546 
AFRICA AND ITS EXPLORATION. 
After a very agreeable night with our hospitable 
English host, the Kabinda was again under way. 
The puissant river below Boma reminded me of the 
scenes above Uyanzi ; the colour of the water, the 
numerous islands, and the enormous breadth recalled 
those days when we had sought the liquid wildernesses 
of the Livingstone, to avoid incessant conflicts with 
the human beasts of prey in the midst of Primitive 
Africa, and at the sight my eyes filled with tears at the 
thought that I could not recall my lost friends, and bid 
them share the rapturous joy that now filled the hearts 
of all those who had endured and survived. 
A few hours later and we were gliding through the 
broad portal into the Ocean, the blue domain of civili- 
zation ! 
Turning to take a farewell glance at the mighty River 
on whose brown bosom we had endured so greatly, I saw 
it approach, awed and humbled, the threshold of the 
watery immensity, to whose immeasurable volume and 
illimitable expanse, awful as had been its power, and 
terrible as had been its fury, its flood was but a drop. 
And I felt my heart suffused with purest gratitude to 
Him whose hand had protected us, and who had enabled 
us to pierce the Dark Continent from east to west, and 
to trace its mightiest River to its Ocean bourne. 
KABINDA, OUR LAST RESTING PLACE. 
