The biggest advantage of being an underage child at Christmas is that you can get gifts from your elders and adult older siblings, and you don't have to bother preparing a gift in return.

Of course, underage children still need to give each other Christmas gifts, and this is only between children, and children do not need to prepare Christmas gifts for adults.

The size of the gift is limited by the amount of their own pocket money, and the children mainly give each other gifts mainly in the form of homemade greeting cards, and occasionally some children with strong financial resources are at most giving boxes of chocolates.

There is no reason for parents to pay for gifts between their children.

Joey, who has long been in a state of abject poverty, sent a group of friends a greeting card that he had carefully drawn, only the Christmas gift for Mary was a little special, in addition to the greeting card, there were also 9 chapters of Harry Potter and the secret room novel.

Victoria, the underage sister, gave Joey a pair of gloves that she had knitted herself, white knitted gloves embroidered with an unusually beautiful blue cornflower, according to what her sister told Joey, it took her a long time to knit, and this was the only one that was given to Joey as a special Christmas present.

What Joey gave to his sister was a private music record he personally made in Siemens, and now German aristocratic families are frantically chasing a series of novelty electrical products, among which the record player has become one of the most profitable products of Siemens.

Sophie and Margaret, the two little ones, are not at all easy to deal with, and in the afternoon, while Joey apologizes to them, they blackmail Joey's fenaki mirror and a full set of animal clockwork toys.

Of course, Margaery's name is Joey's kerosene-powered model of a steam train, and Joey doesn't dare to give it to his sisters, it's too chaotic and dangerous, and as compensation, Joey promises to make her sisters a card game called "Land Lords".

After all, Joey from the 21st century, after seeing his and his sisters' toy collection, has already decided that he has another road to wealth that shines with golden light, a huge toy market.

After the gift-giving, the most important finale is to use the size of the dice to determine the ownership of the Christmas gifts under the Christmas tree.

This is the characteristic of German family-style Christmas parties, in addition to the elders to give the children gifts, but also to put some gifts under the Christmas tree, mainly candy, toys, hats, gloves, and other such small objects, through the dice roll size game to win mystery gifts, so that the children spend Christmas Eve less boring.

The bigger the family and the more mysterious gifts the adults put away, the more fun the children will have to get unknown gifts.

At Christmas, the more mysterious and unknown the gifts, the more people look forward to them.

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In terms of weather alone, 1879 was destined to be an extraordinary year, with the summer being unusually hot throughout Europe, and the Siberian cold snap beginning to rage on the continent in November.

Since the beginning of the Christmas holidays, the clouds like lead blocks have shrouded the warm Cantabrian Sea, and the snow has begun to fall on the sea in the biting cold wind, sitting on a warship at full speed, shuttling through the turbulent waves of the Atlantic Ocean in the middle of the night, which is definitely the most disgusting thing for sailors.

The sailors aboard the Triomphante, after leaving the sea in the early hours of the 22nd, have endured this inhuman treatment in the angry Atlantic Ocean for 77 consecutive hours.

The "Triumph" wooden armored cruiser was the third of the French Navy's La Galissonnier class and the last wooden hull armored cruiser in the history of the French Navy, construction began in 1869 and was not completed until the first half of 1879 and delivered to the Atlantic Fleet.

According to the original construction plan, the Triumph was supposed to be the second ship of the Lagarisonnière class, and the Victory, also launched on August 5, 1869, was the third.

The Franco-Prussian War a year later disrupted the plans of the French Navy, and with the end of the Franco-Prussian War in 1871, not only the French government and army, but also the French navy, were also deeply affected by the Treaty of Versailles between Germany and France.

On the one hand, the French Navy was forced by the pressure of the Versailles Treaty to directly reduce the number of naval warships from 439 to 137, while vigorously cutting down the naval warships, the French Third Republic government was also busy clearing the nobles in the French Navy installed by the emperor Napoleon III during the Second Empire.

Like the "Victory" of the same class, it was towed until it was launched in 1875 and completed in 1877.

On the other hand, the French Navy's Jeune Ecole, or Youth School, began to rise, advocating the use of fast cruisers and torpedo boats to challenge Britain's fragile ocean-going commercial routes, so the "Triumph", as an armored cruiser under construction, immediately became a test bed for the French Navy's new technology, and as the son of the French Admiralty, all new technologies began to be loaded on ships.

