LTHOUGH the travellers' tales from Africa are so numerous and so interesting that the difficulty is not to find them, but to choose among them, there is one traveller who stands out head and shoulders above all the rest. And though his name be 'familiar in our mouths as household words,' we cannot speak of the heroes of Africa and leave it out. Yet, strange to say, though there is no life-story more enthralling than that of David Livingstone, it is less easy to find thrilling adventures in his account of his own travels than in the journals of most explorers. For the man whose heroism has helped so many was never a hero in his own estimation. It is of his work, his beautiful surroundings, the poor people he sought to help, the crying evils of the slave-trade that he writes. He really meant what he said so simply in the Senate House at Cambridge, 'I never made a sacrifice.' To be permitted to do such work for his Master was, to him, reward enough. If it meant sickness, suffering, separation from those he loved, and death at last alone in the wilderness, these were just the incidents of no sacrifice, nothing to boast of or to magnify him in the eyes of his fellow-men. Yet, even from his own matter-of-fact account, we can see how, again and again, his cool courage saved his own life and the lives of the men who followed him.
During his great journey to the West Coast, Livingstone found himself in the village of the Chiboque tribe, where the chief sent to him a demand for tribute, in the form of a man, an ox, a gun, or some cloth or powder. All the fighting strength of the village surrounded the travellers—grim-looking warriors, whose naturally plain cast of countenance was not improved by the prevailing fashion of filing their teeth to a point. Livingstone overheard the sinister remark, 'They have only five guns,' as if the Chiboque chief were quite prepared to measure forces with the strangers. The Englishman knew his own followers to be loyal, and by no means disinclined for a fight, and they would, he believed, be a match for their assailants, but he was most anxious to avoid bloodshed, and not to risk his character as a messenger of peace.
Accordingly, he sat down coolly on his camp-stool, his gun across his knees, and graciously invited the very unpleasant-looking party to be seated also. The Chiboque, accordingly, squatted on the ground, thus giving Livingstone's men, who remained standing, spears in hand, the chance of first blow, if it were impossible to avoid a fight. Fortunately, they were all well under control, and stood watching for a signal from their master, who quietly addressed the chief, bidding him state what he wanted.
A man, an ox, or a gun would do equally well, the Chiboque returned, but tribute he must have, as he always did from strangers.
The first-named was quite impossible, replied Livingstone, calmly; he and his followers would rather die than give one of their number to be a slave. Neither could they part with one of their guns; but he would give a shirt as a present to the chief, who had no right to demand any tribute at all from him. The chief was pleased to accept the shirt, but wanted something more, and Livingstone followed it up with a bunch of beads and a handkerchief. But seeing that each fresh treasure encouraged the enemy's desire to plunder the party, he resolved upon a bold stroke. It was clear, he said, that the Chiboques had no wish to be his friends. He and his men would fight if they were obliged, but the Chiboques, not they, should begin the attack and bear the guilt of it. Let them strike the first blow. Having delivered his challenge, he sat perfectly silent, waiting for the reply.
Should it come in the form of an attack, he knew that the first stroke would be directed at the white man, and he admits that the moments of suspense were, as he puts it, 'rather trying;' but he was 'careful not to appear flurried,' as he sat with his life in his hand, the centre of the wild group.
But the bold proposal succeeded. Perhaps the Chiboque measured the strength of the resolute party, and came to the conclusion that 'good words are better than bad strokes;' perhaps they felt the presence of a superior power in the quiet, watchful-eyed white man. When at last the chief spoke, it was to renew his demand for an ox. He would give in return any present that the stranger liked to name, and they could be friends. Livingstone, seeing approval in the eyes of his men, agreed, asking for some food, of which he and his party were short, and which the chief readily promised to supply. He and his warriors withdrew with their prize; and, later in the evening, a messenger arrived with the return present, a very little meal, and a few pounds of Livingstone's own ox, which had been converted into beef in the meantime!
How the cheery-hearted traveller, whose sense of humour helped him through so much, and whose laugh, Stanley tells us, was 'a laugh of the whole man, from head to heel,' must have chuckled over the generous gift of a bit of tough beast which he had brought so many miles along with him!
But though no stouter-hearted traveller ever pushed his way into the dark continent, we think less, after all, of Livingstone's heroic courage than of the burning love for all mankind which sent him into the waste places of the earth, to carry the truth to those in darkness. We think of the little orphan girl who hid behind his waggon that she might travel under his protection to seek her friends: of how he fed her, hid her from her pursuers, and vowed that, if fifty men came after her, they should not get her. And there is another story which we shall seek for in vain in his own account of his life in Africa, but which has been recorded by one who loved and honoured him.
The incident happened during those happiest days of Livingstone's African life, when, with his true-hearted wife beside him and children growing up around him, he lived in the house he had built for himself at Kolobeng. A very busy, simple life it was, with plenty of occupation to fill the days: teaching, gardening, building, doctoring, making careful observations of the plants and animals, and winning the love and confidence of the native people. One evening, news came to the little settlement of a furious attack made by a rhinoceros upon the driver of a waggon. The unfortunate man had been horribly gored; he was lying in the forest, eight or ten miles away; would the doctor come to him?