How I found Livingstone : $b Travels, adventures, and discoveres in Central Africa, including an account of four months' residence with Dr. LivingstoneStanley, Henry M. (Henry Morton)
History
How I found Livingstone : $b Travels, adventures, and discoveres in Central Africa, including an account of four months' residence with Dr. Livingstone
Stanley, Henry M. (Henry Morton)
Africa, Central -- Description and travel; Livingstone, David, 1813-1873
"I shall tell him this morning who sent me, and what brought me here.
I will then ask him to write a letter to Mr. Bennett, and to give
what news he can spare. I did not come here to rob him of his news.
Sufficient for me is it that I have found him. It is a complete success
so far. But it will be a greater one if he gives me letters for Mr.
Bennett, and an acknowledgment that he has seen me."
"Do you think he will do so?"
"Why not? I have come here to do him a service. He has no goods. I have.
He has no men with him. I have. If I do a friendly part by him, will he
not do a friendly part by me? What says the poet?--
Nor hope to find
A friend, but who has found a friend in thee.
All like the purchase; few the price will pay
And this makes friends such wonders here below.
I have paid the purchase, by coming so far to do him a service. But I
think, from what I have seen of him last night, that he is not such
a niggard and misanthrope as I was led to believe. He exhibited
considerable emotion, despite the monosyllabic greeting, when he shook
my hand. If he were a man to feel annoyance at any person coming after
him, he would not have received me as he did, nor would he ask me to
live with him, but he would have surlily refused to see me, and told
me to mind my own business. Neither does he mind my nationality; for
'here,' said he, 'Americans and Englishmen are the same people. We speak
the same language and have the same ideas.' Just so, Doctor; I agree
with you. Here at least, Americans and Englishmen shall be brothers,
and, whatever I can do for you, you may command me freely."
I dressed myself quietly, intending to take a stroll along the Tanganika
before the Doctor should rise; opened the door, which creaked horribly
on its hinges, and walked out to the veranda.
"Halloa, Doctor!--you up already? I hope you have slept well?"
"Good-morning, Mr. Stanley! I am glad to see you. I hope you rested
well. I sat up late reading my letters. You have brought me good and bad
news. But sit down." He made a place for me by his side. "Yes, many of
my friends are dead. My eldest son has met with a sad accident--that is,
my boy Tom; my second son, Oswell, is at college studying medicine, and
is doing well I am told. Agnes, my eldest daughter, has been enjoying
herself in a yacht, with 'Sir Paraffine' Young and his family. Sir
Roderick, also, is well, and expresses a hope that he will soon see me.
You have brought me quite a budget."
The man was not an apparition, then, and yesterday's scenes were not the
result of a dream! and I gazed on him intently, for thus I was assured
he had not run away, which was the great fear that constantly haunted me
as I was journeying to Ujiji.
"Now, Doctor," said I, "you are, probably, wondering why I came here?"
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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