3Q2 DAVID LIVINGSTONE. [chap. xiv. 



Burrup," and remembers the similar fate of the Helmores, 

 who, like the Bishop and his friends, had had it in their 

 hearts to build a temple to the Lord hi Africa, but had 

 not been permitted. Then comes some family news, 

 especially about her son Robert, whose sudden death 

 occurred a few days after, and was another bitter drop 

 in the family cup. And then some motherly forecastings 

 of her daughter's future, kindly counsel where she could 

 offer any, and affectionate prayers for the guidance ol 

 God where the future was too dark for her to penetrate. 



For a whole month before this letter was written, 

 poor Mary had been sleeping under the baobab-tree at 

 Shupanga ! 



In Livingstone's letter to Mrs. Moffat he gives the 

 details of her illness,, and pours his heart out in the same 

 affectionate terms as in his Journal. He dwells on the 

 many unhappy causes of delay which had detained them 

 near the mouth of the river, contrary to all his wishes 

 and arrangements. He is concerned that her deafness 

 (through quinine) and comatose condition before her 

 death prevented her from giving him the indications he 

 would have desired respecting her state of mind in the 

 view of eternity. 



" I look," he says, " to her previous experience and 

 life for comfort, and thank God for His mercy that we 

 have it. ... A good wife and mother was she. God 

 have pity on the children — she was so much beloved by 

 them. . . . She was much respected by all the officers of 

 the ' Gorgon,' — they would do anything for her. When 

 they met this vessel at Mozambique, Captain Wilson 

 offered his cabin in that fine large vessel, but she in- 

 sisted rather that Miss Mackenzie and Mrs. Burrup should 

 go. ... I enjoyed her society during the three months 

 we were together. It was the Lord who gave, and He has 

 taken away. I wish to say — Blessed be His name. I 

 regret, as there always are regrets after our loved ones 



