"Fire!" With Han Xing's order, the fifty guns on the port side of the Dongfang began to "open the cavity" one by one, which was mentioned earlier, and in general, in naval battles, in order to prevent the ship from being unstable due to recoil, Qi (shè) was usually not carried out. What's more, at this time, the situation of (qíng) does not need to be qi (shè), but the accuracy of firing the cannon one by one is higher.

So the question arises, if you were asked to command a naval battle, would you put the bow of the ship against the enemy ship, or the side side against the enemy ship?

It's a dilemma, and anyone knows that the smaller the target, the less likely it is to get shot. So it seems like a very wise decision to point the bow of the ship at the enemy, as if in a land battle, squatting is smaller than standing on the target, and it is not easy to be shot.

And if anyone stands dumbfounded, needless to say, he is either stupid or frightened! However, in the era of sail battleships running rampant on the seven seas, this obvious folk wisdom is useless!

It is true that pointing the bow of a smaller target at the enemy can reduce the probability of your own being shot, but in the Age of Sail there are two factors that limit the effectiveness of this simple and effective tactic.

First of all, there is the artillery, and the ship as a whole is rectangular, which dooms most of the artillery to be arranged on the long side rather than the short side. This means that when you point the bow of the ship at the enemy, most of the guns on the side will not be able to strike the enemy. Maybe you will say, "Didn't the flying Dutchman have a three-barreled revolving gun in the bow?" "Didn't the Queen Anne Avenger have a Greek fire spray?"

However, these are all black technologies from the Caribbean, and the reason why legendary battleships are called legendary battleships is because they are rare, and rare things are expensive! If all ships had three-barreled cannons and Greek fire, wouldn't the legendary ships be running all over the ground? Most ordinary ships with only 2 or 4 guns in the bow of the bī are in stark contrast to the enemy's broadside guns with as few as a dozen guns and as many as dozens of guns!

What's more, even if it is a three-barreled run, it can fire (shè) a maximum of six shells, how can it be able to withstand the indiscriminate bombardment of a dozen or dozens of artillery pieces of the opponent?

Secondly, it is because of the material problem of the sail battleship! As we all know, the main material of a sail warship is wood, which is light and cheap, but it is definitely not hard! In fact, even ironwood, which is known for its hardness, may be difficult to withstand artillery bombardment, right? So the only role of the wooden plank is to ensure that the battleship can float on the water and not sink, that's all! To put it simply, rely on the structure to carry the shell!

It is precisely because of the lack of defensive power of the planks, or the absence of them at all, that this is the main reason why sail warships must use the side side to fight the enemy (shè)! If the fragile bow of the ship is exposed to enemy fire, the shell will easily penetrate the outermost plank and then be so overwhelming that a single shell can pierce the entire ship! This is the same as the consequences of artillery bombardment on the flank of an infantry regiment in a marine battle.

At this time, the port side of the Vostok was only twenty meters away from the bow of the Victory! At this distance, if any gunner still misses, then he can go home and treat his advanced cataract!

"Sir, our bow is under shelling from enemy ships!" A British sailor, stroking his hat, staggered to General Nelson, saluted with his other hand.

"What?" Lord Nelson's ears were not good, and his hearing gradually dropped to a low point over the years, after all, his environment was filled with the roar of cannons and the cracking of cannonballs all day long, and in the "rè" environment where there was so much noise that it would make people collapse, it seemed that it was a matter of time before the ears went on strike!

"The bow of the ship is under attack!" Without the soldier retelling, through the tremors and shaking from the bow of the ship and the fact that the ship (shēn) began to tilt forward slightly, Nelson had already come up with an answer based on his years of experience, and he exclaimed.

"Sir, be careful!" The Victory was bobbing and swaying under the continuous shelling of the Vostok, losing his right arm, causing Nelson, who was badly unbalanced (shēn), to nearly fall to the ground, but Captain Warren stepped forward to help him.

"I'm fine! Quick, turn the rudder right! Hurry up and get the port side into the strike position and get ready to shoot back! Nelson stubbornly shook off the captain's hand and staggered toward the port side as he gave the order.

As the last cannon sounded, the Vostok also began to turn the rudder to the right, and at this time the Vostok was directly in front of the Victory, with the port side facing the bow of the Victory.

After the baptism of artillery fire, the bow of the Victory was covered with scorched black holes, and even the bow statue was smashed by the guns, leaving only the upper half (shēn) intact, and the entire lower half (shēn) was cut off at waist length. The incision was uneven, and some of the remaining wood fibers were broken and some pieces of wood were hanging from each other. The sea was covered with wood debris and drifted (dàng) with the waves towards the rear of the Victory.

"Turn the rudder right, don't let the Brits have a plan to catch us! Put down the oars on the port side! Almost at the same time that Nelson gave the order to turn the rudder, Han Xing gave the same order, his purpose was to keep the Vostok directly in front of the Victory, to use the speed advantage to fight guerrilla warfare, and never to allow the British to lock on to their side with the side of the ship.

"Sir, the enemy ship is about to enter the (shè) boundary of the port side guns!" Captain Warren said to Lord Nelson, who was observing the Vostok.

