The Portland daily press. [volume] (Portland, Me.) 1862-1921, 1875-01-30
Recent Publications.

LIFE AND EXPLORATION OF DAVID LIVINGSTONE,
by John s. Roberts: Boston; b. b. Russell. From
John Russell agent for Portland and vicinity.
limo, 35Opp.
This is mainly a compilation from Living
stones own book, and the letters of Stanler
aud others who have been in search of him.
A brief account is given of his parentage and
early life. The author states that from ten to
nineteen years of age he worked in mill from
six in the morning until eight at night with
brief intervals for breakfast and dinner, then
sat school" from eight till ten, Z. NJ, and
finally studied until midnight which may
have happened occasionally, but sounds very
improbable to the average reporter. I 4,
The geography of Africa has been filled up
in little bits, and is still wofully confused.
The latest maps disagree with each other so
much that not one of them is reliable. 1t is
rather curious to find that Livingstone finally
concluded that Herodotus was correct and that
the source of the Nile is a tableand in 10 or
12 degrees South. and several degrees West OF
Lake Tanganyka. This makes the source
some 600 miles south of Bakers Lake Vic
toria. t
To corroborate lis views it is now well known
that Arabian slave traders have for centuries
traversed the whole region, and the explora'
tious of the past century have led modern
geographers through a series of blunders to
nearly the same views as those held by 1.-THE
ancients. First, Bruce convinced the world
that the Blue Nile, rising in Abyssinia, was
the great river, then the White Nile was
found to bring the larger volume OF water
SDeke had ne sooner demonstrated that the
Victoria Lake was the great reservoir, and that
the snow capped mountains, Kenia and Kill
manjaro to the southeast, toward the Indian
Ocean, were the famous mountains OF the
moon" than Baker pushed on and foun1 the
larger Lake, Albert. Livingstone, after OPEN
ing Southern Africa more extensively than any
other traveller, had conceived the theory that
the true source was south of the equator, and
pushed north to find it. He must have been
crushingly disappointed on ascertaining that
the river Rusz flowed into the head of Lake
Tanganyka and not from it into Lake Albert.
Stanley was with him when this important
fact was discovered, and is entitled to part OF
the credit.
Livingstone next turned his attention to the
West, and three hundred miles in that direc-
ton found system of rivers and lakes flowing
north, from an elevated plateau, towards the
land of the Pygmies described by Schwein-
furth. The student can now sympathize keen
ly with that traveller in his disappointment at
being unable to penetrate that country. The
sketch map in Schweinfurths Africa gives the
best view of the situation that in this Living
stone book is contradicted squarely by the
text. We find these rivers and lakes stretching
north toward the equator and then gap in
the map of five hundred miles, when we come
to the affluents of the Welle river flowing down
from the Blue mountain range on the western
coast of Albert Lake. Can they make their
way through this range northeast and flow
into the Lake? or creep around to the west and
join the Ghazal? If they join the Welle sys-
tenn and flow westward, is it possible that
that river afterwards flows northward through
Nam country and becomes part of the Bahr
ell Arab? Schweinfurth shows that thatsthe
latter is as likely to be the main stream as
either the Ghazal or the Ghebel which latter
Baker ascended But he thinks The Welle
comes from streams rising in the Blue Noun
tains, and the river and lakes of Livingstone
could not prove weak tributaries. 1t looks more
probable that they terminate in some great
river on the west coast but when so maby i'm
portant rivers have been proved to be but trib
utaries, and each proven step vindicates the
geography of the ancients, we cannot but SYM
pathze with the cherished hopes of the great
est and best of the African martyrs, and trust
that he has found the true source of the sacred
river, and that, lying On his dying couch, his
heart was cheered with the vision of the sweet
and solemn face of the great sphinx smiling
across the desert at the true discoverer of the
famous fountains of the Nile.
A RAMBLING STORY. By Mary Cowden Clarke.
Boston: Roberts Brothers. For sale by Loring,
Short g Harmon.
No one who peruses this, the latest work of
Mary Cowden Clarke, will question the propri-
ETY. of the title. The story is rambling, the he
TO is rambler, and the author rambles at very
slight provocation. The hero is the, son of an
artist, and early in life falls in love with an
ideal. He has the rare good fortune to meet a
woman who answers to his ideal, and he wins
her. The two are compelled by circumstances
to secret marriage. Many strange adven-
lures are gone through with, and the story as
whole is about as improbable as anything in
the range of fiction. The author has a curious
way of wandering off into by-paths and meet
ing people who have little or nothing to do
with the main characters of the story. These
asides are however not infrequently very pleas
ing, and are really an addition to what is, in
spite of its faults of construction, an entertain
ing novel. The great merit of the book is its
charming STYLE
WEDDING GARMENTS: or, Bessie Norris Diary; BY
Mary w. Milan. New York: Scribner, Arm
strong & Co. For sale by Loring, Short & Har-
mon.
"Weddng Garments" is one of those books
which are liable to run into twenty or thirty
editions, why, no fellow can find out. Love,
sentiment and religion are so closely blended in
its pages that it is hard to tell where one be
Gins. and another ends. To those who have OBJ
iections to taking theiri religion straight" as
it were, the book will possess charm but to
those whose faith is not mere sentiment, who
object to seeing the sublime language of scrip
ture applied to matters the most trivial and
made to do duty in love-making, the book will
possess few attractions. The parable of the
marriage of the Kings Son is made to furnish
the title, and the story is one throughout of
metaphorical millinery. That it will have q
great sale there is no doubt. Such books al
ways do.