“ ‘Cattle plague,’ ‘threatening form,’ ‘joyful news,’ ” I said with a slight shake of the head; “nice things people must take pleasure in in times of war. However, one good thing is that black and yellow posts are erected on the frontiers, so that the plague cannot cross.”
But my father did not hear, and went on reading his pleasant intelligence:—
Fever is raging among the Prussian troops at Neisse. The unhealthy marshland, the bad treatment and the miserable shelter of the troops accumulated in the villages around, must necessarily produce such results. In Austria we have no idea of the treatment of the Prussian soldiery. The nobles believe themselves entitled to give any orders they please to the “common folk.” Six ounces of pork per man is all—and that for men who are not experienced soldiers.
“The newspapers are all full of capital news; above all, the account of the glorious day of Custoza. You should keep these papers, Martha.”
And I have kept them. It is what people should always do; and when a new national quarrel is impending, then read, not the most recent newspapers, but those dating from the former war, and then you will see what weight to attach to all their prophesying and boasting, and even to their accounts and intelligence. That is instructive.
From the seat of war in the north—from headquarters of the Army of the North—they write to us as follows, on the subject of the Prussian plan of campaign (!): “According to the latest advices, the Prussian army has shifted its headquarters to Eastern Silesia. (Then follows in the usual tactical style a long narrative of the projected movements and positions contemplated by the enemy, according to which the gentleman who furnished the news must have had a much clearer picture before him than Moltke and Roon.) According to this, it seems to be the object of the Prussians to anticipate in this way our march on Berlin by their own in which, however, they will hardly succeed, having regard to the precautions taken (with which again ‘our special correspondent’ is much more familiar than Benedek). Favourable accounts may be looked for from the northern army with the utmost confidence, even if they do not arrive so quickly as the popular longing desires them to do. They will, however, thereby become more decisive and more important.”
The new Frankfurter Zeitung relates a pleasant interlude, the march of Austrian troops of Italian nationality through Munich, as follows:—
Among the troops passing through Munich were some battalions of the line. They, like the rest of the troops passing through the Bavarian capital, were entertained in the garden of an inn situated near the station. Anyone might convince himself with what delight these Venetians testified to their joy in fighting the foes of Austria (perhaps too “anyone” might have imagined that drunken soldiers would willingly show enthusiasm for anything they were told to be enthusiastic about). In Würzburg the station was filled by the rank and file of an Austrian regiment of infantry of the line. As far as could be ascertained the whole consisted of Venetians. They were received with equal friendliness (i.e., were made equally drunk); and the men could not find words to express with sufficient warmth their joy and their determination to fight against the truce-breakers (of two parties at war with each other the other is always “the truce-breakers”). The hurrahs were endless. (Could not this “Mr. Any One,” who was thus lounging about the railway station, and so edified by the cries of the soldiery, find out that there is nothing so contagious as hurrahing—that a thousand voices shouting together are not the expression of a thousand unanimous sentiments, but simply exemplify the working of the natural instinct of imitation?)
At Böhmisch-Trübau Field-Marshal Benedek communicated to the Army of the North the three bulletins relative to the victory of the Army of the South, and added the following order of the day:—
In the name of the Army of the North, I have despatched the following telegram to the commander of the Army of the South: Field-Marshal Benedek and the whole northern army to the glorious and most illustrious Commander-in-chief of the brave southern army with joyful admiration, sends most hearty congratulations on the news of the famous day of Custoza. The campaign in the south is opened with a new and glorious victory for our arms. Glorious Custoza shines on the escutcheon of the imperial army.
Soldiers of the Army of the North! You will receive the news with shouts of joy. You will move to battle with increased enthusiasm, so that we also may very soon inscribe names of fame on that same shield, and announce to the emperor a victory from the north also towards which our warlike ardour burns, and which your valour and devotion will conquer, to the cry “Long live the emperor.”
To the foregoing telegram the following answer from Verona reached Böhmisch-Trübau:—
The Army of the South and its commander return their thanks to their beloved ex-commander and his brave army. Convinced that we also shall soon have to send our congratulations for a similar victory.
“Convinced! Convinced!” …
“Does not your heart leap up, my children, when you read such things?” shouted my father in
