‘If the history of modern discovery has a moment comparable for dramatic interest to that in which Columbus turned his prow westward, and sailed into space, to link for ever the destinies of two hemispheres, it is the one in which a roving white man, in the far heart of Africa, set his face down the current of a mighty river, and committed himself to its waters, determined, for weal or woe, to track their course to the sea. The Genoese navigator, indeed, who divined and dared an unknown world, staked the whole future of humanity on his bold intuition, but posterity may one day trace results scarcely less momentous to the resolve of the intrepid explorer who launched his canoe on the Congo at Nyangwe, to win a second great inheritance for mankind. The exploration of the great, moving highway of Africa makes an epoch in the discovery of Africa, closing the era of desultory and isolated research, and opening that of combined, steady effort towards a definite, though distant, goal. That goal is the opening-up of the vast Equatorial region to direct intercourse with Europe.’ I will now close my preface with St. Paul’s words, because they so wonderfully apply to Stanley:-- In journeyings often, in perils of waters, In perils of robbers, in perils by mine own countrymen, in perils by the heathen, In perils in the city, in perils in the wilderness, in perils in the sea, In perils among false brethren; In weariness and painfulness, in watchings often, In hunger and thirst, in fastings often, In cold and nakedness. * * * * * If I must needs glory, I will glory of the things that concern my weakness. (II Corinthians, Chap. xi, 26, 27, 30.) The first nine chapters of the book are the Autobiography, covering the early years of Stanley’s life. In the remaining chapters, the aim has been to make him the narrator and interpreter of his own actions. This has been done, wherever possible, by interweaving, into a connected narrative, strands gathered from his unpublished writings. These materials consist, first, of journals and note-books. For many years he kept a line-a-day diary; through some periods, especially during his explorations, he wrote a full journal; and at a later period he kept note-books, as well as a journal, for jotting down, sometimes a personal retrospect, sometimes a comment on the society about him, or a philosophical reflection.