Chapter 3 Toulon

　　Joseph, along with his brother Napoleon, spent a day traveling the calm Mediterranean Sea in a two-masted ship called the Autumn Fairy, and early the next morning, arrived at the southern French port of Toulon.

　　Toulon was France's largest military port, and the most important French shipyards, as well as more than half of the country's warships, were deployed in this harbor. The commercial wharf where the ship docked was in close proximity to the military harbor. Standing on the deck of the Flower Moon, one could clearly see the tall, battleships that were like castles floating on the sea. They were arranged one after another in the military harbor.

　　Napoleon stood on the deck, gazing at these huge ships with unblinking eyes.

　　"It's majestic, isn't it?" Joseph put his hand on his brother's shoulder and said in the Corsican dialect, "White sails like white clouds in the sky, lofty hulls like floating castles, and cannons firing in unison like the thunder of Zeus ... Look at all these warships, feeling the pressure, my brother? "

　　"Indeed, we are too weak compared to France." Napoleon nodded, "That's why we need a hero, a hero who can do more with less and win with weakness."

　　"Huh." Joseph laughed.

　　"What does huh mean?" Napoleon said, unsatisfied.

　　"O my foolish brother, huh is huh."

　　By this time the ship had docked firmly. Passengers were beginning to disembark one by one. Mr. Fouet had not intended to stop at Toulon. According to his plan, he should have immediately boarded a carriage and traveled to Marseille, which was more than sixty kilometers away. However, on the way to Toulon, he had suffered so much from seasickness that he had to take a day's rest in Toulon first, and then go to Marseille when he was in better health.

　　For Joseph and Napoleon, this also meant that they had a day to have a good look around Toulon.

　　After staying at the hotel for the time being, Napoleon encouraged Joseph to go out and look around. Joseph knew that Napoleon was taking the opportunity to take a closer look at the largest military port in France and get to know his future enemies.

　　So Joseph went to Foix and told him that he would like to take his brother Napoleon for a walk and try to use his newly acquired French.

　　Foix was pleased with the request of the studious boy, but he was not so sure about the security around Toulon. Over the years, France had been at a disadvantage in the competition with Britain for overseas interests. This had also left it in a not-so-good economic situation. In order to get more money to compete with England, the French king had raised taxes more than once. To be honest, Louis XVI didn't raise taxes too much. But there have always been a few invariable laws in human society: the first is that bureaucrats will always seize every opportunity to get advantages for themselves; the second is that any burdens will always fall on those who really should bear them and can afford to bear them.

　　The decision to increase taxes gave many people the opportunity to enrich themselves, and likewise the burden of these taxes did not fall on the great nobles and bishops, but on the third class. This caused more and more peasants and craftsmen to go bankrupt. Generally speaking, the more the number of bankrupts and the more the number of people who have no means of subsistence in a society, the more the social order will be disturbed. Nowadays, the economic situation in France is not so good, so of course the social security is not much better.

　　Mr. Fuwa thought for a moment and remembered that one of his servants was a native of Toulon, so he called the servant called Swann and instructed him to take the two brothers out for a walk and take care of their safety.

　　Swan answered and led the brothers out the door.

　　"Where are you going to look around?" Swan asked.

　　"We want to see the warships." Joseph said without hesitation.

　　Napoleon gave Joseph a look but didn't say anything.

　　"Ah, every boy who comes to Toulon for the first time loves to see the warships." Swann chuckled.

　　"So is there a way we can get a good look at the warships?" Napoleon asked.

　　"There is." Swann replied, "For a few sous, you can rent a fishing boat and then you can go fishing near the military harbor. There you can see a lot of warships, but of course, we can't get too close."

　　"Then everything will be trouble for you." Joseph said this to Swan.

　　Swan was a local, so he quickly contacted a fishing boat. Several people boarded the boat, and the boatman swung the oars and rowed the boat in the direction of the military harbor.

　　At this time, it was around ten o'clock in the morning, and the rare winter sunlight shimmered and jumped on the tips of the fine waves in the bay. The boatman stopped the boat and threw the bait into the sea, then pointed to the military harbor not far away and introduced the guests, one by one, to the warships that were docked there.

　　"Look, that's the 'Busantor', that's the biggest one in there, that's a three-decked battleship with a hundred cannons. The one a little to the left is the cruiser 'Awe,' which is much smaller, having only one gun deck ..."

　　"This is the 'Busantor', which was later the flagship of the combined French and Spanish fleet at the Battle of Trafalgar." Listening to the boatman's introduction, Joseph couldn't help but think this.

　　"What's over there?" Napoleon asked, pointing to his right at a small, half jutting into the bay. Joseph looked over that way, only to see an iris flag erected on top of that little hillock, and underneath that flag, something like a fortress could be faintly seen.

　　"That's the Malgrave fort. There are batteries up there that guard the harbor. Need to go over and take a look? You can catch some pretty good cod in the sea over there sometimes." The boatman replied.

　　Napoleon said, "Then go over there and take a look."

　　When the boatswain heard that? he was going to put away his bait and turn over to the Malgrave fortress, when a bell tied to a fishing line snapped. The boatman hurriedly reached out and grabbed the line. The line did not shake very much, and the boatman's face showed his disappointment, he pulled the line up a few times, and there was just a small mackerel hanging on the hook.

　　The boatman threw the mackerel into the fish basket, then stowed the line and rowed towards the fortress of Malgrave.

　　It took the boat an hour to go below the fortress of Malgrave. But the size of the Malgrave Fortress was actually still very limited at this time, so there wasn't much to see. Plus it was already past noon and everyone's stomachs were hungry. So the boat didn't stay there for long before going back.

　　After getting off the boat and finding a place to casually eat something, Joseph took the opportunity to use his broken French to talk to some passersby - talking about boring, everyday life things, nothing more than lamenting together about how hard life was. Then a few of the men went back to the hotel. All the way Napoleon said nothing. It wasn't until they got into the room that Joseph smiled toward Napoleon and said, "What's the matter, intimidated by the French warships?"

　　"No." Napoleon replied briefly.

　　"What did you specifically want to see over at the Malgrave fortress afterwards? There's nothing to see over there." Joseph asked again.

　　"If an army took over there, it could use a few cannons and sink all the warships in the harbor." Napoleon spoke up.

　　"A few cannons would not be enough, because the warships move, they would leave their berths and retreat out to sea. Also, they will return fire." Joseph laughed, "And it takes a lot of knowledge to use cannons well, like math, like physics. If you can't get a good grasp of Sir Isaac Newton's set, even if you have a hundred cannons, it might not work."

　　"Then let's go learn those well." Napoleon replied.

　　Joseph nodded, then asked, "Napoleon, do you know what I saw at Toulon?"

　　"What did you see?"

　　"I saw poverty and anger. The same poverty and anger that we saw in Corsica." Joseph replied, "O my foolish brother, have you not noticed the same dusty, almost ash-heaped poor people trudging through the dusty streets of Toulon?"

　　"Notice them for what?" Napoleon asked.

　　"Even the humblest slave needs hope. Do you see hope in the eyes of those poor people in the streets of Toulon? Do you see in their words that they still have any bright ideas for the future? Do you know what happened to the humblest of slaves when they lost all hope?" Joseph continued to ask.

　　"I know ..." replied Napoleon, "that there was a rebellion of Spartacus. But ... but they weren't really hopeless, he didn't there was still a hope, the only hope, and that was heaven. They are not like Spartacus, they are people of faith."

　　"People of faith?" Napoleon's remark was completely unexpected by Joseph. Although he was now treated as a manifestation of divine grace by Bishop Mignonette, Joseph himself knew very well that the so-called exorcism ceremony was not useful at all. The so-called effect was nothing more than Joseph as a traveler gradually adapting to the environment. But even now, Joseph would always habitually ignore religious influences when considering issues.

　　"Religion is really the opium of the people ah." Joseph thought silently in his heart, and then said, "My foolish brother, you have to remember that the bread of the future can't replace the bread of the present, and the bread of the future can't fill the stomach of the present. Otherwise, why did we Corsicans oppose the rule of Genoa in the first place? What's more, revolting and going to heaven are two different things, aren't they? Although it's said that a king's power is granted by God. But when someone wants to rebel, isn't that God's will? God is all-knowing and all-powerful, if he doesn't want someone to oppose the king, how can there be a rebellion. My brother, know what I see? I see that seemingly powerful France is like a storehouse piled high with wood and brimstone, and its caretakers, who still raise fires in this storehouse to roast and eat their meat."