As the end of the year approaches, Fujian Governor Xu Xueju finally submitted a memorial to the court, demanding the opening of trade with Manila. This memorial has been brewing long ago and is also the result of the compromise between Fujian bureaucracy and Gaocai eunuch. Gaocai eunuch threatened that if Manila trade is not opened, Yuegang The share of silver paid by the Supervisor's Fund will increase, which will reduce the income of Fujian bureaucrats accordingly.
Gao Cai encouraged Yuan Jin's thirteen pirates to work hard for a year, and did not cause any harm to Yin Feng. Gao Cai, who was angry and embarrassed, spent a lot of money to hire bandits from western Fujian and some people from the martial arts world to try to be in Yin. Feng assassinated him when he returned to Quanzhou. As a result, more than a hundred assassins involved in the assassination crossed the southern gate of Quanzhou, and Yin Feng escaped from Quanzhou without any damage.
Fujian officials pretended to be deaf and ignored the matter. Gao Cai's confidant Fujian General Zhu Wenda took the opportunity to send troops to search the Quanzhou Huaxing joint number, but this caused an uproar. Many wealthy businessmen and gentlemen in Quanzhou, including the Quanzhou prefect Cheng Dadu has dividends in Huaxing Lianhao, Quanzhou. Cheng Da was a Jinshi of Qingjiang. In the 29th year of Wanli (1601), he served as the prefect of Quanzhou. His official reputation was still good and he did not bother the people. However, it was Ming Dynasty. As a common practice of not having an official government, corruption has become a normal thing. As long as the local officials are not too corrupt, they can be considered honest officials at that time.
Among the friends Cheng Da made, there was a prominent Fujianese figure, Ye Xianggao, Ye Xianggao, whose courtesy name was Jinqing and his pseudonym was Taishan. He was born in the 38th year of Jiajing in the Ming Dynasty (1559 AD), and was from Fuqing, Fujian. Next year, in May of the 35th year of Wanli, Ye Xianggao was promoted to Minister of Rites and Grand Secretary of the Dongge, becoming Grand Secretary of the Cabinet and Prime Minister.
Yin Feng was assassinated, but was only a victim of a more famous businessman. For the bureaucratic class at all levels in Fujian government, it was a small matter. However, the high eunuch and his subordinates directly threatened and damaged the immediate interests of the bureaucratic class. This is a big deal. Cheng Da and other literati-doctors who had damaged their property quickly reported the situation secretly to Ye Xianggao, and Ye himself had no good idea. At that time, the mining supervision taxes in various places made the sky fly all over the place, causing uncontrollable chaos everywhere. In the situation, Ye Xianggao was busy pursuing party struggles and quelling unrest in various places. He also tended to calm down the turbulent situation first when it came to what happened in his hometown.
Therefore, through Gao Eunuch's confidant, Fujian General Zhu Wenda, Fujian bureaucracy and Gao Cai eunuch reached a compromise; Yin Feng's Huaxing League Quanzhou Branch resumed business, and the Fujian government submitted a memorial to the court to reopen the overseas trade with Manila.
Yin Feng was listening to Lin Xiao’s report on the subsequent development of the assassination incident, and Lin Xiao said angrily: “…In this way, the ship owner, the assassination, is it considered that you have never happened before. Is there any other way to the king? ”
"This has nothing to do with the law of the king, it is related to the face of the court and the interests of all officials," said Zeng Qi, who was sitting on the side. He had just arrived from Quanzhou. He looked contemptuous and continued: "Xu Xueju This person is timid and afraid of things and has no opinion. He dares not fight against eunuchs or offends the officials and gentry in his province. Therefore, he compromised with Gao Cai, a virtuous son-in-law,..." He turned to Yin Feng and said, "No matter what, Your affairs are not a legal issue now. As long as you don’t sue, it will be left alone.”
Yin Feng smiled bitterly and said, "What should I do? It's all in vain. We have already fought along the coast of Fujian. I'm afraid the Fujian officials should be a little alert,"
Zeng Qi shook his head and sneered: "You are fighting pirates, they are still eager. These pirates are a talented force. If you destroy them, Xu Xueju and the others may not be happy." They have been in the officialdom for decades. Zeng Qi has a keen insight into every move of the government.
