Hence it could not be otherwise than that the name of white man should be associated with everything revolting and cruel, and that his presence among these wild barbarians should awaken feelings of vengeance. A white man, to those inland tribes, represented wrong and cruelty alone. The very word meant separation of wives, and husbands, and families, and carrying away to a doom whose mystery only enhanced its actual horrors. Hence the white man's rapacity and cruelty put an effectual bar to his curiosity and enterprise. The love of knowledge and physical science was thwarted by the love of sin and wrong, and the civilized world, instead of wondering at the ignorance and barbarity that kept back all research and all benevolent effort, should wonder that any one bearing the slightest relationship to the so-called outside civilized world, should have been allowed to exist for a day where these wronged, outraged savages bore sway. It is not a little singular that the first real encroachment of these forbidden regions was not made by daring explorers either for adventure or geographical knowledge, or to extend commerce, but by a poor missionary, whose sole object was to get the Gospel introduced among these uncounted millions of heathen. Livingstone really broke the spell that hung over tropical Africa, and set on foot movements that are to work a change in the continent more important and momentous than the imagination of man can at present conceive. It is the tropical region of Africa that gives birth to its largest rivers, is covered by its most magnificent forests, is crossed by its loftiest mountains, and where dwell its teeming millions. And this is the unknown part of the continent and the central point toward which all explorers press. This tropical Africa extends from about ten degrees above to ten degrees below the equator, and from ten to thirty-five east longitude, or in round numbers, nearly a thousand miles above and below the equator, to two thousand or more east and west between these parallels of latitudes. With an ordinary map before him, and with Zanzibar on the east and Congo on the west as great landmarks, the reader will get a very clear idea of the ground aimed at and touched, or pierced and crossed by the more recent explorers, and the thorough final explorations of which will unlock the hidden mystery of Africa, and open all there is of interest to both the Christian and commercial world. That to the former there is a field to be occupied that will tax the self-sacrifice and benevolence of the Christian world, there can be no doubt; while to the commercial world a field of equal magnitude and importance will be laid open.