Letter to John Kirk
David Livingstone

Date of composition: 25 March 1871
Place of composition: Webb's Lualaba or Lacustrine River
Repository: National Library of Scotland, Edinburgh, United Kingdom
Shelfmark: MS.10768, f. 80
Clendennen & Cunningham number(s): Letters, 1968
Digital edition and date: Livingstone Online, 2016
Publisher: University of Maryland Libraries, College Park, MD, USA
Project id: liv_002569
TEI encoding: Adrian S. Wisnicki, Megan Ward, Heather F. Ball, Kate Simpson, Ashanka Kumari, Alexander Munson

[liv_002569_0001]
Webbs Lualaba or Lacustrine River 25 March 1871 across
another great bend to the West of about 100'
My Dear Kirk

I very thankfully recieved your letter of 28th Feb/69
5sent by Sheikh bin Nassib at Mamohela about 7 days N.W. of Bam
barre containing a welcome one from Agnes to you. By it I first
learned that you had taken unto yourself a wife who has presented you
with a daughter - Blessings on them both - R.C. people think each has an
angel - I only know that the little ones are angels themselves and come as
10ministering spirits of peace and love - I have but one regret in looking
back to my stationary missionary life and that is that I did not play
more with my children but I worked so hard physically & mentally that in
the evenings there was seldom any fun left in me - I thankfully accept
your invitation to lodge with you at Zanzibar but I feel so woefully
15far away and am going still further in order to make a complete
work of the exploration of the sources of the Nile - I have been sorely let [ ]
hindered in Manyema and reaction against the bloody Ujijian slaving
having set in I [ ]{went} off not without apprehension and until I get
beyond the region of bloodshed I cannot feel safe - It is not slave trade
20it is slaking thirst for blood and catching free people very many of
whom die before reaching the coast - I shall give you an episode which
happened about a fortnight ago close by the spot where I write - My spirits
are beyond measure depressed in writing on such matters for the public
and I can only give half statements for fear of letting heartless dawdlers
25drawl from their club sofas "exaggeration" "overdrawing" &c - The
restrained exposure of the vile Portuguese deeds on the Shire in my last
book made me oblivious to every thing else - My own & family interests
were unheeded - Lord Palmerston sent a Queen's counsel to ask me "what
he could do to aid me as he was most anxious to serve me" I could only think
30of the work in Africa & asked the East African ports to be opened to lawful
commerce ^ for all nations - It never occurred to me that he meant aught for myself or
children till I was out here and Lord Palmerston dead - The episode I
mention was by Muhamad Bogharib's people, and he being the best man
of all who have come to trade in Manyema you may if you can imagine
35the conduct of the people of the worst - Bon Hassani - Bon embegu &
Bin Omar the heads of the party sent to trade gave the Manyema near
Moene Lualaba 25 copper bl{r}acelets worth at Ujiji about 2 ½ dollars.
This was the trap - Then went down the river & sold all the rest of their copper
for ivory - coming back they demanded ivory for the 25 rings & began
40to shoot the men in cold blood, and capture women & children & grass cloth -
goats & fowls - they continued the murdering for three days in a densely peopled
district and carried off an immense number of women & children because
Muhamad does not intend to trade here again - With all his goodness I
have no doubt but he knew the plan & will recieve his full share of the captives
45They will come into Zanzibar as traders, and the people as bought slaves but there is
not one slave among them and to make the matter the more atrocious the very men
who murdered & captured repeatedly declared to me that the people now vicitimized
were remarkably civil and kind - thousands come over to the river every ^ market day to hold
markets at various points for flour cassava beans groundnuts fish salt oil
50bananas plantains sweet potatoes sugar cane grass cloth earthen ware = iron ware as
knives spears needles fowls sheep goats pigs slaves ivory &c and it was particularly
noticed that when the men of two districts were engaged in actual hostilities the women
go from market to market with their wares unmolested - Women were never
touched until now by these Muhamadans - as a rule not a slave is sold in
55Manyema except by the ruffian strangers - It would be only Justice if the
Sultan would set free all captives from Manyema as soon as they arrive -
They were not traded for but murdered for - In talking with these Ujijians I
always protest against shedding human blood - they think that rhyming
over "God is great" &c all sin is forgiven - a slave of Thani bin Suellim of
60Ujiji named Yahood boasted in my hearing of having with his comrades
killed one kindred people & burned 9 villages - all for a single string of red beads
which a Manyema man tried in vain to steal - I said to him "you were sent
to trade not to murder" He replied "we are sent to kill people, that is our work"
one of my people was killed I suppose in blind revenge - a man was pinned
65to the ground with a spear near the 9 villages and I was sleeping in another
close by - three were killed at another village and we dont know who are
friends & who have first cause to seek revenge of all strangers - I find great
difficulty in getting a canoe after the Bogharib feat of arms - all flee from us
your men seem as eager for blood as others - all long to be able to brag of blood
70shed = That Shereef Bosher has put me to great inconvenience by refusing
to send me my own beads and other things while he stops to feast at my expense
He thinks that he and his three slaves are earning salary - I have sent orders to
take the goods & give them to Moenyeghere a trustworthy man - Awathe the
Had it at Zanzibar and onwards
75other headman has enlarged scrotum - I feel extremely thankful for all
says now it pains him!! wants pay without work I fear
you did for me in the most trying circumstances a man could be placed
in - I send a cheque for Rs 4000 by Muhamad Bogharib - Lualaba becomes
smaller down here than stated in my despatch - "2 to 4 miles" - but it is still
80a mighty river ^ from 1 ½ to 2 miles = Please to detain the Despatch & letters if you hear of
my being on the way down and near I should like to rewrite

