The Sun.
London, England, 1860-04-23 00:00:00

CENTRAL ITALY.

A letter from Florence, dated April 16, says :
King Victor Emmanuel, late of Sardinia, presently '
of Italy, bound for his new provinces of Tuscany '
and the !Emilia, left Turin yesterday (Sunday), at
six o'clock. About 100 members of Parliament,
mostly deputies, preceded him by a special train,
which started for Genoa at half-past four. I tra-
velled with them, and we reached Genoa at about
half-past seven. Three large steam-frigates and a
small steamer were destined to convey the royal party
to Leghorn. The Maria Adelaide, on board which
Count Persano had hoisted the admiral's flag, was
handsomely fitted out for the King himself and his
immediate household and suite. The deputies were
accommodated in the Carlo Alberto and Vittorio
Emmanuele. The Maria Adelaide, a fast screw
steamer, reckons the distance from port to port (80
miles) at about six and a half to seven hours' voy-
age. The two other vessels, especially the Carlo
Alberto, in which your correspondent embarked,
are comparatively slow coaches, and employ from
nine to ten hours in the passage. The King was
to weigh anchor at 12, midnight. We set out at
half-past 10, and it was understood that we should
wait for each other at early morning off Leghorn,
so as to come into port as near as possible at the
same time. The Maria Adelaide, however, easily
I outstripped us, in spite of our two hours' start, and
1 we qaw her far ahead of us when we awoke at break
of day this morning off the Isle of Gorgona. Our
fast-steaming sister then took us in tow, this being
the first time, as far as I know, in which a King,
instead of being urged on by his Parliament, had
fairly to drag his national representatives along
with him. We got on thus creditably enoagh, but
as we neared harbour we had to wait for the Vit-
torio Emmanuele, who, maddened with the sense
of his disgrace, put on more steam, and went tear-
ing on with so little discretion that, as the Maria
Adelaide had rid herself of our encumbrance, we
again lagged miserably behind. Not a little time
was thus lost ; we heard the cannon hailing the
King on his landing, and when, at last, we also set
foot on shore it was very near 12 o'clock at noon,
and the King, who, somewhat loath to stand the
brunt of the reception of two cities in one day, had
resolved upon cutting Leghorn for this time, had
already set out by his own Royal train for Florence.
Notwithstanding this little bit of mismanage-
ment, I believe that high prices are due to the Sar-
dinian marine ; and the Sardinian navy, small as it
is even in proportion to the minor kingdom to
which it hitherto belonged, deserves the utmost at-
tention that the rulers of the now increased State
may be likely to bestow upon it. With its dock-
yards at Spezia, a long extent of Mediterranean
coasts, and a pied a terra in the Adriatic, the in-
heritor of old Ligurian renown, this navy cannot
fail to play an important part in these inland seas.
The officers look brave and intelligent, and burn
with zeal to be put to some use. They complain
that their own department was too long neglected
under La Marmora, who, wholly a soldier, never
troubled his head about men who go down to the
sea in ships. The Marine Ministry is now set
apart from the War-office, and as the new portfolio
has been taken in hand by Count Cavour, who, like
another distinguished leading statesman, is "up
to anything, even to taking the command of a
three-decker," good hopes are entertained that his
hundred-handed activity will soon be felt in this
part of the now disunited service.
A prodigious amount of gunpowder was burnt ;
we had to salute the King and the harbour of Leg-
horn ; we had to answer the salute of her Britan-
nic Majesty's good frigate the Racoon ; we were
pavoises fore and aft, every one of our masts, and
the masts of all vessels off and in Leghorn, as gaudy
with banners, pennons, and streamers as any pea-
cock-tails. But our broad Italian tricolour was our
boast—that tricolour which only 12 years ago would
have been shot down in these very waters, and by
none more heartily than by these very Sardinian
men-of-war, as if it had been no better than a Riff
pirate's red flag or IL buccaneer's death's head and
cross bones.

We landed at Leghorn. The King had left the
gay pavilion which had been prepared for his re-
ception. An odd notion seemed to have got hold of
the good people of Leghorn, that the pavilion was
meant for the King alone, and that it would be
desecration if the members of the Legislative body
had trodden the same ground which had been hal-
lowed by the foot of the King. We were not to
land where the King had landed; it seemed for a
moment doubtful where we were to land, and
whether we should land at all ; at last the small
steamtug which conveyed the live freight from the
C,,10 Alberto neared a wharf, the edge of which was
protected by a low railing by way of a parapet.
There we jumped down, and it is a perfectly au-
thentic fact that all the representatives of the nation,
with not a few of the Tuscan deputies among them,
and some of the most distinguished names in Italy
foremost among them, such as Minghetti, Pepoli,
Gualterio, &c., encumbered as they were with great
coats, railway wrappers, and hand-bags, travel-
stained, also, unwashed and unshaven, and some-
what odd with wideawakes or skull-caps—in the
oddest and poorest plight imaginable, in short—
had to stoop and twist themselves under those rail-
ings, effecting thus their triumphal entry into Tus-
cany by passing under the Caudine Forks. No
wonder the mob did not shout. Their breath was
spent in hurraing for the King ; they had no dis-
tinct notion of the condition of those travellers, and
saw them performing an evolution which did not
certainly set off their dignity. Your correspondent
was the only one of the company who avoided the
ignominy of that obeisance by vaulting over the
railings.

Weil, a short walk through some of the most
miserable and most offensive streets of Leghorn took
us to the Marine Railway station, where, apparently,
no man, and certainly no train, was awaiting us. The
King had left, of course, but, luckily, his luggage
was yet to follow. We rushed into the luggage
train ; one of the Tuscan deputies, Toscanelli, of
Pisa, known and dreaded at the station as a rail-
way director, bespoke in our behalf instant accom-
modation and speed ; and, in obedience to his loud
ringing imperious voice, off we started at a rapid
pace, and, without ever slackening our speed, we
got over the hundred kilometres which parted us
from Florence in about five quarters of an hour.
Down we jumped from the carriages at a little
past lhori'dclvoacukitejdusitataet
theth saemdodreewntith a
in which b
the
-
liant Staff, and was prancing out of the station's
gate, in the midst of the shouting multitude. The
carriages for his non-riding retinue now drove up;
and up into them the most pushing of us, and our
dusty seats, wideawakes, and carpet-bags, jumped
also
.pell-mell with bewigged magistrates, ermined
patricians, and gold-laced diplomatists, who, I know
not whether more wondering. at our intrusion, or
shrinking from our contact, made room for us on
their soft cushions, while a great many of our
honourable fellow-travellers, either because more
bashful and irresolute or because less lucky,
were left standing in the crowd, with their great-
coats,
in their hands, and their vexation and disap-
pointment hardly concealed by the shadow of their
broad-brimmed wide-awakes ; I was, I believe, in
the fortieth carriage, and cannot tell how many
hundreds followed after me. On we drove at a
slow pace, just from time to time catching a glimpse
of the brilliant cavalcade; deafened by the shouts
elicited by the graceful curvet of
bofoltdh,e9ilatonylyalosatneecele:
stout, massive heroic rider, engulfed
aiidthe
fm
firm, erect,rae easy
of
its
at every step by the vast, heaving, roaring mass,
which, as far as the eye could reach, filled every
inch of space of the railway-yards, the vast
entrance to the Cascine, and every avenue of the
inia.antyo.roawdshat a which
worldhe reocfo converge upon utphoeur thee Ni,,e Pr
co rt thar
three
Prato
Florences in the field! More than 60,000 strangers
had this day entered the city gates, and it is
astonishing by how many shifts and devices the