Part 25

"June 26th, 8 P.M.

"MAZZINI: I propose, therefore (dunque), to go out to-morrow evening. Send me to-morrow morning the chief who is to assume the command here. Order the general-in-chief to prepare one hundred fifty mounted dragoons, who, with the fifty lancers, will make up two hundred horse. I shall take eight hundred of the legion, and to-morrow shall send them to change their shirts [i.e., doff their 'red' for 'gray']. Answer at once, and keep the plan a profound secret."

The attempt was not made, probably because it was impossible to march out secretly from any gate, and Manara writes from Villa Spada, 1 P.M. on the same day:

"CITIZEN TRIUMVIR: I have received your letter. I am somewhat better and at my post. I have spoken with Pisacane [chief of Rosselli's staff]; we are perfectly agreed. Both animated by the same spirit, it is impossible for petty jealousies to come between us. Be assured of this. I have begged General Garibaldi to return to San Pancrazio, so as not to deprive that post at this moment of his legion and his efficacious power. He promises me that before dawn all will be here. Everything is quiet.

"MANARA."

This was Manara's last letter to Mazzini; at that same Villa Spada the yearned-for bullet pierced his heroic heart. Manara died as the barbarians entered Rome.

And here, to all appearances, is Garibaldi's last letter written in Rome to Mazzini:

"We have retaken our positions outside San Pancrazio. Let General Rosselli send me orders; this is now no time for change. Yours,

"G. GARIBALDI."

No time for anything but one last desperate onslaught at the point of the bayonet, Garibaldi in the foremost ranks with sword unsheathed, while Medici from Villa Savorelli renewed the wonders of the Vascello. Twice the assailants were driven back to their second lines; thrice they returned in overpowering numbers; but, gaining the gate, they were received with volleys of musketry from the barricades at the ingress to Villa Spada and Savorelli. There fell the flower of the Lombards; boys of the "band of hope"; Garibaldi's giant negro, faithful, brave Anghiar; six hundred added to the three thousand four hundred corpses on which the soldiers of La Grande Nation reconstructed the throne of the supreme Pontiff, and guarded it with their bayonets until the sword of their self-chosen master fell from his trembling hands at Sedan.

(1849) LIVINGSTONE'S AFRICAN DISCOVERIES, David Livinstone and Thomas Hughes

Although Africa, the second largest grand division of the earth, has figured in history from ancient times, still it has been rightly named, and until recently was called with good reason, the "Dark Continent." But though it has been thus designated, as the least known of the world's grand divisions, the progress of discovery and settlement is rapidly dispelling the ignorance and mystery to which the designation was due. The ancient seats of African civilization were confined to the northern parts of the continent. The Phoenicians are said to have circumnavigated Africa as early as the seventh century before Christ. In the middle of the fifteenth century of the present era the Portuguese explored much of the coastline, and in 1497 Vasco da Gama doubled the Cape of Good Hope. But no modern explorations of the interior are known to have been made until the latter part of the eighteenth century. Since James Bruce, the Scottish traveller, explored the Nile Valley in 1768, more than thirty others have distinguished themselves by their discoveries on the African continent.

None of Livingstone's predecessors equalled the achievements of this Scottish missionary and explorer, who combined with his zeal in the cause of religion and humanity a spirit of investigation and adventure that made him also the servant of science, the "advance-agent" of discovery, settlement, and civilization. These are at last bringing the "Dark Continent" into the light of a new day that begins to dawn in the remotest corners of the earth.

David Livingstone was born near Glasgow, Scotland, March 19, 1813, and he died in Central Africa April 30, 1873. After he had been admitted to the medical profession and had studied theology, he decided to join Robert Moffat, the celebrated missionary, in Africa. Livingstone arrived at Cape Town in 1840, and soon moved toward the interior. He spent sixteen years in Africa, engaged in medical and missionary labors and in making his famous and most useful explorations of the country. His own account of the beginnings of his work, taken from his Missionary Travels, shows the sincere and simple spirit of the man, and his natural powers of observation and description are seen in his own story of his first important discovery, that of Lake Ngami. The narrative of Thomas Hughes, the well-known English author, whose favorite subjects were manly men and their characteristic deeds, follows the explorer on the first of his famous journeys in the Zambesi Basin.

