A RAY OF HOPE.
Mrs. Weldon's first feeling on being left alone was a sense of relief
at having a week's respite. She had no trust in Negoro's honesty, but
she knew well enough that their "marketable value" would secure them
from any personal danger, and she had time to consider whether some
compromise might be effected by which her husband might be spared the
necessity of coming to Kazonndé. Upon the receipt of a letter from
herself, he would not hesitate for a moment in undertaking the journey,
but she entertained no little fear that after all perhaps her own
departure might not be permitted; the slightest caprice on the part of
Queen Moena would detain her as a captive, whilst as to Negoro, if once
he should get the ransom he wanted, he would take no further pains in
the matter.
Accordingly, she resolved to make the proposition that she should be
conveyed to some point upon the coast, where the bargain could be
concluded without Mr. Weldon's coming up the country.
She had to weigh all the consequences that would follow any refusal on
her part to fall in with Negoro's demands. Of course, he would spend
the interval in preparing for his start to America, and when he should
come back and find her still hesitating, was it not likely that he
would find scope for his revenge in suggesting that she must be
separated from her child.
The very thought sent a pang through her heart, and she clasped her
little boy tenderly to her side.
"What makes you so sad, mamma?" asked Jack.
"I was thinking of your father, my child," she answered; "would you not
like to see him?"
"Yes, yes; is he coming here?"
"No, my boy, he must not come here."
"Then let us take Dick, and Tom, and Hercules, and go to him."
Mrs. Weldon tried to conceal her tears.
"Have you heard from papa?"
"No."
"Then why do you not write to him?"
"Write to him?" repeated his mother, "that is the very thing I was
thinking about."
The child little knew the agitation that was troubling her mind.
Meanwhile Mrs. Weldon had another inducement which she hardly ventured
to own to herself for postponing her final decision. Was it absolutely
impossible that her liberation should be effected by some different
means altogether?
A few days previously she had overheard a conversation outside her hut,
and over this she had found herself continually pondering.
Alvez and one of the Ujiji dealers, discussing the future prospects of
their business, mutually agreed in denouncing the efforts that were
being made for the suppression of the slave-traffic, not only by the
cruisers on the coast, but by the intrusion of travellers and
missionaries into the interior.
Alvez averred that all these troublesome visitors ought to be
exterminated forthwith.
"But kill one, and another crops up," replied the dealer.
"Yes, their exaggerated reports bring up a swarm of them," said Alvez.
It seemed a subject of bitter complaint that the markets of Nyangwé,
Zanzibar, and the lake-district had been invaded by Speke and Grant and
others, and although they congratulated each other that the western
provinces had not yet been much persecuted, they confessed that now
that the travelling epidemic had begun to rage, there was no telling
how soon a lot of European and American busy-bodies might be among
them. Thedépôts at Cassange and Bihe had both been visited, and
although Kazonndé had hitherto been left quiet, there were rumours
enough that the continent was to be tramped over from east to west.[1]
[Footnote: This extraordinary feat was, it is universally known,
subsequently accomplished by Cameron.]
"And it may be," continued Alvez, "that that missionary fellow,
Livingstone, is already on his way to us; if he comes there can be but
one result; there must be freedom for all the slaves in Kazonndé."
"Freedom for the slaves in Kazonndé!" These were the words which in
connexion with Dr. Livingstone's name had arrested Mrs. Weldon's
attention, and who can wonder that she pondered them over and over
again, and ventured to associate them with her own prospects?
Here was a ray of hope!
The mere mention of Livingstone's name in association with this story
seems to demand a brief survey of his career.
Born on the 19th of March, 1813, David Livingstone was the second of
six children of a tradesman in the village of Blantyre, in Lanarkshire.
After two years' training in medicine and theology, he was sent out by
the London Missionary Society, and landed at the Cape of Good Hope in
1840, with the intention of joining Moffat in South Africa. After
exploring the country of the Bechuanas, he returned to Kuruman, and,
having married Moffat's daughter, proceeded in 1843 to found a mission
in the Mabotsa valley.
