—Captain Neves Fereira, Governor of Benguela, and some other officers, have placed themselves at the disposition of the Geographical Society of Lisbon, for a new Portuguese expedition from the west to the east, upon an itinerary like that of Serpa Pinto.
—P. Francisco Autuses, charged with establishing the mission of Zoumba upon the Zambeze, has set out from Lisbon for Mozambique. After studying theology and natural sciences at Louvain, he will devote himself to taking meteorological observations. He will establish a station for this purpose at Zoumba. In a little while he will be joined by a number of Portuguese workmen, whom government will send there to make the necessary buildings for a commercial office.
—The Portuguese Commission of Public Works has constructed in the Province of Angola a telegraphic line of 344 kilometers from St. Paul de Loanda to Dondo and Calcullo. It has already rendered good service to commerce and the navigation of the Quanza. At Dondo everything is ready to prolong the line as far as Poungo Andongo.
—The Sultan of Zanzibar has just explored the upper country of the Loufigi with an expedition, the command of which was entrusted to M. Beardall, who formerly studied the region of the Rovouma, and more recently has had under his care the construction of the Dar-es-Salam road.
—The society formed at Sfax will establish at the most important points in the rich countries of Haussa, Bornou, Darfour, &c., commercial stations, which will be at the same time scientific stations, and between which will pass regular caravans, well armed, to which will be joined special men, furnished with all necessary instruments for making topographical and meteorological surveys.
—Four Roman Catholic missionaries have gone to the Baptist mission at San Salvador. They were brought by a Portuguese vessel to the point where the Congo ceases to be navigable, and escorted from thence to San Salvador by a lieutenant and a detachment of the navy. They carried with them some holy water, fire-arms, silver vases and a golden crown, and offered them to the King of San Salvador from the King of Portugal. The king received them and returned thanks, saying that it was the most beautiful present he had ever received. He has promised his protection to the missionaries.
—Mr. James Stevenson, Esq., has offered £4,000 to the London Missionary Society and the Livingstonia Mission, provided they will, without delay, establish stations and maintain them on the line of road between Lake Tanganyika and Quilimane on the coast. It is expected that merchandise will be transported over this route by steamer up the Zambezi and Shiré to the falls of the latter river. There will also be steamboat facilities on the upper Shiré and the Nyassa lake, leaving only about three hundred miles for the transportation of goods by porters or domestic animals in order to reach the Tanganyika.