As I looked at the empty tent and the dejected,
woe-stricken servants, a choking sensation
of unutterable grief filled me. The sorrow-laden
mind fondly recalled the lost man’s inestimable
qualities, his extraordinary gentleness, his patient
temper, his industry, cheerfulness, and his tender
friendship; it dwelt upon the pleasure of his society,
his general usefulness, his piety, and cheer-
ful trust in our success with which he had renewed
our hope and courage; and each new
virtue that it remembered only served to intensify
my sorrow for his loss, and to suffuse my
heart with pity and regret, that after the exhibition
of so many admirable qualities and such
long faithful service he should depart this life
so abruptly, and without reward.
When curtained about by anxieties, and the
gloom created by the almost insurmountable obstacles
we encountered, his voice had ever made
music in my soul. When grieving for the hapless
lives that were lost, he consoled me. But
now my friendly comforter and true-hearted
friend was gone! Ah, had some one then but
relieved me from my cares, and satisfied me that
my dark followers would see their Zanjian homes
again, I would that day have gladly ended the
struggle, and, crying out, “Who dies earliest
dies best,” have embarked in my- boat and
dropped calmly over the cataracts into eternity.
The moon rose high above the southern wall
none 3,1877.1 b r o o d in g o v e r my s a d l o s s . i 57
Zinga. J
nf the chasm. Its white funereal light revealed
in ghostly motion the scene of death to which
I owed the sundering of a long fellowship and
a firm-knit unity. Over the great Zinga Fall
sat for hours upon a warm boulder, looking up
river towards the hateful Massassa, deluding myself
with the vain hope that by some chance he
might have escaped out of the dreadful whirlpool,
picturing the horrible scene which an intense
and morbid imagination called up with
such reality, that I half fancied that the scene
was being enacted, while I was helpless to reheve.
How awful sounded the thunders of the many
falls in the silent and calm night! Between
distant Mowa’s torrent-rush, down to Ingulufi
below, the Massesse, Massassa, and Zinga filled
the walled channel with their fury, while the
latt'er, only 30 y ards from me’ hissed ^ t0fe
along with restless plunge and gurgle, and roaring
plunged, glistering white, into a sea ot
billows. .
Alas! alas! we never saw Frank more. Vain
was the hope that by some miracle he might
have escaped, for eight days afterwards a native
arrived at Zinga from Kilanga, with the statement
that a fisherman, while skimming Kilanga
basin for whitebait, had been attracted by something
gleaming on the water, and, paddling his
canoe towards it, had been horrified to fin
to be the upturned face of a white man!