Toulon

Joseph and his younger brother Napoleon spent a day sailing across the calm Mediterranean Sea aboard a two-masted ship called the Colchicum. Early the next morning, they reached Toulon, a port in southern France.

Toulon was France's largest naval port. The country's most important shipyard and more than half its warships were stationed there. The commercial docks where merchant vessels berthed lay close to the naval harbor. From the deck of the Floréal, one could clearly see the towering battleships, like castles floating on the sea. They sat in the harbor, one after another.

Napoleon stood on deck, gazing intently at the massive ships.

"Quite a sight, aren't they?" Joseph said in the Corsican dialect, resting a hand on his brother's shoulder. "The white sails are like clouds in the sky, their towering hulls like floating castles, and their broadsides like the thunderbolts of Zeus... Look at those warships. Feeling the pressure, my brother?"

"Indeed. Compared with France, we're terribly weak," Napoleon replied with a nod. "That's why we need a hero, someone who can win against the odds and triumph over the strong despite being weak."

"Heh," Joseph laughed.

"What do you mean by that?" Napoleon asked, displeased.

"My foolish brother, heh means heh."

By then, the ship had docked. The passengers began disembarking one by one. Monsieur Foy had not planned to stop in Toulon. According to his itinerary, he should have taken a carriage straight to Marseille, more than sixty kilometers away. But he had suffered terribly from seasickness on the way to Toulon, so he needed to rest there for a day and wait until he felt better before continuing to Marseille.

For Joseph and Napoleon, that meant they had a whole day to look around Toulon.

After they had settled into an inn, Napoleon urged Joseph to go out with him. Joseph knew Napoleon wanted to use the opportunity to study France's largest naval port closely and learn about his future enemies.

So Joseph went to Monsieur Foy and said he hoped to take his younger brother Napoleon out for a walk, giving them a chance to practice the French they had just begun learning.

Monsieur Foy was pleased by the boy's eagerness to learn, but he was uneasy about the state of security around Toulon. In recent years, France had been losing ground to Britain in their struggle for overseas interests. As a result, its economy was in poor shape. To raise more funds for the rivalry with Britain, the French king had increased taxes more than once. To be fair, Louis XVI's tax hikes had not been all that steep. But human society had always followed a few unchanging rules: first, bureaucrats seized every opportunity to line their own pockets; second, burdens never fell on the people who truly ought to bear them and could afford to do so.

The tax increases gave many people an excuse to line their pockets through extortion. And those burdens never landed on the great nobles or the bishops; they weighed heavily on the Third Estate instead. More and more farmers and artisans were going bankrupt. In general, the more people in a society who were destitute and had no means of making a living, the worse public order became. France's economy was now in poor shape, so it was no surprise that public order was poor as well.

Monsieur Foy thought it over, then remembered that one of his servants was from Toulon. He called in the servant, a man named Swan, and instructed him to take the brothers out and keep them safe.

Swan acknowledged the order and led the brothers outside.

"Where would you like to go?" Swan asked.

"We want to see the warships," Joseph answered without hesitation.

Napoleon glanced at Joseph but said nothing.

"Ah, every boy visiting Toulon for the first time wants to see the warships most of all," Swan said with a smile.

"Is there a way for us to get a good look at them?" Napoleon asked.

"There is," Swan replied. "For just a few sous, we can rent a little fishing boat and fish near the naval harbor. You'll see plenty of warships from there, though we can't get too close."

"Then I'll leave it to you," Joseph said to Swan.

Swan was a local, so it did not take him long to find a small fishing boat. The group climbed aboard, and the boatman rowed them toward the naval harbor.

It was around ten in the morning. Rare winter sunlight sparkled and danced on the little waves in the bay. The boatman brought the boat to a stop, cast his bait into the sea, then pointed toward the nearby naval harbor and introduced the warships berthed there one by one.

"Look, that's the Bucentaure, the biggest one in there. She's a three-deck ship of the line, with a hundred cannons. The one a little to the left is the Redoutable, a cruiser. She's much smaller, with only one gun deck..."

