate that the teacher whom Livingstone stationed with
Bubi's people was seized with a violent fever, so that he was obliged to
bring him away. As for Bubi himself, he was afterward burned to death by
an explosion of gunpowder, which one of his sorcerers was trying, by
means of burnt roots, to _un_-bewitch.
In advancing, Livingstone had occasion to pass through a part of the
great Kalahari desert, and here he met with Sekomi, a chief of the
Bamangwato, from whom also he received a most friendly reception. The
ignorance of this tribe he found to be exceedingly great:
"Their conceptions of the Deity are of the most vague and
contradictory nature, and the name of God conveys no more to
their understanding than the idea of superiority. Hence they
do not hesitate to apply the name to their chiefs. I was
every day shocked by being addressed by that title, and
though it as often furnished me with a text from which to
tell them of the only true God and Jesus Christ, whom he has
sent, yet it deeply pained me, and I never felt so fully
convinced of the lamentable detoriation of our species. It is
indeed a mournful truth that man has become like the beasts
that perish."
The place was greatly infested by lions, and during Livingstone's visit
an awful occurrence took place that made a great impression on him:
"A woman was actually devoured in her garden during my visit,
and that so near the town that I had frequently walked past
it. It was most affecting to hear the cries of the orphan
children of this woman. During the whole day after her death
the surrounding rocks and valleys rang and re-echoed with
their bitter cries. I frequently thought as I listened to the
loud sobs, painfully indicative of the sorrows of those who
have no hope, that if some of our churches could have heard
their sad wailings, it would have awakened the firm
resolution to do more for the heathen than they have done."
Poor Sekomi advanced a new theory of regeneration which Livingstone was
unable to work out:
"On one occasion Sekomi, having sat by me in the hut for some
time in deep thought, at length addressing me by a pompous
title said, 'I wish you would change my heart. Give me
medicine to change it, for it is proud, proud and angry,
angry always.' I lifted up the Testament and was about to
tell him of the only way in which the heart can be changed,
but he interrupted me by saying, 'Nay, I wish to have it
changed by medicine, to drink and have it changed at once,
for it is always very proud and very uneasy, and continually
angry with some one.' He then rose and went away."
A third tribe visited at this time was the Bakaa, and here, too,
Livingstone was able to put in force his wonderful powers of management.
Shortly before, the Bakaa had murdered a trader and his company. When
Livingstone appeared their consciences smote them, and, with the
exception of the chief and two attendants, the whole of the people fled
from his presence. Nothing could allay their terror, till, a dish of
porridge having been prepared, they saw Livingstone partake of it along
with themselves without distrust. When they saw him lie down and fall
asleep they were quite at their ease. Thereafter he began to speak
to them:
"I had more than ordinary pleasure in telling these murderers
of the precious blood which cleanseth from all sin. I bless
God that He has conferred on one so worthless the
distinguished privilege and honor of being the first
messenger of mercy that ever trod these regions. Its being
also the first occasion on which I had ventured to address a
number of Bechuanas in their own tongue without reading it,
renders it to myself one of peculiar interest. I felt more
freedom than I had anticipated, but I have an immense amount
of labor still before me, ere I can call myself a master of
Sichuana. This journey discloses to me that when I have
acquired the Batlapi, there is another and perhaps more
arduous task to be accomplished in the other dialects, but by
the Divine assistance I hope I shall be enabled to conquer.
When I left the Bakaa, the chief sent his son with a number
of his people to see me safe part of the way to the
Makalaka."
On his way home, in passing through Bubi's country, he was visited by
sixteen of the people of Sebehwe, a chief who had successfully withstood
Mosilikatse, but whose cowardly neighbors, under the influence of
jealousy, had banded together to deprive him of what they had not had
the courage to defend. Consequently he had been driven into the sandy
desert, and his object in sending to Livingstone was to solicit his
advice and protection, as he wished to come out, in order that his
people might grow corn, etc. Sebehwe, like many of the other people of
the country, had the notion that if he got a single white man to live
with him, he would be quite secure. It was no wonder that Livingstone
early acquired the strong conviction that if missions could only be
scattered over Africa, their immediate effect in promoting the
tranquillity of the continent could hardly be over-estimated.
We have given these details somewhat fully, because they show that
before he had been a year in the country Livingstone had learned how to
rule the Africans. From the very first, his genial address, simple and
fearless manner, and transparent kindliness formed a spell which rarely
failed. He had great faith in the power of humor. He was never afraid of
a man who had a hearty laugh. By a playful way of dealing with the
people, he made them feel at ease with him, and afterward he could be
solemn enough when the occasion required. His medical knowledge helped
him greatly; but for permanent influence all would have been in vain if
he had not uniformly observed the rules of justice, good feeling, and
good manners. Often ha would say that the true road to influence was
patient continuance in well-doing. It is remarkable that, from the very
first, he should have seen the charm of that method which he employed so
successfully to the end.
In the course of this journey, Livingstone was within ten days of Lake
'Ngami, the lake of which he had heard at the Cape, and which he
actually discovered in 1849; and he might have discovered it now, had
discovery alone been his object. Part of his journey was performed on
foot, in consequence of the draught oxen having become sick:
"Some of my companions," he says in his first book, "who had
recently joined us, and did not know that I understood a
little of their speech, were overheard by me discussing my
appearance and powers: 'He is not strong, he is quite slim,
and only appears stout because he puts himself in those bags
(trousers); he will soon knock up.' This caused my Highland
blood to rise, and made me despise the fatigue of keeping
them all at the top of their speed for days together, and
until I heard them expressing proper opinions of my
pedestrian powers."
We have seen how full Livingstone's heart was of the missionary spirit;
how intent he was on making friends of the natives, and how he could
already preach in one dialect, and was learning another. But the
activity of his mind enabled him to give attention at the same time to
other matters. He was already pondering the structure of the great
African Continent, and carefully investigating the process of
desiccation that had been going on for a long time, and had left much
uncomfortable evidence of its activity in many parts. In the desert, he
informs his friend Watt that no fewer than thirty-two edible roots and
forty-three fruits grew without cultivation. He had the rare faculty of
directing his mind at the full stretch of its power to one great object,
and yet, apparently without effort, giving minute and most careful
attention to many other matters,--all bearing, however, on the same
great end.
