In the Austrian army the artillery was provided with bronze muzzle-loading rifled guns, classified as 8-pdrs. and 4-pdrs. The infantry was armed with the muzzle-loading Lorenz rifle. The German allies of Austria could place about 150,000 men in the field; Italy, about 200,000. THE GEOGRAPHICAL SITUATION. The geographical situation was unfavorable to Prussia. The map of Germany, as it existed before the Austro-Prussian war, shows Rhineland and Westphalia completely separated from the other provinces of Prussia by the hostile territory of Hanover and Hesse-Cassel, which, extending from the north, joined the South German States which were in arms against the northern kingdom. The Austrian province of Bohemia, with the adjacent kingdom of Saxony, formed a salient, pushing forward, as it were, into the Prussian dominions, and furnishing a base from which either Silesia or Lusatia might be invaded. In the language of the Prussian Staff History of the Campaign of 1866: “In one direction stood the Saxon army as a powerful advanced guard only six or seven marches distant from the Prussian capital, which is protected from the south by no considerable vantage ground; in the other Breslau could the more easily be reached in five marches, because, trusting to a former federal compact with Austria, Schweidnitz had been given up as a fortress.” The forces of Hanover and Hesse-Cassel, numbering 25,000 men, could operate against the communications of the Prussian armies, or withdraw to the south and unite with the Austrians or Bavarians. The South German armies might form a junction in Saxony or Bohemia with the Austro-Saxon army. THE PLANS OF VON MOLTKE AND VON BENEDEK, AND THE DISPOSITIONS OF THE OPPOSING ARMIES. The Prussian army was commanded by the King. His chief-of-staff was Baron Hellmuth Von Moltke, a soldier of reputation in Prussia, but as yet almost unknown beyond the boundaries of his own country. The object of Von Moltke was to protect the Prussian rear by defeating the Hanoverian and Hessian troops; to prevent a junction of these troops with their South German allies; to “contain” the latter with as small a force as possible, and to hurl the crushing weight of the Prussian forces upon the Austro-Saxon army. On the 14th of June the Prussian armies were stationed as follows: The “Army of the Elbe,” consisting of three divisions, two cavalry brigades and 144 guns, in cantonments round Torgau, under command of General Herwarth Von Bittenfeld; The “First Army,” consisting of three army corps, a cavalry corps of six brigades, and 300 guns, near Görlitz, under command of Prince Frederick Charles; The “Second Army,” consisting of four army corps, a cavalry division of three brigades, and 336 guns, in the vicinity of Neisse, under command of the Crown Prince. Besides the three main armies, there were other forces stationed as follows: One division at Altona, in Holstein, under Von Manteuffel;