Me seeing this graphic in a Youtube video
"Buddha-type valve???" 
(These are the three types of valves you find on bicycle tires: Presta, Dunlop and Schrader, often also called French, English and American valves, respectively)
I somehow didn't know this before and I find it really funny
The more astounding thing is that the kanji for "England" means outstanding or heroic. What makes England so outstanding? Their imperialism? Their utter failure to maintain a functioning state? Their train-replacement bus services?
It's phonetic
My haphazard attempt at a translation
During the Edo period, England's pronunciation was 'Egeresu' and during the Meiji and Taisho Periods the kanji 英吉利 (eigiri?) were used. After this it was given the name 英国 (eikoku)
So the 英 comes from the phonetic abbreviation. It's the same in Chinese where 英国 yingguo comes from 英格兰 yinggelan. In phonetic transcriptions, characters with good meanings are chosen over characters with negative meanings, so the 英 meaning heroic is incidental
I love those sorts of terms in Japanese, like popcorn is ポップコーン (poppukōn) and katsuretsu, shortened to katsu, is from the English word cutlet.
It's still a pretty generic concept like most of the other country ateji. 仏 on the other hand is heavily associated with Buddhism which you'd think could lead to a lot of unnecessary confusion.
Whenever I see that character from now on I will think of Fr*nch people