A very interesting letter to Dr. Risdon Bennett, dated Kuruman, 18th
December, 1841, gives an account of his first year's work from the
medical and scientific point of view. First, he gives an amusing picture
of the Bechuana chiefs, and then some details of his medical practice:
The people are all under the feudal system of government, the
chieftainship is hereditary, and although the chief is
usually the greatest ass, and the most insignificant of the
tribe in appearance, the people pay a deference to him which
is truly astonishing.... I feel the benefit often of your
instructions, and of those I got through your kindness. Here
I have an immense practice. I have patients now under
treatment who have walked 130 miles for my advice; and when
these go home, others will come for the same purpose. This is
the country for a medical man if he wants a large practice,
but he must leave fees out of the question! The Bechuanas
have a great deal more disease than I expected to find among
a savage nation; but little else can be expected, for they
are nearly naked, and endure the scorching heat of the day
and the chills of the night in that condition. Add to this
that they are absolutely omnivorous. Indigestion, rheumatism,
opthalmia are the prevailing diseases.... Many very bad cases
were brought to me, sometimes, when traveling, my wagon was
quite besieged by their blind and halt and lame. What a
mighty effect would be produced if one of the seventy
disciples were among them to heal them all by a word! The
Bechuanas resort to the Bushmen and the poor people that live
in the desert for doctors. The fact of my dealing in that
line a little is so strange, and now my fame has spread far
and wide. But if one of Christ's apostles were here, I should
think he would be very soon known all over the continent to
Abyssinia. The great deal of work I have had to do in
attending to the sick has proved beneficial to me, for they
make me speak the language perpetually, and if I were
inclined to be lazy in learning it, they would prevent me
indulging the propensity. And they are excellent patients,
too, besides. There is no wincing; everything prescribed is
done _instanter_. Their only failing is that they become
tired of a long course. But in any operation, even the women
sit unmoved. I have been quite astonished again and again at
their calmness. In cutting out a tumor, an inch in diameter,
they sit and talk as if they felt nothing. 'A man like me
never cries,' they say, 'they are children that cry.' And it
is a fact that the men never cry. But when the Spirit of God
works on their minds they cry most piteously. Sometimes in
church they endeavor to screen themselves from the eyes of
the preacher by hiding under the forms or covering their
heads with their karosses as a remedy against their
convictions. And when they find that won't do, they rush out
of the church and run with all their might, crying as if the
hand of death were behind them. One would think, when they
got away, there they would remain; but no, there they are in
their places at the very next meeting. It is not to be
wondered at that they should exhibit agitations of body when
the mind is affected, as they are quite unaccustomed to
restrain their feelings. But that the hardened beings should
be moved mentally at all is wonderful indeed. If you saw them
in their savage state you would feel the force of this
more.... _N.B._--I have got for Professor Owen specimens of
the incubated ostrich in abundance, and am waiting for an
opportunity to transmit the box to the college. I tried to
keep for you some of the fine birds of the interior, but the
weather was so horribly hot they were putrid in a few hours.
When he returned to Kuruman in June, 1842, he found that no instructions
had as yet come from the Directors as to his permanent quarters. He was
preparing for another journey when news arrived that contrary to his
advice, Sebehwe had left the desert where he was encamped, had been
treacherously attacked by the chief Mahura, and that many of his people,
including women and children, had been savagely murdered. What
aggravated the case was that several native Christians from Kuruman had
been at the time with Sebehwe, and that these were accused of having
acted treacherously by him. But now no native would expose himself to
the expected rage of Sebehwe, so that for want of attendants Livingstone
could not go to him. He was obliged to remain for some months about
Kuruman, itinerating to the neighboring tribes, and taking part in the
routine work of the station: that is to say preaching, printing,
building a chapel at an out-station, prescribing for the sick, and many
things else that would have been intolerable, he said, to a man of
"clerical dignity."
He was able to give his father a very encouraging report of the mission
work (July 13, 1842): "The work of God goes on here notwithstanding all
our infirmities. Souls are gathered in continually, and sometimes from
among those you would never have expected to see turning to the Lord.
Twenty-four were added to the Church last month, and there are several
inquirers. At Motito, a French station about thirty-three miles
northeast of this, there has been an awakening, and I hope much good
will result. I have good news, too, from Rio de Janeiro. The Bibles that
have been distributed are beginning to cause a stir."
The state of the country continued so disturbed that it was not till
February, 1843, that he was able to set out for the village where
Sebehwe had taken up his residence with the remains of his tribe. This
visit he undertook at great personal risk. Though looking at first very
ill-pleased, Sebehwe treated him in a short time in a most friendly way,
and on the Sunday after his arrival, sent a herald to proclaim that on
that day nothing should be done but pray to God and listen to the words
of the foreigner. He himself listened with great attention while
Livingstone told him of Jesus and the resurrection, and the missionary
was often interrupted by the questions of the chief. Here, then, was
another chief pacified, and brought under the preaching of the gospel.
Livingstone then passed on to the country of the Bakhatla, where he had
purposed to erect his mission-station. The country was fertile, and the
people industrious, and among other industries was an iron manufactory,
to which as a bachelor he got admission, whereas married men were wont
to be excluded, through fear that they would bewitch the iron! When he
asked the chief if he would like him to come and be his missionary, he
held up his hands and said, "Oh, I shall dance if you do; I shall
collect all my people to hoe for you a garden, and you will get more
sweet reed and corn than myself." The cautious Directors at home,
however, had sent no instructions as to Livingstone's station, and he
could only say to the chief that he would tell them of his desire for a
missionary.
At a distance of five days' journey beyond the Bakhatla was situated the
village of Sechéle, chief of the Bakwains, afterward one of
Livingstone's greatest friends. Sechéle had been enraged at him for not
visiting him the year before, and threatened him with mischief. It
happened that his only child was ill when the missionary arrived, and
also the child of one of his principal men. Livingstone's treatment of
both was successful, and Sechéle had not an angry word. Some of his
questions struck the heart of the missionary:
"'Since it is true that all who die unforgiven are lost
forever, why did your nation not come to tell us of it before
now? My ancestors are all gone, and none of them knew
anything of what you tell me. How is this?' I thought
immediately," says Livingstone, "of the guilt of the Church,
but did not confess. I told him multitudes in our own country
were like himself, so much in love with their sins. My
ancestors had spent a great deal of time in trying to
persuade them, and yet after all many of them by refusing
were lost. We now wish to tell all the world about a Saviour,
and if men did not believe, the guilt would be entirely
theirs. Sechéle has been driven from another part of his
country from that in which he was located last year, and so
has Bubi, so that the prospects I had of benefiting them by
native teachers are for the present darkened."
Among other things that Livingstone found time for in these wanderings
among strange people, was translating hymns into the Sichuana language.
Writing to his father (Bakwain Country, 21st March, 1843), he says:
"Janet may be pleased to learn that I am become a poet, or
rather a poetaster, in Sichuana. Half a dozen of my hymns
were lately printed in a collection of the French brethren.
One of them is a translation of 'There is a fountain filled
with blood;' another, 'Jesus shall reign where'er the sun;'
others are on 'The earth being filled with the glory of the
Lord,' 'Self-dedication,' 'Invitation to Sinners,' 'The soul
that loves God finds him everywhere.' Janet may try to make
English ones on these latter subjects if she can, and Agnes
will doubtless set them to music on the same condition. I do
not boast of having done this, but only mention it to let you
know that I am getting a little better fitted for the great
work of a missionary, that your hearts may be drawn out to
more prayer for the success of the gospel proclaimed by my
feeble lips."
