From the very first Livingstone saw the importance of the Shiré Valley and Lake Nyassa as the key to Central Africa. Ever since, it has become more and more evident that his surmise was correct. To make the occupation thoroughly effective, he thought much of the desirableness of a British colony, and was prepared to expend a great part of the remainder of his private means to carry it into effect. On August 4th, he says in his Journal:
"I have a very strong desire to commence a system of colonization of the honest poor; I would give £2000 or £3000 for the purpose. Intend to write my friend Young about it, and authorize him to draw if the project seems feasible. The Lord remember my desire, sanctify my motives, and purify all my desires. Wrote him.
"Colonization from a country such as ours ought to be one of hope, and not of despair. It ought not to be looked upon as the last and worst shift that a family can come to, but the performance of an imperative duty to our blood, our country, our religion, and to humankind. As soon as children begin to be felt an incumbrance, and what was properly in ancient times Old Testament blessings are no longer welcomed, parents ought to provide for removal to parts of this wide world where every accession is an addition of strength, and every member of the household feels in his inmost heart, 'the more the merrier.' It is a monstrous evil that all our healthy, handy, blooming daughters of England have not a fair chance at least to become the centres of domestic affections. The state of society, which precludes so many of them from occupying the position which Englishwomen are so well calculated to adorn, gives rise to enormous evils in the opposite sex,--evils and wrongs which we dare not even name,--and national colonization is almost the only remedy. Englishwomen are, in general, the most beautiful in the world, and yet our national emigration has often, by selecting the female emigrants from workhouses, sent forth the ugliest huzzies in creation to be the mothers--the model mothers--of new empires. Here, as in other cases, State necessities have led to the ill-formed and ill-informed being preferred to the well-formed and well-inclined honest poor, as if the worst as well as better qualities of mankind did not often run in the blood."
The idea of the colony quite fascinated Livingstone, and we find him writing on it fully to three of his most confidential business friends--Mr. Maclear, Mr. Young, and Sir Roderick Murchison. In all Livingstone's correspondence we find the tone of his letters modified by the character of his correspondents. While to Mr. Young and Sir Roderick he is somewhat cautious on the subject of the colony, knowing the keen practical eye they would direct on the proposal, to Mr. Maclear he is more gushing. He writes to him:
"I feel such a gush of emotion on thinking of the great work before us that I must unburden my mind. I am becoming every day more decidedly convinced that English colonization is an essential ingredient for our large success.... In this new region of Highlands no end of good could be effected in developing the trade in cotton and in discouraging that in slaves.... You know how I have been led on from one step to another by the overruling Providence of the great Parent, as I believe, in order to a great good for Africa. 'Commit thy way unto the Lord, trust also in Him, and He will bring it to pass.' I have tried to do this, and now see the prospect in front spreading out grandly.... But how is the land so promising to be occupied?... How many of our home poor are fighting hard to keep body and soul together! My heart yearns over our own poor when I see so much of God's fair earth unoccupied. Here it is really so; for the people have only a few sheep and goats, and no cattle. I wonder why we cannot have the old monastery system without the celibacy. In no other part where I have been does the prospect of self-support seem so inviting, and promising so much influence. Most of what is done for the poor has especial reference to the blackguard poor."