298 DA VID LIVINGSTONE. [chap. xiv. 



On the 2 5 th the symptoms were alarming — vomitings 

 every quarter of an hour, which prevented any medicine 

 from remaining on her stomach. On the 26th she was 

 worse and delirious. On the evening of Sunday the 27th 

 Dr. Stewart got a message from her husband that the 

 end was drawing near. " He was sitting by the side of 

 a rude bed formed of boxes, but covered with a soft 

 mattress, on which lay his dying wife. All consciousness 

 had now departed, as she was in a state of deep coma, 

 from which all efforts to rouse her had been unavailing. 

 The strongest medical remedies and her husband's voice 

 were both alike powerless to reach the spirit which was 

 still there, but was now so rapidly sinking into the 

 depths of slumber, and darkness, and death. The fixed- 

 ness of feature and the oppressed and heavy breathing- 

 only made it too plain that the end was near. And the 

 man who had faced so many deaths, and braved so many 

 dangers, was now utterly broken down and weeping like 

 a child." 



Dr. Livingstone asked Dr. Stewart to commend her 

 spirit to God, and along with Dr. Kirk, they kneeled in 

 prayer beside her. In less than an hour, her spirit had 

 returned to God. Half-an-hour after, Dr. Stewart was 

 struck with her likeness to her father, Dr. Moffat. He 

 was afraid to utter what struck him so much, but at last 

 he said to Livingstone, — " Do you notice any change V 

 " Yes," he replied, without raising his eyes from her face, 

 — " the very features and expression of her father." 



Every one is struck with the calmness of Dr. Living- 

 stone's notice of his wife's death in The Zambesi and its 

 Tributaries. Its matter-of-fact tone only shows that he 

 regarded that book as a sort of official report to the nation, 

 in which it would not be becoming for him to introduce 

 personal feelings. A few extracts from his Journal and 

 letters will show better the state of his heart. 



"It is the first heavy stroke I have suffered, and 



