This degree or measure of success seemed to put the great lake further off than ever. Europeans despaired of their ever finding or beholding[N12] it, and none but traders and huntsmen subsequently traversed that part merely of the road towards it, which the expedition did pass over; while the only scientific mission which has acted since in South Africa, viz., that of Captain Sir J. E. Alexander, sent out by the Royal Geographical Society of London,—hopeless, apparently, of doing anything by following Dr Smith's route, travelled and explored along the western coast.
It was remarked long since by the North American Indians and other aborigines, that the “black-robe chiefs of the mission” had always preceded the daring hunter and the crafty trader; and in no country has the preceding spirit of the missionaries been more evident than in South Africa. While pushing their stations continually further and further into the interior, they christianize and civilize the tribes as they go, and so leave the way paved and open behind them; a most important condition, when it is remembered what excessive distances a traveller is there from his resources, and in what an impracticable country.
Silently, but surely, has this operation been going on, until as it were, almost by natural causes, a point has been reached, within which the lake was but at a moderate distance. Starting from Mr Moffat's advanced post of Kuruman, Mr Livingston had founded the station of Kolobeng further north; and then it only required a small advance of money to pay the expense of the long contemplated journey. That sum was furnished by two lay gentlemen, Messrs Murray and Oswell,—and this great cynosure of South African geography, fell, in the ripeness of time, an easy prize.
But if we have this much to say for the effective lever which the missionary system affords for geographical discovery, we cannot say so much as we should like in favour of the manner in which it has been worked in this instance, though it may be better than in the generality of cases.
There has been of late, it must be confessed, rather a decline of the true scientific spirit of geographical exploration; and men have too frequently been contented with filling their books with accounts merely of what they shot and what they eat; unable to give any more intelligent account of the country than the natives themselves.
Hardly any better, the Rev. Mr Rebman, who is supposed to have discovered in 5° S. lat., and 3 or 400 miles within the eastern coast of Africa, a mountain reaching above the limits of perpetual snow, and which may be the source of the Nile on the one hand, and of the rivers which feed the great lake Ngami on the other; for though he has been twice to the mountains, yet he has sent home such puerile statements, that the fact of its being snow at all which was thought to have been seen, is now contested; and the height, latitude, longitude, &c., of the mountain are quite uncertain.
Mr Livingston has done much better than this, though there is almost everything for the geographer, the botanist, &c., to do; but no fault is to be imputed to him, he had a higher object in view: we mention the case so prominently here, rather to incite scientific men to go and do their part. We append Mr Livingston's letter to the end of this notice, and will merely condense here the principal notabilia.
The latitude of the E. corner of the lake at its junction with the effluence the Zonga, was measured with a sextant, to be 20° 20´ S. The longitude was estimated at 24° E., consequently about midway between the E. and W. coasts. The height above the level of the sea was thermometrically determined at 2200 feet. The length and breadth were stated by the natives at 70 and 15 miles; Mr Livingston saw in the former direction an uninterrupted horizon of water.
The feeder of the lake coming down from the north was described only by the natives; but its water being very clear, even during its annual risings, and these being incomprehensible to the inhabitants of that part of the country, this course may be expected to be long, and not improbably rising from a snowy mountain.
The effluent of the lake, the Zonga, was travelled along by Mr L. for 300 miles; as the water was clear, the stream placid, the banks thickly clothed with beds of reeds, and the height above the sea 2200 feet,—it may be presumed that this river does not communicate with the ocean, and that it is gradually dissipated like other rivers there by evaporation and absorption.