Fox of France

Just when France was experiencing a political earthquake and Napoleon was appointed Dictator, no, it should be the first ruler, there was also a violent shock in the British political arena.

The Whigs fiercely attacked Tory rule, focusing their criticism on Prime Minister William Pitt Jr. They blamed him for Britain's failures on the Continent. At this time, Prime Minister Peter had conflicts with King George III because of his religious policy in Ireland.

The British king in this period was not a pure national symbol later. The king still has a high authority and power. Little Pete was able to ascend to the position of prime minister in his twenties, the most important thing is to get the support of the king. It was the alliance with the king that enabled Pitt Jr. and the Tories to suppress the Whigs who had long controlled the political arena and become the prime minister and ruling party of the United Kingdom. Of course, Pitt Jr. has always called himself a "Whig", but neither the Whigs nor the Tories admit it.

King George III has always been very supportive of Pete Jr., but on religious issues, the two have great conflicts. In order to soften the Irish, Pete Jr. proposed that legal activities of Catholicism could be allowed in Ireland. This may have helped divide the Irish, but it touched the king's scales.

In England, since Cromwell's Revolution, the King's staunchest supporter has been the Anglican Church. This church is counted among the Protestants, but the similarities between the "Protestantism" of the Anglican Church and Catholicism are much greater than they are with Lutheranism, Calvinism and other authentic Protestantisms in continental Europe. Except for not recognizing the pope of Rome and replacing it with the king of England, they are almost indistinguishable from Catholicism in terms of doctrine, ceremony and even clothing.

Generally speaking, if two religions are very different, it will naturally lead to struggle. But if the difference is small, that doesn't mean peace, it just means more intense struggle. Heretics are hateful, but heretics are more hateful than heretics, and the less a heretic differs from us, the more heinous-for the more likely he is to confuse our flocks!

For the Anglican Church, to recognize the right of Catholicism to practice legally in the United Kingdom, even if only in Ireland, is a huge threat to the Anglican Church. Today, the Anglican Church is already the political base of the King of England. Although George III suffered from porphyria, when the disease was severe, he would even suffer from mental disorders. For example, in 1788, George III, who was ill, took a big oak tree as the king of Prussia, and had some disputes with it. Important issues were debated for more than two hours. But when he was not sick, he was still very conscious.

Although the king has always admired little Pete, but on this issue, as long as he is not sick, he will never allow little Pete to do this. So the Prime Minister lost his most important supporter at this most dangerous moment.

In the end, in order to preserve the regime of the Tory Party, at this critical moment, it is only natural to wrong Pete Jr. and let him take the blame first. So after Napoleon captured Hanover, Pete Jr. took the blame and resigned.

It is said that when Henry Addington, who succeeded him, came to Pete Jr.'s office, Pete Jr. was instructing the servants to pack their things and prepare to leave. A servant also rolled up the large map of Europe hanging on the wall, stuffed it into a box, and was about to take it away, just in time for Little Pete to see it. So the former Prime Minister shouted: "That map is for Henry!"

The servant hurriedly prepared to hang up the map again, but Little Pete suddenly smiled wryly; "Forget it, put everything away, so don't hang it up, anyway, in the next ten years, I don't think the British Prime Minister will need to look at the map of Europe again." gone."

In fact, facing the current situation, the newly replaced Prime Minister Henry Addington has nothing to do. But sometimes, changing hands is like changing a knife. Changing a person may change a kind of luck.

This is like some football clubs in later generations. When the results are poor, they often don't care about the three sevens and twenty-one, and try to change the coach first. And it is true that there are many times when a new coach is changed, although the new coach has hardly done anything, the luck of the team suddenly improves.

In a previous game, I took dozens of shots and a dozen shots on target, but I couldn’t score a single goal; now I changed a coach, and in a game, I took five or six shots, one or two shots on target, and then scored. . Even in the past, as long as someone hit our goalpost, the ball would bounce into the net, and if we hit their goalpost, the ball would bounce out. But after changing the coach, the situation immediately reversed. There are more than one or two such things.

The change of prime minister of the British seems to have achieved the same effect. Just two weeks after the new prime minister took office, good news came from the British navy: the new type of ship they spent a lot of money to develop was successful in the test. success. According to the navy, using this kind of ship, they will definitely reduce the efficiency of the smuggling route from France to Ireland by a large margin.