That's the Bucentaure, the flagship of the combined French and Spanish fleet at the Battle of Trafalgar, Joseph couldn't help thinking as he listened to the boatman.

"What's over there?" Napoleon asked, pointing at a low hill that jutted partway into the bay on the right. Joseph looked that way and saw a fleur-de-lis flag flying atop it. Beneath the flag, he could just make out what looked like some fortifications.

"That's Fort Mulgrave. There are batteries up there to guard the port. Would you like to go take a look? Sometimes you can catch some fine cod in the water over there," the boatman replied.

"Then let's go have a look," Napoleon said.

The boatman started to pull in the bait so he could take them over to Fort Mulgrave. Just then, however, the bell attached to the fishing line rang sharply. The boatman quickly grabbed the line. It was not pulling very hard, and disappointment showed on his face. He hauled it in with a few quick tugs, only to find a small mackerel on the hook.

The boatman tossed the mackerel into his fish basket, put away the line, and rowed toward Fort Mulgrave.

It took a full hour for the little boat to reach the foot of Fort Mulgrave. But the fort was still quite small at that time, so there was not much to see. And since it was already past noon and everyone was hungry, they did not stay long before heading back.

After getting off the boat, they found somewhere to eat a little something. Taking the opportunity, Joseph tried out his clumsy French by chatting with some passersby. They talked about nothing important, just the hardships of everyday life, lamenting how difficult it was to get by. Then they returned to the inn. Napoleon did not say a word the whole way. Only after they had entered their room did Joseph grin at him and ask, "Well, were you frightened by the French warships?"

"No," Napoleon answered curtly.

"Why did you insist on going to see Fort Mulgrave? There was nothing worth seeing there," Joseph asked.

"If an army occupied it, a few cannons could sink every warship in the harbor," Napoleon replied.

"A few cannons wouldn't be enough. Warships can move; they'd leave their berths and retreat out to sea. And they'd fire back," Joseph said with a laugh. "Besides, you need a lot of knowledge to use cannons well—mathematics, for instance, and physics. If you don't master Sir Newton's principles, even a hundred cannons might not do you any good."

"Then we'll go and learn all of that," Napoleon replied.

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

"What did you see?"

"I saw poverty and anger. The same kind of poverty and anger we saw in Corsica," Joseph replied. "My foolish brother, didn't you notice the poor people staggering along Toulon's dusty streets, their faces just as dusty, as if they were made of dust themselves?"

"Why should I pay attention to them?" Napoleon asked.

"Even the lowliest slave needs hope. Did you see any hope in the eyes of the poor on Toulon's streets? Did you hear them speak of any beautiful dreams for the future? Do you know what happens when the lowliest slaves lose all hope?" Joseph continued.

"I know..." Napoleon answered. "The Spartacus revolt happened. But... but they hadn't truly lost hope. They still had one hope, their only hope: heaven. They're not like Spartacus. They have faith."

"People of faith?" Napoleon's words took Joseph completely by surprise. Although Bishop Minier now regarded him as a manifestation of divine grace, Joseph himself knew perfectly well that the supposed exorcism had done nothing. Its so-called effect was simply that he, a time traveler, had gradually adjusted to his new surroundings. Even now, though, whenever he considered a problem, he still habitually overlooked the influence of religion.

Religion really is the opium of the people, Joseph thought silently. Then he said, "My foolish brother, remember this: tomorrow's bread can't replace today's bread, and tomorrow's bread won't fill an empty stomach today. Otherwise, why did we Corsicans oppose Genoese rule in the first place? Besides, rebellion and going to heaven are two different things, aren't they? They say a king's authority is granted by God. But if someone rebels, doesn't that mean it's God's will too? God is omniscient and omnipotent. If He didn't want people to oppose the king, how could there be rebels? My brother, do you know what I saw? I saw mighty France, seemingly so powerful, like a storehouse piled high with firewood and sulfur, while its keepers were starting a fire inside to roast meat."