Livingstone was bent on advancing in the direction of the country of the
Matebele and their chief Mosilikatse, but the dread of that terrible
warrior prevented him from getting Bakwains to accompany him, and being
thus unable to rig out a wagon, he was obliged to travel on oxback. In a
letter to Dr. Risdon Bennett (30th June, 1843), he gives a lively
description of this mode of traveling: "It is rough traveling, as you
can conceive. The skin is so loose there is no getting one's great-coat,
which has to serve both as saddle and blanket, to stick on; and then the
long horns in front, with which he can give one a punch in the abdomen
if he likes, make us sit as bolt upright as dragoons. In this manner I
traveled more than 400 miles." Visits to some of the villages of the
Bakalahari gave him much pleasure. He was listened to with great
attention, and while sitting by their fires and listening to their
traditionary tales, he intermingled the story of the Cross with their
conversation, and it was by far the happiest portion of his journey.
The people were a poor, degraded, enslaved race, who hunted for other
tribes to procure them skins; they were far from wells, and had their
gardens far from their houses, in order to have their produce safe from
the chiefs who visited them.
Coming on to his old friends the Bakaa, he found them out of humor with
him, accusing him of having given poison to a native who had been seized
with fever on occasion of his former visit. Consequently he could get
little or nothing to eat, and had to content himself, as he wrote to his
friends, with the sumptuous feasts of his imagination. With his usual
habit of discovering good in all his troubles, however, he found cause
for thankfulness at their stinginess, for in coming down a steep pass,
absorbed with the questions which the people were putting to him, he
forgot where he was, lost his footing, and, striking his hand between a
rock and his Bible which he was carrying, he suffered a compound
fracture of his finger. His involuntary low diet saved him from taking
fever, and the finger was healing favorably, when a sudden visit in the
middle of the night from a lion, that threw them all into consternation,
made him, without thinking, discharge his revolver at the visitor, and
the recoil hurt him more than the shot did the lion. It rebroke his
finger, and the second fracture was worse than the first. "The
Bakwains," he says, "who were most attentive to my wants during the
whole journey of more than 400 miles, tried to comfort me when they saw
the blood again flowing, by saying, 'You have hurt yourself, but you
have redeemed us: henceforth we will only swear by you.' Poor
creatures," he writes to Dr. Bennett, "I wished they had felt gratitude
for the blood that was shed for their precious souls."
Returning to Kuruman from this journey, in June, 1843, Livingstone was
delighted to find at length a letter from the Directors of the Society
authorizing the formation of a settlement in the regions beyond. He
found another letter that greatly cheered him, from a Mrs. M'Robert, the
wife of art Independent minister at Cambuslang (near Blantyre), who had
collected and now sent him £12 for a native agent, and was willing, on
the part of some young friends, to send presents of clothing for the
converts. In acknowledging this letter, Livingstone poured out his very
heart, so full was he of gratitude and delight. He entreated the givers
to consider Mebalwe as their own agent, and to concentrate their prayers
upon him, for prayer, he thought, was always more efficacious when it
could be said, "One thing have I desired of the Lord." As to the present
of clothing, he simply entreated his friends to send nothing of the
kind; such things demoralized the recipients, and bred endless
jealousies. If he were allowed to charge something for the clothes, he
would be pleased to have them, but on no other terms.
Writing to the Secretary of the Society, Rev. A. Tidman (24th June,
1843), and referring to the past success of the Mission in the nearer
localities, he says: "If you could realize this fact as fully as those
on the spot can, you would be able to enter into the feelings of
irrepressible delight with which I hail the decision of the Directors
that we go forward to the dark interior. May the Lord enable me to
consecrate my whole being to the glorious work!"
In this communication to the Directors Livingstone modestly, but frankly
and firmly, gives them his mind on some points touched on in their
letter to him. In regard to his favorite measure--native agency--he is
glad that a friend has remitted money for the employment of one agent,
and that others have promised the means of employing other two. On
another subject he had a communication to make to them which evidently
cost him no ordinary effort. In his more private letters to his friends,
from an early period after entering Africa, he had expressed himself
very freely, almost contemptuously, on the distribution of the
laborers. There was far too much clustering about the Cape Colony, and
the district immediately beyond it, and a woeful slowness to strike out
with the fearless chivalry that became missionaries of the Cross, and
take possession of the vast continent beyond. All his letters reveal the
chafing of his spirit with this confinement of evangelistic energy in
the face of so vast a field--this huddling together of laborers in
sparsely peopled districts, instead of sending them forth over the whole
of Africa, India, and China, to preach the gospel to every creature. He
felt deeply that both the Church at home, and many of the missionaries
on the spot, had a poor conception of missionary duty, out of which came
little faith, little effort, little expectation, with a miserable
tendency to exaggerate their own evils and grievances, and fall into
paltry squabbles which would not have been possible if they had been
fired with the ambition to win the world for Christ.
But what it was a positive relief for him to whisper in the ear of an
intimate friend, it demanded the courage of a hero to proclaim to the
Directors of a great Society. It was like impugning their whole policy
and arraigning their wisdom. But Livingstone could not say one thing in
private and another in public. Frankly and fearlessly he proclaimed
his views:
"The conviction to which I refer is that a much larger share
of the benevolence of the Church and of missionary exertion
is directed into this country than the amount of population,
as compared with other countries, and the success attending
those efforts, seem to call for. This conviction has been
forced upon me, both by a personal inspection, more extensive
than that which has fallen to the lot of any other, either
missionary or trader, and by the sentiments of other
missionaries who have investigated the subject according to
their opportunities. In reference to the population, I may
mention that I was led in England to believe that the
population of the interior was dense, and now since I have
come to this country I have conversed with many, both of our
Society and of the French, and none of them would reckon up
the number of 30,000 Bechuanas."
He then proceeds to details in a most characteristic way, giving the
number of huts in every village, and being careful in every case, as his
argument proceeded on there being a small population, rather to
overstate than understate the number:
"In view of these facts and the confirmation of them I have
received from both French and English brethren, computing the
population much below what I have stated, I confess I feel
grieved to hear of the arrival of new missionaries. Nor am I
the only one who deplores their appointment to this country.
Again and again have I been pained at heart to hear the
question put, Where will these new brethren find fields of
labor in this country? Because I know that in India or China
there are fields large enough for all their energies. I am
very far from undervaluing the success which has attended the
labors of missionaries in this land. No! I gratefully
acknowledge the wonders God hath wrought, and I feel that the
salvation of one soul is of more value than all the effort
that has been expended; but we are to seek the field where
there is a possibility that most souls will be converted, and
it is this consideration which makes me earnestly call the
attention of the Directors to the subject of statistics. If
these were actually returned--and there would be very little
difficulty in doing so--it might, perhaps, be found that
there is not a country better supplied with missionaries in
the world, and that in proportion to the number of agents
compared to the amount of population, the success may be
inferior to most other countries where efforts have been
made."
