The Birmingham age-herald., 1912-10-31

Basil Mathews in the London Chronicle. IVINGSTONES centenary will be
 celebrated on a world scale on A March 19, 1913. The only survivor who shared with him the perils of the expeditions which opened Africa to the world and founded our empire there-un- dertalxings that are unsurpassed among the authentic epics of world heroism-is Sir John Kirk, who now lives in retire ment at Sevenoaks, where a Daily Chronicle" representative found him the other day.
 You see those arrows remarked Sir John ("the real originator of the British empire in East Africa" as Sir Harry Johnston has described him). As he spoke he pointed to a sheaf of arrows hanging on the wall in his dining room.
 Most of them," he continued, were shot at Livingstone and myself as we ex- plored the Rovuma. l picked them up from the deck of the boat
 There was something curiously startling in hearing the aged scientist and diplo- mat speak thus casually of sharing with Livingstone the perils of the marvellous series of expeditions which opened Africa to the world. It was with sense Of deep veneration that I sat listening to this man. who raises modern knighthood to something of it's old chivalrous worth. He sat resting his hands on his ebony stick, his eyes gleaming momentarily as he told stories of his wonderful life in Africa, where-after Livingstone had been laid in Westminster Abbey he, himself carried on the great work by putting an end to>the slave trade the east coast, and by helping to lay the founda- tions of railway and commercial expan- sion in Uganda and Nigeria.
 Sir John Kirk. father Qor so he is terined) of Sir. Harry Johnston and Sir Frederick Lugard, is 80 on December 19 of thls year.
 As we strolled in his garden l remarked on the strange ornaments at the side of the path-the skulls of an elephant and hippopotamus.
 Yes" he said. stopping before the hip popotamus, and lifting it's enormous up- per jaw until the huge head resembled a cavern, T think l am the only man who has had his thigh between the jaws of hippopotamus and has escaped.
 Livingstone and I were travelling in boats up the Shire. l was lying back in the gunwale steering, and taking little notice of anything save to keep the boat from running into a bunch of reeds, let ting my leg rest carelessly the while along the edge of the boat.
 Suddenly a bucketful of water was hurled into the boat by the snout of hippopotamus. He opened his enormous jaws-the lower jaw under the boat, the upper over my leg. Had he closed his jaws he would have crushed the boat and carried away my leg, but for some mys- terous reason he turned and dived We never saw him again. One of our Ma kololo men turned to me and said of the deiiverance, It is Gods providence only"
 Are the stories of Liyingstones bray cry exaggefated?s I asked. Did he really show no fear in the days when. Tor instance. you had arrows rattling on the deck?
 ..I.ivingstone's absolute lack of any sense of fear amounted almost to weak ness" replied Sir John. He would go ii,to the most perilous positions without a tremor or touch of hesitation. never knew him to blench or show a sign of timorousness in any circumstances whatever.
 Yes" he continued, with growing en- thusiasm, he was true missionary though not in any narrow sense. He had no personal ambition. His one idea was to benefit Africa and the Africans Sir John Kirk remarked that the mis- sonary work which had followed in Liv- ingstone's steps had exercised a great and beneficial influence for the African and on the British empire.
 Tt is a preparation of the minds and lives of the people," he said, securing peace and preparing them for all that civ ilization and empire imply" Then he told the wonderful story of how he ended the slave trade on the east coast-a traffic which had left deserts in place of populous villages and was at tended by horrible inter-racial destruc- ton that depopulated the Central Af- rican lake plateau.
 1 Sir Bartle Frere had failed to induce the Sultan of Zanzibar to sign the treaty Sor the stopoage of the slave trade. The