STANLEY AND LIVINGSTONE.

Southland Times, Issue 1659, 8 November 1872, Page 1 (Supplement)

STANLEY AND LIVINGSTONE.

"Writing from London on the 6th September, the London correspondent of the Melbourne Argus says: — The event of the week, however, was the appearance of Mr Stanley. The concert-hall of the pavilion, which ia capable of containing 2000 people, was every inch of it crammed with an educated audience, who eagerly listened to his African experiences. He was received with tempestuous applause — a resolute-looking man, young, lithe, compact — bronzed as if the blood of the negro was in his veins, and with crisp, curly, black hair ; and a voice that rose in full, Strong tones, and held the cultivated crowd, as in a spell, from the first word. "If anyone had asked me," said Mr Stanley at a literary dinner the other day, " what I was going to say before the British Association, I couldn't tell him. I should have said, ' I don't know. I shall be guided by the sympathy I see expressed in every face.' When I stood up and saw every dumb face before me lit «p with enthusiasm, what could I do but open out my heart, and drop technical geography." And so Mr Stanley spoke with entire freedom — ia vivid, humorous description, and with an energy of words ' and geßture that varied with bis subject. j Mr Francis Galton, as chairman of the geographical section, introduced him to the meeting. " I consider myself in the light of a troubadour," said Mr SLauley ; and he went quickly on to tell the tale from the beginning : — | " Before 1 started for Central Africa 1 I knew nothing of that great broad tract in the centre of the African continent. My duty led me to fields of journalism — my duty carried me far away from Central Africa. If* I had ever dreamed that 1 should visit the heart of Africa, I should have smiled 'at myself. Now, while I was following my duties at Madrid, I received a telegram to come to Paris on important business. I went, and found Mr James Gordon Bennett, the younger, of the New York Herald — (cheers) — I found him in bed. I knocked at his door. He said, ' Come in,' and then demanded my name. 'My name is Stanley.' 'Oh, you are the man I want. Do you kijow

where Livingstone is ? ' I said, ' I declare to you Ido not.' (Laughter ) 'Do you suppose Vie is alive?' 'I really don't know.' ' What do you think of it ? ' I replied, 'It passes all my comprehension.' (Laughter.) ' Well, I think he is alive, and I want you to find him.' (Laughter.) I thought it was a most gigantic task, but I dared not sny ' No' to Mr Bennett. I answered, ' If you send me to Central Africa T shall go there.' (Loud cheers.) He said, ' Well, go. I believe be is alive, and you can find him.' I said, 'Mr Bennett, have you the least idea how much that little journey will cost ? ' (Laughter.) 'The Burton and. Speke expedition cost between £2000 and £4000. Are you ready to incur that expense ? ' Mr Bennett responded. I ' Draw £1000, and when that is finished, draw another £1000 ; and when that is i done, draw another £1000; and when j ; you have got rid of that, draw another, t j and another.' (Cheers.) ' When I was i lin such a position, what was Itodo ? I I [ saw he was determined I should go and : find Dr Livingstone, and I went ; he would take no apologies or excuses, so I said, ' What it ia open to poor human nature to do, I will do — I bid you good night.' " (Laughter and cheers.) With this characteristic introduction, Mr Stanley proceeded to narrate the circumstances of his journey, and of his meeting with Dr Livingstone. There were some lively touches in the story which were new to us all. The climax of interest was in the sudden discovery of the long-lost traveller : — " I came next to a land notorious for its robbers. I did not know this, and one night I called a council of my principal men. I told them I could not stand this tribute-taking. They asked, ' What will you do, master?' I said, ' The thing is to go into the jungle, and make direct west.' At the dead of the nighfc ue went into the bamboo jungle, and on the fourth day we stood on the last hill ; we had crossed the last stream ; we had traversed the last plain ; we had climbed the last mountain, and TJjiji lay embowered in the palms beneath us. (Cheers.) Now", it is customary in Africa to make your presence known by shouting and shooting guns. We fired our guns as only exuberant heroes can do, I said, ' I suppose I shall not find the white man here. We must go on to the Congo, and away to the Atlantic Ocean ; but we must find this white man.' So we were firing away, shouting, blowing horns, beating drums. All the people came out, and the great Arabs from Muscat came out. Hearing we were from Zanzibar, and were friendly, and brought news of their relatives, they welcomed us. And while we were travelling down that stsep hill, down to this little town, I heard a voice saying, 'Good morning, sir." (Loud cheers and laughter.) I turned and said sharply, ' Who the mischief are you ?' 'I am the servant of Dr Livingstone, sir.' I said, • What ! Is Dr Livingstone hers ?' ' Tea, he ia here. I saw him just now.' I said, ' Do you mean to say Dr Livingstone is here ?' ' Sure.' 'Go and tell him lam coming.' (laughter and cheers.) Do you think it possible for me to describe my emotions as I walked down those few hundred yards. This man, David Livingstone, that I believed to be a myth, was in front of me a few yards I confess to you that were it not for certain feelings of pride, I should have turned over a somersault. (Laughter.) But I was ineffably happy. I had found Livingstone ; my work is ended. It is only a march home quick, carry the news to the first telegraph station, and so give the word to the world. (Cheers.) A great many people gathered around us. My attention was directed to where a group of Arabs were standing, and in the centre of this group a pale, care-worn, greybeared old man, dressed in a red shirt, with a crimson joho, with a gold band round his cap, an old Tweed pair of pants, his shoes looking the worse for wear. Who is this old man ? I ask myself. Is it Livingstone ? Tes, it is. No, it is not. Yes, it is. 'Dr Livingstone, I presume ?' ' Yes.' (Loud cheers.) Now, it would never have done in the presence of the grave Arabs who stood there stroking their beards, for two white men to kick up their heels. No; the Arabs must be attended to. They would carry the story that we were children — fools. So we walked side by side into the verandah. There we sat — the man, the myth, and I. This was the man ; and what a woeful tale of calamities that wrinkled face, those grey hairs in bis beard, those silver lines in his head — what a woeful tale they told ! Now we begin to talk ; I don't know about what. I know we talk, and by-and-bye come plenty of presents from the Arabs. We eat and talk, and whether Livingstone eats most or I eat most I cannot tell." My readers will forgive me this long quotation, although there are some repetitions in it, but I must not follow the remainder of the narrative in detail. Mr Stanley, abandoning the extemporaneous, afterwards 'read a paper on the expedition which he made with Dr Livingstone to the head of Lake Tanganyika, the object of which was to ascertain whether a river named Kusizi ran into that lake or out of it ; whether, in fact, the lake by this channel was connected with the Albert Nyanza. Mr Stanley was severe upon Dr Livingatoue's critics, and made caustic allusion to the questions which had been raised respecting his own letters. In conclusion, he asked permission to deliver a message from fcbe veteran explorer : — " He told me to tell you that he wants no companion now ; that he requires no more stores ; that when he has satisfied himself of the sources of the Nile he will come home, and give you such reports as will satisfy you. With plenty of stores, aud over 70 good men well armed and equipped, he is now en route to Ufipa, healthy and strong, and as enthusiastic as ever." The debate which ensued turned on i the accuracy of Dr Livingstone's deductions as to the source of the Nile. His various despatches and the letter of Mr \ Stanley had been thoroughly studied, and