DAVID LIVINGSTONE

I embarked for Africa in 1840, and, after a voyage of three months, reached Cape Town. Spending but a short time there, I started for the interior by going round to Algoa Bay, and soon proceeded inland, and spent the following sixteen years of my life, namely, from 1840 to 1856, in medical and missionary labors there without cost to the inhabitants.

The general instructions I received from the directors of the London Missionary Society led me, as soon as I reached Kuruman or Lattakoo, then their farthest inland station from the Cape, to turn my attention to the north. Without waiting longer at Kuruman than was necessary to recruit the oxen, which were pretty well tired by the long journey from Algoa Bay, I proceeded, in company with another missionary, to the Bechuana or Bakwain country, and found Sechele, with his tribe, located at Shokuane. We shortly afterward retraced our steps to Kuruman; but as the objects in view were by no means to be attained by a temporary excursion of this sort, I determined to make a fresh start into the interior as soon as possible. Accordingly, after resting three months at Kuruman, which is a kind of head station in the country, I returned to a spot about fifteen miles south of Shokuane, called Lepelole (now Litubaruba). Here, in order to obtain an accurate knowledge of the language, I cut myself off from all European society for about six months, and gained by this ordeal an insight into the habits, ways of thinking, laws, and language of that section of the Bechuanas called Bakwains, which has proved of incalculable advantage in my intercourse with them ever since.

In this second journey to Lepelole--so called from a cavern of that name--I began preparations for a settlement by making a canal to irrigate gardens from a stream, then flowing copiously, but now quite dry. When these preparations were well advanced I went northward to visit the Bakaa and Bamangwato, and the Makalaka, living between 22° and 23° south latitude. The Bakaa Mountains had been visited before by a trader, who, with his people, all perished from fever. In going round the northern part of these basaltic hills, near Letloche, I was only ten days distant from the lower part of the Zouga, which passed by the same name as Lake Ngami; and I might then (in 1842) have discovered that lake, had discovery alone been my object. Most of this journey beyond Shokuane was performed on foot, in consequence of the draught oxen having become sick. Some of my companions who had recently joined us, and did not know that I understood a little of their speech, were overheard by me discussing my appearance and powers: "He is not strong; he is quite slim, and only appears stout because he puts himself into those bags [trousers]; he will soon knock up." This caused my Highland blood to rise, and made me despise the fatigue of keeping them all at the top of their speed for days together, till I heard them expressing proper opinions of my pedestrian powers.

Returning to Kuruman, in order to bring my luggage to our proposed settlement, I was followed by the news that the tribe of Bakwains, who had shown themselves so friendly toward me, had been driven from Lepelole by the Barolongs, so that my prospects for the time of forming a settlement there were at an end. One of those periodical outbreaks of war, which seem to have occurred from time immemorial, for the possession of cattle, had burst forth in the land, and had so changed the relations of the tribes to each other that I was obliged to set out anew to look for a suitable locality for a mission-station.

In going north again a comet blazed on our sight, exciting the wonder of every tribe we visited. That of 1816 had been followed by an irruption of the Matabele, the most cruel enemies the Bechuanas ever knew, and this they thought might portend something as bad, or it might only foreshadow the death of some great chief. On this subject of comets I knew little more than they did themselves, but I had that confidence in a kind overruling Providence which makes such a difference between Christians and both the ancient and modern heathen.

As some of the Bamangwato people had accompanied me to Kuruman, I was obliged to restore them and their goods to their chief Sekomi. This made a journey to the residence of that chief again necessary, and, for the first time, I performed a distance of some hundred miles on oxback.

Returning toward Kuruman, I selected the beautiful valley of Mabotsa (latitude 25° 14' south, longitude 26° 30') as the site of a missionary-station, and thither I removed in 1843. Here an occurrence took place concerning which I have frequently been questioned in England, and which, but for the importunities of friends, I meant to have kept in store to tell my children when in my dotage. The Bakatla of the village Mabotsa were much troubled by lions, which leaped into the cattle-pens by night and destroyed their cows. They even attacked the herds in open day. This was so unusual an occurrence that the people believed they were bewitched--"given," as they said, "into the power of the lions by a neighboring tribe." They went at once to attack the animals, but, being rather a cowardly people compared to Bechuanas in general on such occasions, they returned without killing any.

