ZAMBEZI MISSION.

New Zealander, Volume XVIII, Issue 1718, 27 August 1862, Page 6

ZAMBEZI MISSION.

[From the " Sydney Herald,” August 2 ]

The misfortunes whicli have befallen the Zambezi Mission which will occasion much regret in Great Britian. The reports of Dr. Livingston induced a number of zealous men to constitute an expedition to establish a mission, on a large scale, under the auspices of the Church of England. The first Missionary Bishop sent by that-Church was consecrated for the new diocese. that wealth and experience could combine to ensure success were placed at the service of this new experiment; and here after two or three years we have lamentable accounts of failure, and that under circumstances of pecular perplexity. The letter of Dr. Kirk, written on hoard H.M S. Pioneer, gives some particulars which naturally create a wish for more detailed information. We are far from condemning those measures of defence which were adopted by the Bishop. If exposed to immediate attack it might be proper or admissible to stand upon the defensive, and even to anticipate the plunders by depriving them of their power to execute their purpose; but still there is something rather shocking in the mode in which the events are related by Dr. Kirk. When we read of a Bishop making attacks upon the various camps of the Ajawa, and being successful, and then of the Bishop avenging the loss of his goods by forming an armed party of Makololo natives—destroying the village of the Chief and carrying off his flocks, we certainly are more and more lost in bewilderment. But if there is some difficulty in accounting for the course pursued by the Bishop, there is none in tracing the hostile attacks which lie thought it his duty to repress. The slave trade—that curse of Africa—reveals itself wherever Europeans can be traced. They create everywhere in the minds of the natives, either the spirit of war, in order that there may be captives for sale, or that fear, which is everywhere the parent of cruelty, and which induces the unhappy Africans to wreak upon Europeans the ferocious revenge which has been aroused and infuriated by European example. This deadly trade is at the foundation of all those difficulties which have beset the civilisation of Africa, and which have occasioned the sacrifice of the lives of so many missionaries in former times. It is to be hoped that after having concluded with America a treaty which gives to both countries the right of search and thus the means of effectual repression—Great Britian will deal peremptorily with those other Powers of inferior grade, who, while pretending to discourage, are really the main abettors of the slave trade. Until this great crime against humanity shall be finally suppressed, the disorders which our intelligence records will always interpose between the missionary and the civilisation of the African people. The Zambezi mission, planned upon amunificient scale, and promising great results—will not, we hope, be abandoned. Tf the missionaries prosecute their task in the spirit of their message the natives will soon learn to distinguish them from the slave-hunting Europeans, and will seek refuge under their auspices. There may indeed be some danger of a theocratic government arising and thus those forms of evil which such a Government has ever occasioned. This danger, however, will probaly be obviated by the enterprise of independent Europeans, and the existence of missions of various denominations side by side with each other.

It is not the custom of the English people to be discouraged by a rebuff or even by a temporary failure. We have no doubt that in the same intrepid spirit in this instance rather erratic in its manifestation—others will be found to step into the place of those who have fallen, and, after longer experience, improve the advantages which may be already acquired. It is a moot question whether in the propagation of Christianity among savage people a better plan is not to send those employed in that task in very small companies such as shall excite no umbrage, supersede no authority, and depend entirely upon protection of the people whoso interests it is proposed to serve. It has been often found that men going with their staff iq their hand, and carrying no-

thing with them but those small presents which savages covet, have been welcomed as guests and entertained as strangers, and have been able by their residence, unsuspected of mischievous designs, to acquire the language and to engage the confidence of the people. On the other hand a large display of wealth, a manifestation of force, a setting up of authority and the gathering together of numbers, have awakened suspicion and distrust, and—as in the instance mentioned by Dr. Kirk — left the impression upon the natives “ that their teachers came rather to fight than to instruct them.” The civilization of Africa will be the work of ages; but it is not less certain. When the peor pie are not near the disastrous influence of Europeans, they arc commonly mild and impressible. The teeming millions of Africa must surely have in reserve some better destiny than has hitherto been assigned them. With the infusion of higher notions of their nature and moral responsibility we may hope to see simultaneously a taste for the gratifications which their own industry may furnish. Thus the great revolution which is taking place in America, by which the slave will recover his freedom, will open to him, when its passions are allayed, the light of Christian civilization, and thus we reward his long suffering. The policy of European nations will be purified from the last remnants of the slave trade, and thus smooth the way to the elevation of the nations of Africa. Who can tell but that from the millions of American slaves some great apostle and liberator may be found with an intellectual vigour and moral energy which shall qualify him to go to his own country, and with a constitution adapted to its climate, and so give back to Africa advantages which may compensate for ages of persecution and sorrow? That people who have proved most efficient instructors of the human race were cradled in bondage as severe and unrelenting as that which has oppressed the African. It is in the same school that noble minds of African origin may be formed into the instructors of their regenerated race. Singular destiny for an oppressed people, to see their oppressors suffer, without one effort of their own, the deserved chastisement of their crimes. There would be no difficulty in tracing a startling retribution in holy writ. The same helpless endurance—the same haughty tyranny—the same High Hand, and the same terrible overthrow.