LIVINGSTONE’S SECOND (AND LAST) EXPEDITION TO AFRICA.
Again leaves England, March, 1858 -- Resigning his position as
Missionary for the London Society, he is appointed by the British
Government Consul at Killimane -- After a brief exploration along the
Zambesi, he again visits England -- Sails on his Final Expedition
August 14th, 1865, and proceeds by way of Bombay to Zanzibar -- Report
of his Murder on the shores of Nyassa.
Among great men who have had much to do in directing the destinies of
nations or any considerable number of mankind, there have been two
kinds--one class, who supposed they controlled events and by imperial
will and power mastered circumstances and the course of Providence; the
other, composed of those who have modestly imagined they were but
instruments in the hands of a Superior Power through whom some of his
beneficent designs were to be accomplished. Among the former was
Napoleon Bonaparte, who probably thought that in many particulars God
was entitled to high respect, but that in the general conduct of
military campaigns, He could not be compared with the French Emperor. It
is historically true that the men of this class have generally inflicted
great evils upon mankind. Of the other class of great men, David
Livingstone is a conspicuous example; and the one thing of which he is
the most unaffectedly ignorant is his own genius. “If the reader
remembers,” he modestly remarks near the close of his work, “the way in
which I was led, while teaching the Bakwains, to commence exploration,
he will, I think, recognize the hand of Providence.” And he goes on to
show how, previously to this, Sebituane had gone north and from a
country larger than France expelled hordes of bloody savages, and
occupied their country with a people speaking the language of the
Bakwains. Then again he was singularly turned toward the west instead of
the east coast of Africa, it thus happening that when he returned upon
his great expedition across the continent, the country was at peace and
his life saved. Meantime, Sechele himself at Kolobeng had become a
missionary to his own people and they were becoming civilized. “I
think,” he concludes, “that I see the operation of the unseen hand in
all this, and I humbly hope that it will still guide me to do good in my
day and generation in Africa.”
[Illustration: ATTACKED BY BUFFALOES.]
But this explorer was withal eminently practical. He wanted British
merchants as well as English missionaries to go to Africa, and thinking
that philanthropy and profit were equally interested, he believed that
the explorations he had already made fully justified the opinion that
still further discoveries might completely demonstrate the fact that
Africa was not only a great missionary field but might become of the
greatest value in the commercial world through the production especially
of cotton and sugar. “I propose,” he says, “to spend some more years of
labor, and shall be thankful if I see the system fairly begun in an open
pathway which will eventually benefit both Africa and England.”
From all which it is clear that the second expedition of Dr. Livingstone
to Africa, and which had not at that time been concluded, was the result
of a deliberate opinion that, with the blessing of heaven, he might be
able to accomplish that which should result in great good to Africa and
at the same time help to increase the trade and commerce of his own
country. Impelled by such worthy and unselfish motives, he again left
England in March, 1858, and sailed for Kilimane. He had resigned his
position as missionary for the London Society, but the British
government had appointed him consul at Kilimane, with the understanding
that he was not on this account to give up his character of explorer. On
the contrary, he was supplied with a small vessel, and accompanied by a
number of scientific associates, made a number of exploring expeditions
by which his ideas in respect to the production of cotton and sugar and
the overthrow of the slave traffic were greatly encouraged, and the
conclusion reached that it would not be long before the opening of
commercial intercourse between European nations and the tribes of South
Africa. It was afterwards discovered by Mr. Young, in charge of an
English expedition of search, which proceeded far up the Zambesi river,
that the memory of Dr. Livingstone was highly revered, and his influence
manifested in the moral improvement of the people and the advancement of
their material interests. Subsequently, Dr. Livingstone made an
expedition in a large region of country drained by the river Rovuma,
which, along the east coast of Africa is a sort of boundary between
Mohammedan and Portuguese authority. For this expedition a steamer was
provided, but it was found to be of too great draft of water to be of
much service. Dr. Livingstone, therefore, with the object of
accomplishing the great design of his second voyage to Africa, returned
to England, having re-explored a large portion of country along the
Zambesi and visited for the first time the tribes of a large extent of
country several hundred miles north of the Zambesi in its eastward
course. This return to England was, however, but a part of the
expedition upon which he had started in 1858, or rather an episode in
it, without which the original object--the discovery of the principal
watershed of the African continent, including the sources of the
Nile--would not have been accomplished. Whilst, therefore, Dr.
