Excerpt from Some Reminiscences

If the student should find no material to enrich his store of knowledge, the general reader will be interested in following the impressive story, com pressed as it is, and, though he may be familiar with some or all of the incidents, he will not be wearied by the recapitulation, for tales of heroism, like classic works, never become tiresome.

From the days of long ago up to the date of my first voyage, South Africa had been the field of stirring events and unexpected revelations. Since I have known it, there have rarely been many dull or tranquil moments. The complex problem Of races alone has kept excitement, expectation, and anxiety alive. Looking into the distant retrospect when the Bushmen painted upon the walls of their caves, and showed a glimmering of artistic perception, in spite of their lowly place in the human scale; when a race of men long dead and lost in the annals of history, but obviously advanced in knowledge, built Zimbabwe - whose ruins still perplex the antiquarian; when the Portuguese established two ports of call, alla and dela Goa; when the Dutch first seized the Cape, and tribes of savages ate each other up, Africa was in a state Of perpetual strife. Settled communities of white men since the sixteenth century have gradually become established and have explored and somewhat tamed the ferocity in being. They have diminished the wanton waste of life, but still, right up to and into my own days, horrible carnage was endemic and the struggle against the pristine wildness waged. Within my recollection, dauntless missionaries.

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