Quotes from David Livingstone

Sichuana," and "Nya," No, is identical. The men here deny that cannibalism is common: they eat only those killed in war, and, it seems, in revenge, for, said Mokandira, "the meat is not nice; it makes one dream of the dead man." Some west of Lualaba eat even those bought for the purpose of a feast; but I am not quite positive on this point: all agree in saying that human flesh is saltish, and needs but little condiment. And

The strangest disease I have seen in this country seems really to be broken-heartedness, and it attacks free men who have been captured and made slaves.

The adults as a rule came into the slave-sticks from treachery, and had never been slaves before. Very often the Arabs would promise a present of dried fish to villagers if they would act as guides to some distant point, and as soon as they were far enough away from their friends they were seized and pinned into the yoke from which there is no escape.

Cold-blooded murders are frightfully common here. Some kill people in order to be allowed to wear the red tail feathers of a parrot in their hair, and yet they are not ugly like the West Coast Negroes, for many men have as finely formed heads as could be found in London. We English, if naked, would make but poor figures beside the strapping forms and finely shaped limbs of Manyuema men and women.

A great deal of power is thus lost in the Church. Fastings and vigils, without a special object in view, are time run to waste. They are made to minister to a sort of self-gratification, instead of being turned to account for the good of others. They are like groaning in sickness. Some people amuse themselves when ill with continuous moaning. The forty days of Lent might be annually spent in visiting adjacent tribes, and bearing unavoidable hunger and thirst with a good grace. Considering

No objection would be made to teaching the natives of the country to read their own languages in the Roman character. No Arab has ever attempted to teach them the Arabic-Koran, they are called guma, hard, or difficult as to religion. This is not wonderful, since the Koran is never translated, and a very extraordinary desire for knowledge would be required to sustain a man in committing to memory pages and chapters of, to him, unmeaning gibberish.

11th March, 1871.—I had a long, fierce oration from Amur, in which I was told again and again that I should be killed and eaten—the people wanted a "white one" to eat! I needed 200 guns; and "must not go to die." I told him that I was thankful for advice, if given by one who had knowledge, but his vehement threats were dreams of one who had never gone anywhere, but sent his slaves to kill people. He was only frightening my people, and doing me an injury.

Slave-trading seems to have been coeval with the knowledge of iron. The monuments of Egypt show that this curse has venerable antiquity. Some people say, "If so ancient, why try to stop an old established usage now?" Well, some believe that the affliction that befel the most ancient of all the patriarchs, Job, was small-pox. Why then stop the ravages of this venerable disease in London and New York by vaccination?

15th March, 1871.—Falsehood seems ingrained in their constitutions: no wonder that in all this region they have never tried to propagate Islamism; the natives soon learn to hate them, and slaving, as carried on by the Kilwans and Ujijians, is so bloody, as to prove an effectual barrier against proselytism.

With others arguments are useless, and the only answer I care to give is the remark of an English sailor, who, on seeing slave-traders actually at their occupation, said to his companion, "Shiver my timbers, mate, if the devil don't catch these fellows, we might as well have no devil at all.

The central Lualaba I would fain call the Lake River Webb; the western, the Lake River Young. The Lufira and Lualaba West form a Lake, the native name of which, "Chibungo," must give way to Lake Lincoln. I wish to name the fountain of the Liambai or Upper Zambesi, Palmerston Fountain, and adding that of Sir Bartle Frere to the fountain of Lufira, three names of men who have done more to abolish slavery and the slave-trade than any of their contemporaries.

To dictate definition is to wield cultural power

25th December, 1872, Christmas Day.—I thank the good Lord for the good gift of His Son Christ Jesus our Lord. Slaughtered an ox, and gave a fundo and a half to each of the party. This is our great day, so we rest.

Thus in his death, not less than in his life, David Livingstone bore testimony to that goodwill and kindliness which exists in the heart of the African.

My own people persuaded the Bagenya not to sell a canoe: Hassani knows it all, but swears that he did not join in the slander, and even points up to Heaven in attestation of innocence of all, even of Manilla's foray. Mohamadans are certainly famous as liars, and the falsehood of Mohamad has been transmitted to his followers in a measure unknown in other religions.

The trade is chiefly with Madagascar: the houses are richly furnished with furniture, dishes from India, &c. At Garaganza there are hundreds of Arab traders, there too all fruits abound, and the climate is healthy, from its elevation. Why cannot we missionaries imitate these Arabs in living on heights?

I noticed a very pretty woman come past this quite jauntily about a month ago, on marriage with Monasimba. Ten goats were given; her friends came and asked another goat, which being refused, she was enticed away, became sick of rheumatic fever two days afterwards, and died yesterday. Not a syllable of regret for the beautiful young creature does one hear, but for the goats: "Oh, our ten goats!"—they cannot grieve too much—"Our ten goats—oh! oh!

Lion's fat is regarded as a sure preventive of tsetse or bungo. This was noted before, but I add now that it is smeared on the ox's tail, and preserves hundreds of the Banyamwesi cattle in safety while going to the coast; it is also used to keep pigs and hippopotami away from gardens: the smell is probably the efficacious part in "Heresi," as they call it.

What is the atonement of Christ? It is Himself: it is the inherent and everlasting mercy of God made apparent to human eyes and ears. The everlasting love was disclosed by our Lord's life and death. It showed that God forgives, because He loves to forgive. He works by smiles if possible, if not by frowns; pain is only a means of enforcing love. If we speak of strength, lo! He is strong. The Almighty; the Over Power; the Mind of the Universe. The heart thrills at the idea of His greatness.

Immediately after the Franco-German war the value of ivory increased considerably; and when we look at the prices realized on large Zanzibar tusks at the public sales, we can well understand the motive power which drove the Arab ivory hunters further and further into the country from which the chief supply was derived when Dr. Livingstone met them.

Emancipation was a mistake;" and these fast writers drew along with them a large body, who would fain be slaveholders themselves. We must never lose sight of the fact that though the majority perhaps are on the side of freedom, large numbers of Englishmen are not slaveholders only because the law forbids the practice

We admired Stonewall Jackson as a modern type of Cromwell's Ironsides; and we praised Lee for his generalship, which, after all, was chiefly conspicuous by the absence of commanding abilities in his opponents, but, unquestionably, there existed besides an eager desire that slaveocracy might prosper, and the Negro go to the wall.

Single tusks vary in weight from 1 lb. to 165 lbs.: the average of a pair of tusks may be put at 28 lbs., and therefore 44,000 elephants, large and small, must be killed yearly to supply the ivory which comes to England alone, and when we remember that an enormous quantity goes to America, to India and China, for consumption there, and of which we have no account, some faint notion may be formed of the destruction that goes on amongst the herds of elephants.

What is the atonement of Christ? It is Himself: it is the inherent and everlasting mercy of God made apparent to human eyes and ears. The everlasting love was disclosed by our Lord's life and death. It showed that God forgives, because He loves to forgive. He works by smiles if possible, if not by frowns; pain is only a means of enforcing love.