William Garden Blaikie

“ The years of monotonous toil spent in the factory were never regretted by Livingstone. On the contrary, he regarded his experience there as an important part of his education, and had it been possible, he would have liked "to begin life over again in the same lowly style, and to pass through the same hardy training [7] ." The fellow-feeling he acquired for the children of labor was invaluable for enabling him to gain influence with the same class, whether in Scotland or in Africa. As we have already seen, he was essentially a man of the people. ”

“ They give us the secret of his life. Acts of self-denial that are very hard to do under the iron law of conscience, become a willing service under the glow of divine love. It was the glow of divine love as well as the power of conscience that moved Livingstone. ”

“ There were traditions of Ulva life that must have been very congenial to the temperament of David Livingstone. In the "Statistical Account" of the parish to which it belongs [2] we read of an old custom among the inhabitants, to remove with their flocks in the beginning of each summer to the upland pastures, and bivouac there till they were obliged to descend in the month of August. The open-air life, the free intercourse of families, the roaming frolics of the young men, the songs and merriment of young and old, seem to have made this a singularly happy time. ”

“ Early on Sunday mornings he would go through the village ringing a bell to rouse the people that they might attend an early prayer-meeting which he had established. His temperament was far too high for most even of the well-disposed people of Blantyre, but Neil Livingstone appreciated his genuine worth, and so did his son. David says of him that "for about forty years he had been incessant and never weary in good works, and that such men were an honor to their country and their profession." Yet it was not after the model of Thomas Burke that Livingstone's own religious life was fashioned. ”

“ From the first he disliked men of much profession and little performance; the aversion grew as he advanced in years; and by the end of his life, in judging of men, he had come to make somewhat light both of profession and of formal creed, retaining and cherishing more and more firmly the one great test of the Saviour--"By their fruits ye shall know them." ”

“ Not liking Glasgow, they returned to Blantyre. In a humble home there, five sons and two daughters were born. Two of the sons died in infancy, to the great sorrow of the parents. Mrs. Livingstone's family spoke and speak of her as a very loving mother, one who contributed to their home a remarkable element of brightness and serenity. Active, orderly, and of thorough cleanliness, she trained her family in the same virtues, exemplifying their value in their own home. ”

“ Only one son remained at home, Neil, the father of David, who eventually became a tea-dealer, and spent his life at Blantyre and Hamilton. David Livingstone has told us that his father was of the high type of character portrayed in the _Cottar's Saturday Night_. There are friends still alive who remember him well, and on whom he made a deep impression. He was a great reader from his youth upward, especially of religious works. His reading and his religion refined his character, and made him a most pleasant and instructive companion. ”

“ There is a tradition in the family, showing his sense of the value of education, that he was complimented by the Blantyre school-master for never grudging the price of a school-book for any of his children--a compliment, we fear, not often won at the present day. The other near relations of Livingstone seem to have left the island at the same time, and settled in Canada, Prince Edward's Isle, and the United States. ”

“ In 1792, his grandfather, as he tells us, left it for Blantyre, in Lanarkshire, about seven miles from Glasgow, on the banks of the Clyde, where he found employment in a cotton factory. The dying charge of the unnamed ancestor must have sunk into the heart of his descendant, for, being a God-fearing man and of sterling honesty, he was employed in the conveyance of large sums of money from Glasgow to the works, and in his old age was pensioned off, so as to spend his declining years in ease and comfort. ”

“ In poetic feeling, or at least in the power of expressing it, as in many other things, David Livingstone and Robert Burns were a great contrast; but in sympathy with the people they were alike, and in both cases the people felt it. Away and alone, in the heart of Africa, when mourning "the pride and avarice that make man a wolf to man," Livingstone would welcome the "good time coming," humming the words of Burns:
[Footnote 7: _Missionary Travels_, p. 6.]
"When man to man, the world o'er, Shall brothers be for a' that." ”

“ Livingstone quotes Macaulay's remark on the extreme savagery of the Highlanders of those days, like the Cape Caffres, as he says; and the tradition of Kirsty's Rock would seem to confirm it. But the stories of the "baughting-time" presented a fairer aspect of Ulva life, and no doubt left happier impressions on his mind. His grandfather, as he tells us, had an almost unlimited stock of such stories, which he was wont to rehearse to his grandchildren and other rapt listeners. ”