462 LIFE OF DA VID LIVINGSTONE, LL.D. 



cannot afford to indulge in heroic impulses of this nature, and it was a for- 

 tunate thing for Livingstone, and a matter for congratulation on the part of 

 civilised mankind, that Mr. Bennet had such a man on his staff, and had the 

 wisdom to know that he was the man who could carry out his wishes, if these 

 were possible. 



In 1841, shortly after David Livingstone had joined Robert Moffat and 

 his coadjutors at Kuruman, with the view of fitting himself for the work of the 

 Christian Mission to the heathen tribes, to the north of the furthest missionary 

 outpost — in a humble cottage on the site of the old Castle of Denbigh, a son 

 was born to John Rowlands, son of a small farmer, and Elizabeth Parry, 

 daughter of a respectable butcher of Denbigh. No lives could have seemed so 

 far apart as that of the resolute and adventurous Scot, who was commencing 

 that career of lofty and " high souled-surprise " in Africa which has rendered 

 his name illustrious, and that of the infant who was entering upon a childhood 

 and boyhood of poverty and dependence. That child, who for fifteen years 

 went by the name of his father and grandfather — John Rowlands — as Mr. 

 Henry M. Stanley, was destined to have his name associated with that of 

 David Livingstone, as his deliverer and preserver, when his fate was the sub- 

 ject of anxiety and discussion throughout the civilized world. 



In any circumstances, the early life of such a man, prior to the great 

 achievement which has rendered him famous, could not fail to be a subject of 

 interest to all, but as in his case there had been crowded into his previous 

 thirty years of life an amount of trial, vicissitude, and daring adventure, 

 given to few to experience during the natural term of life, our interest in him 

 is redoubled. The father and maternal grandfather of John Rowlands (Rol- 

 lants, the Welsh have it), having died when he was about ten years of age, 

 the child was left all but dependent upon a humble couple, who, so long as 

 their means would permit, treated him as though he had been a member of 

 their own family. When five years of age the death of an uncle left the child 

 totally dependent upon strangers, and he was received into the work-house at 

 St. Asaph. This last refuge of the poor is in too many cases a cold foster-parent 

 to the orphan, but it is a pleasure to be able to record, that the work-house of 

 St. Asaph was not only admirably looked after by the guardians and the 

 officials, but the outside public, from the Bishop of the diocese and the local 

 county families down to the tradesmen of the district, took such an interest 

 in the management of the house and the well-being of its inmates, that the 

 incidents in the bfe of the orphan boy, up to the time of his leaving St. Asaph, 

 have been easily collected. 



For ten years John Rowlands was an inmate of the work-house of St. 

 Asaph, where, amongst other experiences of much use to him in after life, he 

 received an admirable elementary education. He was notable among his 

 compeers in the class-room and the play-ground as a lad of more than ordinary 



