How I Found Livingstone - Henry M. Stanley (best ereader for comics txt) 📗

is a wild dance altogether. The music is lively, and evoked

from the sonorous sound of four drums, which are arranged before

the bodies of four men, who stand in the centre of the weird

circle. Bombay, as ever comical, never so much at home as when in

the dance of the Mrima, has my water-bucket on his head; Chowpereh—

the sturdy, the nimble, sure-footed Chowpereh—has an axe in his

hand, and wears a goatskin on his head; Baraka has my bearskin,

and handles a spear; Mabruki, the “Bullheaded,” has entered into

the spirit of the thing, and steps up and down like a solemn

elephant; Ulimengo has a gun, and is a fierce Drawcansir, and you

would imagine he was about to do battle to a hundred thousand,

so ferocious is he in appearance; Khamisi and Kamna are before

the drummers, back to back, kicking up ambitiously at the stars;

Asmani,—the embodiment of giant strength,—a towering Titan,—

has also a gun, with which he is dealing blows in the air, as if

he were Thor, slaying myriads with his hammer. The scruples and

passions of us all are in abeyance; we are contending demons under

the heavenly light of the stars, enacting only the part of a weird

drama, quickened into action and movement by the appalling energy

and thunder of the drums.

 

The warlike music is ended, and another is started. The choragus

has fallen on his knees, and dips his head two or three times in an

excavation in the ground, and a choir, also on their knees, repeat

in dolorous tones the last words of a slow and solemn refrain. The

words are literally translated:—

 

Choragus. Oh-oh-oh! the white man is going home!

 

Choir. Oh-oh-oh! going home!

Going home, oh-oh-oh!

 

Choragus. To the happy island on the sea,

Where the beads are plenty, oh-oh-oh!

 

Choir. Oh-oh-oh! where the beads are plenty,

Oh-oh-oh!

 

Choragus. While Singiri has kept us, oh, very long

From our homes very long, oh-oh-oh.!

 

Choir From our homes, oh-oh-oh!

Oh-oh-oh!

 

Choragus. And we have had no food for very long—

We are half-starved, oh, for so long!

Bana Singiri!

 

Choir. For so very long, oh-oh-oh!

Bana Singiri-Singiri!

Singiri! oh, Singiri

 

Choragus. Mirambo has gone to war

To fight against the Arabs;

The Arabs and Wangwana

Have gone to fight Mirambo!

 

Choir Oh-oh-oh! to fight Mirambo!

 

Oh, Mirambo! Mirambo

Oh, to fight Mirambo!

 

Choragus. But the white man will make us glad,

He is going home! For he is going home,

And he will make us glad! Sh-sh-sh!

 

Choir. The white man will make us glad! Sh-sh-sh

Sh–—sh-h-h–—sh-h-h-h-h-h!

Um-m—mu–um-m-m–-sh!

 

This is the singular farewell which I received from the Wanyamwezi

of Singiri, and for its remarkable epic beauty(?), rhythmic

excellence(?), and impassioned force(?), I have immortalised it in

the pages of this book, as one of the most wonderful productions of

the chorus-loving children of Unyamwezi.

 

March 13th.—The last day of my stay with Livingstone has come

and gone, and the last night we shall be together is present, and

I cannot evade the morrow! I feel as though I would rebel against

the fate which drives me away from him. The minutes beat fast,

and grow into hours.

 

Our door is closed, and we are both of us busy with our own

thoughts. What his thoughts are I know not. Mine are sad. My

days seem to have been spent in an Elysian field; otherwise, why

should I so keenly regret the near approach of the parting hour?

Have I not been battered by successive fevers, prostrate with

agony day after day lately? Have I not raved and stormed in

madness? Have I not clenched my fists in fury, and fought with

the wild strength of despair when in delirium? Yet, I regret to

surrender the pleasure I have felt in this man’s society, though

so dearly purchased.

 

I cannot resist the sure advance of time, which flies this night

as if it mocked me, and gloated on the misery it created!

Be it so!

 

How many times have I not suffered the pang of parting with

friends! I wished to linger longer, but the inevitable would

come—Fate sundered us. This is the same regretful feeling, only

it is more poignant, and the farewell may be forever! FOREVER?

And “FOR EVER,” echo the reverberations of a woful whisper.

 

I have noted down all he has said to-night; but the reader shall

not share it with me. It is mine!

 

I am as jealous as he is himself of his Journal; and I have

written in German text, and in round hand, on either side of it,

on the waterproof canvas cover, “POSITTVELY NOT TO BE OPENED;”

to which he has affixed his signature. I have stenographed every

word he has said to me respecting the equable distribution of

certain curiosities among his friends and children, and his last

wish about “his” dear old friend, Sir Roderick Murchison, because

he has been getting anxious about him ever since we received the

newspapers at Ugunda, when we read that the old man was suffering

from a paralytic stroke. I must be sure to send him the news, as

soon as I get to Aden; and I have promised that he will receive

the message from me quicker than anything was ever received in

Central Africa.

 

“Tomorrow night, Doctor, you will be alone!”

