e any signs, that
they intended to adopt a more active system of warfare. It is the
business of a commander to see that after a victory the fruit of it
should not be lost, and for this reason the enemy is pursued and
molested, and time is not left him for reorganization. Nothing of this
happened after the 24th--nothing has been done by the Austrians to secure
such results. The frontier which separates the two dominions is now the
same as it was on the eve of the declaration of war. At Goito, at
Monzambano, and in the other villages of the extreme frontier, the
Italian authorities are still discharging their duties. Nothing is
changed in those places, were we to except that now and then an Austrian
cavalry party suddenly makes its appearance, with the only object of
watching the movements of the Italian army. One of these parties, formed
by four squadrons of the Wurtemberg hussar regiment, having advanced at
six o'clock this morning on the right bank of the Mincio, met the fourth
squadron of the Italian lancers of Foggia and were beaten back, and
compelled to retire in disorder towards Goito and Rivolta. In this
unequal encounter the Italian lancers distinguished themselves very much,
made some Austrian hussars prisoners, and killed a few more, amongst whom
was an officer. The same state of thing, prevails at Rivottella, a small
village on the shores of the Lake of Garda, about four miles distant from
the most advanced fortifications of Peschiera. There, as elsewhere, some
Austrian parties advanced with the object of watching the movements of
the Garibaldians, who occupy the hilly ground, which from Castiglione,
Eseuta, and Cartel Venzago stretches to Lonato, Salo, and Desenzano, and
to the mountain passes of Caffaro. In the last-named place the
Garibaldians came to blows with the Austrians on the morning of the 28th,
and the former got the best of the fray. Had the fait d'armes of the
24th, or the battle of Custozza, as Archduke Albrecht calls it, been a
great victory for the Austrians, why should the imperial army remain in
such inaction? The only conclusion we must come to is simply this, that
the Austrian losses have been such as to induce the commander-in-chief of
the army to act prudently on the defensive. We are now informed that the
charges of cavalry which the Austrian lancers and the Hungarian hussars
had to sustain near Villafranca on the 24th with the Italian horsemen of
the Aorta and Alessandria regiments have
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