In eight deaths on the Zambesi and Shire districts, not a single parting word or direction in any instance was uttered. Neither hope nor courage give way as death approaches. In most cases, a comatose state of exhaustion supervenes, which, if it be not quickly arrested by active measures, passes into complete insensibility; this is almost invariably the closing scene.
In Dr. Livingstone’s case, we find some departure from the ordinary symptoms. The great loss of blood may have had a bearing on the case. He was alive to the conviction that malarial poison is the basis of every disorder in Tropical Africa, and he did not doubt but that he was fully under its influence while suffering so severely. A man of less endurance in all probability would have perished in the first week of the terrible approach to the lake, through the flooded country and under the continual downpour that he describes. It tried every constitution, saturated every man with fever-poison, and destroyed several. The greater vitality in his iron system very likely staved off for a few days the last state of coma to which we refer; but there is quite sufficient to show us that only a thin margin lay between the heavy drowsiness of the last few days before reaching Chitambo’s and the final and usual symptom that brings on unconsciousness and inability to speak.
He hoped to recover as he had so often done before; and this in a measure accounts for the absence of anything like a dying statement. It may be that at the last a flash of conviction for a moment lighted up the mind; if so, what greater consolation can those have who mourn his loss, than the account that the men give of what they saw when they entered the hut? Livingstone had not merely turned himself, he had risen to pray; he still rested on his knees, his hands were clasped under his head; when they approached him, he seemed to live. He had not fallen to right or left when he rendered up his spirit to God. Death required no change of limb or position; there was merely the gentle settling forward of the frame unstrung by pain, for the Traveler’s perfect rest had come.
Before daylight the men were quietly told in each hut what had happened, and that they were to assemble. Susi and Chuma wished every body to be present while the boxes were opened, so that, in case money or valuables were in them, all might be responsible. Jacob Wainwright (who could write, they knew) was asked to make some notes which should serve as an inventory, and then the boxes were brought out from the hut.
Before he left England in 1865, Dr. Livingstone had arranged that his traveling equipment should be as compact as possible. An old friend gave him some exceedingly well-made tin boxes, two of which lasted out the whole of his travels. In these his papers and instruments were safe from wet and from white ants, which have to be guarded against more than anything else. Besides the articles mentioned below, a number of letters and dispatches in various stages were likewise inclosed, and one can never sufficiently extol the good feeling which after his death invested all these writings with something like a sacred care in the estimation of all his men. It was the Doctor’s custom to carry a small metallic note-book in his pocket; a quantity of these have come to hand, filled from end to end; and as the men preserved every one that they found, we have almost a daily entry to fall back upon. Nor was less care shown for his rifles, sextants, his Bible and Church-service, and the medicine chest.
Jacob’s entry is as follows, and it was thoughtfully made at the back end of the same note-book that was in use by the Doctor when he died. It runs as follows:
“11 o’clock night, 28th April.
“In the chest was found about a shilling and a half, and in other chest his hat, one watch, and two small boxes of measuring instrments, and in each box there was one. One compass, three other kind of measuring instruments. Four other kind of measuring instruments. And in another chest three drachmas and half half scrople.”
A word is necessary concerning the first part of this. It will be observed that Dr. Livingstone made his last note on the 27th of April. Jacob, referring to it as the only indication of the day of the month, and fancying, moreover, that it was written on the preceding day, wrote down “28th April.” Had he observed that the few words opposite the 27th in the pocket-book related to the stay at Kalunganjovu’s village, and not to any portion of the time at Chitambo’s the error would have been avoided. Again, with respect to the time. It was about 11 o’clock P.M, when Susi last saw his master alive, and therefore this time is noted; but both he and Chuma feel quite sure, from what Majwara said, that death did not take place till some hours after.
It was not without some alarm that the men realized their more immediate difficulties; none could see better than they what complications might arise in an hour.