“4th February, 1853.—­I am spared in health, while all the company have been attacked by the fever.  If God has accepted my service, then my life is charmed till my work is done.  And though I pass through many dangers unscathed while working the work given me to do, when that is finished, some simple thing will give me my quietus.  Death is a glorious event to one going to Jesus.  Whither does the soul wing its way?  What does it see first?  There is something sublime in passing into the second stage of our immortal lives if washed from our sins.  But oh! to be consigned to ponder over all our sins with memories excited, every scene of our lives held up as in a mirror before our eyes, and we looking at them and waiting for the day of judgment!”

“17th February.—­It is not the encountering of difficulties and dangers in obedience to the promptings of the inward spiritual life, which constitutes tempting of God and Providence; but the acting without faith, proceeding on our own errands with no previous convictions of duty, and no prayer for aid and direction.”

“22d May.—­I will place no value on anything I have or may possess, except in relation to the kingdom of Christ.  If anything will advance the interests of that kingdom, it shall be given away or kept, only as by giving or keeping of it I shall most promote the glory of Him to whom I owe all my hopes in time and eternity.  May grace and strength sufficient to enable me to adhere faithfully to this resolution be imparted to me, so that in truth, not in name only, all my interests and those of my children may be identified with his cause....  I will try and remember always to approach God in secret with as much reverence in speech, posture, and behavior as in public.  Help me, Thou who knowest my frame and pitiest as a father his children.”

When Livingstone reached the Makololo, a change had taken place in the government of the tribe.  Ma-mochisane, the daughter of Sebituane, had not been happy in her chiefdom, and had found it difficult to get along with the number of husbands whom her dignity as chief required her to maintain.  She had given over the government to her brother Sekeletu, a youth of eighteen, who was generally recognized, though not without some reluctance, by his brother, Mpepe.  Livingstone could not have foreseen how Sekeletu would receive him, but to his great relief and satisfaction he found him actuated by the most kindly feelings.  He found him, boy as he was, full of vague expectations of benefits, marvelous and miraculous, which the missionaries were to bring.  It was Livingstone’s first work to disabuse his mind of these expectations, and let him understand that his supreme object was to teach them the way of salvation through Jesus Christ.  To a certain extent Sekeletu was interested in this: