394 THE WORLD'S WONDERS. 



"If the good Lord gives me favor, and permits me to finish 

 my work, I shall thank and bless him, though it has cost me 

 untold toil, pain, and travel. This trip has made my hair all 



gray." 



His last birthday, March 19th, found him on the Chambeze 

 river, en route for Bangweolo lake. The river was at its flood 

 from long-continued heavy rains, and canoes were very difficult 

 to obtain, so that sore vexations plagued him into forget/illness 

 of the day. All the world was dreary to him in that dense soli- 

 tude of savage nature over which the very heavens wept in pity. 



He waited beside the Chambeze until March 16th before he 

 could obtain canoes to ferry his party across. When he did under- 

 take the passage one of the canoes was sunk, containing a large 

 number of cartridges, several guns, and a saddle, all of which 

 were lost. After crossing other larger canoes were secured, in 

 which the party traveled in the flooded district, as the paths were 

 fully six feet under water. This mode of travel, however, was 

 excessively fatiguing, for at short intervals the canoes would 

 have to be dragged over dense sedges or spots of land, so that 

 everyone was constantly wet and worried with the exhausting 

 labor. All this told seriously on Livingstone. 



THE END COMES. 



WITH unexampled fortitude he continued the journey, not- 

 withstanding a rapidly growing weakness which could have but 

 one result. After leaving the canoes the roads were full of 

 water, and every step in advance seemed like entering more 

 deeply into the slough of hopelesness. He continued to grow 

 weaker, and at his request his servants made a litter in which to 

 carry him, consisting of two side-pieces of seven feet in length, 

 crossed with rails three feet long and about four inches apart, the 

 whole lashed strongly together. This frame work was covered 

 with grass and a blanket laid on it. Slung from a pole, and 

 borne between two strong men, it made a tolerable palanquin, 

 and on this the exausted traveler was conveyed to the next vil- 

 lage through a flooded grass plain. To render the kitanda more 

 comfortable, another blanket was suspended across the pole, so 