The Governor is very li[ ]eral with presents of foolscap paper London makers name Millington 1867 same as yours - Sus-
picious
I got a
85sheet of
my own
paper

[liv_002569_0002]

all the hearsay written only in apprehension of never coming
out - Not a single line from Sir Paraffin Young since I left England
and I have written him by every opportunity - the money I sent for was to
be lifted from £1000 in Coutts hands - mine not his - letters may be in the
5box which Muhamad bin Saleh had my note to open and take out medicines
and letters but Mr Shereef refused to allow him - If you write to Seward
remember me kindly to him and his wife - Take good care of your
better half & child
move about as
10often as you can
Good people are
scarce - I am
thankful to hear
you say that
15my words have
had some little
effect at home -
I have often
said with a sore
20heart, I have laboured in
vain & spent
my strength for
nought & in
vain, yet surely
25my work is
with the Lord
and my judg-
-ment with my
god - the cheering
30prospect of
stopping the
East Coast
slave trade belongs
to you, and
35therein I do greatly
rejoice - The
Sultan must
get troops who
will scorn the
40mainland &
catch the bloody
thieves inland
By the counsel
of an old man
45near him he is
said to have
parted with his
Belooches to save
expense - He
50must not trust
to Arabs they are
such liars -
their prophet
lied to reform
55his countrymen who now lie because it is
ingrained in their constitutions -

In the event of detaining the despatch & letters
you might give the substance of my letter to you
to the Government = I am rather anxious to
60give but little to the public - Four spurious pub-
-lications = were concocted from my letters on my
journey across the continent - one a five shilling
book was sold in America & all over the world
extensively as "The book" It was by a schoolmaster
65named Adams - Routledge sold a shilling book as
mine at all the railways in England & America
and offered me £20 to hold my peace about it -
a secretary of the London Missionary Society issued
a pamphlet = Dr L's life & travels "with a map"
70"by the author" and again advertised it with "revised by himself" another secretary performed a like piece
of villainy but palmed it off as from the "Society" knowing that I would not injure a great Institution doing
work of priceless value in the world = Another secretary of the same society indulged on a tirade ^ in a London church against me as
"morally guilty of the death of Mr Helmore" Cooley regularly proved me all wrong in the Athenæum as soon
as my letters reached home - The Liambai which we found to be a mile broad was "an undeveloped river" that
75ran under the Kalahari desert and was lost "and I was a fool to say that it was a river at all - Give Waller a hint
not to answer him by name - It is the breath of life to him to be named - When I was silent he entreated me to
argue the point of the Liambai with him and Athenæum shu[ ] out his letters when I only joked at him without naming
him -"the great apostle of hearsay geography"- Waller does not seem to know James Russell Lowells poems
He is a Northerner and lashed the slaveocracy of the South when they uttered the same trash as the Anthropologists
80till they were red hot with rage -"The mass aught to labour and we lie on sofies" &c &c

A friend at Mamohela gave me a young Soko or gorilla lately - she sits 18 inches high and is the most
intelligent and least mischievous of all the monkeys I have seen - I could not take her with me as
I am mobbed enough already - two sokos she & I would not get a breath of air - she is to be kept for me at
Ujiji - she walks on the backs of four fingers the space between the first joint & second touching the ground -
85the nails & thumbs do not touch it = It is like the daft minister you knew the legs are hitched forward as if the arms were crutches

Moosa Kamaals was detain[ ]ed many months & even sent back to Ujiji He hid
his letter as his wages depended on it -
The 40 letters went off same day as Moosa Kamaals I
suspect the Governor is guilty not to allow evidence
90of the plunder of my goods by his man Musa bin
Salum going to the coast - Giving off my goods to his own
creature who stopped the porters ten days while he plundered
was villainy - the porters needed no one they had come so
far honestly - and then Salum went off to buy ivory in
95Karagwe - I fear my two guns are abstracted from
the box which Shereef nurses - You packed it and it is
now repacked with I suspect Shereefs connivance
but I may be mistaken - It is suspicious that Shereef
persisted in keeping it close in spite of my written order to
100Muhamad bin Saleh to open it or sent it entire - the men came
without loads - a party went from us to Ujiji told Shereef
that I was near and waiting for him - invited him to come with
them so he is inexcusable