For example, the elliptical boiler using fire-tube boiler technology, the vertical shaft reciprocating steam engine, the first to eliminate sail rigging, the armor protection technology of the central ironclad fort, the mixing and matching of the central and open batteries, 6 240mm/18x diameter Mode 1870 guns (4 central batteries, 2 open batteries), 1 194 mm/20x diameter Mode 1870 gun, 6 x 138mm/21x diameter Mode 1870 guns, plus 4 14-inch torpedo launchers.

The above, the bizarre and extremely funny-looking caliber of French naval guns, are all derived from the French pound in the era of sails.

Therefore, the combination of the above two factors made the "Triumph" change from the second ship to the third ship, and it was not until 1879 that it was handed over to the French Navy.

If the sailors in the cabin or on deck feel that it is a hell to roll with a warship on the roaring Atlantic Ocean in the cold winter wind, then the sailors in charge of the lookout standing in the mast of the towering mast of the "Triumph" are undoubtedly in the depths of the nine layers of hell.

Standing on the most exciting swing in the world, the sailors on the "Triumph" mast must not only try to stand firm, so as not to let themselves fly out, but also hold binoculars and keep searching the northern sea.

The sailors on the mast, no one knew what the specific targets needed to be searched for, and the chief of staff of the Atlantic Fleet, Colonel Amidi Anatol Prospa Courbet, who suddenly boarded the ship and took command, simply told all the lookouts to keep their eyes on the northern ocean.

In order to maximize the quality of the search, Colonel Kubel ordered that the number of lookouts on the mast be doubled than usual.

No matter how dangerous the place is, it can't stop the vigorous and beating hearts of the French, especially when several French people are crammed into a small space, and the purest French way of chatting is correctly opened, first complaining, then talking about food and politics, and finally... Strikes, of course.

It's just that sailors are also soldiers, and in addition to the topic of strikes, which is similar to an army mutiny, the first two items are indispensable good topics to chat and pass the time.

Towards dawn, after more than six hours on duty in the middle of the night, and without the officers' foremasts, the conversation of several French sailors became more and more open, and they began to talk about several mysterious events that had taken place in the port of Brest during the past few days.

At least for the sailors of Brest, the most important military port on France's Atlantic coast, this Christmas is unusually mysterious.

As is the custom every year for the French Atlantic Fleet, Vice Admiral Jean-Bernard Jorégéberg, Minister of the Navy and the Colonies, visits the base on Christmas Day in even-numbered years to pay respects to the officers and men of the Atlantic Fleet.

But this year, on Christmas of this odd-numbered year, Vice Admiral Reggiberg actually made an exception to visit the port of Brest for two consecutive years, and what was even more strange was that not only the number of military guards in the harbor was doubled, but the range of the border was also doubled, and all the batteries that occupied the dangerous positions had all shed their gun jackets, and there were even rumors that the Paris police department also sent plainclothes police officers to the port of Brest.

The port of Brest was not without the reception of the giants of the French military, who did so every time they came, and so excitedly, according to the rumors of the old sailors, that is, before the great Emperor Napoleon was preparing to invade England.

However, according to the gossip of a sailor on the foremast, Vice Admiral Jorégie Berg was not the biggest man in the Christmas visitors, but a chaperone, and the real visitors to the port of Brest were the French Minister of War, Henri François-Xavier Graceley, and the Chief of the French General Staff of the National Defense, General Leopold Davout.

"Hey, Pierre, do you really see Old Gerry? Shouldn't the Minister be in Paris to accompany his newlywed wife? The sailor who shouted to Pierre was called Denis, a thin man from Le Havre, a city on the Atlantic coast known in France for his gossip.

"Damn redneck! Are you questioning my honesty? The pale-skinned Pierre grew up in Grand Paris, and when he heard the people of Le Havre questioning, he couldn't help but curse loudly, "When I was smoking in front of the Navy building the other day, I saw a group of guys in civilian clothes getting out of the carriage, and one of them was an old bastard, I will always remember him!" ”

"Hey, Deni, Pierre won't lie about this." Sébastian, who also came from Grand Paris but lived in the slums of the 11th arrondissement, said, "You know, the reason Pierre joined the navy was because he was the most beautiful handmaiden of that old fellow." ”

Whistles and cheers erupted.

"Dear Sebati, tell us about it!" Renel, a diminutive Nantes, shouted as he stared at the far north with a telescope as he clamped his handrail.

"Damn René, keep your eyes peeled and don't be lazy!" After scolding Renel, Sebastian glanced at the proud Pierre, and smiled and told the glamorous past of Pierre before joining the army.

"Pierre, how can it be so coincidental that the Minister would let you see it?" Denis, a native of Le Havre, asked in a somewhat inquisitive manner.

"On the 21st, the night of the first holiday, I happened to be at the back door of the Navy Building, preparing to have a wonderful dinner with the beautiful Miss Elisa." Pierre shrugged his shoulders a little proudly, "And then I suddenly saw that old bastard and a bunch of guys coming in a carriage, but luckily, I was hiding in the shadows under the pillars of the building....."

"Oh..... Beautiful Elisa, Ellie...."Renel began to writhe his crotch obscenely as he moaned incessantly.

"Shut up, you nymphomaniac!" Pierre couldn't help but kick at the Nantes.

After being kicked, Renel smiled, and suddenly said in a shocking voice, "I said brothers, if what Pierre saw is true, then let us spend Christmas on the Atlantic, and the black hand tied to the mast is this old goat!" ”

"I've been in the fleet since '71 and I've never been on patrol so close to the British at Christmas!"

"Damn René, you're going to be hanged for talking nonsense, unless you have any proof that we're close to the British?" In the wind, Sebastian's voice was a little soft.

"I've peeked at the sextant and compass a few times in the past few days, and I'm pretty sure we're at the northernmost tip of the Cantabrian Sea now." Renel swallowed his saliva, lowered his head and carefully swept the silent and uninhabited deck, and then tried to control his voice and said, "That is, at the south entrance of the Strait of La Manche (English Channel), from east to west, constantly doing a figure-eight movement. ”

"The Chief of Staff of the Fleet told us to keep an eye on the north, in fact, at the Strait of Ramancy."

"Really, René! But I didn't see the lights of Wessan! Denis shouted in some panic.

"Denis, you idiot, it wasn't us who started the first shift in the early morning of the 22nd! Whether or not you have passed by the island of Wesan we don't know at all. Sebastian raised his arms angrily towards Denis, a typical French greeting to an idiot.

"René, you've worked as a navigator on a merchant ship, where do you think we're located?" Pierre interjected.

"I want to be on the line from Saint-Pole-de-León to Perros-Guireque." Renel blurted out.

"It's between Morlé and Lanillon." Sebastian nodded, then spat hard and said viciously, "That is, for the past three days, we have been in circles at the gate of Plymouth Harbour, England. ”

"Pierre, you are from Grand Paris, you have a lot of news, are we going to war with the British?" Deni's blue eyes were filled with fear, and his hand clenched the guardrail became whiter from the cold.

"You poor idiot, the real war is a decisive battle between fleets, and it is not for us to challenge a lions with such a small ship!" Pierre's words from Grand Paris always seemed so profound.

"But the old men in Paris said that from now on, it will be us little bites, and we must bravely charge at the British, and charge again, until we can throw torpedoes." Denis retorted with some cowardice.

"Oh, oh, oh!" Pierre reached out and slapped Denis the back of the head, "Smart Denis, can you tell me what else the old man said, let the brothers huddle in that tin can crawling underwater, and throw torpedoes at the British merchant ships and passenger ships?!" ”

"Those dishonorable bastards, who dare not point their swords at the enemy, but dare to slaughter civilians!" Pierre cursed loudly, "Thousands of years of honor for the French knights have been lost in the hands of this group of untouchables. ”

"Tie us to the mast like cattle, don't eat or drink, and have all the shit and urine in our crotch, just to stare at this damned, nothing-for-nothing water!"

"Enough, Pierre!" Sebastian, the highest-ranking of the four, stopped Pierre's complaints, and if Pierre continued to speak, it was estimated that it would really turn into a strike.

Just as Sebastian was about to say something, a terrible scream rang out from Renel's mouth, staring at the ocean, followed by words that were clearly out of tune.

"Enemy attack!"

Sebastian didn't bother to say anything, and raised his binoculars in Renel's direction, staring into the distance.

At about 7 o'clock in the morning on December 25, 1879, the cold Siberian snap that had been raging France for several weeks suddenly stopped, and the long-lost sun finally tore through the thick clouds and shone on the Atlantic Ocean, which was still dark and rolling with huge waves.

In Sebastian's telescope, a row of tall masts undulated among the waves, and a huge military flag with a blue St. Andrew's Cross on a white background shone in the sun, but what made Sebastian feel even more dazzling was the Jack's flag with a white skull printed on a black background above the military flag!

Sailing the seas of the 19th century, when someone raises the Jack's flag at you, it means war.