Arnold was stunned. He didn't understand how the respected Consul Ferdinand would make such a low-level mistake. He was a diplomat who controlled the entire Middle East alone. Without him, there would be no current canal.

In the Crimean War, Viscount Ferdinand, under the instructions of the French Emperor, began to mediate difficultly with the Ottoman Empire. He used all his strength to convince the Egyptian Governor to agree to authorize the canal to France.

What a difficult negotiation. Britain, which competed at the same time, could not defeat Ferdinand. It is not an exaggeration to say that he is the father of this canal.

Viscount Ferdinand was already at the age of retirement, but because France faced extremely serious international threats, Prussia was preparing for war, and even a Chinese in the East began to challenge the dignity of the French emperor.

In addition, those republicans in China have always tried to restore the French Republic, and their conspiracy and secret battles have left Napoleon III in a panic.

The situation in Egypt was also very bad. Since Ferdinand returned to China, the French Emperor began to draw elite soldiers from various colonies. Although on the surface, the total number of soldiers from various colonies remained unchanged, the insiders had long seen through it. The elites from the colonies had been drawn, and the rest were all new recruits and old people.

Under this situation, France's control over the colony is constantly declining, which has triggered the arousal of all forces. British spies are secretly establishing some subtle relationship with the Bedouin tribe.

Prussian spies are preparing for how to attack the lifeline of France's economic lifeline in the war. This year, another major diplomatic incident occurred in the Qing emperor and Chinese heads of state visited Europe.

Everything needs strong people to be in charge of Egypt. So who else can be there besides Ferdinand? Who is the entire Egyptian garrison who is not convinced by that old man?

"But why did the consul fail to stop the Chinese? This is impossible! With the ability of the consul, it should be fine to delay the Chinese for twelve hours, right? How come it didn't hold it for a minute?"

Arnold roared angrily, and he looked at the pointer on his pocket watch and knew very well that this time was inferred before, and the timetable for Chinese people to break through the canal normally.

If the joint fleet entered the sea outside Said Port at around 7:30, it proved that the consul had not stopped him for even a minute!

"My sir! Now is not the time to bother the consul. Now we must take it. What we want is to make a quick decision!"

"Yes...yes...yes...real decision!" Arnold was so busy wearing his military uniform that he was so excited that he even tied his buttons in a slight manner.

"Send the order and prepare for combat... The artillery captain takes his seat, distributes live ammunition, and enters the first-level combat readiness..."

The adjutant who stayed up late was so angry that he stomped his feet, and even blocked the superior's mouth. "Sir! Are you crazy? How can the war be heard on us?"

"We don't know what happened in the Suez Canal. I'm afraid even the garrison in Port Said could not be very clear... They asked us to enter the canal and said they didn't say we wanted us to fight?"

"What are you doing? Declare war with the Chinese? You will bring us disasters, and France will also be implicated..."

"Even if you are determined to open fire, can you beat the British? To the south is the combined fleet in the canal, and the British Indian Ocean warships came with Xiao Letian!"

"The British Atlantic Mediterranean Fleet is also coming to the north and south when the war really starts? We will be surrounded..."

Arnold was awake at this moment. "Oh God, I'm so confused! You did the right thing, do you have any proposals? I really should have listened to you last night..."

The deputy chief sighed, "It's not the time to talk about this. I have already made a plan. In fact, the requirements of Port Said are similar to my plan..."

"Please ask the captain to immediately order the warships must speed up and drill into the river before the Zhiyuan rushes out... and then immediately hang the fault flag and use our ships to block the river. This is the only way to block the Chinese without starting a war!"

"Okay, okay, I'll listen to you... I'll order it now!"

At 7:20 in the morning, the French Mediterranean fleet appeared outside the sea of ​​Port Said. After a brief panic, the flagship Maranta suddenly began to accelerate and headed towards the canal mouth.

The Maranta is the latest battleship of France. It uses sail steam dual power, with a displacement of 6,800 tons. There is a thick chimney in the middle of the three-masted sail, which is filled with black smoke.

Inside the battleship, a single boiler drives a single-drive propeller, which can provide up to 1,500 horsepower. If combined with the kinetic energy provided by the huge sails, the battleship can travel at a speed of 18 knots on the sea.

The two-layer shooting decks on both sides of the battleship, and the gun doors were densely arranged in two sections. The shiny steel armor protected the battleship. The entire Maranta glittered silver light like the silver armored knights in the Middle World.

With sails and steam power, how powerful does the Maranta have? It is really impossible to calculate, because the power provided by sails is entirely based on the heavens' food, and God gives them as much as they give them.

However, some engineers have calculated that if the wind is smooth, the Maranta can reach a maximum of 3,000-4,000 horsepower under the push of the sixth and seventh level winds, which is already a very powerful power system at the end of the 19th century.

Under Captain Arnold's strict order, the heat waves in the warship boiler bin suddenly rolled up, the dark coal was thrown into the furnace, the blower was blowing, and the red flames made people's eyes hurt.

The rolling black smoke suddenly rushed out of the chimney, and the white sails suddenly became pitch black. The Maranta number was like a sudden injection of morphine. It shook on the sea for a while and rushed forward quickly.

Other French warships did not have as good power systems as he did. They could not catch up with the speed of the Maranta at all. As a result, the originally neat formation immediately appeared in a gap.

The French's abnormal movements alerted the British fleet in parallel. As expected, the quality of the elite commander of the Royal Navy was much higher than that of Arnold. It was not even used for half a minute, and the British fleet made a decision.

"Accelerate... immediately intersperse into the French army and cut their formation. No matter what conspiracy these people have, we will disrupt their rhythm first..."

The sea outside Said Port was in chaos, and both armies began to change formations, and the entire sea was filled with the sound of sailors shouting.

In this chaos, no one noticed that a dark band of smoke was approaching quietly and quickly on the southern horizon.

Note: It’s a new month, and it’s a new beginning! First, I’ll report on the results of last month! I looked at the rankings last night. Our Yinlong ranked 36th on the monthly sales list, and it has made a big progress from more than 50th to 36th.

Thank you to all the book friends who support the genuine edition, and even more thanks to the rich book friends who ordered Yinlong at the end of the month. We went from fifty to thirty-six. Thanks to the book friends who gave all seven subscribes at the end of the month, they ordered them all!

As soon as the seven rich people took action, their performance soared sharply, very good, very good!

I am pure and not greedy. If ten local tycoons take action in March, each of them will order one, and our results will probably be much better!

Silently praying...
Chapter completed!