EDITORIAL COMMENTS. 299 



twentieth thousand just taken from the press. Seldom had the 

 reading public of England manifested a deeper interest in a 

 book ; an interest, too, which was seconded by the great demand 

 for the singularly interesting book in other countries. It did 

 not, however, escape the severe criticism which everything 

 human must expect, since there are so many people in the world 

 whose single aptitude is for slaughter, and whose solitary de- 

 light consists in viewing the mutilation of productions which 

 they despise because they are incapable of appreciating them. 

 The leading journals of England and America made haste to 

 furnish their readers with very extended reviews, which were 

 made up largely of lengthy quotations concerning the customs 

 of the people and the features of the country which the writer 

 had so vividly depicted. The London Leader for November 

 24th, in the midst of an extended editorial, could not restrain 

 its admiration, and burst forth into a very eloquent tribute. 

 "The author," says the reviewer, "is an Aladdin wandering 

 through his new palace, with its infinite series of chambers, 

 each a treasury. He is a Marco Polo, recounting the marvels 

 of Nigritian Carthy. A Mungo Park, coming suddenly upon 

 unknown lakes and rivers. A Delia Valle in the romance of 

 his adventures ; and more than a sixteenth century pilgrim in 

 the intrepidity of his enterprises." 



Public sentiment ripened rapidly after the publication of the 

 book. The simple, candid and careful account of the tribes, the 

 soil, rivers, animals, trees, plants, climate and minerals, left no 

 room for* doubt, and the foremost men of the nation were ready 

 to forward with their means and influence an enterprise which 

 looked to the complete opening up of the wonderful land so 

 suddenly brought to view. 



Nor was the Christian community behind the commercial. 

 The London Missionary Society manifested their confidence in 

 the judgment of Livingstone by arranging for mission stations 

 with the Makololo and the Matebele. It was with deep regret, 

 too, that they relinquished from their service the man who was 

 so peculiarly fitted to head such enterprises ; but they felt that 

 a more extended field demanded his services. It was not for 

 him to confine his attention to a single tribe or a circumscribed 

 territory. God seemed to have laid it upon him to be the 



