The generous and hearty appreciation of Livingstone by the medical profession was well expressed in the words of the _Lancet_: "Few men have disappeared from our ranks more universally deplored, as few have served in them with a higher purpose, or shed upon them the lustre of a purer devotion."
Lord Polwarth, in acknowledging a letter from Dr. Livingstone's daughter, thanking him for some words on her father, wrote thus: "I have long cherished the memory of his example, and feel that the truest beauty was his essentially Christian spirit. Many admire in him the great explorer and the noble-hearted philanthropist; but I like to think of him, not only thus, but as a man who was a servant of God, loved his Word intensely, and while he spoke to men of God, spoke more to God of men,
"His memory will never perish, though the first freshness, and the impulse it gives just now, may fade; but his prayers will be had in everlasting remembrance, and unspeakable blessings will yet flow to that vast continent he opened up at the expense of his life. God called and qualified him for a noble work, which, by grace, he nobly fulfilled, and we can love the honored servant, and adore the gracious Master."
Lastly, we give the beautiful wreath of Florence Nightingale, also in the form of a letter to Dr. Livingstone's daughter:
"LONDON, _Feb._ 18_th_,1874.
"DEAR MISS LIVINGSTONE,--I am only one of all England which is feeling with you and for you at this moment.
"But Sir Bartle Frere encourages me to write to you.
"We cannot help still yearning to hear of some hope that your great father may be still alive.
"God knows; and in knowing that He knows who is all wisdom, goodness, and power, we must find our rest.
"He has taken away, if at last it be as we fear, the greatest man of his generation, for Dr. Livingstone stood alone.
"There are few enough, but a few statesmen. There are few enough, but a few great in medicine, or in art, or in poetry. There are a few great travelers. But Dr. Livingstone stood alone as the great Missionary Traveler, the bringer-in of civilization; or rather the pioneer of civilization--he that cometh before--to races lying in darkness.
"I always think of him as what John the Baptist, had he been living in the nineteenth century, would have been.
"Dr. Livingstone's fame was so world-wide that there were other nations who understood him even better than we did.
"Learned philologists from Germany, not at all orthodox in their opinions, have yet told me that Dr. Livingstone was the only man who understood races, and how to deal with them for good; that he was the one true missionary. We cannot console ourselves for our loss. He is irreplaceable.
"It is not sad that he should have died out there. Perhaps it was the thing, much as he yearned for home, that was the fitting end for him. He may have felt it so himself.
"But would that he could have completed that which he offered his life to God to do!
"If God took him, however, it was that his life was completed in God's sight; his work finished, the most glorious work of our generation.
"He has opened those countries for God to enter in. He struck the first blow to abolish a hideous slave-trade.
"He, like Stephen, was the first martyr.
"'He climbed the steep ascent of heaven, Through peril, toil, and pain; O God! to us may grace be given To follow in his train!'
"To us it is very dreary, not to have seen him again, that he should have had none of us by him at the last; no last word or message.
"I feel this with regard to my dear father and one who was more than mother to me, Mrs. Bracebridge, who went with me to the Crimean war, both of whom were taken from me last month.