How I Found Livingstone Travels, Adventures And Discoveries In Central Africa Including Four Months Residence With Dr. Livingstone By Sir Henry M. Stanley
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I Have Been Twice
Guilty Of This In Africa Once When We Were Famishing In Southern
Uvinza I Inscribed The Date, My Initials, And The Word "Starving,"
In Large Letters On The Trunk Of A Sycamore.
In passing through the forest of Ukamba, we saw the bleached skull
of an unfortunate victim to the privations of travel.
Referring to
it, the Doctor remarked that he could never pass through an African
forest, with its solemn stillness and serenity, without wishing to
be buried quietly under the dead leaves, where he would be sure to
rest undisturbed. In England there was no elbow-room, the graves
were often desecrated; and ever since he had buried his wife in
the woods of Shupanga he had sighed for just such a spot, where his
weary bones would receive the eternal rest they coveted.
The same evening, when the tent door was down, and the interior
was made cheerful by the light of a paraffin candle, the Doctor
related to me some incidents respecting the career and the death
of his eldest son, Robert. Readers of Livingstone's first book,
`South Africa,' without which no boy should be, will probably
recollect the dying Sebituane's regard for the little boy
"Robert." Mrs. Livingstone and family were taken to the Cape of
Good Hope, and thence sent to England, where Robert was put in the
charge of a tutor; but wearied of inactivity, when he was about
eighteen, he left Scotland and came to Natal, whence he endeavoured
to reach his father. Unsuccessful in his attempt, he took ship and
sailed for New York, and enlisted in the Northern Army, in a New
Hampshire regiment of Volunteers, discarding his own name of Robert
Moffatt Livingstone, and taking that of Rupert Vincent that his
tutor, who seems to have been ignorant of his duties to the youth,
might not find him. From one of the battles before Richmond, he
was conveyed to a North Carolina hospital, where he died from his
wounds.
On the 7th of February we arrived at the Gombe, and camped near
one of its largest lakes. This lake is probably several miles in
length, and swarms with hippopotami and crocodiles.
From this camp I despatched Ferajji, the cook, and Chowpereh to
Unyanyembe, to bring the letters and medicines that were sent to
me from Zanzibar, and meet us at Ugunda, while the next day we moved
to our old quarters on the Gombe, where we were first introduced to
the real hunter's paradise in Central Africa. The rain had
scattered the greater number of the herds, but there was plenty of
game in the vicinity. Soon after breakfast I took Khamisi and
Kalulu with me for a hunt. After a long walk we arrived near a
thin jungle, where I discovered the tracks of several animals - boar,
antelope, elephant, rhinoceros, hippopotamus, and an unusual
number of imprints of the lion's paw. Suddenly I heard Khamisi
say, "Master, master! here is a `simba!' (lion);" and he came
up to me trembling with excitement and fear - for the young fellow
was an arrant coward - to point out the head of a beast, which could
be seen just above the tall grass, looking steadily towards us.
It immediately afterwards bounded from side to side, but the grass
was so high that it was impossible to tell exactly what it was.
Taking advantage of a tree in my front, I crept quietly onwards,
intending to rest the heavy rifle against it, as I was so weak
from the effects of several fevers that I felt myself utterly
incapable of supporting my rifle for a steady aim.
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