When we returned, the contrast between the vegetation about Muazi’s and that near the ship was very striking. We had come so quickly down, that while on the plateau in latitude 12 degrees S., the young leaves had in many cases passed from the pink or other colour they have on first coming out to the light fresh green which succeeds it, here, on the borders of 16 degrees S., or from 150 to 180 miles distant, the trees were still bare, the grey colour of the bark predominating over every other hue. The trees in the tropics here have a very well-marked annual rest. On the Rovuma even, which is only about ten degrees from the equator, in September the slopes up from the river some sixty miles inland were of a light ashy-grey colour; and on ascending them, we found that the majority of the trees were without leaves; those of the bamboo even lay crisp and crumpled on the ground. As the sun is usually hot by day, even in the winter, this withering process may be owing to the cool nights; Africa differing so much from Central India in the fact that, in Africa, however hot the day may be, the air generally cools down sufficiently by the early morning watches to render a covering or even a blanket agreeable.
The first fortnight after our return to the ship was employed in the delightful process of resting, to appreciate which a man must have gone through great exertions. In our case the muscles of the limbs were as hard as boards, and not an ounce of fat existed on any part of the body. We now had frequent showers; but, these being only the earlier rains, the result on the rise of the river was but a few inches. The effect of these rains on the surrounding scenery was beautiful in the extreme. All trace of the dry season was soon obliterated, and hills and mountains from base to summit were covered with a mantle of living green. The sun passed us on his way south without causing a flood, so all our hopes of a release were centred on his return towards the Equator, when, as a rule, the waters of inundation are made to flow. Up to this time the rains descended simply to water the earth, fill the pools, and make ready for the grand overflow for which we had still to wait six weeks. It is of no use to conceal that we waited with much chagrin; for had we not been forced to return from the highlands west of Nyassa we might have visited Lake Bemba; but unavailing regrets are poor employment for the mind; so we banished them to the best of our power.
About the middle of December, 1863, we were informed that Bishop Mackenzie’s successor, after spending a few months on the top of a mountain about as high as Ben Nevis in Scotland, at the mouth of the Shiré, where there were few or no people to be taught, had determined to leave the country. This unfortunate decision was communicated to us at the same time that six of the boys reared by Bishop Mackenzie were sent back into heathenism. The boys were taken to a place about seven miles from the ship, but immediately found their way up to us. We told them that if they wished to remain in the country they had better so arrange at once, for we were soon to leave. The sequel will show their choice.
As soon as the death of Bishop Mackenzie was known at the Cape, Dr. Gray, the excellent Bishop there, proceeded at once to England, with a view of securing an early appointment of another head to the Mission, which in its origin owed so much to his zeal for the spread of the gospel among the heathen, and whose interests he had continually at heart. About the middle of 1862 we heard that Dr. Gray’s efforts had been successful, and that another clergyman would soon take the place of our departed friend. This pleasing intelligence was exceedingly cheering to the Missionaries, and gratifying also to the members of the Expedition. About the beginning of 1863 the new Bishop arrived at the mouth of the river in a man-of-war, and after some delay proceeded inland. The Bishop of the Cape had taken a voyage home at considerable inconvenience to himself, for the sole object of promoting this Mission to the heathen; and it was somehow expected that the man he would secure would be an image of himself; and we must say, that whatever others, from the representations that have gone abroad, may think of his character, we invariably found Dr. Gray to be a true, warm-hearted promoter of the welfare of his fellow-men; a man whose courage and zeal have provoked very many to good works.
It was hoped that the presence of a new head to the Mission would infuse new energy and life into the small band of Missionaries, whose ranks had been thinned by death; and who, though discouraged by the disasters which the slave war and famine had induced, and also dispirited by the depressing influences of a low and unhealthy position in the swampy Shiré Valley, were yet bravely holding out till the much-needed moral and material aid should arrive.
