AN INTERRUPTED JOURNEY.

When Livingstone was marching down the valley of the Zambezi, and had crossed its great northern affluent, the Loangwe, he found himself and party of carriers in the midst of a dense forest. All of his riding oxen had been killed by the tsetse fly, except one, and this had been so reduced in strength as to be unable to carry

the traveler more than half the time. Therefore such a thing as forced journeys were out of the question. There was nothing to do but to proceed leisurely, and this the party were doing,—pushing now through thick clumps of forest, and now through tangled bush, as best they might.

While thus threading their way through a forest clump, there was a rush and a roar off to the left, and almost instantly three huge buffaloes made their appearance, running as if they been badly frightened in the direction whence they came. As the bush was thick and high, they evidently did not see that their course was directly athwart that of the traveling party, and so they rushed right into the midst of the carriers, before they had time to clear the way. Livingstone’s ox, frightened at the unexpected dash, made a plunge forward, nearly throwing its rider off, but thereby escaping the fury of the charging buffaloes. When he turned, he saw one of his carriers flying through the air at a height of twenty feet, having been tossed by the foremost of the animals, whose fright seems to have been turned into rage at sight of human beings.

The buffaloes rushed by and Livingstone hastened to his carrier, expecting to find him dead or badly gored. But strange to say he was only bruised and frightened, and was quickly able to resume his load. On inquiry, Livingstone found that the carrier had drawn his misfortune on himself. Instead of doing as the others had done, making for a friendly tree, he had thrown down his load, and as the leading buffalo was dashing by, he had given it a vicious stab in the side, whereupon the beast had savagely turned upon him and sent him high into the air.