CHAPTER XXIV
H. M. Stanley sits to Joseph Tussaud—The story of his life—How he found Livingstone—A mysterious veiled lady—The Prince Imperial.
In 1873 the nation was saddened by the death at Ilala of Dr. Livingstone, the great missionary-explorer, who, some time before, had disappeared in the trackless wastes of Central Africa while preaching the gospel to savages and making surveys of the great continent. The name of Livingstone will always be bracketed with that of H. M. Stanley, who, as the emissary of the New York Herald, “discovered” him.
DAVID LIVINGSTONE
Missionary and African Explorer, whose model is in the Tussaud collection.
When my father wrote to Stanley asking for a sitting, he replied that he was too heavily engaged at the time writing his book How I Found Livingstone, and he proposed that the artist should call and make a study of him at his desk. This he did, with the happy result that he produced a very striking portrait.
The story of Stanley’s life is a romance in itself.
Born of poor parents at Denbigh, in Wales, about 1840, he at first bore the name of John Rowlands. When about fifteen years of age he worked his way as a cabin boy to New Orleans, where he was employed by a merchant, name Stanley, whose name he assumed.