Scientific Life David Livingstone

7/28/2019 Scientific Life David Livingstone

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The Royal Society of Edinburgh

The Scientific Life of Dr Livingstone

Professor Michael Barrett FRSEProfessor of Biochemical Parasitology

(Infection Immunity and Inflammation Life Science)University of Glasgow

19 March 2013

Report by J ennifer Trueland

On the 200th anniversary of David Livingstones birth, Professor Michael Barrettdescribed the man, his life, and his achievements as explorer, doctor andhumanitarian as well as an important figure in the Scottish tradition of tropicalmedicine.

David Livingstone was a remarkable Victorian an explorer, doctor, scientist,naturalist and writer. He was, Professor Barrett said, one of the most astonishingfigures in the history of humanity. In a lecture to mark the 200th anniversary ofLivingstones birth, Professor Barrett focused on the scientific achievements of the millboy from Blantyre, in the context of his life more generally. In particular, he describedLivingstones contribution to and understanding of tropical medicine.

David Livingstone was born in Blantyre in Lanarkshire, and lived with his parents andsiblings in a small room in a tenement for mill workers. From the age of 10, he worked14 hours a day in the mill, then attended school for two hours and read until midnight.

He was keen to study science, being fascinated by fossils, flora and fauna, but hisstrictly evangelical father wouldnt let him, believing that science and Christianity couldnot be reconciled. The young David, however, found a way forward: inspired by thewritings of Thomas Dick, an eccentric scientist from Broughty Ferry, who wrote thatscience and religion were striving for the same truth, he persuaded his father that hecould study medicine so that he could save the heathen as a missionary.

Livingstone studied medicine in Glasgow, before applying to the London MissionarySociety where he was to meet the missionary Robert Moffatt, who was home fromKuruman, in South Africa. Livingstone had intended going to China, but the opiumwars intervened, and he decided to follow Moffatt and go to southern Africa instead.Livingstone quickly made a reputation for hard work and derring-do the famous

episode where he fought off a lion, which left him with a broken arm, only enhancedhis image. He married Moffatts daughter, Mary, who travelled with him across theKalahari Desert.

It was here that Livingstone was to make one of his first significant discoveries in LakeNgami; a large body of water so close to the Kalahari was important if his idea ofopening up Africa to legitimate trade and agriculture was to succeed. Livingstone waskeen to find a route into central Africa and walked many thousands of miles to try tofind a way. Walking through Africa was tough there were no roads, and there werethreats from wildlife not just the big beasts we associate with Africa, but tinycreatures such as the mosquito. At the time, it wasnt known that malaria was carriedby mosquitoes, and Livingstone had repeated attacks of the disease; indeed, he

nearly died. Meanwhile he was showing his scientific zeal and curiosity. When he firstsaw the Victoria Falls, for example (he was the first to bring this incredible landmark tothe attention of Europeans), it wasnt enough for him simply to wonder at their beauty


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and majesty: he immediately took his sextant and other scientific equipment andproceeded to measure it and record his observations. Deciding that the Zambezi riverwas the answer to finding a workable route, he went back to Britain and proceeded toraise the money for what was to be an ill-fated expedition.

Livingstone was feted as a hero back in the UK, and his ideas and writings wereinfluential. He believed that the slave trade was the biggest impediment to

development in Africa, for example, and this was a view that gained some momentumwith his backing. Interestingly, another eminent Victorian, Charles Darwin, held similarviews, and had a similar life pattern at this point (studying medicine in Scotland,theology in London, then travelling, although in Darwins case it was to SouthAmerica). J ohn Murray published Darwins Origin of the Species in 1858, the yearafter the same publisher brought out Livingstones Missionary Travels andResearches in South Africa.

