Second coffee was taken on the balcony at which time I noted that the shadow of the railings on the seafront were decidedly right leaning and almost as one.
By third coffee the shorts were donned and there was a discernible gap between each rails' shadow and they were not so right leaning.
It was about now that I got to 14th July 1798 and the French opened Bastille prison in a fit of rage as their aspirations to world dominance had once again been thwarted by their northern neighbour. Recognising the folly of picking fights with their strongest foe they turned their attention to a group over whom they expected a victory.
At first, having freed lots of nasty people they took on their royal family, politicians they didn't like, doctors, teachers, pretty much the same groups as Pol Pot did almost 200 years later. Once they'd done for all the upper class and middle class they turned on anyone else they didn't like. This was called "The Terror" and unsurprisingly very little was, is or has been written authoritatively about it. Not even the tribes of French literati who wrote reams about the greatness of France, the poverty of England, the depth of French Philosphie and the paucity of all things intellectually British even so much as mentioned it. Indeed, Oscar Wilde, not the most sensible of people watchers asked about it and was most unhappy with the results although his disfigurement was only temporary.
Bit of a shame really because when Monsieur Napoleon saw the tattered threads of French society they'd made he weaved together a fiendish plan which no one argued against as all the brains had been separated from the bodies of those who knew how to use them..
Alas, for monsieur le frenchmen Nelson happened to be off Trafalgar at the right time as Napoleon had told Villeneuve to rendezvous in the English Channel with the channel fleet from Brest. Sadly Napoleon's followers had chopped the heads off the meteorologists, too. If they hadn't someone may have pointed out that the wind needed by the southern fleet was the exact opposite of the wind needed by the northern one. Anyway, Napoleon went off in a huff and fought everyone else.
Once he'd made a mess of Spain, Italy, Austria, Prussia, Russia and the Germans he got his comeuppance and was dumped on Corsica. One nice point is that when Wellington rode into Bordeaux in mid 1813 he was met by the mayor who was a Jacobite Irishman from Galway!
By now it was hot and coffee gave way to cold Cisk. The shirt came off and the railing shadows were at right angles to the wall they were fitted on.
So the French had a second revolution without Napoleon although for 100 days Napoleon got ashore, raised an army and marched to Waterloo. This time he got carted off to St.Helena where he died but sadly not before he'd rewritten his story and sent it to all and sundry. Which is largely why about 30 years later his nephew came out of exile and set himself the target so widely missed by his uncle. He should have known better as he'd spent his exile as a special constable in Windsor and had looked after Price Albert at times.
Anyway Napoleon III, as he called himself raged and raged and eventually by about 1870/1 he'd lost Alsace, Lorraine and left the stage with Paris under siege. His neighbours over the channel were by now a tad fed up with having all this going on and it was beginning to interfere with trade so they sent a gunboat or two, issued threats to all the protagonists and got on with fighting their own wars in the rest of the world, well, Sudan, Afghanistan, Pakistan, South Africa, India et al.
So at this point the French revolted for the third and so far, last time.
By now the railings shadows had merged as one but to the left. It was still hot and a mug of tea was set before me thus I continued to read how the French adopted British Parliamentary procedure, tried to threaten us with a tunnel and built "Gloria" an ironclad steam warship which was pretty much made redundant instantly as HMS Warrior hit the scene. They didn't give up trying to annoy until it looked like Kaiser Wilhelm was about to unleash Moltke who was still sore at having been pulled back from Paris in 1871. Hence the first of a number of Entente Cordiales.
So, three revolutions by the revolting French who still await some kind of dominance that matters over some group who care. As long as they let us visit, make wine, baguettes and egg and bacon pies they should be happy enough.
By now it was a bit dimpsy, there was no shadow to observe so one had to make do with a large glass of Maltese Red in the balmy embrace of another Mediterranean evening.
So there, a wonderful Wednesday watching a sundial, reading a book and drinking drinks as appropriate.
Better do something tomorrow, I suppose.
Time I did a postcard or two.
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| Railings of delivery man against redcar parker as barefoot lady passes by. |
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