The Sun.
London, England, 1859-06-06 00:00:00

THE ALLIBD CAMP.

The following is from a letter dated Vercelli,
May 31:—
According to my promise, I seize the first inte-

resting moment to write to you. You must not ex-
pect this first letter long, for there is so much to do
and so much to see that very little time remains for
thinking and writing, The mystery of this unusual
movement, which contrasts so strongly with the dul-
ness of the last month, is explained in a few words.
The allied armies have completed their preparations
and are advancing, and advancing with a rapidity
and energy which must silence those who were so
impatient and expected battle after battle, and
victory after victory, 24 hours after the populations
of Genoa and Turin had saluted so vociferously the
first French troops.

No doubt, we have to thank in a great measure
the Austrians, who allowed us to make all these
preparations without thinking of disturbing them,
except by some partial effort, such as that at Mon-
tebello and the little skirmishes along the Sesia.
There, were those who smiled at the idea of the
Emperor taking the command of his army in
person. They ought to have been on the spot, and
seen the manlier in which this magnificent army
has been collected, provided with everything, pro-
tected against any possible attempt on the part of
the enemy to disturb these preparations, and they
ought to see now the manner in which this army is
brought with unexampled rapidity to the desired
point, and they would, I think, already forget smil-
ing, for this is due to the Emperor himself ; it is he
who keeps every thing together—he who directs
and guides. One fact will show more than anything
else how he does this. Not more than four or five
days ago the body of the French army was eche-
loned from Voghera along the Po and to Alessan-
dria, and thence to Valenza and Casale, and to-day
this mass, with the exception of the Guards, has
passed the Sesia, and all this without confusion,
without accident, and with such great skill that
until yesterday the general impression was that
the movement of the army would be quite in
another direction—that is, towards the east. This
impression was so strong that the rumour, which
was spread on purpose, that the Imperial head-
quarters would be transferred to Voghera was fully
credited. No doubt, the repeated preparations of
departure from Alessandria contributed consider-
ably to this success.

It was yesterday and the day before that the
movement assumed its proper shape. Up to this
moment the great object was to take up• a
defensive position, so as to be able to bring up the
French army in line. To realise what an army
of above 100,000 men is, is something like trying'to
acquire a distinct idea of millions of money. It can
never be done unless by actual contemplation, and
the most lively imagination must remain behind the
reality. Now, you must know that all the materiel
and the larger part of all the provisions has to
come from France—all the hundred thousand tons
of stores, artillery, munitions, and pontoons. Tho
question was how to do this undisturbed, for the
least confusion would have retarded all these
preparations in a frightful proportion. As, there-
fore, the French troops arrived they were sent to
the front, in order to check any attempt on the part
of the Austrians. Thus, by degrees, the French
corps d'armee were echeloned along the line of the
Po from Casteggio, Voghera, Castelnuovo, and Sale,
to Bassignano, with Alessandria and Tortona as
points d'appui, while the Piedmontese army occu-
pied the line from Valenza to Casale, and, since the
retreat of the Austrians, to Vercolli.

The first point was to gain a passage across the
Sesia, one of those broad swampy rivers which in-
tersect the upper Italian plains. There was only
one bridge from Vercelli over it, built on arches of
fine masonry. It served for the railway as well as
for the great chaussee to Novara. The Austrians,
you will remember, blew up two arches of this fine
bridge; to re-establish them in the face of the
Austrians would have taken too much time and
trouble, and would very likely have attracted too
much attention towards this point. The Sardinian
division Cialdini received therefore the mission to
effect a passage across the Sesia, which, as you
know, was done with complete success more than a
week ago. Cialdini established himself at Borgo
Vercelli, the first considerable place on the road to
Novara. A bridge was immediately constructed,
and thus a communication secured between the two
banks of the river. Since that time gradually the
mass of the Sardinian army has been concentrated
on that point, the different corps of the French
army succeeding and occupying the places left by
them.

The day before yesterday the King himself trans-
ferred his head-quarters from Casale to Borgo
Vercelli, a little village a couple of miles beyond
the river. Already another bridge had been con-
structed by the French engineers to facilitate the
passage of the French army, and the French troops
began to cross over. In the movement of the latter
from the right to the left of the line the railway
played a considerable part, and certainly, for a. first
trial of the use of railways in warfare, the success
was indeed brilliant. Troops which would have
had five or six days' hard marching were trans-
ported often in so many hours to the place of their
destination. This had the desired advantage of
relieving the passage of the others on the road,
which would have been too much encumbered other-
wise, and of saving a large mass of troops the fatigue
of a forced march.

This latter consideration would have been the
least important, for there never, perhaps, has been
an army in finer marching condition than the French
army here. Were it not for the mass, one might
almost imagine they were
picked
troops. The greater
part of them are soldiers of several years' standing,
by their age, mostly from 25 to 30 ; from their free
and elastic step, and their thorough soldierlike