Trade of the Sotidan. with Italy.

I shall tr} to bring also sojne animals, alive or stufPed. I will spare no pains to make a collection of the skulls of the various tribes, and a complete collection of the production of the countries we cross.

As to the customs of the people, they will be all minutely observed and faithfully described. Although the means obtained in Italy are very limited for such an undertaking, I have, despite the losses suffered by the fire at Suez, again devoted a considerable sum of money to my enterprise. I shall hope that all will go well. The Italians who are so interested in what concerns geographical studies will not abandon us, knowing that I have also a family of whose future I have to think.

The whole sum collected in Italy for our expedition was about 10,000 francs, a sum which scarcely sufficed to purchase the things most urgently necessary for our journey, and defray our expenses as far as Cairo. From that city to Khartoum I have been obliged to dip into my savings. As ill luck Avould have it all the means of transport have been doubled in price on account of a mortality among the animals. Only to cross the desert from Korosko to -Berber I paid 42/., at other times it would not have cost me more than eighteen or twenty. Finally I have been obliged here, in prospect of the " harif," to have suitable cases made and a thousand articles indispensable for a long campaign. At Fadasi or Fazoglii, I must also purchase mules, camels or horses, the transport by bearers not being customary there.

If I had not lost so much by the fire, I should not have hesitated to send home a ship load of indiarubber and tamarinds, and I am convinced that a trade in these articles could be opened direct from here to Italy.

Monsignore Daniel Combini, the head of the Catholic IVIission in Africa with its central seat at Khartoum, is to arrive in a few days. Gordon