Finding that a brother missionary was willing to accompany him to the
station he had fixed on among the Bakhatlas, and enable him to set to
work with the necessary arrangements, Livingstone set out with him in
the beginning of August, 1843, and arrived at his destination after a
fortnight's journey. Writing to his family, "in sight of the hills of
Bakhatla," August 21st, 1843, he says: "We are in company with a party
of three hunters: one of them from the West Indies, and two from
India--Mr. Pringle from Tinnevelly, and Captain Steel of the Coldstream
Guards, aide-de-camp to the Governor of Madras.... The Captain is the
politest of the whole, well versed in the classics, and possessed of
much general knowledge." Captain Steele, now General Sir Thomas Steele,
proved one of Livingstone's best and most constant friends. In one
respect the society of gentlemen who came to hunt would not have been
sought by Livingstone, their aims and pursuits being so different from
his; but he got on with them wonderfully. In some instances these
strangers were thoroughly sympathetic, but not in all. When they were
not sympathetic on religion, he had a strong conviction that his first
duty as a servant of Christ was to commend his religion by his life and
spirit--by integrity, civility, kindness, and constant readiness to deny
himself in obliging others; having thus secured, their esteem and
confidence, he would take such quiet opportunities as presented
themselves to get near their consciences on his Master's behalf. He took
care that there should be no moving about on the day of rest, and that
the outward demeanor of all should be befitting a Christian company. For
himself, while he abhorred the indiscriminate slaughter of animals for
mere slaughter's sake, he thought well of the chase as a means of
developing courage, promptness of action in time of danger, protracted
endurance of hunger and thirst, determination in the pursuit of an
object, and other qualities befitting brave and powerful men. The
respect and affection with which he inspired the gentlemen who were thus
associated with him was very remarkable. Doubtless, with his quick
apprehension, he learned a good deal from their society of the ways and
feelings of a class with whom hitherto he had hardly ever been in
contact. The large resources with which they were furnished, in contrast
to his own, excited no feeling of envy, nor even a desire to possess
their ample means, unless he could have used them to extend missionary
operations; and the gentlemen themselves would sometimes remark that the
missionaries were more comfortable than they. Though they might at times
spend thousands of pounds where Livingstone did not spend as many
pence, and would be provided with horses, servants, tents, and stores,
enough to secure comfort under almost any conditions, they had not that
key to the native heart and that power to command the willing services
of native attendants which belonged so remarkably to the missionary.
"When we arrive at a spot where we intend to spend the night," writes
Livingstone to his family, "all hands immediately unyoke the oxen. Then
one or two of the company collect wood; one of us strikes up a fire,
another gets out the water-bucket and fills the kettle; a piece of meat
is thrown on the fire, and if we have biscuits, we are at our coffee in
less than half an hour after arriving. Our friends, perhaps, sit or
stand shivering at their fire for two or three hours before they get
their things ready, and are glad occasionally of a cup of coffee
from us."
The first act of the missionaries on arriving at their destination was
to have an interview with the chief, and ask whether he desired a
missionary. Having an eye to the beads, guns, and other things, of which
white men seemed always to have an ample store, the chief and his men
gave them a cordial welcome, and Livingstone next proceeded to make a
purchase of land. This, like Abraham with the sons of Heth, he insisted
should be done in legal form, and for this purpose he drew up a written
contract to which, after it was fully explained to them, both parties
attached their signatures or marks. They then proceeded to the erection
of a hut fifty feet by eighteen, not getting much help from the
Bakhatlas, who devolved such labors on the women, but being greatly
helped by the native deacon, Mebalwe. All this Livingstone and his
companion had done on their own responsibility, and in the hope that the
Directors would approve of it. But if they did not, he told them that he
was at their disposal "to go anywhere--_provided it be_ FORWARD."
The progress of medical and scientific work during this period is noted
in a letter to Dr. Risdon Bennett, dated 30th June, 1843. In addition to
full details of the missionary work, this letter enters largely into the
state of disease in South Africa, and records some interesting cases,
medical and surgical. Still more interesting, perhaps, is the evidence
it affords of the place in Livingstone's attention which began to be
occupied by three great subjects of which we shall hear much
anon--Fever, Tsetse, and "the Lake." Fever he considered the greatest
barrier to the evangelization of Africa. Tsetse, an insect like a common
fly, destroyed horses and oxen, so that many traders lost literally
every ox in their team. As for the Lake, it lay somewhat beyond the
outskirts of his new district, and was reported terrible for fever. He
heard that Mr. Moffat intended to visit it, but he was somewhat alarmed
lest his friend should suffer. It was not Moffat, but Livingstone,
however, that first braved the risks of that fever swamp.
A subject of special scientific interest to the missionary during this
period was--the desiccation of Africa. On this topic he addressed a long
letter to Dr. Buckland in 1843, of which, considerably to his regret, no
public notice appears to have been taken, and perhaps the letter never
reached him. The substance of this paper may, however, be gathered from
a communication subsequently made to the Royal Geographical Society[20]
after his first impression had been confirmed by enlarged observation
and discovery. Around, and north of Kuruman, he had found many
indications of a much larger supply of water in a former age. He
ascribed the desiccation to the gradual elevation of the western part of
the country. He found traces of a very large ancient river which flowed
nearly north and south to a large lake, including the bed of the present
Orange River; in fact, he believed that the whole country south of Lake
'Ngami presented in ancient times very much the same appearance as the
basin north of that lake does now, and that the southern lake
disappeared when a fissure was made in the ridge through which the
Orange River now proceeds to the sea. He could even indicate the spot
where the river and the lake met, for some hills there had caused an
eddy in which was found a mound of calcareous tufa and travertine, full
of fossil bones. These fossils he was most eager to examine, in order to
determine the time of the change; but on his first visit he had no time,
and when he returned, he was suddenly called away to visit a
missionary's child, a hundred miles off. It happened that he was never
in the same locality again, and had therefore no opportunity to complete
his investigation.
[Footnote 20: See Journal, vol. xxvii. p. 356.]
Dr. Livingstone's mind had that wonderful power which belongs to some
men of the highest gifts, of passing with the utmost rapidity, not only
from subject to subject, but from one mood or key to another entirely
different. In a letter to his family, written about this time, we have a
characteristic instance. On one side of the sheet is a prolonged
outburst of tender Christian love and lamentation over a young attendant
who had died of fever suddenly; on the other side, he gives a map of the
Bakhatla country with its rivers and mountains, and is quite at home in
the geographical details, crowning his description with some sentimental
and half-ludicrous lines of poetry. No reasonable man will fancy that in
the wailings of his heart there was any levity or want of sincerity.