We believe that we are uttering the sentiments of many devout members of different sections of Christians, when we say, it was a pity that the Mission of the Universities was abandoned. The ground had been consecrated in the truest sense by the lives of those brave men who first occupied it. In bare justice to Bishop Mackenzie, who was the first to fall, it must be said, that the repudiation of all he had done, and the sudden abandonment of all that had cost so much life and money to secure, was a serious line of conduct for one so unversed in Missionary operations as his successor, to inaugurate. It would have been no more than fair that Bishop Tozer, before winding up the affairs of the Mission, should actually have examined the highlands of the Upper Shiré; he would thus have gratified the associates of his predecessor, who believed that the highlands had never had a fair trial, and he would have gained from personal observation a more accurate knowledge of the country and the people than he could possibly have become possessed of by information gathered chiefly on the coast. With this examination, rather than with a stay of a few months on the humid, dripping top of misty Morambala, we should have felt much more satisfied.
In January, 1864, the natives all confidently asserted that at next full moon the river would have its great and permanent flood. It had several times risen as much as a foot, but fell again as suddenly. It was curious that their observation coincided exactly with ours, that the flood of inundation happens when the sun comes overhead on his way back to the Equator. We mention this more minutely because, from the observation of several years, we believe that in this way the inundation of the Nile is to be explained. On the 19th the Shiré suddenly rose several feet, and we started at once; and stopping only for a short time at Chibisa’s to bid adieu to the Ajawa and Makololo, who had been extremely useful to us of late in supplying maize and fresh provisions, we hastened on our way to the ocean. In order to keep a steerage way on the “Pioneer,” we had to go quicker than the stream, and unfortunately carried away her rudder in passing suddenly round a bank. The delay required for the repairs prevented our reaching Morambala till the 2nd of February.
The flood-water ran into a marsh some miles above the mountain, and became as black as ink; and when it returned again to the river emitted so strong an effluvium of sulphuretted hydrogen, that one could not forget for an instant that the air was most offensive. The natives said this stench did not produce disease. We spent one night in it, and suffered no ill effects, though we fully expected an attack of fever. Next morning every particle of white paint on both ships was so deeply blackened, that it could not be cleaned by scrubbing with soap and water. The brass was all turned to a bronze colour, and even the iron and ropes had taken a new tint. This is an additional proof that malaria and offensive effluvia are not always companions. We did not suffer more from fever in the mangrove swamps, where we inhaled so much of the heavy mousey smell that it was distinguishable in the odour of our shirts and flannels, than we did elsewhere.
We tarried in the foul and blackening emanations from the marsh because we had agreed to receive on board about thirty poor orphan boys and girls, and a few helpless widows whom Bishop Mackenzie had attached to his Mission. All who were able to support themselves had been encouraged by the Missionaries to do so by cultivating the ground, and they now formed a little free community. But the boys and girls who were only from seven to twelve years of age, and orphans without any one to help them, could not be abandoned without bringing odium on the English name. The effect of an outcry by some persons in England, who knew nothing of the circumstances in which Bishop Mackenzie was placed, and who certainly had not given up their own right of appeal to the sword of the magistrate, was, that the new head of the Mission had gone to extremes in the opposite direction from his predecessor; not even protesting against the one monstrous evil of the country, the slave-trade. We believed that we ought to leave the English name in the same good repute among the natives that we had found it; and in removing the poor creatures, who had lived with Mackenzie as children with a father, to a land where the education he began would be completed, we had the aid and sympathy of the best of the Portuguese, and of the whole population. The difference between shipping slaves and receiving these free orphans struck us as they came on board. As soon as permission to embark was given, the rush into the boat nearly swamped her—their eagerness to be safe on the “Pioneer’s” deck had to be repressed.
Bishop Tozer had already left for Quillimane when we took these people and the last of the Universities’ Missionaries on board and proceeded to the Zambesi. It was in high flood. We have always spoken of this river as if at its lowest, for fear lest we should convey an exaggerated impression of its capabilities for navigation. Instead of from five to fifteen feet, it was now from fifteen to thirty feet, or more, deep. All the sandbanks and many of the islands had disappeared, and before us rolled a river capable, as one of our naval friends thought, of carrying a gunboat. Some of the sandy islands are annually swept away, and the quantities of sand carried down are prodigious.