Journeys of Wisdom
September 21, 2008

What kind of books do you crave when you are sick at heart? Humor? Self-help? Introspective novels? Mysteries? What do you look for when you scan your shelves? Escapism, understanding, a philosophical perspective? Perhaps it depends upon the type of problem you are facing and the emotions that accompany you at that time. Do you ever find that even with all the books on your nightstand and your shelves that you really don’t have the “right” book after all?

For me, I think it’s escapism with a brain, that is, adventure, history of the personal kind be it fiction (but based on real life experiences) or nonfiction. It’s about taking chances, pushing the limits, trying to find the answer to questions whose answers may never be found. Books like Through the Dark Continent (1878) by Henry M. Stanley that take me out of my time and place in the world can with their vivid, sometimes horrible descriptions make my heart right again.

Again and again as we sailed onward we were attacked by the savages o the shore. They were hideously be-painted for war, one half of their bodies being white, the other ochreous. Shouting their war-cries, they rushed on our stockade fences like a herd of buffaloes several times, in one of which charges two of our men were killed. Up to the afternoon of the 29th of January we had fought twenty-four times, and out of these struggles we had obtained sixty-five door-like shields, which upon the commencement of a fight on the river at all times had been raised by the women, children, and non-combatants as bulwarks before the riflemen, from behind which, cool and confident, the forty-three guns were of more avail than though there were 150 riflemen unprotected. At sunset our antagonist retired, leaving us to dress our wounds and burry our dead, and prepare for the morrow by distributing a new store of cartridges.

About ten o’clock of the 30th another conflict began, in the usual way, by a determined assault on us in canoes. By charging under cover of our shields we captured one canoe and eight men. Through our captives we were enabled to negotiate for an unmolested passage. Though hostilities ceased, the drumming continued with unabated fury; bass and kettle-drums gave out a thunderous sound, which must have been heard to an immense distance.

We were getting weary with fighting every day. The strain to which we were exposed had been too long; the incessant, longlasting enmity shown to us was beginning to make us feel baited, harassed, and bitter. Dared we but dash down by night? Ah, but who could tell us what lay below! Whom could we ask, when everything in the shape of man raised his spear and screamed his rage at us as soon as we were observed? So we emerged out of the forest shades of the islands with soured and embittered feelings. But we would turn our eyes resolutely away from the advancing cannibals until they came within spear throw of us, and then, why—we must fight again.Destiny urged us on. There were no retreats for us. Man refused us, and the forest rejected us, for it had nothing to support us.

In these wild regions our mere presence excited the most furious passions of hate and murder, just as in shallow waters a deep vessel stirs up muddy sediments.

And their journey had begun with such high hopes. I think it’s because there is that connection between the historical travels and real life—after all, we begin our life journeys fresh and clean, innocently unaware of the difficulties, complexities, struggles that will define and balance the joys and happiness—that gives such books a particular appeal.

In this manner we begin our long journey, full of hopes. There is noise and laughter along the ranks, and a hum of gay voices murmuring through the fields, as we rise and descend with the waves of the land and with the sinnosities of the path. Motion had restored us all to a sense of satisfaction. We had an intensely bright and fervid sun shining above us, the path was dry, hard, and admirably fit for travel, and during the commencement of our first march nothing could be conceived in better order than the lengthy thin column about to confront the wilderness.

Presently, however, the fervour of the dazzling sun grows overpowering as we descend into the valley of the Kingani river. The ranks become broken and disordered; stragglers are many; the men complain of the terrible heat; the dogs pant in agony. The veterans of travel push on towards the river three miles distant, where they may obtain rest and shelter, but the inexperienced are lying prostrate on the ground, exclaiming against the heat, and crying for water, bewailing their folly in leaving Zanzibar. We stop to tell them to rest a while and then to come on to the river, where they will find us; we advise, encourage, and console the irritated people as best we can, and tell them that it is only the commencement of a journey that is so hard, that all this pain and weariness are always felt by beginners, but that by and by it is shaken off, and that those who are steadfast emerge out of the struggle heroes.

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