What we are about to copy merits careful consideration: first, as
evincing the depth and tenderness of his love for these black savages;
next, as showing that it was pre-eminently Christian love, intensified
by his vivid view of the eternal world, and belief in Christ as the only
Saviour; and, lastly, as revealing the secret of the affection which
these poor fellows bore to him in return. The intensity of the scrutiny
which he directs on his heart, and the severity of the judgment which he
seems to pass on himself, as if he had not done all he might have done
for the spiritual good of this young man, show with what intense
conscientiousness he tried to discharge his missionary duty:
"Poor Sehamy, where art thou now? Where lodges thy soul
to-night? Didst thou think of what I told thee as thou
turnedst from side to side in distress? I could now do
anything for thee. I could weep for thy soul. But now nothing
can be done. Thy fate is fixed. Oh, am I guilty of the blood
of thy soul, my poor dear Sehamy? If so, how shall I look
upon thee in the judgment? But I told thee of a Saviour;
didst thou think of Him, and did He lead thee through the
dark valley? Did He comfort as He only can? Help me, O Lord
Jesus, to be faithful to every one. Remember me, and let me
not be guilty of the blood of souls. This poor young man was
the leader of the party. He governed the others, and most
attentive he was to me. He anticipated my every want. He kept
the water-calabash at his head at night, and if I awoke, he
was ready to give me a draught immediately. When the meat was
boiled he secured the best portion for me, the best place for
sleeping, the best of everything. Oh, where is he now? He
became ill after leaving a certain tribe, and believed he had
been poisoned. Another of the party and he ate of a certain
dish given them by a woman whom they had displeased, and
having met this man yesterday he said, 'Sehamy is gone to
heaven, and I am almost dead by the poison given us by that
woman.' I don't believe they took any poison, but they do,
and their imaginations are dreadfully excited when they
entertain that belief."
The same letter intimates that in case his family should have arranged
to emigrate to America, as he had formerly advised them to do, he had
sent home a bill of which £10 was to aid the emigration, and £10 to be
spent on clothes for himself. In regard to the latter sum, he now wished
them to add it to the other, so that his help might be more substantial;
and for himself he would make his old clothes serve for another year.
The emigration scheme, which he thought would have added to the comfort
of his parents and sisters, was not, however, carried into effect. The
advice to his family to emigrate proceeded from deep convictions. In a
subsequent letter (4th December, 1850) he writes: "If I could only be
with you for a week, you would goon be pushing on in the world. The
world is ours. Our Father made it to be inhabited, and many shall run
to and fro, and knowledge shall be increased. _It will be increased more
by emigration than by missionaries._" He held it to be God's wish that
the unoccupied parts of the earth should be possessed, and he believed
in Christian colonization as a great means of spreading the gospel. We
shall see afterward that to plant English and Scotch colonies in Africa
became one of his master ideas and favorite schemes.
CHAPTER IV.
FIRST TWO STATIONS--MABOTSA AND CHONUANE.
A.D. 1843-1847.
Description of Mabotsa--A favorite hymn--General reading--Mabotsa
infested with lions--Livingstone's encounter--The native deacon who
saved him--His Sunday-school--Marriage to Mary Moffat--Work at
Mabotsa--Proposed institution for training native agents--Letter to his
mother--Trouble at Mabotsa--Noble sacrifice of Livingstone--Goes to
Sechéle and the Bakwains--New station at Chonuane--Interest shown by
Sechéle--Journeys eastward--The Boers and the Transvaal--Their
occupation of the country, and treatment of the natives--Work among the
Bakwains--Livingstone's desire to move on--Theological conflict at
home--His view of it--His scientific labors and miscellaneous
employments.
Describing what was to be his new home to his friend Watt from Kuruman,
27th September, 1843, Livingstone says: "The Bakhatla have cheerfully
offered to remove to a more favorable position than they at present
occupy. We have fixed upon a most delightful valley, which we hope to
make the centre of our sphere of operations in the interior. It is
situated in what poetical gents like you would call almost an
amphitheatre of mountains. The mountain range immediately in the rear of
the spot where we have fixed our residence is called Mabotsa, or a
marriage-feast. May the Lord lift upon us the light of his countenance,
so that by our feeble instrumentality many may thence be admitted to the
marriage-feast of the Lamb. The people are as raw as may well be
imagined; they have not the least desire but for the things of the
earth, and it must be a long time ere we can gain their attention to the
things which are above."
Something led him in his letter to Mr. Watt to talk of the old monks,
and the spots they selected for their establishments. He goes on to
write lovingly of what was good in some of the old fathers of the
mediæval Church, despite the strong feeling of many to the contrary;
indicating thus early the working of that catholic spirit which was
constantly expanding in later years, which could separate the good in
any man from all its evil surroundings, and think of it thankfully and
admiringly. In the following extract we get a glimpse of a range of
reading much wider than most would probably have supposed likely:
"Who can read the sermons of St. Bernard, the meditations of
St. Augustine, etc., without saying, whatever other faults
they had: They thirsted, and now they are filled. That hymn:
of St. Bernard, on the name of Christ, although in what might
he termed dog-Latin, pleases me so; it rings in my ears as I
wander across the wide, wide wilderness, and makes me wish I
was more like them--
"Jesu, dulcis memoria, Jesu, spes poenitentibus,
Dans cordi vera gaudia; Quam pius es petentibus!
Sed super mel et omnia, Quam bonus es quærentibus!
Ejus dulcis præsentia. Sed quid invenientibus!
Nil canitur suavius, Jesu, dulcedo cordium,
Nil auditur jucundius, Fons, rivus, lumen mentium,
Nil cogitatur dulcius, Excedens omne gaudium,
Quam Jesus Dei filius. Et omne desiderium."
Livingstone was in the habit of fastening inside the boards of his
journals, or writing on the fly-leaf, verses that interested him
specially. In one of these volumes this hymn is copied at full length.
In another we find a very yellow newspaper clipping of the "Song of the
Shirt." In the same volume a clipping containing "The Bridge of
Sighs," beginning
"One more unfortunate,
Weary of breath,
Rashly importunate,
Gone to her death."
In another we have Coleridge's lines:
"He prayeth well who loveth well
Both man and bird and beast.
He prayeth best who loveth best
All things both great and small;
For the dear God who loveth us,
He made and loveth all."
In another, hardly legible on the marble paper, we find:
"So runs my dream: but what am I?
An infant crying in the night;
An infant crying for the light:
And with no language but a cry."
All Livingstone's personal friends testify that, considering the state
of banishment in which he lived, his acquaintance with English
literature was quite remarkable. When a controversy arose in America as
to the genuineness of his letters to the _New York Herald_, the
familiarity of the writer with the poems of Whittier was made an
argument against him. But Livingstone knew a great part of the poetry of
Longfellow, Whittier, and others by heart.
There was one drawback to the new locality: it was infested with lions.
All the world knows the story of the encounter at Mabotsa, which was so
near ending Livingstone's career, when the lion seized him by the
shoulder, tore his flesh, and crushed his bone. Nothing in all
Livingstone's history took more hold of the popular imagination, or was
more frequently inquired about when he came home[21]. By a kind of
miracle his life was saved, but the encounter left him lame for life of
the arm which the lion crunched[22]. But the world generally does not
know that Mebalwe, the native who was with him, and who saved his life
by diverting the lion when his paw was on his head, was the teacher whom
Mrs. M'Robert's twelve pounds had enabled him to employ. Little did the
good woman think that this offering would indirectly be the means of
preserving the life of Livingstone for the wonderful work of the next
thirty years! When, on being attacked by Mebalwe, the lion left
Livingstone, and sprang upon him, he bit his thigh, then dashed toward
another man, and caught him by the shoulder, when in a moment, the
previous shots taking effect, he fell down dead. Sir Bartle Frere, in
his obituary notice of Livingstone read to the Royal Geographical
Society, remarked: "For thirty years afterward all his labors and
adventures, entailing such exertion and fatigue, were undertaken with a
limb so maimed that it was painful for him to raise a fowling-piece, or
in fact to place the left arm in any position above the level of the
shoulder."
