out, a way by which these wretched ones may escape from the gloom of
their miserable existence into a higher and happier life.
Long wandering in the Forest of the Shadow of Death at out doors, has
familiarised me with its horrors; but while the realisation is a
vigorous spur to action it has never been so oppressive as to
extinguish hope. Mr. Stanley never succumbed to the terrors which
oppressed his followers. He had lived in a larger life, and knew that
the forest, though long, was not interminable. Every step forward
brought him nearer his destined goal, nearer to the light of the sun,
the clear sky, and the rolling uplands of the grazing land.
Therefore he did not despair. The Equatorial Forest was, after all,
a mere corner of one quarter of the world. In the knowledge of
the light outside, in the confidence begotten by past experience of
successful endeavour, he pressed forward; and when the 160 days'
struggle was over, he and his men came out into a pleasant place where
the land smiled with peace and plenty, and their hardships and hunger
were forgotten in the joy of a great deliverance.

So I venture to believe it will be with us. But the end is not yet.
We are still in the depths of the depressing gloom. It is in no spirit
of light-heartedness that this book is sent forth into the world as if
it was written some ten years ago.

If this were the first time that this wail of hopeless misery had
sounded on our ears the matter would have been less serious. It is
because we have heard it so often that the case is so desperate.
The exceeding bitter cry of the disinherited has become to be as
familiar in the ears of men as the dull roar of the streets or as the
moaning of the wind through the trees. And so it rises unceasing, year
in and year out, and we are too busy or too idle, too indifferent or