Chapter 94 San must have made preparations in advance before breaking the shackles with a hammer

In the same year, 1823, towards the end of October, the inhabitants of Toulon saw the return of the warship "Orion"; that warship was later to be used as a training ship at Brest. Yes, but it belonged to the Mediterranean Fleet at the time, and it returned to Hong Kong for repairs because of the damage caused by the strong wind. The giant warship was hit by a windstorm in the sea and was seriously damaged. It took a lot of effort to drive into the dock.I can't remember what flag it was flying at that time. As usual, it was supposed to receive the eleven-gun salute, and it also fired one shot for another, a total of twenty-two shots.The salute, the courtesies of the royal family, the army and the navy, the roar of salutation, the badge of honor, the regulations of the dock and battery, the sunrise and sunset, the opening and closing of cities, and the like, are to be done by all the batteries and all the forts. and it has been calculated that the civilized world fires salutes all over the globe at a rate of 150,000 salutes every twenty-four hours, to no avail.Calculated on the basis of six francs per hair, that is 900,000 francs per day, 30 million per year, all turned into a wisp of green smoke.It's just a little thing.Meanwhile, the poor are dying of hunger.

1823 was the so-called "Spanish War Period" of the Restoration. That war was many things in one thing, and had many oddities.It was a great family affair of the Bourbons, the support and protection of the Madrid one by the French one, that is to say, the maintenance of the blood line, a superficial restoration of our national tradition; Monsieur Duc d'Angouleme, "the hero of Andújar," restrained, with an air of complacency not quite commensurate with his usual composure, the real old terror of the Inquisition, hostile to the utopian terror of the liberals. policy; the reappearance of the sans-culottes as the shirtless ghost appalling the widows on alimony; and the despotism that thwarted progress by calling it anarchy; All kinds of theories in 1989; all Europe's intimidation of French ideas that are popular all over the world; wearing the red epaulettes of Sergeant Habayashi, participating in the king's crusade to suppress people of all nationalities as a volunteer soldier, and fighting with the son of France , the commander-in-chief of the great army, the Prince of Garion, under the pseudonym Charles-Albert; the imperial soldiers who had rested for eight years, aged, and went on the journey dejectedly wearing white cockades; The raised tricolor recalls the white flag that appeared at Koblenz thirty years ago; the monks who mingled with our ranks; the spirit of freedom and innovation suppressed by the spear; France that destroyed its intellectual achievements by force; also, the enemy generals who were bribed, the soldiers who were in retreat, and the city besieged by billions of dollars; there is no danger of fighting but there is the possibility of explosion, just like suddenly breaking into a dynamite pit little bloodshed, little honor, almost all ashamed, but no one honored; these are the Spanish wars, started by some of the princes of the descendants of Louis XIV, and carried out by Napoleon's men Directed by some generals.It has such a sad quality that it compares neither with any great military action nor with any great political strategy that preceded it.

There were a few serious campaigns, such as the capture of Trocadero, which was a more magnificent military operation; but, on the whole, we repeat, since the trumpets were not sounded , the whole motive is ambiguous, and history has proved that it is indeed difficult for France to accept that kind of glory that seems to be but is not.Some of the officers in Spain who were ordered to defend the country apparently gave way so easily that one can imagine the corrupting effect of bribes in that kind of victory; full face.It was a disgraceful battle indeed, and the words "Banque de France" were revealed in the shade of the banners.

The soldiers who stormed Zaragoza in 1808 frowned when they saw that the fortresses were easily opened to meet the enemy in 1823, and regretted that they had not encountered Palafox.The character of France welcomed Rostopkin more than Ballesteros. A still more serious point, which deserves emphasizing, is that in France that war offended both the martial spirit and the democratic mind.It was a business of enslaving people.The French soldier is the son of democratic thought, but in that battle its task was to impose the yoke on other people's necks.Shamefully unconscionable.France's mission is to awaken the hearts of peoples, not to suppress them.Since 1792, the revolutions of all Europe have been inseparable from the French Revolution, and from France the light of liberty radiates like the rays of the sun.Only those with blind eyes can't see it!It was Bonaparte who said it.

