In stimulating African exploration the influence of Livingstone was very decided. He was the first of the galaxy of modern African travelers, for both in the Geographical Society and in the world at large his name became famous before those of Baker, Grant, Speke, Burton, Stanley, and Cameron. Stanley, inspired first by the desire of finding him, became himself a remarkable and successful traveler. The same remark is applicable to Cameron. Not only did Livingstone stimulate professed geographers, but, what was truly a novelty in the annals of exploration, he set newspaper companies to open up Africa. The _New York Herald_, having found Livingstone, became hungry for new discoveries, and enlisting a brother-in-arms, Mr. Edwin Arnold and the _Daily Telegraph_, the two papers united to send Mr. Stanley "to fresh woods and pastures new." Under the auspices of the African Exploration Society, and the directions of the Royal Geographical, Mr. Keith Johnston and Mr. Joseph Thomson undertook the exploration of the country between Dar es Salaam and Lake Nyassa, the former falling a victim to illness, the latter penetrating through unexplored regions to Nyassa, and subsequently extending his journey to Tanganyika. We can but name the international enterprise resulting from Brussels Conference; the French researches of Lieutenant de Semellé and of de Brazza; the various German Expeditions of Dr. Lenz, Dr. Pogge, Dr. Fischer, and Herr Denhardts; and the Portuguese exploration on the west, from Benguela to the head-waters of the Zambesi. Africa does not want for explorers, and generally they are men bent on advancing legitimate commerce and the improvement of the people. It would be a comfort if we could think of all as having this for their object; but tares, we fear, will always be mingled with the good seed; and if there have been travelers who have led immoral lives and sought their own amusement only, and traders who by trafficking in rum and such things have demoralized the natives, they have only shown that in some natures selfishness is too deeply imbedded to be affected by the noblest examples.
Livingstone himself traveled twenty-nine thousand miles in Africa, and added to the known part of the globe about a million square miles. He discovered Lakes 'Ngami, Shirwa, Nyassa, Moero, and Bangweolo; the upper Zambesi, and many other rivers; made known the wonderful Victoria Falls; also the high ridges flanking the depressed basin of the central plateau; he was the first European to traverse the whole length of Lake Tanganyika, and to give it its true orientation; he traversed in much pain and sorrow the vast watershed near Lake Bangweolo, and, through no fault of his own, just missed the information that would have set at rest all his surmises about the sources of the Nile. His discoveries were never mere happy guesses or vague descriptions from the accounts of natives; each spot was determined with the utmost precision, though at the time his head might be giddy from fever or his body tormented with pain. He strove after an accurate notion of the form and structure of the continent; Investigated its geology, hydrography, botany, and zoölogy; and grappled with the two great enemies of man and beast that prey on it--fever and tsetse. Yet all these were matters apart from the great business of his life. In science he was neither amateur nor dilettante, but a careful, patient, laborious worker. And hence his high position, and the respect he inspired in the scientific world. Small men might peck and nibble at him, but the true kings of science,--the Owens, Murchisons, Herschels, Sedgwicks, and Fergussons--honored him the more the longer they knew him. We miss an important fact in his life if we do not take note of the impression which he made on such men.
Last, but not least, we note the marvelous expansion of missionary enterprise in Africa since Livingstone's death. Though he used no sensational methods of appeal, he had a wonderful power to draw men to the mission field. In his own quiet way, he not only enlisted recruits, but inspired them with the enthusiasm of their calling. Not even Charles Simeon, during his long residence at Cambridge, sent more men to India than Livingstone drew to Africa in his brief visit to the Universities. It seemed as if he suddenly awakened the minds of young men to a new view of the grand purposes of life. Mr. Monk wrote to him truly, "That Cambridge visit of yours. lighted a candle which will NEVER, NEVER go out."