DAVID LIVINGSTONE.*
LIVINGSTONZ'S life is likely to be read in one hape or other as long and as widely as that of any man of this century ; and he who writes it aspires, at any rate, to supply materials fOr something much more than the need of the moment. Perhaps the best praise we can give to this volume is that its merits are unobtrusive. In reading it, we think of the subject, not of the author, of the book ; and even the reviewer, when he has reached the last page, finds himself so absorbed in Livingstone, that he has to turn back and recover himself, before it is possible to say whether the book about Livingstone is well written or not. This may be accepted as the best evidence we can give that the work is, on the whole, well done. It may not be a perfect biography. It may be replaced by another at some later time. There are vexed questions which border on the life- work of Livingstone, both personal and political, which may be dealt with more freely hereafter. Meantime, Dr. Blaikie places the man himself before us, in a continuous narrative, which will be read with unflagging interest, from title-page to closing line.
To many persons, Livingstone is known much in the same way in which a book in a showy binding is known to the children, who make incursions from time to time into their father's library ; they know the volume with the green and gold. back, and from answers to questions have some vague ideas as to its contents, but nothing more. So a large section of the public knows the man who has been, literally and figuratively, in the lion's mouth ; who began as a missionary, and became an explorer; who traversed Africa from the Cape to the Tanganyika Lake, from Mozambique to Leland° ; who discovered the Victoria Falls, and. perished in the endeavour to find the sources of the Nile. From such materials a picture of the man is drawn,—such a picture as we often see by an inferior artist, with some poiuts of external resemblance, but nothing of the soul. Judged from such materials, Livingstone's career seems unsatisfactory, especially towards its close. Many seem to think that he began as the soldier of Christ, and ended as the servant of the Geographical Society. Those who have no great belief in missionary work may be pleased to think of him chiefly as an explorer ; but after all, must there not have been something hard and unamiable in the man who could so com- pletely set aside the interests of wife and children, in favour of the lust of roaming in undiscovered countries with which they credit him ? The courage which made him refuse to turn back with Stanley, and go on to the end, tramping over the earth- sponges of Central Africa, through utter pain and, weakness, in search of the Nile sources, which he did not find, de- meads a certain admiration ; yet, was not this obstinacy ?
Was not this the perseverance in self-sacrifice for an insufficient end which belongs to an .iti6e Are, if not to monomania P From
another point of view, the religious public; are disappointed in the man who seemed to prefer wandering to preaching the Gospel ; who severed his connection with the Missionary Society ; who, having been ordained minister, dressed like a lay- man, and did not insist upon the reverend title. There were those of his own household who did not think him clear from blame on some of these points, and it is less to be wondered at if a portion of the general public shared their mistake. 'Living- stone, like the noblest of the Seven against Thebes, sought not
to seem, but to be. No man ever more clearly saw the mark, or pressed towards it with greater constancy. It is the chief object of the Persona/ Life to show that Liviugstoue's career was wholly directed to the noblest motives, which he never changed, or thought of changing.
* The Persona 140 of David Livittodout, By W. 0. Binikio, DJ/ Loudon John Murray. 1880.
It was this singleness of purpose, together with the modesty of his nature, which left him open to partial misapprehension.
He was not indifferent to praise and. blame, but he did not seek
to gain the one or avoid the other. Fame was valued, so far as it gave him influence which he could use in the cause of Africa.
But be never put forward his personal claims, unless they were necessary to his purpose. On the contrary, it is only now, when we read his private letters and journals, that we find out how great were his sacrifices, and how constant he was to his purpose. He has been justly admired for a variety of reasons, for his capacity as an explorer, for his geographical discoveries, for the scientific observations which he kept with such wonder- ful accuracy, under circumstances of almost unparalleled diffi- culty. But he was sent out to A.frica for the purpose of giving Christianity to the natives, and this remained to the day of his death the one object to which everything else was subordinated. No doubt he did not take the ordinary view of missionary work.