After four years he removed to Kolobeng in the Bechuana district, 225
miles north of Kuruman, whence, in 1849, starting off with his wife,
three children, and two friends, Mr. Oswell and Mr. Murray, he
discovered Lake Ngami, and returned by descending the course of the
Zouga.
The opposition of the natives had prevented his proceeding beyond Lake
Ngami at his first visit, and he made a second with no better success.
In a third attempt, however, he wended his way northwards with his
family and Mr. Oswell along the Chobé, an affluent of the Zambesi, and
after a difficult journey at length reached the district of the
Makalolos, of whom the chief, named Sebituané, joined him at Linyanté.
The Zambesi itself was discovered at the end of June, 1851, and the
doctor returned to the Cape for the purpose of sending his family to
England.
[Illustration: Dr. Livingstone. _Page_ 408.]
His next project was to cross the continent obliquely from south to
west, but in this expedition he had resolved that he would risk no life
but his own. Accompanied, therefore, by only a few natives, he started
in the following June, and skirting the Kalahari desert entered
Litoubarouba on the last day of the year; here he found the Bechuana
district much ravaged by the Boers, the original Dutch colonists, who
had formed the population of the Cape before it came into the
possession of the English. After a fortnight's stay, he proceeded into
the heart of the district of the Bamangonatos, and travelled
continuously until the 23rd of May, when he arrived at Linyanté, and
was received with much honour by Sekeletoo, who had recently become
sovereign of the Makalolos. A severe attack of fever detained the
traveller here for a period, but he made good use of the enforced rest
by studying the manners of the country, and became for the first time
sensible of its terrible sufferings in consequence of the slave-trade.
Descending the course of the Chobé to the Zambesi, he next entered
Naniele, and after visiting Katonga and Libonta, advanced to the point
of confluence of the Leeba with the Zambesi, where he determined upon
ascending the former as far as the Portuguese possessions in the west;
it was an undertaking, however, that required considerable preparation,
so that it was necessary for him to return to Linyanté.
On the 11th of November he again started. He was accompanied by
twenty-seven Makalolos, and ascended the Leeba till, in the territory
of the Balonda, he reached a spot where it received the waters of its
tributary the Makondo.
It was the first time a white man had ever penetrated so far.
Proceeding on their way, they arrived at the residence of Shinté, the
most powerful of the chieftains of the Balonda, by whom they were well
received, and having met with equal kindness from Kateema, a ruler on
the other side of the Leeba, they encamped, on the 20th of February,
1853, on the banks of Lake Dilolo.
Here it was that the real difficulty commenced; the arduous travelling,
the attacks of the natives, and their exorbitant demands, the
conspiracies of his own attendants and their desertions, would soon
have caused any one of less energy to abandon his enterprise; but David
Livingstone was not a man to be daunted; resolutely he persevered, and
on the 4th of April reached the banks of the Coango, the stream that
forms the frontier of the Portuguese possessions, and joins the Zaire
on the north.
Six days later he passed through Cassangé. Here it was that Alvez had
seen him. On the 31st of May he arrived at St. Paul de Loanda, having
traversed the continent in about two years.
It was not long, however, before he was off again. Following the banks
of the Coanza, the river which was to bring such trying experiences to
Dick Sands and his party, he reached the Lombé, and having met numbers
of slave-caravans on his way, again passed through Cassange, crossed
the Coango, and reached the Zambesi at Kewawa. By the 8th of the
following June he was again at Lake Dilolo, and descending the river,
he re-entered Linyanté. Here he stayed till the 3rd of November, when
he commenced his second great journey, which was to carry him
completely across Africa from west to east.
After visiting the famed Victoria Falls, the intrepid explorer quitted
the Zambesi, and took a north-easterly route. The transit of the
territory of the Batokas, a people brutalized by the inhalation of
hemp; a visit to Semalemboni the powerful chief of the district; the
passage of the Kafoni; a visit to king Mbourouma; an inspection of the
ruins of Zumbo, an old Portuguese town; a meeting with the chief
Mpendé, at that time at war with the Portuguese, these were the
principal events of this journey, and on the 22nd of April, Livingstone
left Teté, and having descended the river as far as its delta, reached
Quilimané, just four years after his last departure from the Cape. On
the 12th of July he embarked for the Mauritius, and on the 22nd of
December, 1856, he landed in England after an absence of sixteen years.
