A.D. 1854-1856.
Livingstone sets out from Loanda--Journey back--Effects of slavery--Letter to his wife--Severe attack of fever--He reaches the Barotse country--Day of thanksgiving--His efforts for the good of his men--Anxieties of the Moffats--Mr. Moffat's journey to Mosilikatse--Box at Linyanti--Letter from Mrs. Moffat--Letters to Mrs. Livingstone, Mr. Moffat, and Mrs. Moffat--Kindness of Sekelétu--New escort--He sets out for the East Coast--Discovers the Victoria Falls--The healthy longitudinal ridges--Pedestrianism--Great dangers--Narrow escapes--Triumph of the spirit of trust in God--Favorite texts--Reference to Captain Maclure's experience--Chief subjects of thought--Structure of the continent--Sir Roderick Murchison anticipates his discovery--Letters to Geographical Society--First letter from Sir Roderick Murchison--Missionary labor--Monasteries--Protestant mission-stations wanting in self-support--Letter to Directors--Fever not so serious an obstruction as it seemed--His own hardships--Theories of mission-work--Expansion v. Concentration--Views of a missionary statesman--He reaches Tette--Letter to King of Portugal--To Sir Roderick Murchison--Reaches Senna--Quilimane--Retrospect--Letter from Directors--Goes to Mauritius--Voyage home--Narrow escape from shipwreck in Bay of Tunis--He reaches England, Dec., 1856--News of his father's death.
Dr. Livingstone left St. Paul de Loanda on 24th September, 1854, arrived at his old quarters at Linyanti on 11th September, 1855, set out eastward on 3d November, 1855, and reached Quilimane on the eastern coast on 20th May, 1856. His journey thus occupied a year and eight months, and the whole time from his leaving the Cape on 8th June, 1852, was within a few days of four years. The return journey from Loanda to Linyanti took longer than the journey outward. This arose from detention of various kinds [41]: the sicknesses of Livingstone and his men, the heavy rains, and in one case, at Pungo Andongo, the necessity of reproducing a large packet of letters, journals, maps, and despatches, which he had sent off from Loanda. These were despatched by the mail-packet "Forerunner," which unhappily went down off Madeira, all the passengers but one being lost. But for his promise to the Makololo to return with them to their country, Dr. Livingstone would have been himself a passenger in the ship. Hearing of the disaster while paying a visit to a very kind and hospitable Portuguese gentleman at Pungo Andongo, on his way back, Livingstone remained there some time to reproduce his lost papers. The labor thus entailed must have been very great, for his ordinary letters covered sheets almost as large as a newspaper, and his maps and despatches were produced with extraordinary care.
[41] Dr. Livingstone observed that traders generally traveled ten days in the month, and rested twenty, making seven geographical miles a day, or seventy per month. In his case in this journey the proportion was generally reversed--twenty days of traveling and ten of rest, and his rate per day was about ten geographical miles, or two hundred per month. As he often zigzagged, the geographical mile represented considerably, more. See letter to Royal Geographical Society, October 16, 1855.
He found renewed occasion to acknowledge in the warmest terms the kindness he received from the Portuguese; and his prayers that God would reward and bless them were not the less sincere that in many important matters he could not approve of their ways.
