A Popular Account of Dr. Livingstone's Expedition to the Zambesi and Its Tributaries: And of the Discovery of Lakes Shirwa and Nyassa, 1858-1864Livingstone, David
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A Popular Account of Dr. Livingstone's Expedition to the Zambesi and Its Tributaries: And of the Discovery of Lakes Shirwa and Nyassa, 1858-1864
Livingstone, David
Africa, Central -- Description and travel; Africa, Central -- Discovery and exploration
and a large body of slaves. Four were armed with muskets, and we were
obliged in self-defence to return their fire and drive them off. When
they saw the range of rifles, they very soon desisted, and ran away; but
some shouted to us from the hills the consoling intimation, that they
would follow, and kill us where we slept. Only two of the captives
escaped to us, but probably most of those made prisoners that day fled
elsewhere in the confusion. We returned to the village which we had left
in the morning, after a hungry, fatiguing, and most unpleasant day.
Though we could not blame ourselves for the course we had followed, we
felt sorry for what had happened. It was the first time we had ever been
attacked by the natives or come into collision with them; though we had
always taken it for granted that we might be called upon to act in self-
defence, we were on this occasion less prepared than usual, no game
having been expected here. The men had only a single round of cartridge
each; their leader had no revolver, and the rifle he usually fired with
was left at the ship to save it from the damp of the season. Had we
known better the effect of slavery and murder on the temper of these
bloodthirsty marauders, we should have tried messages and presents before
going near them.
The old chief, Chinsunse, came on a visit to us next day, and pressed the
Bishop to come and live with him. "Chigunda," he said, "is but a child,
and the Bishop ought to live with the father rather than with the child."
But the old man's object was so evidently to have the Mission as a shield
against the Ajawa, that his invitation was declined. While begging us to
drive away the marauders, that he might live in peace, he adopted the
stratagem of causing a number of his men to rush into the village, in
breathless haste, with the news that the Ajawa were close upon us. And
having been reminded that we never fought, unless attacked, as we were
the day before, and that we had come among them for the purpose of
promoting peace, and of teaching them to worship the Supreme, to give up
selling His children, and to cultivate other objects for barter than each
other, he replied, in a huff, "Then I am dead already."
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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