Livingstone has made three voyages from England to Africa, it will be
more convenient to group his series of explorations under the general
heading of two great expeditions--the first under the auspices of the
London Missionary Society, the second under those of the Royal
Geographical Society, with special assistance from the British
government.
For the completion of the series of explorations of this expedition,
upon which the explorer was then still engaged, he left England, August
14th, 1865, accompanied by his daughter as far as Paris. Thence, he
proceeded to Bombay, and provided himself with _materiel_ and men for
the work before him. From Bombay he proceeded to Zanzibar, and on March
28th, 1866, left that island accompanied by two boys--Chanma and
Wakotasie--a number of Sepoys, several men from Johanna Island, and some
Suahili from a school at Bombay, and having reached the main land
proceeded to the interior by the river Rovuma. As he proceeded he from
time to time sent back accounts of his progress and the interesting
incidents of his explorations. But late in this year the leader of the
Johanna men arrived at Zanzibar with a story that Dr. Livingstone had
been murdered on the shores of Lake Nyassa by a band of Mazitus. The
tale had such an air of truth that no one doubted it. Moosa’s story
being fully credited, the world quite generally gave up Dr. Livingstone
as lost. Dr. G. Edward Seward, resident agent of the English government
at Zanzibar, condensed Moosa’s information into a dispatch to Lord
Stanley, Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs, of which the following
is the principal portion:
“ZANZIBAR, Dec. 10, 1866.
“MY LORD--I send you the saddest news. Dr. Livingstone, in his despatch
from Ngomano, informed your Lordship that he stood ‘on the threshold of
the unexplored.’ Yet, as if that which should betide him had already
thrown its shadow he added:--‘It is but to say little of the future.’
“My Lord, if the report of some fugitives from his party be true, this
brave and good man has ‘crossed the threshold of the unexplored’--he has
confronted the future and will never return. He was slain, so it is
alleged, during a sudden and unprovoked encounter with those very Zulus
of whom he says in his despatch, that they had laid waste the country
round about him and had ‘swept away the food from above and in the
ground.’ With an escort reduced to twenty by desertion, death and
dismissals, he had traversed, as I believe, that _terra incognita_
between the confluence of the Loende and Rovuma rivers, at Nyomano,
and the eastern or northeastern littoral of Lake Nyassa; had crossed the
lake at some point as yet unascertained; had reached a station named
Kompoonda or Mapoonda, on its western, probably its northwestern, shore,
and was pushing west or northwest, into dangerous ground, when between
Marenga and Mukliosowe a band of implacable savages stopped the way, a
mixed horde of Zulus, or Mafilte and Nyassa folk. The Nyassa folk were
armed with bow and arrow, the Zulus with the traditional shield, broad
bladed spears, and axes. With Livingstone there were nine or ten
muskets; his Johanna men were resting with their loads far in the rear.
[Illustration: THE RECEPTION OF DR. LIVINGSTONE BY AN AFRICAN CHIEF.]
“The Mafilte instantly came on to fight; there was no parley, no
avoidance of the combat; they came on with a rush, with war cries and
rattling on their shields their spears. As Livingstone and his party
raised their pieces their onset was for a moment checked, but only for a
moment. Livingstone fired and two Zulus were shot dead (his boys fired
too but their fire was harmless); he was in the act of reloading when
three Mafilte leaped upon him through the smoke. There was no
resistance--there could be none--and one cruel axe cut from behind him
put him out of life. He fell, and when he fell his terror stricken
escort fled, hunted by the Mafilte. One? at least of the fugitives
escaped; and he, the eye-witness, it is who tells the tale--Ali Moosa,
chief of his escort of porters.
