200 DAVID LIVINGSTONE. [chap. x. 



Mrs. Moffat's letter as she reminds her daughter that they 

 that rejoice need to be as though they rejoiced not : — 



" Kuruman, December 4, 1856. — My dearest Mary, — In pro- 

 portion to the anxiety I have experienced about you and. your dear 

 husband for some years past, so now is my joy and satisfaction ; even 

 though we have not yet heard the glad tidings of your having really 

 met, but this for the present we take for granted. Having from the 

 first been in a subdued and chastened state of mind on the subject, I 

 endeavour still to be moderate in my joy. With regard to you both 

 ofttimes has the sentence of death been passed in my mind, and at 

 such seasons I dared not, desired not, to rebel, submissively leaving all 

 to the Divine disposal ; but I now feel that this has been a suitable 

 preparation for what is before me, having to contemplate a complete 

 separation from you till that day when we meet with the spirits of 

 just men made perfect in the kingdom of our Father. Yes, I do feel 

 solemn at death, but there is no melancholy about it, for what is our 

 life, so short and so transient 1 And seeing it is so, we should be 

 happy to do or to suffer as much as we can for Him who bought us 

 with His blood. Should you go to those wilds which God has enabled 

 your husband, through numerous dangers and deaths, to penetrate, 

 there to spend the remainder of your life, and as a consequence there 

 to suffer manifold privations, in addition to those trials through which 

 you have already passed — and they have not been few (for you had a 

 hard life in this interior) — you will not think all too much, when you 

 stand with that multitude who have washed their robes in the blood 

 of the Lamb ! 



" Yet, my dear Mary, while we are yet in the flesh my heart will 

 yearn over you. You are my own dear child, my first-born, and 

 recent circumstances have had a tendency to make me feel still more 

 tenderly towards you, and deeply as I have sympathised with you for 

 the last few years, I shall not cease to do so for the future. Already 

 is my imagination busy picturing the various scenes through which 

 you must pass, from the first transport of joy on meeting till that 

 painful anxious hour when you must bid adieu to your darlings, with 

 faint hopes of ever seeing them again in this life ; and then, what you 

 may both have to pass through in those inhospitable regions. . . . 



" From what I saw in Mr. Livingston's letter to Robert, I was 

 shocked to think that that poor head, in the prime of manhood, was 

 so like my own, who am literally worn out. The symptoms he 

 describes are so like my own. Now, with a little rest and relaxation, 

 having youth on his side, he might regain all, but I cannot help 

 fearing for him if he dashes at once into hardships again. He is 

 certainly the wonder of his age, and with a little prudence as regards 

 his health, the stores of information he now possesses might be turned 

 to a mighty account for poor wretched Africa. . . . We do not 

 yet see how Mr. L. will get on — the case seems so complex. I 