In traversing the road backward along which he had already come, not many things happened that demand special notice in this brief sketch. We find him both in his published book and still more in his private Journal repeating his admiration of the country and its glorious scenery. This revelation of the marvelous beauty of a country hitherto deemed a sandy desert was one of the most astounding effects of Livingstone's travels on the public mind. But the more he sees of the people the more profound does their degradation appear, although the many instances of remarkable kindness to himself, and occasional cases of genuine feeling one toward another, convinced him that there was a something in them not quite barbarised. On one point he was very clear--the Portuguese settlements among them had not improved them. Not that he undervalued the influences which the Portuguese had brought to bear on them; he had a much more favorable opinion of the Jesuit missions than Protestants have usually allowed themselves to entertain, and felt both kindly and respectfully toward the padres, who in the earlier days of these settlements had done, he believed, a useful work. But the great bane of the Portuguese settlements was slavery. Slavery prevented a good example, it hindered justice, it kept down improvement. If a settler took a fancy to a good-looking girl, he had only to buy her, and make her his concubine. Instead of correcting the polygamous habits of the chiefs and others, the Portuguese adopted like habits themselves. In one thing indeed they were far superior to the Boers--in their treatment of the children born to them by native mothers. But the whole system of slavery gendered a blight which nothing could counteract; to make Africa a prosperous land, liberty must be proclaimed to the captive, and the slave system, with all its accursed surroundings, brought conclusively to an end. Writing to Mrs. Livingstone from Bashinge, 20th March, 1855, he gives, some painful particulars of the slave-trade. Referring to a slave-agent with whom he had been, he says:
"This agent is about the same in appearance as Mebalwe, and speaks Portuguese as the Griquas do Dutch. He has two chainsful of women going to be sold for the ivory. Formerly the trade went from the interior into the Portuguese territory; now it goes the opposite way. This is the effect of the Portuguese love of the trade: they cannot send them abroad on account of our ships of war on the coast, yet will sell them to the best advantage. These women are decent-looking, as much so as the general run of Kuruman ladies, and' were caught lately in a skirmish the Portuguese had with their tribe; and they will be sold for about three tusks each. Each has an iron ring round the wrist, and that is attached to the chain, which she carries in the hand to prevent it jerking and hurting the wrist. How would Nannie like to be thus treated? and yet it is only by the goodness of God in appointing our lot in different circumstances that we are not similarly degraded, for we have the same evil nature, which is so degraded in them as to allow of men treating them as beasts.
"I long for the time when I shall see you again. I hope in God's mercy for that pleasure. How are my dear ones? I have not seen any equal to them since I put them on board ship. My brave little dears! I only hope God will show us mercy, and make them good too....
"I work at the interior languages when I have a little time, and also at Portuguese, which I like from being so much like Latin. Indeed, when I came I understood much that was said from its similarity to that tongue, and when I interlarded my attempts at Portuguese with Latin, or spoke it entirely, they understood me very well. The Negro language is not so easy, but I take a spell at it every day I can. It is of the same family of languages as the Sichuana....
"We have passed two chiefs who plagued us much when going down, but now were quite friendly. At that time one of them ordered his people not to sell us anything, and we had at last to force our way past him. Now he came running to meet us, saluting us, etc., with great urbanity. He informed us that he would come in the evening to receive a present, but I said unless he brought one he should receive nothing. He came in the usual way. The Balonda show the exalted position they occupy among men, viz., riding on the shoulders of a spokesman in the way little boys do in England. The chief brought two cocks and some eggs. I then gave a little present too. The alteration in this gentleman's conduct--the Peace Society would not credit-it--is attributable solely to my people possessing guns. When we passed before, we were defenseless. May every needed blessing be granted to you and the dear children, is the earnest prayer of your ever most affectionate
"D. LIVINGSTON."
It was soon after the date of this letter that Livingstone was struck down by that severe attack of rheumatic fever, accompanied by great loss of blood, to which reference has already been made. "I got it," he writes to Mr. Maclear, "by sleeping in the wet. There was no help for it. Every part of a plain was flooded ankle-deep. We got soaked by going on, and sodden if we stood still." In his former journey he had been very desirous to visit Matiamvo, paramount chief of the native tribes of Londa, whose friendship would have helped him greatly in his journey; but at that time he found himself too poor to attempt the enterprise. The loss of time and consumption of goods caused by his illness on the way back prevented him from accomplishing his purpose now.
Not only was the party now better armed than before, but the good name of Livingstone had also become better known along the line, and during his return journey he did not encounter so much opposition. We cannot fail to be struck with his extraordinary care for his men. It was his earnest desire to bring them all back to their homes, and in point of fact the whole twenty-seven returned in good health. How carefully he must have nursed them in their attacks of fever, and kept them from unnecessary exposure, it is hardly possible for strangers adequately to understand.
On reaching the country of the Barotse, the home of most of them, a day of thanksgiving was observed (23d July, 1855). The men had made little fortunes in Loanda, earning sixpence a day for weeks together by helping to discharge a cargo of coals or, as they called them, "stones that burned." But, like Livingstone, they had to part with everything on the way home, and now they were in rags; yet they were quite as cheerful and as fond of their leader as ever, and felt that they had not traveled in vain. They quite understood the benefit the new route would bring in the shape of higher prices for tusks and the other merchandise of home. On the thanksgiving day--