In the previous period of time, both Britain and France were busy with wars on the European continent, so Ireland stopped for a while: the British had no troops, and the Irish didn't get much supplies, so everyone could only Playing around.

France now had an undisputed victory on the Continent, and a large indemnity. You don't need to think about the latter things. Everyone understands that they will definitely greatly increase their support for the Irish rebellion.

This is also a problem with the Tory Party. Although Pete Jr. lost the position of Prime Minister, the position of Prime Minister is still in the hands of the Tory Party, because people in the Whig Party generally believe that the current market has not There are no signs of turning bad, and it is not the right time to buy bottoms. If you rush out to buy the bottom right now, if you don’t do it well, you will copy on the mountainside and lock yourself up.

Prime Minister Addington was overjoyed when he got the news, and he immediately went to the Admiralty to find out the situation.

"Your Excellency, this is the model of our new ship." In the Admiralty, a naval officer began to explain relevant knowledge to Prime Minister Addington in front of several models.

"Well, why is this ship so... so weird?" As the Prime Minister of the United Kingdom, Addington couldn't possibly be unfamiliar with ships. But this kind of ship is really, really ugly in appearance, far less beautiful than the model of the French clipper ship on the side.

"Your Excellency, look at the French clipper ship next to it. This kind of ship has a very low freeboard, heavy waves, and shakes badly, so it can't be equipped with cannons at all. But because it is too fast, it doesn't need to be equipped with cannons at all. , anyway, all warships that can install artillery can't catch up with it.

You also know that in order to intercept such high-speed smuggling ships, we once imitated a batch of such ships. Then rely on the most traditional way of sea combat to intercept them. However, the enemy quickly changed their strategy. They developed naval warfare weapons similar to Byzantine's "Greek Fire". We were caught off guard and suffered a lot. "

Prime Minister Addington listened and nodded. He already knew about these situations before he took office.

"But the situation is different now. Now that we have this new ship, we can not only catch up with the enemy in speed, but also be equipped with cannons, and use them to resolve battles." The officer continued.

"Is this the boat? It doesn't look like it can run very fast." Addington asked.

In the study of the clipper ship, the British also concluded several reasons why the clipper ship can run so fast, one of which is the exaggerated aspect ratio and smooth lines. But neither of these things can be seen on this ship.

"Your Excellency Prime Minister, we have installed a steam engine on this ship." The officer said, "Look at the two paddle wheels next to this. They are driven by the steam engine and can propel the ship forward."

"So, can our ships catch up with the French smuggling ships?" Addington asked.

"Not necessarily." The officer shook his head, "The French clipper ship can reach about 15 knots at the fastest, and our ship can only run at 11 knots at the fastest time."

"Then how?" Prime Minister Addington said.

"Your Excellency, we are still an experimental ship after all, and there is still room for further improvement. In addition, the clipper ship cannot run to fifteen knots at any time. When there is no wind, the speed of the clipper ship will also be very fast." limited. But our ship is basically not affected by the wind force. Moreover, the clipper ship must walk in a zigzag line in order to use the wind force, but our ship can walk in a straight line, so although our ship The figure of speed is a bit lower, but if you are really chasing them at sea, you may not be able to catch up with them."

"So, is there any problem with our ship now?"

"Your Excellency, our ship is propelled by a steam engine, so we need to carry coal. If the coal bunker is too large, it will cause a decrease in speed. If the coal bunker is small, it will affect the journey. In addition, our ship, in high sea conditions The sailing performance under it is very poor, far inferior to that of a clipper ship."

"What? The sailing ability in high sea conditions is not as good as that of a clipper ship? Then how do you use the cannons on it?" Prime Minister Addington was taken aback.

"Your Excellency Prime Minister, in high sea conditions, the shaking of the ship will cause the paddle wheels to come out of the water, which will lead to a sharp drop in propulsion efficiency. It is not because of other reasons, so under normal sea conditions, our ship has no problem using cannons. It is just because Steam engines and paddle wheels are needed, so the number of cannons that can be loaded is relatively small."

Prime Minister Addington nodded and said: "When will the official warship be put into use? Now is the time to teach those French a lesson and let them know that our United Kingdom's technology is the best in the world!"