"I do not feel so much elated," continued Dr. Livingstone, "by the prospect of accomplishing this feat. I feel most thankful to God for preserving my life, where so many, who by superior intelligence would have done more good, have been cut off. But it does not look as if I had reached the goal. Viewed in relation to my calling, the end of the geographical feat is only the beginning of the enterprise. Apart from family longings, I have a most intense longing to hear how it has fared with our brave men at Sebastopol. My last scrap of intelligence was the _Times_, 17th November, 1855, after the terrible affair of the Light Cavalry. The news was not certain about a most determined attack to force the way to Balaclava, and Sebastopol expected every day to fall, and I have had to repress all my longings since, except in a poor prayer to prosper the cause of justice and right, and cover the heads of our soldiers in the day of battle." [A few days later he heard the news.] "We are all engaged in very much the same cause. Geographers, astronomers, and mechanicians, laboring to make men better acquainted with each other; sanitary reformers, prison reformers, promoters of ragged schools and Niger Expeditions; soldiers fighting for right against oppression, and sailors rescuing captives in deadly climes, as well as missionaries, are all aiding in hastening on a glorious consummation to all God's dealings with our race. In the hope that I may yet be honored to do some good to this poor long downtrodden Africa, the gentlemen over whom you have the honor to preside will, I believe, cordially join." From Tette he went on to Senna. Again he is treated with extraordinary kindness by Lieutenant Miranda, and others, and again he is prostrated by an attack of fever. Provided with a comfortable boat, he at last reaches Quilimane on the 20th May, and is most kindly received by Colonel Nunes, "one of the best men in the country." Dr. Livingstone has told us in his book how his joy in reaching Quilimane was embittered on his learning that Captain Maclure, Lieutenant Woodruffe, and five men of H.M.S. "Dart," had been drowned off the bar in coming to Quilimane to pick him up, and how he felt as if he would rather have died for them[46]. [Footnote 46: Among Livingstone's papers we have found draft letter to the Admiralty, earnestly commending to their Lordship's favorable consideration a petition from the widow of one of the men. He had never seen her, he said, but he had been the unconscious cause of her husband's death, and all the joy he felt in crossing the continent was embittered when the news of the sad catastrophe reached him.]