ere is hardly any. As we approached the
villages, the natives collected in large numbers, armed with bows and
poisoned arrows; and some, dodging behind trees, were observed taking aim
as if on the point of shooting. All the women had been sent out of the
way, and the men were evidently prepared to resist aggression. At the
village of a chief named Tingane, at least five hundred natives collected
and ordered us to stop. Dr. Livingstone went ashore; and on his
explaining that we were English and had come neither to take slaves nor
to fight, but only to open a path by which our countrymen might follow to
purchase cotton, or whatever else they might have to sell, except slaves,
Tingane became at once quite friendly. The presence of the steamer,
which showed that they had an entirely new people to deal with, probably
contributed to this result; for Tingane was notorious for being the
barrier to all intercourse between the Portuguese black traders and the
natives further inland; none were allowed to pass him either way. He was
an elderly, well-made man, grey-headed, and over six feet high. Though
somewhat excited by our presence, he readily complied with the request to
call his people together, in order that all might know what our objects
were.

In commencing intercourse with any people we almost always referred to
the English detestation of slavery. Most of them already possess some
information respecting the efforts made by the English at sea to suppress
the slave-trade; and our work being to induce them to raise and sell
cotton, instead of capturing and selling their fellow-men, our errand
appears quite natural; and as they all have clear ideas of their own self-
interest, and are keen traders, the reasonableness of the proposal is at
once admitted; and as a belief in a Supreme Being, the Maker and Ruler of
all things, and in the continued existence of departed spirits, is
universal, it becomes quite appropriate to explain that we possess a Book
containing a Revelation of the will of Him to whom in their natural state
they recognise no relationship. The fact that His Son appeared among
men, and left His words in His Book, always awakens attention; but the
great difficulty is to make them feel that they have any relationship to
Him, and that He feels any interest in them. The numbness of moral
perception exhibited, is often discouraging; but the mode of
communication, either by interpreters, or by the imperfect kn