European exploration of Africa 1840s, so that around the midpoint of the 19th century and the beginning of the colonial Scramble for Africa, the unexplored parts were now limited to what would turn out to be the Congo Basin and the African Great Lakes. This "Heart of Africa" remained one of the last remaining "blank spots" on world maps of the later 19th century (alongside the Arctic, Antarctic and the interior of the Amazon basin). It was left for 19th-century European explorers, including those searching for the famed sources of the Nile, notably John Hanning Speke, Sir Richard Burton, David Livingstone and Henry Morton
Henry Morton Stanley Dr. David Livingstone, of whom little had been heard since his departure for Africa in 1866 to search for the source of the Nile. Stanley travelled to Zanzibar in March 1871, later claiming that he outfitted an expedition with 192 porters. In his first dispatch to the "New York Herald", however, he stated that his expedition numbered only 111. This was in line with figures in his diaries. Bennett, publisher of the "New York Herald" and funder of the expedition, had delayed sending to Stanley the money he had promised, so Stanley borrowed money from the United States Consul. During