How I Found Livingstone Part 37

Choir. Oh-oh-oh! where the beads are plenty, Oh-oh-oh!

Choragus. While Singiri has kept us, oh, very long From our homes very long, oh-oh-oh.!

Choir From our homes, oh-oh-oh!

Oh-oh-oh!

Choragus. And we have had no food for very long-- We are half-starved, oh, for so long!

Bana Singiri!

Choir. For so very long, oh-oh-oh!

Bana Singiri-Singiri!

Singiri! oh, Singiri

Choragus. Mirambo has gone to war To fight against the Arabs; The Arabs and w.a.n.gwana Have gone to fight Mirambo!

Choir Oh-oh-oh! to fight Mirambo!

Oh, Mirambo! Mirambo Oh, to fight Mirambo!

Choragus. But the white man will make us glad, He is going home! For he is going home, And he will make us glad! Sh-sh-s.h.!.+

Choir. The white man will make us glad! Sh-sh-sh Sh-----sh-h-h-----sh-h-h-h-h-h!

Um-m--mu---um-m-m----s.h.!.+

This is the singular farewell which I received from the Wanyamwezi of Singiri, and for its remarkable epic beauty(?), rhythmic excellence(?), and impa.s.sioned force(?), I have immortalised it in the pages of this book, as one of the most wonderful productions of the chorus-loving children of Unyamwezi.

March 13th.--The last day of my stay with Livingstone has come and gone, and the last night we shall be together is present, and I cannot evade the morrow! I feel as though I would rebel against the fate which drives me away from him. The minutes beat fast, and grow into hours.

Our door is closed, and we are both of us busy with our own thoughts.

What his thoughts are I know not. Mine are sad. My days seem to have been spent in an Elysian field; otherwise, why should I so keenly regret the near approach of the parting hour? Have I not been battered by successive fevers, prostrate with agony day after day lately? Have I not raved and stormed in madness? Have I not clenched my fists in fury, and fought with the wild strength of despair when in delirium? Yet, I regret to surrender the pleasure I have felt in this man's society, though so dearly purchased.

I cannot resist the sure advance of time, which flies this night as if it mocked me, and gloated on the misery it created! Be it so!

How many times have I not suffered the pang of parting with friends! I wished to linger longer, but the inevitable would come--Fate sundered us. This is the same regretful feeling, only it is more poignant, and the farewell may be forever! FOREVER? And "FOR EVER," echo the reverberations of a woful whisper.

I have noted down all he has said to-night; but the reader shall not share it with me. It is mine!

I am as jealous as he is himself of his Journal; and I have written in German text, and in round hand, on either side of it, on the waterproof canvas cover, "POSITTVELY NOT TO BE OPENED;" to which he has affixed his signature. I have stenographed every word he has said to me respecting the equable distribution of certain curiosities among his friends and children, and his last wish about "his" dear old friend, Sir Roderick Murchison, because he has been getting anxious about him ever since we received the newspapers at Ugunda, when we read that the old man was suffering from a paralytic stroke. I must be sure to send him the news, as soon as I get to Aden; and I have promised that he will receive the message from me quicker than anything was ever received in Central Africa.

"To-morrow night, Doctor, you will be alone!"

"Yes; the house will look as though a death had taken place. You had better stop until the rains, which are now near, are over."

"I would to G.o.d I could, my dear Doctor; but every day I stop here, now that there is no necessity for me to stay longer, keeps you from your work and home."

"I know; but consider your health--you are not fit to travel. What is it? Only a few weeks longer. You will travel to the coast just as quickly when the rains are over as you will by going now. The plains will be inundated between here and the coast."

"You think so; but I will reach the coast in forty days; if not in forty, I will in fifty--certain. The thought that I am doing you an important service will spur me on."

March 14th.--At dawn we were up, the bales and baggage were taken outside of the building, and the men prepared themselves for the first march towards home.

We had a sad breakfast together. I could not eat, my heart was too full; neither did my companion seem to have an appet.i.te. We found something to do which kept us longer together. At 8 o'clock I was not gone, and I had thought to have been off at 5 A.M.

"Doctor," said I, "I will leave two men with you, who will stop to-day and to-morrow with you, for it may be that you have forgotten something in the hurry of my departure. I will halt a day at Tura, on the frontier of Unyamwezi, for your last word, and your last wish; and now we must part--there is no help for it. Good-bye."

"Oh, I am coming with you a little way. I must see you off on the road."

"Thank you. Now, my men, Home! Kirangozi, lift the flag, and MARCH!"