The war of 1823 was an atrocity against the good Spanish nation and at the same time an atrocity against the French Revolution.And the hideous atrocities committed against others were committed by France, and they were violent aggressions, because all military operations, except the war of liberation, are all violent aggressions. The word "passive obedience" suffices.The army is a strange masterpiece, a combined strength of innumerable feeble wills.This can explain war, which is an involuntary violation of human beings against human beings. For the Bourbons, the War of 1823 was his fatal wound.They thought that war was a victory.They completely fail to see the danger of killing an idea by coercion.In their naivety, they are so mistaken that they want to strengthen their ruling power by crime, not knowing that crime can only greatly weaken themselves.Xiaoxiao's tricks have infiltrated their politics.1830 has sprouted in 1823.The Spanish campaign became a point of contention in their cabinet meetings as either military success or theocracy.Since France can restore the status of "supreme" in Spain, it can naturally restore the absolute monarchy in its own country.They mistake the obedience of the military for the consent of the people, and that is a terrible mistake.That trust is how the throne was overthrown.There is no place to sleep soundly in the shadow of poisonous trees nor in the shadow of armies.

Let us return to the battleship "Orion". When the army led by the prince's commander was fighting, a fleet of warships was also crossing the Mediterranean Sea.As we have just said, the "Orion" belonged to that fleet, and had returned to the port of Toulon due to the storm at sea. When a warship appears in the harbor, it has an indescribable power to attract the masses.That's because the thing is great, and the crowd loves the great thing. Ships of war can display a most magnificent confluence of human and natural craftsmanship. The ship of war is made of both the heaviest and the lightest matter, since it has to do with all three states of matter, solid, liquid, and gas, and has to struggle with each of those three.It has eleven iron claws, which are used to grasp the rocks on the bottom of the sea, and it has more wings and tentacles than a butterfly, so as to reach into the clouds and attract the wind.It exhales from the one hundred and twenty cannons, like a gigantic trumpet, which is no less powerful in answering thunder.The ocean wants to make it lose its way in the thousands of miles of turbulent waves, but the ship has its soul, and its compass that always points north and acts as a guide for it.In the dark, it has searchlights instead of starlight.In this way, it has sails and ropes to protect against the wind, wood to protect against water, iron, copper, and lead to protect against reefs, lights to protect against darkness, and a rudder to protect against the vast sea.

If one wishes to see how gigantic ships of war really are, one has only to enter a six-story covered dock like that of Brest or Toulon.A warship under construction, so to speak, seems to be encased in a glass dome.The gigantic beam was a sail-bar, and the post, which fell to the ground and grew so long that the end could not be seen, was a great mast.Counting from its root that goes deep into the bottom of the dock to its tip that sticks out in the clouds, it is sixty toas long, and the diameter of its base is three feet.The great English masts are two hundred and seventeen feet high from the water.Our predecessors used iron cables for seagoing ships, and our seagoing ships use iron chains today.For a ship of war with a hundred guns, its chains alone would be four feet high, twenty feet long, and eight feet wide.And how much wood is needed to build such a boat?Three thousand cubic meters.That is the whole forest floating on the water.

Also, we have to note that we are talking here only of warships of forty years ago, simple sailing ships.Steam was still in its infancy at the time, and the ingenious new warships appeared later.Today, say, a ship with two sails and a propeller is a formidable machine, with a sail of three thousand square meters and a boiler of two thousand and five hundred horsepower. Apart from these new marvels, the ancient ships of Christopher Columbus and Lyttel are already great masterpieces of mankind.It has inexhaustible power, just like the infinite airflow in space, it holds the wind in the sail, it never loses its way in the vast sea, it rides the wind and waves, and comes and goes freely.

Sometimes, however, a sudden gust of wind would break the 60-foot-long spar in half like straw, and blow the 400-foot-high mast like a reed, shaking repeatedly; , will also float and toss in the raging waves, like a fisherman's hook, falling into the mouth of a whale salamander; monster-like cannons, making a mournful roar, but the night is heavy, the sea and sky are vast, the sound of the guns disappears with the wind, and the surroundings are dim. ; all that power, all that majesty, is submerged under another, higher and greater power and majesty. When people see a power that flourished for a while suddenly come to an end, they can't help but think deeply.Therefore, there are often countless idlers by the harbor, standing and watching around those ingenious warships and sailing ships, and even they themselves cannot explain why it is.

That is why, from morning till night, the quays, embankments, and breakwaters of Toulon are filled with crowds of idlers and idlers whose business, as the Parisians say, is to look at "the versts." Weng number". The "Orion" is a ship that has long had problems.During its previous voyages, layers of shells had accumulated on the bottom of the boat, reducing its speed by half, and last year it was pulled out of the water, the shells were removed, and then it was launched again.But that knockout job damaged the bolts on the bottom of the boat.When she came to the Balearic Islands, the hull was weak and split, and as the bilges were not yet sheeted, the boat got some water.A gust of wind broke the starboard bow and a porthole, and damaged the studs of the fore-mast ropes.Because of those damages, the "Orion" sailed back to the port of Toulon.