Livingstones writings were remarkable for the beauty of his descriptions, but also forthe observations of natural history. He discovered several new species such as thehoney guide, a bird which annoys and irritates humans and leads them to a beesnest, knowing that the humans will raid it for honey and the bird can feast on theirleavings. Despite this skill as a naturalist, he disagreed with Darwin on evolution,saying he had witnessed no struggle for life on the plains of Africa; but this avowal ofa stubborn Christian, sticking to the idea of God as creator, was at odds with hiswriting, in which he described evolution in practice.

Livingstones observations contributed greatly to human understanding of medicine.For example, he observed the association between the bite of the tampan tick andrelapsing fever, and probably gave the first description of an arthropod transmittingdisease. His work was followed up by other great Scottish pioneers of tropicalmedicine, such as Patrick Manson, who established that mosquitoes acted as a vectorfor disease, and encouraged the amazing all-rounder and polymath Sir Ronald Ross

to investigate the life cycle of the malaria parasite, and establish how it wastransmitted by mosquitoes.

This discovery had huge significance; because mosquitoes were implicated, peoplecould protect themselves by sleeping under mosquito nets and by draining swamps.Of course there were also drugs for malaria. Livingstone himself was assiduous abouttaking quinine to cure himself of African fever, and worked out the correct dosage,which was to take it until it caused ringing of the ears. He also invented pills calledLivingstone Rousers, in which the active ingredient was quinine.

Some of Livingstones ideas didnt quite work in practice. For example, he noted that ifdomestic animals in Africa were bitten by the tsetse fly, they became emaciated and

died, but wild animals didnt. It would be too difficult to train wild animals such asbuffalo in Africa to pull carts, so Livingstone imported Indian buffalo which werealready domesticated thinking they too would be immune. They, however, werentresistant and died. It was fruitless, but he was always trying, said Professor Barrett.Livingstone won funding for his Zambezi expedition on the basis that it would open upmineral-rich central Africa for trade, and he also wished to ameliorate the lot of theAfrican people, but he was thwarted by a number of circumstances. Perhaps the mainbarrier was the un-navigable rapids of the Zambezi, which he hadnt previouslynoticed and which despite the horror of his travel companions he tried to conquertime and again. Other issues were famine, cholera and the growth of the slave trade,which all told against him. He did find a tributary, and did find what is now known asLake Malawi, but that wasnt what he had set out to do.

Nevertheless he reported that the area was ripe for conversion by missionaries, and anumber arrived only to die very quickly from malaria. His wife, Mary, also died.


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Livingstone felt very guilty and responsible for the missionaries deaths, because hehad assumed they would take quinine, but hadnt advised them to do so. Theenterprise was considered a fiasco, and Livingstone was profoundly embarrassed,returning to Britain this time as a villain, rather than a hero.

By this time African exploration was all the rage, and Livingstone joined the latestgreat debate, which was over the source of the Nile. Explorers such as Richard Burton

and J ohn Speke were competing over it and Livingstone, still wanting to find waysinto Africa, thought hed look for it too. It was harder this time to raise the money, butLivingstone travelled back to Africa, to Zanzibar, and spent his time tracing rivers to tryto find the source. He became very ill, and lost his medicine chest; he was dependenton Arab traders, and eventually travelled to Lake Tanganyika, where his supplies werestolen. He was in a parlous state, and rumours of his death were already circulating inBritain.

It was at Lake Tanganyika that the famous meeting was to take place betweenLivingstone and the journalist Henry Morton Stanley, who had been sent to find him bythe New York Herald newspaper and who probably didnt actually say DrLivingstone, I presume. Stanley brought him new life, supplies and medicines, andtried to persuade him to go back to Britain. This Livingstone refused to do, and hecontinued to try to find the source of the Nile, but had lost his scientific instruments.He didnt know where he was as he traversed inhospitable swamps and, in fact, wasout of his way by miles.

Livingstone died on 1 May 1873. He was eviscerated and his heart buried in Africa,then his body was dried and transported on foot for over a thousand miles by hisattendants, before being returned to Britain, where he was buried in State inWestminster Abbey.

