answered by an impudent laugh.  Knowing that discipline would be at an end if this mutiny was not quelled, and that our lives depended on vigorously upholding authority, I seized a double-barrelled pistol and darted out with such a savage aspect as to put them to precipitate flight.  They gave no further trouble.”  Every night now they had to build a stockade, and by day to march in a compact body, knowing the forest to be full of enemies dogging their path, for now they had nothing to give as presents, the men having even divested themselves of all their copper ornaments to appease the Chiboque harpies.  “Nothing, however, disturbed us, and for my part I was too ill to care much whether we were attacked or not.”  They struggled on, the Chiboque natives, now joined by bodies of traders, opposing at every ford, Livingstone no longer wondering why expeditions from the interior failed to reach the coast.  “Some of my men proposed to return home, and the prospect of being obliged to turn back from the threshold of the Portuguese settlements distressed me exceedingly.  After using all my powers of persuasion, I declared that if they now returned, I should go on alone, and returning into my little tent, I lifted up my heart to Him who hears the sighing of the soul.  Presently the head man came in.  ‘Do not be disheartened,’ he said, ’we will never leave you.  Wherever you lead, we will follow.  Our remarks were only made on account of the injustice of these people.’  Others followed, and with the most artless simplicity of manner told me to be comforted.  ’They were all my children; they knew no one but Sekeletu and me, and would die for me:  they had spoken in bitterness of spirit, feeling they could do nothing.’”

On April 1st they gained the ridge which overlooks the valley of the Quango and the Portuguese settlements on the farther bank.  “The descent is so steep that I was obliged to dismount, though so weak that I had to be supported.  Below us, at a depth of one thousand feet, lay the magnificent valley of the Quango.  The view of the Vale of Clyde, from the spot where Mary witnessed the Battle of Langside, resembles in miniature the glorious sight which was here presented to our view.”

On the 4th they were close to the Quango, here one hundred fifty yards broad, when they were stopped for the last time by a village chief and surrounded by his men.  The usual altercation ensued; Livingstone refusing to give up his blanket—­the last article he possessed except his watch and instruments and Sekeletu’s tusks, which had been faithfully guarded—­until on board the canoes in which they were to cross.  “I was trying to persuade my people to move on to the bank in spite of them, when a young half-caste Portuguese sergeant of militia, Cypriano di Abren, who had come across in search of beeswax, made his appearance and gave the same advice.”  They marched to the bank—­the chief’s men opening fire on them, but without doing any damage—­made terms with the ferrymen, with Cypriano’s help, crossed the Quango, and were at the end of their troubles.