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For centuries Africa has been "the dark continent" of our globe. The sea-washed edges of this immense tract have been known time immemorial. Egypt, at its northeastern corner, is the oldest of the governments of the earth; while the nations skirting the Red and the Mediterranean seas were actors in the earliest recorded history. But Africa as a whole has been an unknown land.

That it was a fertile land, was demonstrated by the treasures brought from its depths by those mighty rivers, the Nile, the Niger and the Congo. That it was populous, was proven by the fact that its native tribes had furnished to the world without, forty millions of slaves in the period of two centuries. Both the slave-hunter and the slave told wondrous tales of the inner depths of the land, but these were mere hints as to the actual facts of the case. Africa remained a mystery and a riddle, that seemingly were never to be penetrated.

For many years explorations in Africa were made simply to gratify curiosity, or from a desire to penetrate beyond lines reached by other men. All the results desired or expected were amusement or fame. But in later years African explorations have assumed an entirely different aspect. From Livingstone, who first began to open up "the dark continent," to Cameron and Stanley who pierced its very heart, all explorations have tended to one great end—the civilization and Christianization of the vast population that inhabits it. No matter what the ruling motive may have been in each case, whether, as in Livingstone, to introduce Christianity; or, in Baker, to put a stop to the slave trade; or, in Stanley, to unlock the mystery of ages, still the tendency has been the same: to bring Africa into the family of continents instead of being the earth's "pariah;" to throw light on this black spot of our planet, and make those who inhabit it practically and morally, what they are really, a portion of the human race.

Mungo Park, Denham and Clapperton made explorations of considerable value early in the present century, but Livingstone with thirty years of toil in Africa was the real pioneer of successful work. In 1840, at the age of twenty-five, he embarked as a missionary to South Africa, thus entering the land where he lived and died, and which he never left save on two brief visits to his native land.

After Livingstone's last return to Africa, circumstantial reports of his death were received. These were subsequently contradicted and other reports of death came. He wrote but few letters and some of these failed to reach their destination; his fate, therefore, remained in painful uncertainty until Bennett sent Stanley to discover him, dead or alive.

This commission led to the two expeditions of Stanley, the thrilling events of which are narrated in this volume.