The true story of that nine months' march has never been written, and it
never will be, for the full data cannot be supplied. But here is material
waiting for some coming English Homer or Milton to crystallize into one of
the world's noblest epics; and it deserves the master hand of a great poet
artist to do it justice.
See these black men, whom some scientific philosophers would place at one
remove from the gorilla, run all manner of risks, by day and night, for
forty weeks; now going around by circuitous route to resort to strategem to
get their precious burden through the country; sometimes forced to fight
their foes in order to carry out their holy mission. Follow them as they
ford the rivers and travel trackless deserts; facing torrid heat and
drenching tropical storms; daring perils from wild beasts and relentless
wild men; exposing themselves to the fatal fever, and burying several of
their little band on the way. Yet on they went, patient and persevering,
never fainting nor halting, until love and gratitude had done all that
could be done, and they laid down at the feet of the British consul, on the
twelfth of March, 1874, all that was left of Scotland's great hero.
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