It stopped near the arsenal, adjusting equipment and repairing the hull.On the starboard side, the hull was undamaged, but in order to ventilate the interior of the hull, several side platings had been lifted, as is customary. One morning, the audience witnesses an unexpected event. The sailors were busy setting sail at the time.The sailor in charge of managing the upper right corner of the square sail suddenly lost his balance.He wobbled, and the spectators crowded on the arsenal wharf yelled in unison, and saw him, top-heavy, circling the bar with his hands in the air; , the other hand immediately grabbed it together and hung in the air like that.Below him was the sea, so deep it made him dizzy.The momentum of his falling body hit the rope and swayed violently in the air.The man hung from the end of the rope, swinging from side to side like a stone on a sling. Go save him, you have to risk your life, it's scary.The sailors on board were all newly recruited fishermen, and none of them dared to come forward to rescue them.At that time, the poor sailor's strength was gradually weakening. People could not see the pain on his face, but they could see the fatigue of his limbs.His arms hung straight in the air, trying to convulse.He wanted to climb up, but every effort he made only increased the turbulence of the rope.He didn't cry out, for fear of wasting his strength.Everyone saw that he would soon let go of the rope, and everyone turned their heads away from time to time, so as not to see the tragic scene of his fall.Human life is often tied to a short piece of rope, a wooden pole, or a branch. It is really horrible to see a living person, like a ripe fruit, leave the branch and fall. Suddenly everyone saw a man, as nimble as a cat and a tiger, climbing straight up among the sails.The man was wearing a red coat, he was a convict, and he was wearing a green cap, he was a convict for life.When he climbed to the top of the mast shed, a gust of wind knocked off his hat, revealing his white hair. He was not young. He was indeed a convict, and he was transferred to work on the ship instead of the hard labor in prison. When the accident happened, he had already run to the officer on duty. , Let him sacrifice his life to save the sailor.The officer only nodded his head, and he broke the iron chain on his feet with a hammer, took a rope, and flew up the rope ladder.At that time, no one noticed how his iron chain broke so easily.It was only after the fact that everyone recalled it. In the blink of an eye, he had reached the horizontal bar.He paused for a few seconds, as if to estimate the distance.He watched the sailor hanging on the end of the rope float in the wind, and those few seconds seemed like centuries to those watching below.Then the convict, with his eyes on the sky, took a step forward.The audience took a breath.Everyone saw him running forward along the horizontal bar.After running to the end of the bar, he tied one end of the rope he brought to the bar and let it hang down at the other end. Then he held the rope with both hands and slid down. At that time, everyone felt an indescribable anxiety in their hearts. Now There is not one person hanging in the air, but two people. It looked like a spider had just caught a flying insect, but it was a spider that was saving lives, not killing them.All eyes were on the pair of creatures.No one shouted, no one said a word, everyone frowned and trembled together.None of them would exhale, as if exhaling would increase the force of the wind and make the two unfortunate souls more adrift. By then the convict had slipped to the sailor's side.Just in time, if one minute was too late, the man would have lost all hope, and would have fallen into the abyss; the convict seized the rope with one hand, and with the other hand tied him fast.Afterwards, everyone watched as he remounted the bar and lifted the sailor up; he supported him to stand on it for a while to let him recover his strength, then he embraced him with both hands, stepped on the bar, and lifted the He sent back to the masthead to his mates. At this moment, the audience cheered in unison, some of the old prostitutes were still in tears, the women on the docks embraced each other, and all shouted with excited anger, "That man must be pardoned." As for him, he followed the rules at that time, and immediately came down and returned to the team to do his hard work.In order to return to the team earlier, he slid down the sail rope and ran forward stepping on a sail bar below.All eyes followed him.For a moment, everyone panicked, maybe he was tired, maybe he was dazzled, everyone saw that he seemed a little hesitant and a little shaken.The audience suddenly shouted in unison: The convict has fallen into the sea. It's dangerous to fall like that.The light cruiser "Algeciras" was moored beside the "Orion", and the poor convict was falling between the two ships.The fear is that he will be washed under this or that boat.The four jumped onto a sampan in a hurry.The audience also encouraged them together, and everyone's hearts became anxious again.The man never surfaced again.He fell into the sea without a ripple, as if he had fallen into an oil drum.Everyone salvaged it from the water and swam to the bottom of the sea to look for it.No whereabouts.Everyone has been looking for the evening, but the body is also nowhere to be found. The following sentence appeared in the Toulon newspaper the next day: