778 DELIVERING THEIR CHARGE. 



that it is known to oppose the passage of a caravan at times. 

 Twisting its tail round a branch, it will strike one man after 

 another in the head with fatal certainty. Their remedy is to 

 fill a pot with boiling water, which is put on the head and 

 carried under the tree ! The snake dashes his head into this 

 and is killed — the story is given for what it is worth. 



At last the coast town of Bagamoio came in sight, and before 

 many hours were over one of Her Majesty's cruisers conveyed 

 the acting consul, Captain Prideaux, from Zanzibar to the spot 

 which the cortege had reached. Arrangements were quickly 

 made for transporting the remains of Dr. Livingstone to the 

 island, some thirty miles distant, and then it became perhaps 

 rather too painfully plain to the men that their task was 

 finished. 



One word on a subject which will commend itself to most 

 before we close this long eventful history. 



We saw what a train of Indian Sepoys, Johanna men, Nas- 

 sick boys, and Shupanga canoe-men, accompanied Dr. Living- 

 stone when he started from Zanzibar in 1866 to enter upon his 

 last discoveries : of all these, five only could answer to the roll- 

 call as they handed over the dead body of their leader to his 

 countrymen on the shores whither they had returned, and this 

 after eight years' desperate service. 



Once more we repeat the names o* these men. Susi and 

 James Chuma have been sufficiently prominent throughout — 

 hardly so perhaps has Amoda, their comrade ever since the 

 Zambesi days of 1864: then we have Abram ai^d Mabruki, 

 each with service to show from the time he left the Nassick 

 College with the doctor in 1865. Nor must we forget Ntoaeka 

 and Halima, the two native girls of whom we have heard such 

 a good character : they cast in their lot with the wanderers in 

 Manyuema. It does seem strange to hear the men say that no 

 sooner did they arrive at their journey's end than they were so 

 far frowned out of notice, that not so much as a passage to the 

 island was offered them when their burden was borne away. 

 We must hope that it is not too late — even for the sake of con- 

 sistency — to put it on record that whoever assisted Livingstone, 

 whether white or black, has not been overlooked in England. 

 Surely those with whom he spent his last years must not pass 

 away into Africa again unrewarded, and lost to sight. 