[Illustration: With none to guide him except a few natives.]
Loaded with honours by the Geographical Societies of London and Paris,
brilliantly entertained by all ranks, it would have been no matter of
surprise if he had surrendered himself to a well-earned repose; but no
thought of permanent rest occurred to him, and on the 1st of March,
1858, accompanied by his brother Charles, Captain Bedingfield, Dr.
Kirk, Dr. Miller, Mr. Thornton, and Mr. Baines, he started again, with
the intention of exploring the basin of the Zambesi, and arrived in due
time at the coast of Mozambique.
The party ascended the great river by the Kongone mouth; they were on
board a small steamer named the "Ma-Robert," and reached Teté on the
8th of September.
During the following year they investigated the lower course of the
Zambesi, and its left affluent the Shiré, and having visited Lake
Shirwa, they explored the territory of the Manganjas, and discovered
Lake Nyassa. In August, 1860, they returned to the Victoria Falls.
Early in the following year, Bishop Mackenzie and his missionary staff
arrived at the mouth of the Zambesi.
In March an exploration of the Rovouma was made on board the "Pioneer,"
the exploring party returning afterwards to Lake Nyassa, where they
remained a considerable time. The 30th of January, 1862, was signalized
by the arrival of Mrs. Livingstone, and by the addition of another
steamer, the "Lady Nyassa;" but the happiness of reunion was very
transient; it was but a short time before the enthusiastic Bishop
Mackenzie succumbed to the unhealthiness of the climate, and on the
27th of April Mrs. Livingstone expired in her husband's arms.
A second investigation of the Rovouma soon followed and at the end of
November the doctor returned to the Zambesi, and reascended the Shire.
In the spring of 1803 he lost his companion Mr. Thornton, and as his
brother and Dr. Kirk were both much debilitated, he insisted upon their
return to Europe, while he himself returned for the third time to Lake
Nyassa, and completed the hydrographical survey which already he had
begun.
A few months later found him once more at the mouth of the Zambesi;
thence he crossed over to Zanzibar, and after five years' absence
arrived in London, where he published his work, "The exploration of the
Zambesi and its affluents."
Still unwearied and insatiable in his longings, he was back again in
Zanzibar at the commencement of 1866, ready to begin his fourth
journey, this time attended only by a few sepoys and negroes.
Witnessing on his way some horrible scenes which were perpetrated as
the result of the prosecution of the slave-trade, he proceeded to
Mokalaosé on the shores of Lake Nyassa, where nearly all his attendants
deserted him, and returned to Zanzibar with the report that he was dead.
Dr. Livingstone meanwhile was not only alive, but undaunted in his
determination to visit the country between the two lakes Nyassa and
Tanganyika. With none to guide him except a few natives, he crossed the
Loangona, and in the following April discovered Lake Liemmba. Here he
lay for a whole month hovering between life and death, but rallying a
little he pushed on to the north shore of Lake Moero. Taking up his
quarters at Cazembé for six weeks, he made two separate explorations of
the lake, and then started farther northwards, intending to reach
Ujiji, an important town upon Lake Tanganyika; overtaken, however, by
floods, and again abandoned by his servants, he was obliged to retrace
his steps. Six weeks afterwards he had made his way southwards to the
great lake Bangweolo, whence once more he started towards Tanganyika.
This last effort was most trying, and the doctor had grown so weak that
he was obliged to be carried, but he reached Ujiji, where he was
gratified by finding some supplies that had been thoughtfully forwarded
to him by the Oriental Society at Calcutta.
[Illustration: "You are Dr. Livingstone, I presume?"]
