England realizes the immense importance to her commerce of keeping the White Nile Valley open and safe. It is reported that she is now conducting negotiations at Brussels and at Berlin to secure control of the territory connecting Uganda with South Africa, which she tried unsuccessfully to secure several years ago when Lord Rosebery was in power. * * * * * The news that the French liner _La Champagne_ was overdue last month in New York, caused considerable anxiety. This increased as several days passed without bringing any news of her. Then the steamer _Rotterdam_, which arrived in New York on February 27th, brought an officer and six men belonging to _La Champagne_. They had been picked up in an open boat in which they had been tossed about on a rough sea for six days and nights, suffering great hardships. They announced that _La Champagne_ had broken her shaft and was anchored, safe but helpless, off the banks of Newfoundland. They had put out in the open boat in order to seek for assistance in the regular track of the steamers, from which _La Champagne_ had been driven. Assistance was sent to the disabled ship, and a few days later she was brought into the harbor of Halifax. * * * * * The Cubans are keeping up an astonishingly vigorous campaign. The hardest fighting of late has taken place in the eastern part of the island. A severe battle was fought on February 18th and 19th, at Puerto Principe, in which the insurgents were worsted by Gen. Jiminez Castellanos, losing in all one hundred and eighty-one men, and being obliged to abandon more than eighty men who lay dead on the field. It is reported that included among those killed were Colonel Rodriguez, Commandant Angel Rocio, and other officers. The losses of the Spanish were much smaller, but it is said that Lieutenant Porajo was killed. The Spaniards captured a number of horses and considerable ammunition. In the province of Santiago de Cuba, General Pardo has been fighting with the insurgent forces under General Garcia and General Rabi. The engagements lasted through six days, resulting, it is said, in the loss of eighty men on the Spanish side. In this province the Cubans have succeeded in fortifying themselves very strongly. A cablegram from Madrid has stated that of late there has been a great increase in the number of Spanish troops mentioned in the official news as having been killed in Cuba. ARCTIC EXPLORATION. Arctic exploration may be said to have begun in the sixteenth century, and since that time daring sailors of all nations have gone into the icy regions, many of them never to return.