“First come the silver mace-bearers, then the choristers, then the coffin, of brightly polished oak, in which the metal shells have been enclosed. On the brass plate is the inscription,
DAVID LIVINGSTONE,
Born at Blantyre, Lanarkshire, Scotland,
19th March, 1813.
Died at Mullala, Central Africa,
4th May, 1873.
and the lid is covered with wreaths of white camellias and branches of palm.”
The solemn and impressive service of the English Church was effectively conducted by Dean Stanley, assisted by the Sub-Dean and Canons; it was choral throughout. The entire effect was grand in its solemn intensity.
The grave is in the centre of the west part of the nave, in close proximity to those of Telford and Stephenson, the engineers, Sir James Outram and General Wade, the soldiers, and other men of eminence in various lines of service. It is in a spot cheered with sunshine, and during the funeral service it was illumined with a ray of sunlight which, passing through the superb stained-glass memorial window erected to the memory of Brunel, the engineer of the Thames Tunnel and the Saltash Viaduct, had a fine effect. The grave is shallow, owing to the fact that the soil is too sandy to admit of digging deep.
The words “Dust to dust, ashes to ashes” having been pronounced and the service closed, the people dispersed slowly and with a solemnity that seemed to betoken a sense of personal loss.
One fact was evident throughout all the doings of the three days, from the time of the landing at Southampton, to the close of the ceremonies in Westminster Abbey—and that was that the deceased explorer-missionary had won the respect, the esteem, nay, the love, of all classes, from the Royal household to the humblest of the people.
Nor are these sentiments confined to the people of the British Empire; all nations and peoples of the Christian world share in them. And in no part of the world are these feelings warmer and stronger than in the United States. As a partial evidence of this, we may allude to the immense meeting in New York on the 23d of April. The spacious Academy of Music proved far too small to admit the thousands who sought entrance. The warmly eulogistic addresses of Chief Justice Daly, Rev. Dr. Adams, Henry Ward Beecher, Dr. I. I. Hayes (the Arctic explorer), the Rev. Dr. Schenck and others, met with the hearty endorsement of those who were fortunate enough to gain admittance. And outside of New York and among those who could not attend the meeting, the feeling is no less sincere. This universal sentiment is attributable not so much to Dr. Livingstone’s eminent services as an explorer, great as are their certain results, as to his unwearied philanthropy and his Christian spirit of self-consecration to the great work of rescuing the degraded people of Central Africa and of putting an end to the fearful slave trade. His heart lies buried in the land to whose interests he devoted his best years, and his body in an honored grave in Westminster Abbey amid England’s most distinguished sons—his soul has found its home among the “blessed of the Father,” with the Lord whom he loved and served, but he yet lives, a cherished hero, in the memories of the good and true of all Christian climes.
The British Government and people received more than they conferred of honor, in their earnest and unsparing tributes to his memory.