[Footnote 21: He did not speak of it spontaneously, and sometimes he
gave unexpected answers to questions put to him about it. To one person
who asked very earnestly what were his thoughts when the lion was above
him, he answered, "I was thinking what part of me he would eat first"--a
grotesque thought, which some persons considered strange in so good a
man, but which was quite in accordance with human experience in similar
circumstances.]
[Footnote 22: The false joint in the crushed arm was the mark by which
the body of Livingstone was identified when brought home by his
followers in 1873.]
In his _Missionary Travels_ Livingstone says that but for the
importunities of his friends, he meant to have kept this story in store
to tell his children in his dotage. How little he made of it at the time
will be seen from the following allusion to it in a letter to his
father, dated 27th July, 1844. After telling how the attacks of the
lions drew the people of Mabotsa away from the irrigating operations he
was engaged in, he says:
"At last, one of the lions destroyed nine sheep in broad
daylight on a hill just opposite our house. All the people
immediately ran over to it, and, contrary to my custom, I
imprudently went with them, in order to see how they acted,
and encourage them to destroy him. They surrounded him
several times, but he managed to break through the circle. I
then got tired. In coming home I had to come near to the end
of the hill. They were then close upon the lion and had
wounded him. He rushed out from the bushes which concealed
him from view, and bit me on the arm so as to break the bone.
It is now nearly well, however, feeling weak only from having
been confined in one position so long; and I ought to praise
Him who delivered me from so great a danger. I hope I shall
never forget his mercy. You need not be sorry for me, for
long before this reaches you it will be quite as strong as
ever it was. Gratitude is the only feeling we ought to have
in remembering the event. Do not mention this to any one. I
do not like to be talked about."
In a letter to the Directors, Livingstone briefly adverts to Mebalwe's
service on this occasion, but makes it a peg on which to hang some
strong remarks on that favorite topic--the employment of native agency:
"Our native assistant Mebalwe has been of considerable value
to the Mission. In endeavoring to save my life he nearly lost
his own, for he was caught and wounded severely, but both
before being laid aside, and since his recovery, he has shown
great willingness to be useful. The cheerful manner in which
he engages with us in manual labor in the station, and his
affectionate addresses to his countrymen, are truly
gratifying. Mr. E. took him to some of the neighboring
villages lately, in order to introduce him to his work; and I
intend to depart to-morrow for the same purpose to several of
the villages situated northeast of this. In all there may be
a dozen considerable villages situated at convenient
distances around us, and we each purpose to visit them
statedly. It would be an _immense advantage_ to the cause had
we many such agents."
Another proof that his pleas for native agency, published in some of the
Missionary Magazines, were telling at home, was the receipt of a
contribution for the employment of a native helper, amounting to £15,
from a Sunday-school in Southampton. Touched with this proof of youthful
sympathy, Livingstone addressed a long letter of thanks to the
Southampton teachers and children, desiring to deepen their interest in
the work, and concluding with an account of his Sunday-school:
"I yesterday commenced school for the first time at Mabotsa,
and the poor little naked things came with fear and
trembling. A native teacher assisted, and the chief collected
as many of them as he could, or I believe we should have had
none. The reason is, the women make us the hobgoblins of
their children, telling them 'these white men bite children,
feed them with dead men's brains, and all manner of nonsense.
We are just commencing our mission among them."
A new star now appeared in Livingstone's horizon, destined to give a
brighter complexion to his life, and a new illustration to the name
Mabotsa. Till this year (1844) he had steadily repudiated all thoughts
of marriage, thinking it better to be independent. Nor indeed had he met
with any one to induce him to change his mind. Writing in the end of
1843 to his friend Watt, he had said: "There's no outlet for me when I
begin to think of getting married but that of sending home an
advertisement to the _Evangelical Magazine_, and if I get very old, it
must be for some decent sort of widow. In the meantime I am too busy to
think of any thing of the kind." But soon after the Moffats came back
from England to Kuruman, their eldest daughter Mary rapidly effected a
revolution in Livingstone's ideas of matrimony. They became engaged. In
announcing his approaching marriage to the Directors, he makes it plain
that he had carefully considered the bearing which this step might have
on his usefulness as a missionary. No doubt if he had foreseen the very
extraordinary work to which he was afterwards to be called, he might
have come to a different conclusion. But now, apparently, he was fixed
and settled. Mabotsa would become a centre from which native missionary
agents would radiate over a large circumference. His own life-work would
resemble Mr. Moffat's. For influencing the women and children of such a
place, a Christian lady was indispensable, and who so likely to do it
well as one born in Africa, the daughter of an eminent and honored
missionary, herself familiar with missionary life, and gifted with the
winning manner and the ready helping hand that were so peculiarly
adapted for this work? The case was as clear as possible, and
Livingstone was very happy.
On his way home from Kuruman, after the engagement, he writes to her
cheerily from Motito, on 1st August, 1844, chiefly about the household
they were soon to get up; asking her to get her father to order some
necessary articles, and to write to Colesberg about the marriage-license
(and if he did not get it, they would license themselves!), and
concluding thus:
"And now, my dearest, farewell. May God bless you! Let your
affection be towards Him much more than towards me; and, kept
by his mighty power and grace, I hope I shall never give you
cause to regret that you have given me a part. Whatever
friendship we feel towards each other, let us always look to
Jesus as our common friend and guide, and may He shield you
with his everlasting arms from every evil!"
Next month he writes from Mabotsa with full accounts of the progress of
their house, of which he was both architect and builder:
"_Mabotsa, 12th September_, 1844.--I must tell you of the
progress I have made in architecture. The walls are nearly
finished, although the dimensions are 52 feet by 20 outside,
or almost the same size as the house in which you now reside.
I began with stone, but when it was breast-high, I was
obliged to desist from my purpose to build it entirely of
that material by an accident, which, slight as it was, put a
stop to my operations in that line. A stone failing was
stupidly, or rather instinctively, caught by me in its fall
by the left hand, and it nearly broke my arm over again. It
swelled up again, and I fevered so much I was glad of a fire,
although the weather was quite warm. I expected bursting and
discharge, but Baba bound it up nicely, and a few days' rest
put all to rights. I then commenced my architecture, and six
days have brought the walls up a little more than six feet.