“The party had left the western shores of Nyassa about five days. They
had started from Kompoonda, on the lake’s borders (they left the
havildar of Sepoys there dying of dysentery; Livingstone had dismissed
the other Sepoys of the Bombay Twenty-first at Mataka), and had rested
at Marenga, where Livingstone was cautioned not to advance. The next
station was Mahlivoora; they were traversing a flat country, broken by
small hills, and abundantly wooded.
“Indeed, the scene of the tragedy so soon to be consummated would appear
to have been an open forest glade. Livingstone, as usual, led the way,
his nine or ten unpractised musketeers at his heels. Ali Moosa had
nearly come up with them, having left his own Johanna men resting with
their loads far in the rear. Suddenly he heard Livingstone warn the boys
that the Ma-zitus were coming. The boys in turn beckoned Moosa to press
forward. Moosa saw the crowd here and there between the trees.
“He had just gained the party and sunk down behind a tree to deliver his
own fire when his leader fell. Moosa fled for his life along the path he
had come. Meeting his Johanna men, who threw down their loads and in a
body really passed Moosa, his escape and that of his party verges on the
marvelous. However, at sunset, they, in great fear, left their forest
refuge, and got back to the place where they hoped to find their
baggage. It was gone, and then with increasing dread they crept to where
the slain traveler lay.
[Illustration: AN AFRICAN SUN DANCE.]
“Near him, in front, lay the grim Zulus who were killed under his sure
aim; here and there lay scattered some four dead fugitives of the
expedition. That one blow had killed him outright, he had no other wound
but this terrible gash; it must have gone from their description,
through the neck and spine up to the throat in front, and it had nearly
decapitated him. Death came mercifully in its instant suddenness, for
David Livingstone was ever ready.
“They found him stripped of his upper clothing, the Ma-zitus had
respected him when dead. They dug with some stakes a shallow grave and
hid from the starlight the stricken temple of a grand spirit--the body
of an apostle, whose martyrdom should make sacred the shores of that sea
which his labors made known to us, and which now, baptized with his
life’s blood, men should henceforth know as ‘Lake Livingstone.’”
Dr. Seward added the following postscript to his despatch to the foreign
office:
“The date of Dr. Livingstone’s death is left as much to conjecture as
the place of his grave. All that we certainly know is that he was at
Nyomano on the 18th of May last; that he proceeded to Mataka, whence he
sent a despatch to this Consulate. From Mataka he is said to have made
for and struck Nyassa, which he crossed; but where, or where Mataka is,
cannot be ascertained. The runaway Reuben, with the Sepoys, states that
Livingstone left Mataka a few days before they set out on their return
journey to Zanzibar. They were one month and twenty days on the road to
Keelwa, which they reached during the latter days of September. It may
be inferred from this that Livingstone left Mataka about the middle of
last July. The Johanna men named six weeks as the probable time of their
return journey from Mapoonda to Keelwa with the slave caravan. The
fight with the Zulus took place sixteen days before they set out. They
reached Keelwa in November, Zanzibar the 6th of December. Roughly then,
we may conjecture the death of their leader to have happened during
September. The statements of our informants as to time, distance, and
direction are distressingly vague and untrustworthy.”
The publication of this despatch at once created a profound sensation
throughout the civilized world. There being no apparent reason to doubt
the truthfulness of the story, it was quite universally accepted, and
most men lamented the death of the great explorer with unfeigned
sadness. The obituary notices which appeared in the public journals and
proceedings of many learned bodies demonstrated the fame of Dr.
Livingstone in a manner which will surely be exquisitely agreeable to
him when he shall read the eulogiums, as, it is to be hoped, he may soon
do. Dr. Kirk, of Zanzibar, who had, in former years, accompanied Dr.
