“Could one but sum them into a picture it would have grand interest. The uncomplaining heroism of our dark followers, the brave manhood latent in such uncouth disguise, the tenderness we have seen issuing from nameless entities, the great love animating the ignoble, the sacrifice made by the unfortunate for one more unfortunate, the reverence we have noted in barbarians, who, even as ourselves, were inspired with nobleness and incentives to duty——of all these we would speak if we could, but I must end with, thanks be to God forever and ever!” This letter is characteristic of Stanley. The hardships of his journey will fade from memory, but its successes will become historic. He has made the “Dark Continent” dark no longer. To him and his undaunted comrades the world owes a debt of gratitude it will be difficult to repay. The vast tracts of hitherto unknown wilderness through which he traveled will stimulate the enterprise of the pioneer, and the day is not far distant——within the lifetime of our children’s children, perhaps——when the shrill echo of the engine’s whistle will be heard on the rugged sides of snow capped mountains which Stanley has explored; when those illimitable forests will resound with the woodman’s axe, and when the law of commerce will change the tawny native from a savage into a self-respecting citizen. Barbarism will retire from its last stronghold on the planet, as the darkness disappears when the sun rises over the hilltops. The dire distresses of his long journey, begun two and a-half years ago, are beyond the reach of language. He merely hints at some of them and leaves the rest to the imagination. We ponder his pathetic references to the sturdy loyalty of companions and followers, “maddened with the agonies of fierce fevers,” falling into their graves through the subtle poison with which the natives tipped their arrows and spears, bravely fighting their way through interminable swamps only to succumb at last, and the conviction steals over us that such a story has never been told before and may never be told again. He rescued Emin and his comrades, who were “in daily expectation of their doom,” then turned his face southward, made various and important explorations on his way, and at last came within speaking distance of the millions who followed him from the hour he entered the mouth of the Congo with a solicitude which no other man of our time has commanded.