The Emperor (who was accompanied by the King of Saxony and other high general officers) has just returned from a rapid ride round the circle of the outer forts, within which the troops are all lying under canvas; and from the top of the Garrison Church Steeple, the highest point in this mighty fortressed town, nothing can be seen but endless vistas of tented bivouacs. Never before has the German soldier been allowed any other night covering in the field but the canopy of heaven, though, indeed, in a country like France, which is, in truth, a land flowing with milk, wine, and honey, and teeming with villages and other opportunities of cantonment, he had comparatively little need of tents. But it is quite a different thing in Russia, with its raw and rigid climate, its vast, uncultivated, and uninhabited spaces; and it was in view of the probable contingency of a campaign in such a foodless and roofless wilderness that the General Staff, with that remarkable foresight and wisdom which has always distinguished it, resolved to equip all the Army Corps lying nearest the Eastern frontier with the very best tents procurable—namely, such as were at once waterproof, windproof, and even fireproof. For otherwise what ruin might not a spark from a bivouac fire entail upon the tented fields which stretch away in every direction towards the horizon, both here and at Posen, at Neisse, and at Königsberg, reminding one of the hosts, countless as the sands on the sea-shore, of the five kings who encamped over against Gibeon. But I must not omit to record a curious incident which happened as the Emperor was riding past the statue of Copernicus, whose birthplace was Thorn. Just when abreast the monument of that immortal astronomer, His Majesty remarked to his suite: ‘_Ja, meine Herren_, there you see the man who first opened the eyes of the world to the true nature of the solar system; and I think that with God’s help we shall equally be able to assign Russia her proper place in the system of nations.’ THE AUSTRIAN PLAN OF CAMPAIGN. DETAILS OF PREPARATION. (_By Telegraph from our Special Correspondent, Mr. Charles Lowe._) THORN, _April 29_. To-night the Emperor (who continues to display wonderfully good spirits and energy) gave a banquet in the hastily furbished-up rooms of the gloomy old Schloss, in honour of Feldzeugmeister Baron Beck, the Chief of the Austrian Staff, who, pending the progress of his well-thought-out mobilisation and massing scheme, which he had set a-going by a simple order from Vienna, had hastily run up here by rail to concert united action with his German colleague, Count von Schlieffen, the present occupier of Moltke’s high and responsible office. From a trustworthy source I gather that this was the substance of Baron von Beck’s communication:—