Livingstone in some of his explorations, gave the man Moosa a long and
careful examination and cross-examination, and the longer he proceeded
the more terrible the facts connected with Dr. Livingstone’s death
appeared. A letter from him, generally published and quoted by all
journals, seemed to leave the painful reports fully and abundantly
confirmed. The world’s sorrow, therefore, expressed in every proper way,
was, to all appearance, entirely reasonable.
Nevertheless, there were those who did not put their trust in Moosa’s
story. Among these was Sir Roderick Murchison, whose reputation for
sagacity in England was very high. So early as 1844, Sir Roderick had
announced, from the examination of certain rocks brought to him for
study, the existence of gold in Australia, and had vainly endeavored to
enlist the aid of government in behalf of practically testing the
question. We have seen that he correctly decyphered the general
geological formation of central South Africa before the practical
discovery of the fact by Livingstone. By these and other things of like
nature, Sir Roderick had acquired the reputation of a prophet. He could
give no special reason for his opinion, but he did not believe Moosa’s
story of Livingstone’s death, and the fact of his want of faith in it
made many suppose there might be ground for doubt after all. Sir
Roderick was sustained in his doubts by Mr. E. D. Young, an African
traveler of considerable experience who came forward and said that Ali
Moosa belonged to a treacherous race. Suppose he had betrayed Dr.
Livingstone, how else than by a cunningly-devised story of his death
could he prevail upon the British consul to pay him. Here, at least, was
a motive for the story, and it soon had many to believe in it. The
consequence was a variety of conflicting reports and conflicting
opinions, in the midst of which the Royal Geographical Society organized
a search expedition and placed it under the charge of Mr. Young.
[Illustration: ZULU WARRIOR.]
On the 8th of August, 1867, the little steel boat “Search,” Mr. Young in
command, was pointed up the Zambesi river, under the most explicit and
comprehensive instructions from the Geographical Society. At Shupanga,
the grave of Mrs. Livingstone was visited, and such attention given it
as was required. On the 4th of September, Mr. Young heard of a white man
having been seen on Lake Pamalombi, which is far south of Lake Nyassa,
the scene of the reported death. Young proceeded thither and became
convinced that the white man was Livingstone. Continuing the search, he
found that his views were from day to day confirmed by the reports of
natives and articles which the explorer had left with them subsequent to
the time of his reported murder. The search was continued till toward
the close of the year, with the result that Dr. Livingstone had
certainly been seen at a long distance from the Lake Nyassa, months
after he had been reported killed. The expedition under Mr. Young did
not find Dr. Livingstone, but discovered enough to demonstrate that Ali
Moosa’s story was an ably and cunningly devised romance. Then the
Geographical Society received letters from Livingstone himself, which
proved that he was alive and well in February, 1867, some six months
after Moosa’s heroic but vain defense near Lake Nyassa. Authentic
reports of his presence on Lake Ujiji in October of the same year were
received. But about this time Sir Roderick Murchison published a letter
in the London “Times” newspaper, confidently predicting, on intelligence
which he supposed to be reliable, Dr. Livingstone’s return to England
about the coming Christmas. It has since transpired that Sir Roderick
was imposed upon by a round-about story from Trincomalee in the island
of Ceylon, which had been based upon an entire misunderstanding of
something that had been said by Dr. Kirk, British Consul at Zanzibar,
and the report of which was first transmitted from Trincomalee.
Dr. Livingstone did not appear in accordance with his friend’s
prediction, and the consequence was a new variety of reports of
misfortune and death. Conjecture was free; nothing had been lately heard
from him; the suspense of the public in regard to the fate of one in
whom there was so deep and universal interest was absolutely painful.
And it was at this time of intense public anxiety that an expedition was
set on foot, the like of which had not previously been known and the
complete success of which has bestowed upon its projector and commander
imperishable renown.
[Illustration]