"Impossible! How could they turn the rudder so fast! However, Lord Nelson, who was keeping an eye on the Vostok, had no time to care, and he was shocked to find that the Vostok, in front of him, had completed the right rudder at a very fast speed and at a very small angle, and once they had accelerated, the port side would never again try to lock on to them!

Why did the Vostok turn the rudder so fast? In fact, the reason lies in the long oars on the port side, we all know that when rowing, if you want the boat to turn left, you have to use the oars to row backwards on the right side of the boat; And vice versa, because it is the reaction force that pushes the ship forward. So you've got to do it the other way around!

The Vostok was converted from a large Mediterranean galleys, and the presence of long oars provided additional power to ships sailing in the calm Mediterranean, and the efficiency of long oars usually depended on the person rowing the boat! And Han Xing happens to have a large group of hard-working and hard-working cheap laborers who don't need money - the Devil Terminator! In fact, the only thing Han Xing needed to worry about was that they had too much strength, would they break the long oar·····

The Victory, on the other hand, was a serious ocean-going warship, and they were not equipped with such a thing as a long oar. Therefore, their rudder is basically completely dependent on manpower and wind power! This is the Mediterranean, home of galleys! Otherwise, the Barbary pirates would not have dared to wrestle with the Goliath with a few small sampans!

"Starboard, reload the chain! Gunner, aim the sails of the enemy ship! "Han Xing's main purpose is to entangle the enemy ship, and the chain bomb destroying the sail is the best way to reduce the opponent's maneuver (xìng) in the sail era! Of course, he didn't know that the ship in front of him was the famous Victory!

"Bang~~Bang~~Bang~~Bang~~Bang~" A pair of metal balls chained together were driven by gunpowder and whistled towards the Victory with sparks from the muzzles.

At this time, the Vostok had already completed the right-turn rudder with the long oar, which was equivalent to showing a "drift" directly in front of the Victory, and the bow of the Victory was once again exposed to the starboard side of the Vostok. The high-speed spinning chain bullet flew like a sharp blade towards the sail hanging on the mast of the Victory, which was more than 60 meters high, which was probably the largest part of the target on the ship!

For a while, the sound of the cloth tearing was endless, and the white sails of the Victory were immediately torn out of hideous holes, and the speed of the entire battleship was stagnant. Even better, the Victory was a serious three-masted sail battleship, which meant that it had a total of three sails, and after piercing the first sail, the chain bullets flew to the second and third sails behind, and the spinnaker at the bow for turning the rudder was taken care of.

The main power of the sail warship comes from the use of wind or aerodynamics, and the sail is the main tool with the help of the wind, which is the same as the parachute! Excuse me, what happens if the parachute breaks? Of course, it is "biu~~~~~~ pop~", that is, it falls quickly and freely, and then the person above falls to the ground with a snap, and the powder (shēn) is broken to the bone, not to mention, and if you are unlucky, you will fall directly into a puddle of (ròu) sauce. (Then again, maybe it's luckier to fall into a puddle of (ròu) sauce?) If you don't die, it will be miserable! ）

"Ah~" A chain bullet pierced the spinnaker located at the bow of the ship, and several British soldiers had time to dodge, and were directly cut in two by the whistling chain bullet, and the blood almost stained the deck of the bow of the Victory. What is the difference between human weakness and tofu in the face of cannonballs pushed by the power of gunpowder?

At this moment, there was a sudden creak of broken wood from the foremast of the Victory. It turned out that a chain bullet actually happened to hit the front mast of the Victory, and under the action of inertia (xìng), the chain bullet was tightly wrapped around two-thirds of the mast, and the huge impact force made the front mast of the Victory break like this! This is also the most important use of chain bullets, although most of the time chain bullets can't get this miraculous effect, after all, the target of the mast is very small, and the artillery of this era is not floating, but this time, this small probability event just let Han Xing bump into it!

The Vostok, which succeeded in the first blow, began to flee at full speed by virtue of its maneuvering advantage, and Nelson immediately ordered to continue to turn the rudder to the right, preparing to continue shelling the Far Vostok with the port side!

Unfortunately, the main power of the sail warship comes from the sails, and now the foremast is missing, and the spinnaker has been beaten so badly that it is like a rag hanging from the bow of the ship, which causes the rudder of the Victory to be unusually slow!

What's more, judging from the white fog that has not yet dissipated thousands of kilometers away, today is not a windy day! The warm sea breeze of the Mediterranean Sea is not at all friendly to a sail warship! On the contrary, the Dongfang, which was a mixed galley battleship, had already escaped a hundred meters away in a moment!

By the time the Victory finally finished turning the rudder, the Vostok had already escaped 500 meters away! At this distance, the stern of the Vostok was only a target the size of a cigarette box, so it stands to reason that the shelling of the Victory did not yield much results!

"Sir, are we going to pursue?" Captain Warren asked cautiously.

"No, turn the rudder right and go to join the fast ship, it would be very unwise to fall alone in this (qíng) situation!" Lord Nelson shook his head and turned his gaze in the direction of where the large French army was.