He saw his colleagues crowded together within the. limits of the Colonies, where their numbers were in excess of the need of them. Among these he would not be. He was still ready to obey his employers, and go where they sent him, "provided it be forward ;" but if they would not give means for the forward course, he would go on by himself, or with such other help as might be to hand. He would be the pioneer Of religion, opening up fresh ground, and working through the agency of native converts ; staying in one place until he had established a centre of influence, and then moving on to the next. Here begins one of the features of his life which has been most criticised. This mode of life exposed his wife and children to many dangers ; and to worse than dangers, in the "filthy conversation" of the natives. It was this latter consideration that made him deter- mine to part with his children; to send them to England, and leave them to the care of others. How deeply he felt all this, his more private writings show,—" A greater misfortune cannot befall a youth than to be cast into the world with- out a home. In regard to even the vestige of a home, my children are absolutely vagabonds. When shall we return to Kolobeng P When to Kuruman P Never, The mark of Cain is on your foreheads ; your father is a missionary." Again, he wrote in the year 1870, in a passage as pathetic as almost any- thing in literature, that he could feel no regret for any part of his conduct in the past, "except that I did not feel it to be my duty, while spending all my energy in teaching the heathen, to devote a special portion of my time to play with my children. But generally I was so much exhausted with the mental and manual labour of the day, that in the evening there was no play left in me. I did not play with my little ones while I had. them; and they soon sprang up in my absences, and loft me conscious that I had none to play with." The iron resolve covered a most tender heart; as is shown again by his regret for his wife, which some seem to have thought did not exist, because he did not dis- play it to the public. But the resolve was iron. Strange as it may seem to those who disbelieve at ease, this man was pre- pared to sacrifice even those whom he loved with no common intensity in the service of God.
But all his sacrifices and all his labours were crossed and thwarted by the great enemy with which he now came into collision at every point, and the struggle with which determined. and explains the latter part of his life. Livingstone was no narrow fanatic, but understood his work, with great breadth of view and minute mastery of detail, in the most practical fashioa. It was vain to expect that Christianity would take and keep hold. of degraded minds. The natives could rise only as the conditions of their life were improved, and to this end their country must be opened to commerce and. colonisation. But he was stopped by the slave-trado,—by the Boers when trying to open a way through the Transvaal, by the Portuguese on the west and on the east, and by Arabs on the north. Every- where slavery and the slave-trade opposed him, and the further he went the more horrible were the forms they assumed. He could do no wide and lasting work in Africa with this abominable traffic desolating whole districts, degrading those left behind as much as the wretched victims carried off in the grip of the slave-stick. The evil was the root of misery in Africa, and must be removed, before good could be done. This conviction brought a change in his plan of action, though none in his main purpose. Every
honourable means must now be used to bring English influence to bear upon the slave-trade, not only at sea, but inland. Hence to Liviugstoue the value of the sources of the Nile. The famous river had taken strong hold of the English imagination. If he 'could return as the discoverer of its origin, his book would have an immense circulation. For the fame thus to be won, his life shows he cared little, and for the profits much less. He would at any time give thrice so much, if he had it, to any well- deserving cause. But the Nile would draw thousands of creaders, who would thus read all the horrors he would describe, :and. be surely roused. to a great resolve. In his last days, his thoughts were always turning home. But to have gone Lack 'with Stanley, without the prize which seemed within his grasp, would have been to deprive himself of the fruit of his labours, 'of the lever on which he counted to lift the weight of England against the men-stealers. If any one doubts that this was the secret of the final determination, let him read Dr. Blaikie's look, and he will be convinced.
To the same source we must refer OUT readers for much which we cannot find space even to hint at here. There are other aspects of Livingstone's character which must be known, in order to value him at his true worth. Scarcely any part of Livingstone's experience will better repay careful study than this method of dealing with the natives. Justice, faithfulness, and forbearance were his principles, and most people know how he succeeded where others failed. Few, indeed, have the courage to keep the finger off the trigger when spears are ,shaken, or even thrown at them ; but he who is not prepared rather to risk being killed than to kil], has DO business .among savages, Livingstone's principles in treating in- ferior races are as applicable to natives as to travellers like himself. When he refused to go home from Loanda, and turned back across Africa only because his Makololo could not wenture on the journey without him, he set an example which it may be hoped we, as a nation, shall some day learn to follow. As things stand in South Africa, we can only think with humiliation of the reflections which would. have been Living- tone's now, and rejoice that he was permitted to die while he could still believe that the influence of England upon Africa svas just and generous.
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