Every reader of _The Zambesi and its Tributaries_ remembers the frightful picture of the slave-sticks, and the row of men, women, and children whom Livingstone and his companions set free. Nothing helped more than this picture to rouse in English bosoms an intense horror of the trade, and a burning sympathy with Livingstone and his friends. Livingstone and the Bishop, with his party, had gone up the Shiré to Chibisa's, and were halting at the village of Mbame, when a slave party came along. The flight of the drivers, the liberation of eighty-four men and women, and their reception by the good Bishop under his charge, speedily followed. The aggressors were the neighboring warlike tribe of Ajawa, and their victims were the Manganja, the inhabitants of the Shiré Valley. The Bishop accepted the invitation of Chigunda, a Manganja chief, to settle at Magomero. It was thought, however, desirable for the Bishop and Livingstone first to visit the Ajawa chief, and try to turn him from his murderous ways. The road was frightful--through burning villages resounding with the wailings of women and the shouts of the warriors. The Ajawa received the offered visit in a hostile spirit, and the shout being raised that Chibisa had come--powerful chief with the reputation of being a sorcerer--they fired on the Bishop's party and compelled them, in self-defense, to fire in return. It was the first time that Livingstone had ever been so attacked by natives, often though they had threatened him. It was the first time he had had to repel an attack with violence; so little was he thinking of such a thing that he had not his rifle with him, and was obliged to borrow a revolver. The encounter was hot and serious, but it ended in the Ajawa being driven off without loss on the other side. It now became a question for the Bishop in what relation he and his party were to stand to these murderous and marauding Ajawa--whether they should quietly witness their onslaughts or drive them from the country and rescue the captive Manganja. Livingstone's advice to them was to be patient, and to avoid taking part in the quarrels of the natives. He then left them at Magomero, and returned to his companions on the Shiré. For a time the Bishop's party followed Livingstone's advice, but circumstances afterward occurred which constrained them to take a different course, and led to very serious results in the history of the Mission. Writing to his son Robert, Livingstone thus describes the attack made by the Ajawa on him, the Bishop, and the missionaries: