Fox of France

In the past few days, the city of Ajaccio has been rainy and rainy, and finally even the sea seems to be wet. The endless rain, thick and sticky, poured down toward the bay from the heights of the sky that seemed never to dry up. The sea rose like a gray, soft sponge in a lost bay.

However, in the continuous rain, the surface of the water does not seem to move; there is only an imperceptible, broad swell in the distance, raising a hazy mist of water vapor on the sea, towards the people surrounded by the wet body. The port is wandering. The city itself rises a cloud of steam, skimming the watery walls to meet the steam from the sea. No matter which direction a person faces, it seems that what he breathes is water, and the air is finally drinkable.

In this water vapor, the boss of the Bonaparte family, Joseph Bonaparte, who is as thin and long as a bamboo pole, is holding an umbrella, stretching out into the sea along the beach along the coast. to the cliff. The cliff, now stained the same blue-gray color as the sea by the incessant rain, jutted out like an arm into the bay. During the dry summer in the Mediterranean, Joseph and his younger brothers and sisters often come here to fish on the reefs below the cliffs, or look for various shell oysters. And at this time, the second child of their family's dwarf would take a book by himself and run to a small natural cave in the middle of the cliff to read.

"But now, why is it raining? Did this troublesome guy run into that cave again?" Joseph murmured in his heart as he walked towards the cliff.

That uneasy guy is his second brother, Napoleon Bonaparte who is destined to leave a strong mark in history. But at this time, His Majesty the Emperor, who will shock Europe in the future, is still just a troublesome child.

Among Joseph's seven younger siblings, Napoleon was the one that gave him the most headaches. Maybe this guy has a weird personality because he is always short and ridiculed by others. Even among brothers and sisters, there are not many who can get along well with him. And Napoleon, who was so small, turned out to be a violent maniac. Once he was ridiculed, or had conflicts with others for other reasons, he always liked to directly use violence to resolve disputes.

To be honest, Napoleon's size is actually not suitable for such an approach. Because in theory, fighting depends on strength, and strength is inseparable from body shape. Otherwise, why should boxing be divided into heavyweight classes? Since size and strength alone are not enough, Napoleon is keen to use violence to solve problems. As a result, the little man developed two sets of means to make up for his lack of strength.

The first move is to use unconventional means to attack the weak point. For example, taking advantage of people's unpreparedness, biting with their teeth, or attacking someone's vitals with their knees.

The second trick is "the villain files first." This trick is generally used to deal with his brothers. Those who have many brothers have never fought with their brothers when they were young. Every time there is a fight, when Letizia, the mother, rushes to stop her in a panic, the first one to come out and complain, and the most likely to act like "I have been wronged a lot", is Napoleon. And because Napoleon had already rehearsed how to pretend to be pitiful and how to deceive his mother many times before he started, so every time he beat other brothers first, but in the end it was the other brothers who were scolded by his mother.

As a result, the brothers didn't like Napoleon very much, but everyone was a little afraid of him and was unwilling to go against his wishes. Except for one person, not only was that person not afraid of Napoleon's tricks, but he was even often able to dominate Napoleon. This person is Napoleon's elder brother Joseph. This is because once, Napoleon and Joseph had a conflict. According to the previous practice, Napoleon made the first move, taking advantage of Joseph's unpreparedness, and kicked Joseph's stomach fiercely. Joseph, who was unsuspecting at the time, was kicked backwards and fell to the ground. The back of his head hit a sharp stone, blood flowed all over the ground, and he fell unconscious. Little Napoleon was also completely frightened and flustered. I quickly called my mother...

Joseph was in a coma for two full days before waking up. After waking up, not only did he not recognize his family members, he could not even speak. No, to be precise, he suddenly couldn't speak the Corsican dialect (a kind of Italian), and he spoke a strange language that people couldn't understand. It sounded a bit like English, but there were many more different. The family thought that he had been possessed by an evil spirit, and that the devil had taken possession of him. (According to the relevant documents of the Catholic Church, suddenly speaking a language that no one can understand is a typical manifestation of a ghost.) If Joseph’s father, Carlo, was not a nobleman, (although he was only a declining nobleman), I’m afraid that Joseph The ending will be very tragic. Carlo invited Bishop Minier and asked him to perform an exorcism ceremony for Joseph.

The effect of this ceremony is obvious. After the ceremony, although Joseph has not fully recovered—he still can’t speak the Corsican dialect, and his memory has not recovered—but at least, he no longer speaks that strange, frightening, Probably a language from hell.

"The devil was cast out of him," said the Bishop of Minière, "but like a house set ablaze, although we put out the fire, it is probable that only ruins remain. The devil possesses a man." When the body is destroyed, it will cause the same damage as the fire, or even more serious damage. Although the devil has been expelled now, it is very difficult to rebuild the house. It is even difficult to recover the damage in the end. We can only look at the will of God."

"Amen!" Carlo, Letizia, and Joseph's younger brothers and sisters all said together.

Then Carlo donated thirty francs to the diocese (not a small sum in those days) and asked Bishop Minier to take Joseph to the church for a period of recovery. After all, damage done by the devil should heal more quickly in a holy church.

Obviously, Carlo's decision is quite wise. Joseph recovered quite quickly in the church. Under the teaching of the bishop, in less than three months, he relearned how to speak and write Italian, and even learned to use Latin.

Bishop Minier always liked to take Joseph by his side and tell everyone about him: "How wonderful is God's will, you see, the devil once occupied this person's body. When I expelled the devil from his body, I only saw a wilderness that had been burned by fire. But the light of God shone on him, and made the saplings grow again in the wilderness, and made the wilderness grow again. The sapling grew rapidly, and in a blink of an eye, it will grow from a small sapling to a real tree. Praise the Almighty and All-Good God.” In his view, Joseph’s recovery was not just a manifestation of God’s grace, In a sense, it is also an expression of his piety.

"Amen." The people who heard it said so, and at the same time stretched out their hands and drew a sign of the cross on their chests.

Convinced that Joseph was fully recovered, Bishop Minière ordered Charles to take Joseph home. Everyone found that the kind Joseph they were familiar with had returned. It's just that he is much quieter than before, and he is fascinated by reading. He even started to teach himself French.

Letizia, a mother, was very happy about this change in her son. She believes that it is God's grace that her son can be fine and become so good. For this reason, she donated another mass to express her gratitude to God. Also because of this, if someone came to tell her bad things about Joseph, she would not listen at all. Because her son has already received the grace of God, how could he do bad things?

Therefore, the means of Napoleon's villain to sue first is no longer useful to Joseph. If Napoleon tried to push something bad on Joseph, Letizia would definitely stretch out her hand, twist his ear, and let him go to the icon of the Virgin Mary to confess his mistake of slandering his brother.

The clever little Napoleon quickly discovered this, so he could only make a compromise and show respect to his elder brother Joseph.

Of course, the change in Napoleon's attitude towards his eldest brother Joseph is not just because the eldest brother now has the unconditional trust of his mother. Also because Big Brother is very different now from before. In the past, although the eldest brother had a generous personality, he was very stupid. Yes stupid. As stupid as a goose.

But now, the eldest brother has completely changed, and his little thoughts are often just emerging, and the eldest brother can see through them at a glance. It's just that although he saw through it, he didn't expose it, but he never stepped on the trap dug by the little Napoleon. In addition, the eldest brother has become more knowledgeable. He has read a lot of books and learned a lot. Napoleon had a lot of things he didn't understand, and he could ask his brother questions, and most of his tricky questions, his brother could give convincing answers.

Of course, my brother has also undergone many unfavorable changes. The most disliked one is that when Joseph answered Napoleon's questions, he always liked to reach out and rub his hair. One sentence: "My stupid brother, this problem is like this..."

Today Napoleon caused trouble again. He beat up the neighbor's kid Paul. The strike was too heavy, and he actually knocked him out. (One of the fighting experiences that Napoleon himself summed up is that as long as you do something, don't be shy, and you must dare to do it.)

Paolo's father, Mr. Giovanni, was a friend of Carlo's, and he had only one son. So as soon as he saw Paul fainted, Napoleon immediately realized that his father might beat him up for it, so he ran away before everyone could react.