some leading geographershad not scrupled to say that he was in error. The qneation was now raised by a paper from Colonel Grant, the companion of Speke, who argued from a comparison of facts that the Lnalaba could not be the "Nile — that, much more probably, Dr Livingstone, having no chronometers to fix his longitude, had got much further west than he supposed, had crossed the watershed of the Nile, and got into the country of the Congo. Mr Pefcherick, another explorer, expressed similar views and so also Dr Beke and Sir Henry Rawlinson. Mr Stanley, however, stood warmly by his friend. " These gentlemen," he said, " have not asked a single question which I have not asked of Dr Livingstone. I asked him if he had discovered the source of the Nile at 2000 feet above the sea, how he could account for the discrepancy as to the- degrees of , latitude which have been mentioned ? i ' Well,' he said, that is what baulks me.' I (Laughter). But still he adhered to his • opinion, and you must recollect that he has arrived at it with hesitation and humility, after six years' travel and hard work ; also, that his thermometers, barometers, and other instruments, which, were new when he started, may now be in error Discrepancies that may now ! seem to exist may hereafter be cleared up. Theory and practice must fight ; which will wiu, do you think ? I think fact— l think practice. I think if a man goes there and says, ' I have seen the source of the x'iver,' the man sitting in his easy chair or lying in bed cannot dispute the fact on any ground of theory." It would have been well ifscepticistn had confined itself to geographical criticism, but Mr Stanley has had to encounter some unpleasant suspicions, and these have made him the more sensitive on all pointa. While he was yet at Zanzibar, it was asked, where was the evidence that he had really found Dr Livingstone; and when this was forthcoming in abundance, his letters were still read with doubting eyes. The public generally were surprised by the sprightliness and the freshness of allusion in the letters sent from Dr Livingstone to the New Tork Herald ; they had not expected a style so flowing and a knowledge so varied from the old man so long lost in savage Africa ; and not unnaturally they suspected some touches of the American correspondent, who might have written from dictation. On this point, however, Mr Stanley is now explicit. " Did you write the letters and Dr Livingstone sign them ?" asked another newspaper correspondent with fraternal sympathy, " for some people thought at first there were phrases in them which were not quite like the doctor's?" His answer was emphatic. " I did not write one word in them ; the originals are in Dr Livingstone's handwriting, and are in the possession of Mr' Bennett at this moment. When I spoke to Livingstone first on the subject, I said, ' Doctor, we don'fc want one of your geographical discoveries ; we don't want anything that may interfere with or forestall the interest of your diary or book when it comes to be published ; but what our people would really like would be gossiping letters upon many of the curious things you must have seen.' Livingstone was naturally anxious to supply me with what I did want, in return for having come out to him, rather than with what I did not want. He knew for whom and to whom he was writing, and this is the obvious explanation of any difference there may have been, and which you now tell me of for the first time, between Livingstone's style iv his books and ia our letters." It was with susceptibilities thus quickened that Mr Stanley attended a banquet given by the doctors of .the neighborhood as the local representatives of science. He was returning thanks for " The Visitors," when he heard, or thought he heard, a sarcastic laugh of incredulity at one of his African statements. He stopped with a few warm words of sudden protest, and left the room before the chairman of the company had time to intervene. It was an untoward incident, and though the offenders protested, that Mr Stanley waa mistaken, left an unpleasant impression. At a subsequent banquet, given some days later by the Mayor of Brighton to the members of the association, Mr Stanley was enthusiastically welcomed, and every reference to his name and services applauded in a manner which must have soothed his sensitive spirit. But ho still chafes under the inuendoes of critics, and bitterly complains of the jealousies which misjudge him. The most graceful honor he has vet received ia from the Queen, who has scut him (through Lord G-ran-ville) a gold snuff-box set with diamonds, accompanied by a letter, in which she expresses her high appreciation of his prudence and zeal, and congratulates him " on having so successfully carried out the mission he so fearlessly undertook." The Royal Geographical Society had previously conveyed to Mr Stanley, in a formal letter, their sense of admiration, but apparently he attaches little value to their opinion. It now also comes out that Livingstone himself, while highly valuing his own chosen friends, distrusts the society, and k unwillina to confide hia discoveries to them. Dr Kirk is not; the only one involved in this personal controversy. Recriminations are never pleasant, and one can but regret that our satisfaction at the discovery of Livingstone is marred' by these complaints of tnan. against man. The Times coudemus, in one of its moat caustic articles, the leaders of our own search expedition, as " the only three Englishmen. " who" would have returned without relieving the traveller. Lieutenant Dawson has reached London, and finds friends to justify him, but it is wiser for all parties now to await the full explanation which he is preparing for the society, in answer to their written, questions. It will bo impossible rightly to apportion all the blame, and profitless to attempt it. The one thing now to do is to see that Livingstone is well supported to the end, let who may be the medium of communicating his diacoveries.