i 9 8 DAVID LIVINGSTONE. [chap. x. 



CHAPTER X. 



FIRST VISIT HOME. 



a.d. 1856-1857. 



Mrs. Livingstone — Her intense anxieties— Her poetical welcome — Congratulatory 

 letters from Mrs. and Dr. Moffat — Meeting of welcome of Royal Geographical 

 Society — of London Missionary Society — Meeting in Mansion House — 

 Enthusiastic public meeting at Cape Town — Livingstone visits Hamilton — 

 Returns to London to write his book — Letter to Mr. Maclear — Dr. Eisdon 

 Bennett's reminiscences of this period — Mr. Frederick Fitch's — Interview 

 with Prince Consort — Honours— Publication and great success of Missionary 

 Travels — Character and design of the book — Why it was not more of a 

 missionary record — Handsome conduct of publisher — Generous use of the 

 profits — Letter to a lady in Carlisle vindicating the character of his speeches. 



The years that had elapsed since Dr. Livingstone bade 

 his wife farewell at Cape Town had been to her years of 

 deep and often terrible anxiety. Letters, as we have 

 seen, were often lost, and none seem more frequently to 

 have gone missing than those between him and her. A 

 stranger in England, without a home, broken in health, 

 with a family of four to care for, often without tidings of 

 her husband for great stretches of time, and harassed 

 with anxieties and apprehensions that sometimes proved 

 too much for her faith, the strain on her was very great. 

 Those who knew her in Africa, when, " queen of the 

 wagon/' and full of life, she directed the arrangements 

 and sustained the spirits of a whole party, would hardly 

 have thought her the same person in England. When 

 Livingstone had been longest unheard of, her heart sank 

 altogether ; but through prayer, tranquillity of mind 

 returned, even before the arrival of any letter announcing 

 his safety. She had been waiting for him at Southamp- 



