PICKERING, OCTAVIUS. 



National, of Lima, " confirms the tidings which 

 other explorers had given us of the great Uca- 

 yali, with respect to the facility with which 

 it can be navigated in any season by larger 

 vessels, as well as (what is now undoubtable) 

 that the Ucayali is the true source of the Am- 

 azon and not the Marafion, as was formerly 

 supposed." 



On the 17th of December the Government 

 issued a decree, declaring the navigation of 

 Peruvian rivers free to flags of all nations. It 

 was expected that this measure would be the 

 means of attracting on a large scale foreign im- 

 migration, thus opening up the rich but un- 

 known valleys of the Amazon. The Peruvian 

 Government has several small steamers on the 

 Peruvian head- waters of the Amazon, and Ad- 

 miral Tucker, in command of the little flotilla, in 

 1868, had surveyed the different branches of 

 the great artery. There exists in that region al- 

 most every description of mineral and agri- 

 cultural wealth, but the difficulty of reaching 

 the locality has always been an insuperable ob- 

 stacle to immigration. "When the railway from 

 Lima to Jauja, which was surveyed in 1868, 

 shall be completed, the intervening distance 

 between the head-waters of steam navigation 

 and the terminus of the railroad will only be 

 about twenty leagues, and the highway thus 

 constructed will form the connecting link in 

 a road which must be as important to Peru 

 as the Pacific Railroad is to the United 

 States. 



The yellow fever, in 1868, raged for about 

 three months with greater than usual severity. 

 Among its victims were Don Toribio Pacheco, 

 the Minister of Foreign Affairs, under the dic- 

 tatorship of Prado, and Edmond de Lesseps, 

 French charg6 d'affaires. 



In August, Peru was visited by a terrible 

 earthquake, which destroyed several towns, 

 and caused the loss of several thousand lives. 

 (See EAKTHQUAKES.) 



PICKERING, OCTAVIUS, LL. D., a distin- 

 guished legal writer and law reporter, and an 

 eminent naturalist, born in Wyoming, Pa., 

 September 2, 1791 ; died in Boston October 29, 

 1868. He graduated from Harvard College in 

 the class of 1810, and studied law in Boston, 

 in the office of his eldest brother, Mr. John 

 Pickering, was admitted to the bar in Suffolk 

 County, March 6, 1816, and opened an office 

 in Boston. He assisted in reporting the de- 

 bates and proceedings of the Massachusetts 

 Convention for revising the constitution, held 

 in 1820. In 1822 Mr. Pickering became the 

 State Reporter, and continued so during the 

 last eight years of the chief justiceship of 

 Isaac Parker, and the first ten of that of 

 Judge Shaw, who succeeded to the office on 

 the death of Judge Parker, in July, 1830. His 

 reports of the decisions of the Supreme Court 

 of Massachusetts during these eighteen years 

 (1822-1840) fill 24 octavo volumes. They are 

 known as " Pickering's Reports, 1 ' and are re- 

 garded as a necessary part of every good law 

 VOL. vin. 40 A 



PORTUGAL. 



625 



library. He went abroad soon after giving up 

 the office of reporter, and lived in England and 

 on the Continent of Europe for seven years, 

 returning home in 1849. He was much inter- 

 ested in science and natural history, and was 

 for many years a member of the American 

 Academy of Arts and Sciences. He was one 

 of those who, in December, 1814, organized 

 "The New-England Society for the Promo- 

 tion of Natural History," belonged to the 

 committee who framed its constitution, and 

 was chosen its treasurer. This society, a 

 month later, changed its name to that of " The 

 Linncean Society of New England," and it was 

 on its ruins that the present thriving " Boston 

 Society of Natural History " was founded in 

 1830. Of this last, as well as its predecessor, 

 Mr. Pickering was an active member. 



PORTUGAL, a kingdom in Europe. King, 

 Luis I., born October 31, 1838 ; succeeded his 

 brother, King Pedro V., November 11, 1861. 

 Heir-apparent, Carlos, born September 28, 

 1863. A new ministry was formed on the 4th 

 of January, composed as follows : Count 

 d'Avila, President, and Minister of the Interior 

 and Foreign Affairs ; Viscount Seabrea, Minis- 

 ter of Justice ; Senhor Jos6 Dias Ferreira, Min- 

 ister of Finance ; General Jose Maria de Magal- 

 haens, Minister of War; General Jose Rodri- 



giiez Caelho do Amaral, Minister of Marine ; 

 ouncillor Sebastiano do Conto Castro Mas- 

 carenhas, Minister of Public Works. This min- 

 istry remained in office only until July 21st, 

 when it resigned and was succeeded by another 

 one, composed as follows: Presidency of the 

 Council and War, Marquis de Sa da Bandeira ; 

 Interior, A. Alves Martins, Bishop of Yizeu ; 

 Justice and Worship, Anthony Pequite Seixas 

 de Andrade ; Finances, Charles Bento da Silva ; 

 Marine and Colonies, Joseph Maria Latino 

 Coelho ; Public Works, Commerce, and Indus- 

 try, Sebastian Lopes Calheiros. Area, 36,510 

 square miles; population in 1863, 3,986,558;- 

 with the Azores and Madeira (in 1863), 4,350,- 

 216. The population of the Portuguese colo- 

 nies in Africa and Asia is given (in the Goiha 

 Almanac, for 1869) as 10,881,022, of whom 

 9,000,000 are set down for Angola, Ambriz, 

 Benguela, Mosammedes.* The revenue in the 

 budget for 1868-'69 was estimated at 16,910,137 

 milreis, and the expenditures at 22,831,941. 

 Public debt, in June, 1867, 220,968,202 milreis; 

 in 1866, 196,562,673 milreis. The strength of 

 the army in the kingdom was in May, 1868, 

 1,567 officers, and 23,092 soldiers; in the colo- 

 nies, 1st line, 9,453 ; 2d line, 21,411. The fleet, 

 in 1867, consisted of 26 armed, and 19 non- 

 armed vessels ; total 45 vessels, with 355 guns. 

 The imports of Portugal, in 1866, amounted to 

 26,530,000 milreis ; the exports to 19,190,000^ 



* For a list of Portuguese colonies in Asia and Africa, 

 see ANNUAL AMERICAN CYCLOPEDIA for 1866. The total 

 population of the colonies was then estimated at 3,811,818. 

 The large difference proceeds solely from the discrepant 

 statements concerning Angola, for which then 2,C 

 and now 9,000,000 are claimed. 



