In later years Du Chaillu has devoted his attention to the northern parts of Sweden, Norway, Lapland, and Finland, and although his travels in these regions had no important geographical outcome, yet they resulted in lately placing the general public in possession of many interesting details of these countries, as given in his book called “The Land of the Midnight Sun.” His important work, “The Viking Age,” is an elaborate presentation of his theory that the ancestors of the English-speaking races were Vikings and not Anglo-Saxons, and has awakened much comment in the scientific world. “Ivar the Viking,” his latest book, is a popular account of Viking life and manners in the third and fourth centuries.
| Arrows of the African Pigmies. |
| Henry M. Stanley. |
XIV.
STANLEY AFRICANUS AND THE CONGO FREE STATE.
The largest, the richest, and the least known of the great continents is Africa. Despite its vast area, numerous tribes, and complicated interests it may be said that its potential influences as regards the rest of the world have been alternately retarded and advanced through the efforts of four individuals. The jealousy of Rome, excited to its highest pitch by the eloquence of the elder Cato, resulted, 146 B.C., in the annihilation of Carthage, an industrial centre whence for five centuries had radiated toward the interior of Africa peaceful and commercial influences. Eight centuries later the hordes of the Arabian Caliph Omar in turn overwhelmed the Roman colony at Alexandria, destroying forever its literary influence by the burning of its great library.
Conversely the missionary labors of David Livingstone, from 1849 to 1873, inculcated peaceful methods and cultivated moral tendencies destined to introduce Christianity and develop civilization. Not only did Livingstone, in the eloquent words of Stanley, “weave by his journeys the figure of his Redeemer’s cross on the map of Africa, but, scattering ever his Master’s words and patterning his life after the Master stamped the story of the cross on the hearts of every African tribe he visited.”
Initiating routes of travel, suggesting new commercial fields, and organizing stable forms of government, came a man of harder metal, of indomitable will and courage, Henry M. Stanley, who merits the title of Stanley Africanus.