It is well known that if one of a troop of lions is killed, the others take the hint and leave that part of the country. So the next time the herds were attacked I went with the people in order to encourage them to rid themselves of the annoyance by destroying one of the marauders. We found the lions on a small hill about a quarter of a mile in length and covered with trees. A circle of men was formed round it, and they gradually closed up, ascending pretty near to each other. Being down below on the plain with a native schoolmaster, named Mebalwe, a most excellent man, I saw one of the lions sitting on a piece of rock within the now closed circle of men. Mebalwe fired at him before I could, and the ball struck the rock on which the animal was sitting. He bit at the spot struck, as a dog does at a stick or stone thrown at him; then leaping away, broke through the opening circle and escaped unhurt. The men were afraid to attack him, perhaps on account of their belief in witchcraft.

When the circle was re-formed we saw two other lions in it; but we were afraid to fire lest we should strike the men, and they allowed the beasts to burst through also. If the Bakatla had acted according to the custom of the country, they would have speared the lions in their attempt to get out. Seeing we could not get them to kill one of the lions, we bent our footsteps toward the village; in going round the end of the hill, however, I saw one of the beasts sitting on a piece of rock as before, but this time he had a little bush in front. Being about thirty yards off, I took a good aim at his body through the bush, and fired both barrels into it. The men then called out, "He is shot! He is shot!"

Others cried: "He has been shot by another man too; let us go to him!" I did not see anyone else shoot at him, but I saw the lion's tail erected in anger behind the bush, and, turning to the people said, "Stop a little, till I load again." When in the act of ramming down the bullets I heard a shout. Starting, and looking half round, I saw the lion just in the act of springing upon me. I was upon a little height; he caught my shoulder as he sprang, and we both came to the ground below together. Growling horribly close to my ear, he shook me as a terrier dog does a rat. The shock produced a stupor similar to that which seems to be felt by a mouse after the first shake of the cat. It caused a sort of dreaminess, in which there was no sense of pain nor feeling of terror, though quite conscious of all that was happening. It was like what patients partially under the influence of chloroform describe, who see all the operation, but feel not the knife.

This singular condition was not the result of any mental process. The shake annihilated fear, and allowed no sense of horror in looking round at the beast. This peculiar state is probably produced in all animals killed by the carnivora; and if so, is a merciful provision by our benevolent Creator for lessening the pain of death. Turning round to relieve myself of the weight, as he had one paw on the back of my head, I saw his eyes directed to Mabalwe, who was trying to shoot him at a distance of ten or fifteen yards. His gun, a flint one, missed fire in both barrels; the lion immediately left me, and, attacking Mebalwe, bit his thigh. Another man--whose life I had saved before, after he had been tossed by a buffalo--attempted to spear the lion while he was biting Mebalwe. He left Mebalwe and caught this man by the shoulder, but at that moment the bullets he had received took effect, and he fell down dead. The whole was the work of a few moments, and must have been his paroxysms of dying rage. In order to take out the charm from him, the Bakatla on the following day made a huge bonfire over the carcass, which was declared to be that of the largest lion they had ever seen. Besides crunching the bone into splinters, he left eleven teeth wounds on the upper part of my arm. It was a long time in healing.

The exact position of Lake Ngami had, for half a century at least, been correctly pointed out by the natives, who had visited it when rains were more copious in the desert than in more recent times, and many attempts had been made to reach it by passing through the desert in the direction indicated; but it was found impossible, even for Griquas, who, having some Bushman blood in them, may be supposed more capable of enduring thirst than Europeans. It was clear, then, that our only chance of success was by going round, instead of through, the desert.

On July 4, 1849, we went forward on horseback toward what we supposed to be the lake, and again and again did we seem to see it; but at last we came to the veritable water of the Zouga, and found it to be a river running to the northeast. A village of Bakurutse lay on the opposite bank; these live among Batletli, a tribe having a click in their language, and who were found by Sebituane to possess large herds of the great horned cattle. They seem allied to the Hottentot family. Mr. Oswell, in trying to cross the river, got his horse bogged in the swampy bank. Two Bakwains and I managed to get over by wading beside a fishing-weir. The people were friendly, and informed us that this water came out of the Ngami. This news gladdened all our hearts, for we now felt certain of reaching our goal. We might, they said, be a moon on the way; but we had the River Zouga at our feet, and by following it we should at last reach the broad water.