 

“Yes; the house will look as though a death had taken place.

You had better stop until the rains, which are now near,

are over.”

 

“I would to God I could, my dear Doctor; but every day I stop

here, now that there is no necessity for me to stay longer, keeps

you from your work and home.”

 

“I know; but consider your health—you are not fit to travel.

What is it? Only a few weeks longer. You will travel to the

coast just as quickly when the rains are over as you will by

going now. The plains will be inundated between here and the

coast.”

 

“You think so; but I will reach the coast in forty days; if

not in forty, I will in fifty—certain. The thought that I

am doing you an important service will spur me on.”

 

March 14th.—At dawn we were up, the bales and baggage were taken

outside of the building, and the men prepared themselves for the

first march towards home.

 

We had a sad breakfast together. I could not eat, my heart was

too full; neither did my companion seem to have an appetite. We

found something to do which kept us longer together. At 8 o’clock

I was not gone, and I had thought to have been off at 5 A.M.

 

“Doctor,” said I, “I will leave two men with you, who will stop

to-day and tomorrow with you, for it may be that you have

forgotten something in the hurry of my departure. I will halt a

day at Tura, on the frontier of Unyamwezi, for your last word,

and your last wish; and now we must part—there is no help for it.

Good-bye.”

 

“Oh, I am coming with you a little way. I must see you off on

the road.”

 

“Thank you. Now, my men, Home! Kirangozi, lift the flag, and

MARCH!”

 

The house looked desolate—it faded from our view. Old times,

and the memories of my aspirations and kindling hopes, came strong

on me. The old hills round about, that I once thought tame and

uninteresting, had become invested with histories and reminiscences

for me. On that burzani I have sat hour after hour, dreaming, and

hoping, and sighing. On that col I stood, watching the battle and

the destruction of Tabora. Under that roof I have sickened and

been delirious, and cried out like a child at the fate that

threatened my mission. Under that banian tree lay my dead comrade—

poor Shaw; I would have given a fortune to have had him by my side

at this time. From that house I started on my journey to Ujiji;

to it I returned as to a friend, with a newer and dearer companion;

and now I leave all. Already it all appears like a strange dream.

 

We walked side by side; the men lifted their voices into a song.

I took long looks at Livingstone, to impress his features

thoroughly on my memory.

 

“The thing is, Doctor, so far as I can understand it, you do not

intend to return home until you have satisfied yourself about the

`Sources of the Nile.’ When you have satisfied yourself, you will

come home and satisfy others. Is it not so?”

 

“That is it, exactly. When your men come back, I shall immediately

start for Ufipa; then, crossing the Rungwa River, I shall strike

south, and round the extremity of the Tanganika. Then, a south-east

course will take me to Chicumbi’s, on the Luapula. On crossing

the Luapula, I shall go direct west to the copper-mines of Katanga.

Eight days south of Katanga, the natives declare the fountains to be.

When I have found them, I shall return by Katanga to the underground

houses of Rua. From the caverns, ten days northeast will take

me to Lake Kamolondo. I shall be able to travel from the lake, in

your boat, up the River Lufira, to Lake Lincoln. Then, coming down

again, I can proceed north, by the Lualaba, to the fourth lake—

which, I think, will explain the whole problem; and I will probably

find that it is either Chowambe (Baker’s lake), or Piaggia’s lake.

 

“And how long do you think this little journey will take you?”

 

“A year and a half, at the furthest, from the day I leave

Unyanyembe.”

 

“Suppose you say two years; contingencies might arise, you know.

It will be well for me to hire these new men for two years; the

day of their engagement to begin from their arrival at Unyanyembe.”

 

“Yes, that will do excellently well.”

 

“Now, my dear Doctor, the best friends must part. You have come

far enough; let me beg of you to turn back.”

 

“Well, I will say this to you: you have done what few men could

do—far better than some great travellers I know. And I am grateful

to you for what you have done for me. God guide you safe home, and

bless you, my friend.”

 

“And may God bring you safe back to us all, my dear friend.

Farewell!”

 

“Farewell!”

 

We wrung each other’s hands, and I had to tear myself away before

I unmanned myself; but Susi, and Chumah, and Hamoydah—the Doctor’s

faithful fellows—they must all shake and kiss my hands before I

could quite turn away. I betrayed myself!

 

“Good-bye, Doctor—dear friend!”

 

“Good-bye!”

 

The FAREWELL between Livingstone and myself had been spoken. We

were parted, he to whatever fate Destiny had yet in store for him,

to battling against difficulties, to many, many days of marching

through wildernesses, with little or nothing much to sustain him

save his own high spirit, and enduring faith in God—“who would

bring all things right at last;” and I to that which Destiny

may have in store for me.

 

But though I may live half a century longer, I shall never forget

that parting scene in Central Africa. I shall never cease to think

of the sad tones of that sorrowful word Farewell, how they

permeated through every core of my heart, how they clouded my

eyes, and made me wish unutterable things which could never be.

 

An audacious desire to steal one embrace from the dear old man came

over me, and almost unmanned me. I felt tempted to stop with him

and assist him, on his long return march