Although the cause of death is generally given as malaria and internal bleeding

caused by dysentery, Professor Barrett believes that Schistosomiasis, or bilharzia, aninfection caused by parasitical tropical worms found in water, is a likely candidate based partly on the knowledge that Livingstone had terrible bleeding haemorrhoids,for which he refused an operation on the grounds that it would be embarrassing.It is likely, then, that Livingstone fell victim to one of the tropical diseases that still killpeople today, despite his contribution to our understanding of parasitology. ProfessorBarrett finished by outlining the current state of malaria, and neglected tropicaldiseases, saying that efforts were underway to continue the work of Livingstone, andother great Scottish pioneers of tropical medicine, in making such conditions a thing ofthe past.

But who is todays Livingstone? Professor Barrett could only describe a composite: as

a naturalist, David Attenborough, whose television programmes are engaging andfascinating, much like Livingstones books; as an explorer, astronaut Neil Armstrong,and as a preacher and human rights activist, Martin Luther King. It takes a collectionof people an extraordinary achievement for a mill boy from Blantyre whose 200thbirthday we celebrate today.


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Questions

An historian asked whether a recent television characterisation of Livingstone as aliar over the prospects of the ill-fated Zambezi expedition was harsh. ProfessorBarrett said that he felt Livingstone had exaggerated the ease and the benefits, butthat this was for reasonable reasons. His preliminary exploration had missed therapids which obviously scuppered the attempt but he couldnt have been expected

to know about the spread of cholera and famine, and the increase in slavery. Hemessed up, he exaggerated, but that doesnt mean he was a liar. He said thatLivingstone was manic depressive, and that in his optimistic moments, he thought hecould pull anything off. I think he generally believed that colonisation was plausible,and he was profoundly disappointed when it didnt happen.

Another historian pointed out that Livingstone deserved credit for not subscribing tothe view of the anthropologists and ethnographers of the time who have been calledpseudoscientific racists that there were different species of human. Richard Burton,on the other hand, believed there were. The historian added that he felt that part of thefailure of the Zambezi expedition was down to Livingstones lack of political flair.Professor Barrett agreed, saying that Darwin had also been outraged byethnographers and others using measuring sticks to try to define differences. Burtonsportrait is on prominent display in the Victorian explorers section of the NationalPortrait Gallery, while Livingstones is not. Its outrageous that his isnt the biggestportrait in the Victorian gallery, he added, urging everyone to write to the Gallery tomake that point.

Sir J ohn Arbuthnott asked how Livingstone kept in touch with the latest scientificthinking when on very long journeys to inaccessible places. Professor Barrett said thatLivingstone received copies ofThe Lancet and the British Medical Journal sometimes a year out of date and that he also received letters. Indeed, he was aprodigious letter writer, sometimes penning 20 per day. Great sacks of mail used to

arrive by sea, then be transported to towns and villages by anyone who happened tobe going that way, including Arab traders. His own mail went the reverse route.

Asked why malaria wasnt on the list of neglected tropical diseases on the point ofbeing controlled or eradicated, Professor Barrett said that unfortunately it is sowidespread that it isnt considered neglected. Microsoft billionaire and philanthropistBill Gates has dared to express the ambition of the eradication of malaria, and thereare positive initiatives taking place such as product development partnerships. Thegood news is that incidence of malaria has fallen dramatically, he said.

Vote of ThanksProfessor Stephen Blackmore, Regius Keeper of the Royal Botanic Garden,Edinburgh, and the Queens Botanist in Scotland, thanked Professor Barrett fordelivering a remarkable lecture. Professor Blackmore said he had been in Malawi andhad tried to retrace some of Dr Livingstones footsteps, but had been interested tohear Professor Barrett talk about the man as a scientist, and keen observer, as well asan explorer.

Opinions expressed here do not necessarily represent the views of the RSE, nor of its Fellows

The Royal Society of Edinburgh, Scotlands National Academy, is Scottish Charity No. SC000470

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