140 DAVID LIVINGSTONE. [chap. vn. 



be imparted to me, so that in truth, not in name only, all my interests 

 and those of my children may be identified with His cause. . . . 

 I will try and remember always to approach God in secret with as 

 much reverence in speech, posture, and behaviour as in public. 

 Help me, Thou who knowest my frame and pitiest as a father his 

 children." 



When Livingstone readied the Makololo, a change 

 had taken place in the government of the tribe. Ma- 

 mochisane, the daughter of Sebituane, had not been 

 happy in her chiefdom, and had found it difficult to get 

 along with the number of husbands whom her dignity as 

 chief required her to maintain. She had given over the 

 government to her brother Sekeletu, a youth of eighteen, 

 who was generally recognised, though not without some 

 reluctance, by his brother Mpepe. Livingstone could not 

 have foreseen how Sekeletu would receive him, but to his 

 great relief and satisfaction he found him actuated by the 

 most kindly feelings. He found him, boy as he was, full 

 of vague expectations of benefits, marvellous and mira- 

 culous, which the missionaries were to bring. It was 

 Livingstone's first work to disabuse his mind of these 

 expectations, and let him understand that his supreme 

 object was to teach them the way of salvation through 

 Jesus Christ. To a certain extent Sekeletu was inter- 

 ested in this : — 



" He asked many sensible questions about the system of Christianity 

 in connection with the putting away of wives. They are always 

 furnished with objections sooner than with the information. I com- 

 mended him for asking me, and will begin a course of instruction 

 to-morrow. He fears that learning to read will change his heart, and 

 make him put away his wives. Much depends on his decision. May 

 God influence his heart to decide aright !" 



Two days after Livingstone says in his Journal : — 



" 1st June. — The chief presented eight large and three small tusks 

 this morning. I told him and his people I would rather see them 

 trading than giving them to me. They replied that they would get 

 trade with George Fleming, and that, too, as soon as he was well ; but 

 these they gave to their father, and they were just as any other 