The house looked desolate--it faded from our view. Old times, and the memories of my aspirations and kindling hopes, came strong on me. The old hills round about, that I once thought tame and uninteresting, had become invested with histories and reminiscences for me. On that burzani I have sat hour after hour, dreaming, and hoping, and sighing. On that col I stood, watching the battle and the destruction of Tabora. Under that roof I have sickened and been delirious, and cried out like a child at the fate that threatened my mission. Under that banian tree lay my dead comrade--poor Shaw; I would have given a fortune to have had him by my side at this time. From that house I started on my journey to Ujiji; to it I returned as to a friend, with a newer and dearer companion; and now I leave all. Already it all appears like a strange dream.

We walked side by side; the men lifted their voices into a song. I took long looks at Livingstone, to impress his features thoroughly on my memory.

"The thing is, Doctor, so far as I can understand it, you do not intend to return home until you have satisfied yourself about the 'Sources of the Nile.' When you have satisfied yourself, you will come home and satisfy others. Is it not so?"

"That is it, exactly. When your men come back, I shall immediately start for Ufipa; then, crossing the Rungwa River, I shall strike south, and round the extremity of the Tanganika. Then, a south-east course will take me to Chic.u.mbi's, on the Luapula. On crossing the Luapula, I shall go direct west to the copper-mines of Katanga. Eight days south of Katanga, the natives declare the fountains to be. When I have found them, I shall return by Katanga to the underground houses of Rua. From the caverns, ten days north-east will take me to Lake Kamolondo. I shall be able to travel from the lake, in your boat, up the River Lufira, to Lake Lincoln. Then, coming down again, I can proceed north, by the Lualaba, to the fourth lake--which, I think, will explain the whole problem; and I will probably find that it is either Chowambe (Baker's lake), or Piaggia's lake.

"And how long do you think this little journey will take you?"

"A year and a half, at the furthest, from the day I leave Unyanyembe."

"Suppose you say two years; contingencies might arise, you know. It will be well for me to hire these new men for two years; the day of their engagement to begin from their arrival at Unyanyembe."

"Yes, that will do excellently well."

"Now, my dear Doctor, the best friends must part. You have come far enough; let me beg of you to turn back."

"Well, I will say this to you: you have done what few men could do--far better than some great travellers I know. And I am grateful to you for what you have done for me. G.o.d guide you safe home, and bless you, my friend."

"And may G.o.d bring you safe back to us all, my dear friend. Farewell!"

"Farewell!"

We wrung each other's hands, and I had to tear myself away before I unmanned myself; but Susi, and Chumah, and Hamoydah--the Doctor's faithful fellows--they must all shake and kiss my hands before I could quite turn away. I betrayed myself!

"Good-bye, Doctor--dear friend!"

"Good-bye!"

The FAREWELL between Livingstone and myself had been spoken. We were parted, he to whatever fate Destiny had yet in store for him, to battling against difficulties, to many, many days of marching through wildernesses, with little or nothing much to sustain him save his own high spirit, and enduring faith in G.o.d--"who would bring all things right at last;" and I to that which Destiny may have in store for me.

But though I may live half a century longer, I shall never forget that parting scene in Central Africa. I shall never cease to think of the sad tones of that sorrowful word Farewell, how they permeated through every core of my heart, how they clouded my eyes, and made me wish unutterable things which could never be.

An audacious desire to steal one embrace from the dear old man came over me, and almost unmanned me. I felt tempted to stop with him and a.s.sist him, on his long return march to the fountain region, but these things were not to be, any more than many other impulsive wishes, and despite the intensified emotions which filled both of us, save by silent tears, and a tremulous parting word, we did not betray our stoicism of manhood and race.

I a.s.sumed a gruff voice, and ordered the Expedition to march, and I resolutely turned my face toward the eastern sky. But ever and anon my eyes would seek that deserted figure of an old man in grey clothes, who with bended head and slow steps was returning to his solitude, the very picture of melancholy, and each time I saw him--as the plain was wide and clear of obstructions--I felt my eyes stream, and my heart swell with a vague, indefinable feeling of foreboding and sorrow.

I thought of his lonely figure sitting day after day on the burzani of his house, by which all caravans from the coast would have to pa.s.s, and of the many, many times he would ask the new-comers whether they had pa.s.sed any men coming along the road for him, and I thought as each day pa.s.sed, and his stores and letters had not arrived how he would grieve at the lengthening delay. I then felt strong again, as I felt that so long as I should be doing service for Livingstone, I was not quite parted from him, and by doing the work effectively and speedily the bond of friends.h.i.+p between us would be strengthened. Such thoughts spurred me to the resolution to march so quickly for the coast, that Arabs in after time should marvel at the speed with which the white man's caravan travelled from Unyanyembe to Zanzibar.