THE WORLD'S WONDERS. 343 



Speaking of the results of his second expedition, Livingstone 

 says : " We opened a cotton-field, which, taking in the Shire and 

 Lake Nyassa, was 400 miles in length. We had gained the con- 

 fidence of the people wherever we had gone ; and a new era had 

 commenced in a region much larger than the cotton-fields of the 

 Southern States of America." His hopes for the future of that 

 country, however, were not fulfilled, and it is yet almost as wild 

 and barbarous as when he visited it, the curse of slave-hunting 

 seeming to rest upon it from generation to generation. 



LIVINGSTONE'S 



THIRD EXPEDITION 



CHAPTER XIX. 



SEARCH FOR THE NILE'S SOURCE. 



Soox after his return from Africa, in 1864, Livingstone was 

 apprised of the results of Speke and Grant's discoveries, and 

 upon reading their journals was impressed with a belief that they 

 had not found the true source of the Nile, which he thought 

 must be in a chain of lakes lying south of Victoria N'yanza. 

 Revolving the matter much in his own mind, he soon concluded 

 to visit Africa for the third time, to test the claims put forth by 

 Speke and Grant and to make other explorations. 



It chanced that at this time the government of India desired to 

 present to the Sultan of Zanzibar the steamer ThuUj which had 



