Dr. Livingstone, as we have seen, welcomed the Mission right cordially, for indeed it was what he had been most eagerly praying for, and he believed that it would be the beginning of all blessing to Eastern and Central Africa, and help to assimilate the condition of the East Coast to that of the West The field for the cultivation of cotton which he had discovered along the Shire and Lake Nyassa was immense, above 400 miles in length, and now it seemed as if commerce and Christianity were going to take possession of it.  But it was found that the turning-point of prosperity had been reached, and it was his lot to encounter dark reverses.  The navigation of the Shire was difficult, for the “Pioneer” being deep in the water would often run aground.  On these occasions the Bishop, Mr. Scudamore, and Mr. Waller, the best and the bravest of the missionary party, were ever ready with their help in hauling.  Livingstone was sometimes scandalized to see the Bishop toiling in the hot sun, while some of his subordinates were reading or writing in the cabin.  As they proceeded up the Shire it was seen that the promises of assistance from the Portuguese Government were worse than fruitless.  Evidently the Portuguese traders were pushing the slave-trade with greater eagerness than ever.  Slave-hunting chiefs were marauding the country, driving peaceful inhabitants before them, destroying their crops, seizing on all the people they could lay hands on, and selling them as slaves.  The contrast to what Livingstone had seen on his last journey was lamentable.  All their prospects were overcast.  How could commerce or Christianity flourish in countries desolated by war?

Every reader of The Zambesi and its Tributaries remembers the frightful picture of the slave-sticks, and the row of men, women, and children whom Livingstone and his companions set free.  Nothing helped more than this picture to rouse in English bosoms an intense horror of the trade, and a burning sympathy with Livingstone and his friends.  Livingstone and the Bishop, with his party, had gone up the Shire to Chibisa’s, and were halting at the village of Mbame, when a slave party came along.  The flight of the drivers, the liberation of eighty-four men and women, and their reception by the good Bishop under his charge, speedily followed.  The aggressors were the neighboring warlike tribe of Ajawa, and their victims were the Manganja, the inhabitants of the Shire Valley.  The Bishop accepted the invitation of Chigunda, a Manganja chief, to settle at Magomero.  It was thought, however, desirable for the Bishop and Livingstone first to visit the Ajawa chief, and try to turn him from his murderous ways.  The road was frightful—­through burning villages resounding with the wailings of women and the shouts of the warriors.  The Ajawa received the offered visit in a hostile spirit, and the shout being raised that Chibisa had come—­powerful chief with the reputation of being a sorcerer—­they