"The walls will be finished long before you receive this, and
I suppose the roof too, but I have still the wood of the roof
to seek. It is not, however, far off; and as Mr. E. and I,
with the Kurumanites, got on the roof of the school in a
week, I hope this will not be more than a fortnight or three
weeks. Baba has been most useful to me in making door and
window frames; indeed, if he had not turned out I should not
have been advanced so far as I am. Mr. E.'s finger is the
cause in part of my having no aid from him, but all will come
right at last. It is pretty hard work, and almost enough to
drive love out of my head, but it is not situated there; it
is in my heart, and won't come out unless you behave so as to
quench it!...
"You must try and get a maid of some sort to come with
although it is only old Moyimang; you can't go without some
one, and a Makhatla can't be had for either love or money....
"You must excuse soiled paper, my hands won't wash clean
after dabbling mud all day. And although the above does not
contain evidence of it, you are as dear to me as ever, and
will be as long as our lives are spared.--I am still your
most affectionate
"D. LIVINGSTON."
A few weeks later he writes:
"As I am favored with another opportunity to Kuruman, I
gladly embrace it, and wish I could embrace you at the same
time; but as I cannot, I must do the next best to it, and
while I give you the good news that our work is making
progress, and of course the time of our separation becoming
beautifully less, I am happy in the hope that, by the
messenger who now goes, I shall receive the good news that
you are well and happy, and remembering me with some of that
affection which we bear to each other.... All goes on pretty
well here; the school is sometimes well, sometimes ill
attended. I begin to like it, and I once believed I could
never have any pleasure in such employment. I had a great
objection to school-keeping, but I find in that as in almost
everything else I set myself to as a matter of duty, I soon
became enamored of it. A boy came three times last week, and
on the third time could act as monitor to the rest through a
great portion of the alphabet. He is a real Mokhatla, but I
have lost sight of him again. If I get them on a little, I
shall translate some of your infant-school hymns into
Sichuana rhyme, and you may yet, if you have time, teach them
the tunes to them. I, poor mortal, am as mute as a fish in
regard to singing, and Mr. Englis says I have not a bit of
imagination. Mebalwe teaches them the alphabet in the 'auld
lang syne' tune sometimes, and I heard it sung by some youths
in the gardens yesterday--a great improvement over their old
see-saw tunes indeed. Sometimes we have twenty, sometimes
two, sometimes none at all.
"Give my love to A., and tell her to be sure to keep my
lecture warm. She must not be vexed with herself, that she
was not more frank to me. If she is now pleased, all is
right. I have sisters, and know all of you have your
failings, but I won't love you less for these. And to mother,
too, give my kindest salutation. I suppose I shall get a
lecture from her, too, about the largeness of the house. If
there are too many windows, she can just let me know. I could
build them all up in two days, and let the light come down
the chimney, if that would please. I'll do anything for
peace, except fighting for it. And now I must again, my dear,
dear Mary, bid you good-bye. Accept my expressions as
literally true when I say, I am your most affectionate and
still confiding lover,
"D. LIVINGSTON."
In due time the marriage was solemnized, and Livingstone brought his
wife to Mabotsa. Here they went vigorously to work, Mrs. Livingstone
with her infant-school, and her husband with all the varied agencies,
medical, educational, and pastoral, which his active spirit could bring
to bear upon the people. They were a very superstitious race, and, among
other things, had great faith in rain-making. Livingstone had a famous
encounter with one of their rain-makers, the effect of which, was that
the pretender was wholly nonplused; but instead of being convinced of
the absurdity of their belief, the people were rather disposed to think
that the missionaries did not want them to get rain. Some of them were
workers in iron, who carried their superstitious notions into that
department of life, too, believing that the iron could be smelted only
by the power of medicines, and that those who had not the proper
medicine need not attempt the work. In the hope of breaking down these
absurdities, Livingstone planned a course of popular lectures on the
works of God in creation and providence, to be carried out in the
following way:
"I intend to commence with the goodness-of God in giving iron
ore, by giving, if I can, a general knowledge of the
simplicity of the substance, and endeavoring to disabuse
their minds of the idea which prevents them, in general, from
reaping the benefit of that mineral which abounds in their
country. I intend, also, to pay more attention to the
children of the few believers we have with us as a class, for
whom, as baptized ones, we are bound especially to care. May
the Lord enable me to fulfill my resolutions! I have now the
happy prospect before me of real missionary work. All that
has preceded has been preparatory."
All this time Livingstone had been cherishing his plan of a training
seminary for native agents. He had written a paper and brought the
matter before the missionaries, but without success. Some opposed the
scheme fairly, as being premature, while some insinuated that his object
was to stand well with the Directors, and get himself made Professor.
This last objection induced him to withdraw his proposal. He saw that in
his mode of prosecuting the matter he had not been very knowing; it
would have been better to get some of the older brethren to adopt it. He
feared that his zeal had injured the cause he desired to benefit, and in
writing to his friend Watt, he said that for months he felt bitter
grief, and could never think of the subject without a pang[23].
[Footnote 23: Dr. Moffat favored the scheme of a training seminary, and
when he came home afterward, helped to raise a large sum of money for
the purpose. He was strongly of opinion that the institution should be
built at Sechéle's; but, contrary to his view, and that of Livingstone,
it has been placed at Kuruman.]
A second time he brought forward his proposal, but again without
success. Was he then to be beaten? Far from it. He would change his
tactics, however. He would first set himself to show what could be done
by native efforts; he would travel about, wherever he found a road, and
after inquiries, settle native agents far and wide. The plan had only to
be tried, under God's blessing, to succeed. Here again we trace the
Providence that shaped his career. Had his wishes been carried into
effect, he might have spent his life training native agents, and doing
undoubtedly a noble work: but he would not have traversed Africa; he
would not have given its death-blow to African slavery; he would not
have closed the open sore of the world, nor rolled away the great
obstacle to the evangelization of the Continent.
Some glimpses of his Mabotsa life may be got from a letter to his mother
(14th May, 1845). Usually his letters for home were meant for the whole
family and addressed accordingly; but with a delicacy of feeling, which
many will appreciate, he wrote separately to his mother after a little
experience of married life:
"I often think of you, and perhaps more frequently since I
got married than before. Only yesterday I said to my wife,
when I thought of the nice clean bed I enjoy now, 'You put me
in mind of my mother; she was always particular about our
beds and linen. I had had rough times of it before.'...
"I cannot perceive that the attentions paid to my
father-in-law at home have spoiled him. He is, of course, not
the same man he formerly must have been, for he now knows the
standing he has among the friends of Christ at home. But the
plaudits he received have had a bad effect, and tho' not on
_his_ mind, yet on that of his fellow-laborers. You, perhaps,
cannot understand this, but so it is. If one man is praised,
others think this is more than is deserved, and that they,
too ('others,' they say, while they mean themselves), ought
to have a share. Perhaps you were gratified to see my letters
quoted in the _Chronicle_. In some minds they produced bitter
envy, and if it were in my power, I should prevent the
publication of any in future. But all is in the Lord's hands;
on Him I cast my care. His testimony I receive as it
stands--He careth for us. Yes, He does; for He says it, who
is every way worthy of credit. He will give what is good for
me. He will see to it that all things work together for good.
Do thou for me, O Lord God Almighty! May his blessing rest on
you, my dear mother....
"I received the box from Mr. D. The clothes are all too wide
by four inches at least. Does he think that aldermen grow in
Africa? Mr. N., too, fell into the same fault, but he will be
pleased to know his boots will be worn by a much better
man--Mr. Moffat. I am not an atom thicker than when you
saw me....
"Respecting the mission here, we can say nothing. The people
have not the smallest love to the gospel of Jesus. They hate
and fear it, as a revolutionary spirit is disliked by the old
Tories. It appears to them as that which, if not carefully
guarded against, will seduce them, and destroy their
much-loved domestic institutions. No pro-slavery man in the
Southern States dreads more the abolition principles than do
the Bakhatla the innovations of the Word of God. Nothing but
power Divine can work the mighty change."
Unhappily Mr. and Mrs. Livingstone's residence at Mabotsa was embittered
by a painful collision with the missionary who had taken part in rearing
the station. Livingstone was accused of acting unfairly by him, of
assuming to himself more than his due, and attempts were made to
discredit him, both among the missionaries and the Directors. It was a
very painful ordeal, and Livingstone felt it keenly. He held the
accusation to be unjust, as most people will hold it to have been who
know that one of the charges against him was that he was a
"non-entity"! A tone of indignation pervades his letters:--that after
having borne the heat and burden of the day, he should be accused of
claiming for himself the credit due to one who had done so little in
comparison. But the noble spirit of Livingstone rose to the occasion.
Rather than have any scandal before the heathen, he would give up his
house and garden at Mabotsa, with all the toil and money they had cost
him, go with his young bride to some other place, and begin anew the
toil of house and school building, and gathering the people around him.
His colleague was so struck with his generosity that he said had he
known his intention he never would have spoken a word against him.
Livingstone had spent all his money, and out of a salary of a hundred
pounds it was not easy to build a house every other year. But he stuck
to his resolution. Parting with his garden evidently cost him a pang,
especially when he thought of the tasteless hands into which it was to
fall. "I like a garden," he wrote, "but paradise will make amends for
all our privations and sorrows here." Self-denial was a firmly
established habit with him; and the passion of "moving on" was warm in
his blood. Mabotsa did not thrive after Livingstone left it, but the
brother with whom he had the difference lived to manifest a very
different spirit.
In some of his journeys, Livingstone had come into close contact with
the tribe of the Bakwains, which, on the murder of their chief, some
time before, had been divided into two, one part under Bubi, already
referred to, and the other under Sechéle, son of the murdered chief,
also already introduced. Both of these chiefs had shown much regard for
Livingstone, and on the death of Bubi, Sechéle and his people indicated
a strong wish that a missionary should reside among them. On leaving
Mabotsa, Livingstone transferred his services to this tribe. The name of
the pew station was Chonuane; it was situated some forty miles from
Mabotsa, and in 1846 it became the centre of Livingstone's operations
among the Bakwains and their chief Sechéle.
Livingstone had been disappointed with the result of his work among the
Bakhatlas. No doubt much good had been done; he had prevented several
wars; but where were the conversions[24]? On leaving he found that he
had made more impressions on them than he had supposed. They were most
unwilling to lose him, offered to do anything in their power for his
comfort, and even when his oxen were "inspanned" and he was on the point
of moving, they offered to build a new house without expense to him in
some other place, if only he would not leave them. In a financial point
of view, the removal to Chonuane was a serious undertaking. He had to
apply to the Directors at home for a building-grant--only thirty pounds,
but there were not wanting objectors even to that small sum. It was only
in self-vindication that he was constrained to tell of the hardships
which his family had borne;--
[Footnote 24: When some of Livingstone's "new light" friends heard that
there were so few conversions, they seem to have thought that he was too
much of an old Calvinist, and wrote to him to preach that the remedy was
as extensive as the disease--Christ loved _you_, and gave himself for
_you_. "You may think me heretical," replied he, "but we don't need to
make the extent of the atonement the main topic of our preaching. We
preach to men who don't know but they are beasts, who have no idea of
God as a personal agent, or of sin as evil, otherwise than as an offense
against each other, which may or may not be punished by the party
offended.... Their consciences are seared, and moral perceptions
blunted. Their memories retain scarcely anything we teach them, and so
low have they sunk that the plainest text in the whole Bible cannot be
understood by them."]
"We endured for a long while, using a wretched infusion of
native corn for coffee, but when our corn was done, we were
fairly obliged to go to Kuruman for supplies. I can bear what
other Europeans would consider hunger and thirst without any
inconvenience, but when we arrived, to hear the old woman who
had seen my wife depart about two years before, exclaiming
before the door, 'Bless me! how lean she is! Has he starved
her? Is there no food in the country to which she has been?'
was more than I could well bear."
From the first, Sechéle showed an intelligent interest in Livingstone's
preaching. He became a great reader especially of the Bible, and
lamented very bitterly that he had got involved in heathen customs, and
now did not know what to do with his wives. At one time he expressed
himself quite willing to convert all his people to Christianity by the
litupa, _i.e._ whips of rhinoceros hide; but when he came to understand
better, he lamented that while he could make his people do anything else
he liked, he could not get one of them to believe. He began family
worship, and Livingstone was surprised to hear how well he conducted
prayer in his own simple and beautiful style. When he was baptized,
after a profession of three years, he sent away his superfluous wives in
a kindly and generous way; but all their connections became active and
bitter enemies of the gospel, and the conversion of Sechéle, instead of
increasing the congregation, reduced it so much that sometimes the chief
and his family were almost the only persons present. A bell-man of a
somewhat peculiar order was once employed to collect the people for
service--a tall gaunt fellow. "Up he jumped on a sort of platform, and
shouted at the top of his voice, 'Knock that woman down over there.
Strike her, she is putting on her pot! Do you see that one hiding
herself? Give her a good blow. There she is--see, see, knock her down!'
All the women ran to the place of meeting in no time, for each thought
herself meant. But, though a most efficient bell-man, we did not like to
employ him."
While residing at Chonuane, Livingstone performed two journeys eastward,
in order to attempt the removal of certain obstacles to the
establishment of at least one of his native teachers in that direction.
This brought him into connection with the Dutch Boers of the Cashan
mountains, otherwise called Magaliesberg. The Boers were emigrants from
the Cape, who had been dissatisfied with the British rule, and
especially with the emancipation of their Hottentot slaves, and had
created for themselves a republic in the north (the Transvaal), in order
that they might pursue, unmolested, the proper treatment of the blacks.
"It is almost needless to add," says Livingstone, "that proper treatment
has always contained in it the essential element of slavery, viz.,
compulsory unpaid labor." The Boers had effected the expulsion of
Mosilikatse, a savage Zulu warrior, and in return for this service they
considered themselves sole masters of the soil. While still engaged in
the erection of his dwelling-house at Chonuane, Livingstone received
notes from the Commandant and Council of the emigrants, requesting an
explanation of his intentions
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