His great aim now was to ascend the lake, and reach the sources of the
Nile. On the 21st of September he was at Bambarré, in the country of
the cannibal Manyuema, upon the Lualaba, the river afterwards
ascertained by Stanley to be the Upper Zaire or Congo. At Mamobela the
doctor was ill for twenty-four days, tended only by three followers who
continued faithful; but in July he made a vigorous effort, and although
he was reduced to a skeleton, made his way back to Ujiji.
During this long time no tidings of Livingstone reached Europe, and
many were the misgivings lest the rumours of his death were only too
true. He was himself, too, almost despairing as to receiving any help.
But help was closer at hand than he thought. On the 3rd of November,
only eleven days after his return to Ujiji, some gun shots were heard
within half a mile of the lake. The doctor went out to ascertain whence
they proceeded, and had not gone far before a white man stood before
him.
"You are Dr. Livingstone, I presume," said the stranger, raising his
cap.
"Yes, sir, I am Dr. Livingstone, and am happy to see you," answered the
doctor, smiling kindly.
The two shook each other warmly by the hand.
The new arrival was Henry Stanley, the correspondent of the _New York
Herald_, who had been sent out by Mr. Bennett, the editor, in search of
the great African explorer. On receiving his orders in October, 1870,
without a day's unnecessary delay he had embarked at Bombay for
Zanzibar, and, after a journey involving considerable peril, had
arrived safely at Ujiji.
Very soon the two travellers found themselves on the best of terms, and
set out together on an excursion to the north of Tanganyika. They
proceeded as far as Cape Magala, and decided that the chief outlet of
the lake must be an affluent of the Lualaba, a conclusion that was
subsequently confirmed by Cameron.
Towards the end of the year Stanley began to prepare to return.
Livingstone accompanied him as far as Kwihara, and on the 3rd of the
following March they parted.
"You have done for me what few men would venture to do; I am truly
grateful," said Livingstone.
Stanley could scarcely repress his tears as he expressed his hope that
the doctor might be spared to return to his friends safe and well.
"Good-bye!" said Stanley, choked with emotion.
"Good-bye!" answered the veteran feebly.
Thus they parted, and in July, 1872, Stanley landed at Marseilles.
Again David Livingstone resumed his researches in the interior.
After remaining five months at Kwihara he gathered together a retinue
consisting of his faithful followers Suzi, Chumah, Amoda, and Jacob
Wainwright, and fifty-six men sent to him by Stanley, and lost no time
in proceeding towards the south of Tanganyika. In the course of the
ensuing month the caravan encountered some frightful storms, but
succeeded in reaching Moura. There had previously been an extreme
drought, which was now followed by the rainy season, which entailed the
loss of many of the beasts of burden, in consequence of the bites of
the tzetsy.
On the 24th of January they were at Chitounkwé, and in April, after
rounding the east of Lake Bangweolo, they made their way towards the
village of Chitambo. At this point it was that Livingstone had parted
company with certain slave-dealers, who had carried the information to
old Alvez that the missionary traveller would very likely proceed by
way of Loanda to Kazonndé.
But on the 13th of June, the very day before Negoro reckoned on
obtaining from Mrs. Weldon the letter which should be the means of
securing him a hundred thousand dollars, tidings were circulated in the
district that on the 1st of May Dr. Livingstone had breathed his last.
The report proved perfectly true. On the 29th of April the caravan had
reached the village of Chitambo, the doctor so unwell that he was
carried on a litter. The following night he was in great pain, and
after repeatedly murmuring in a low voice, "Oh dear, oh dear!" he fell
into a kind of stupor. A short time afterwards he called up Suzi, and
having asked for some medicine, told his attendant that he should not
require anything more.
"You can go now."
About four o'clock next morning, when an anxious visit was made to his
room, the doctor was found kneeling by the bed-side, his head in his
hands, in the attitude of prayer. Suzi touched him, but his forehead
was icy with the coldness of death. He had died in the night.
His body was carried by those who loved him, and in spite of many
obstacles was brought to Zanzibar, whence, nine months after his death,
it was conveyed to England. On the 12th of April, 1874, it was interred
in Westminster Abbey, counted worthy to be deposited amongst those whom
the country most delights to honour.