"As long as you don't deal with the officers and soldiers, and don't send troops to attack cities and plunder the land, they will still do business with you. In their hearts, you are still a little more like a businessman than those unruly pirates, so you must swallow your anger. Don't sue, anyway, it's useless to sue, but you can take the opportunity to get some benefits."
Yin Feng's eyes lit up, Lin Xiao scratched his scalp, and couldn't help asking: "Master Zeng, ask the government for benefits, is this possible?"
Zeng Qi smiled, walked in the middle of the house, and said with his hands behind his back: "Feng'er's assassination was actually done by Gao Cai, which is already well-known. The Fujian Governor's yamen did not want this to make a big deal, so he was with Gao Compromise and promise to open up Manila trade; however, in this way, our Fenger paid the price for the Fujian government in vain. If we make trouble and keep things going to the Beijing court, Xu Xueju and his group would be in trouble; they have seen When the power of the Chinese company really starts, the people in the Fujian government will be in trouble. Therefore, we can take the opportunity to propose conditions to buy time for the China United Company and establish good relations with the imperial government,"
"If you want to preside over this kind of thing, your father-in-law will do it. The son-in-law knows nothing about the officialdom," Yin Feng quickly pushed the whole story to his father-in-law, and Lin Xiao laughed aside.
After seeing Zeng Qi off, Yin Feng rushed to the escort training ground. This time he was not going to see the training, but Li Yue asked him to see the invention of the "new weapon" of technical school graduates.
According to the regulations of the Chinese company, craftsmen enjoy the highest work-related food and silver in the company; craftsmen are divided into four levels: workers, craftsmen, craftsmen, masters, etc. Both craftsmen and masters can enjoy the company's dry shares. Enjoy the annual dividend treatment. The technical school actually only teaches weapons manufacturing and self-tone manufacturing technology. Other craftsmen such as ceramics, mud, tiles, glazed, and irons have also been included in the promotion system of the Chinese company, but no one can summarize the relevant theories. To give students formal classes, or to inherit skills in the traditional apprenticeship model.
The production of the self-tone bell of China Company only started to be mastered last year, so the first batch of graduates from the technical school were all from the weapons manufacturing department. They invented a weapon during their graduation design, and Li Yue specially invited Yin Feng to watch their experiments.
I saw a big guy on the campus, who was densely packed with five layers of wooden racks with one hundred mesh rope guns on a modified flatbed frame. Height, each floor has 20 clamps, and the rear of the gun is connected in series with fuses. There is an iron turntable structure between the five-layer wooden frame and the flatbed cart. There are two pillars at the back of the flatbed cart in a figure-eight shape.
When Yin Feng saw this huge iron pipe combination, his brain "boom" for the first time and a word came out: "organ gun".
Since the firearm appeared on the battlefield, people have been working hard to increase their shooting speed. The practice of putting multiple weapons on the mount to shoot is often considered the origin of machine guns. In 1380 (recorded in the Royal British warehouse inventory list.
) Invented an 11-tube ferry gun, one of which fires stone projectiles and the other 10 canals fire lead projectiles and sharp arrows. This multi-tube ferry gun is the so-called organ gun.
In the time and space before Yin Feng traveled, the organ guns from the 15th to 16th centuries in Europe were also placed on a rectangular wooden box. The French Bryant Legion used 2,000 organ guns in a field battle in 1411, and the 18th century
The wheeled 20 tube (5 rows of superposition, the number of tubes from top to bottom is 2, 3, 4, 5, 6) pipe guns appeared, and until the 19th century, such as when the Danish army fought against the Prussian invasion in 1864, it was used.
Shooting the gun.
In the early 18th century, a rotary gun appeared in Britain. It is said that it was the pioneer of the Gatling machine gun. It was ignited by artificial rotation, which was about the past life of the Gatling machine gun; the rotary gun loaded 7 to 9 rounds at a time and was invented.
At that time, Parker also stipulated that enemies who believe in Christianity should use round warheads and pagan enemies, such as those who attack Turks, use square warheads.
It is worth mentioning that there is also the Leka throttle used during the Civil War (1861-1865). The 25 barrels are lined up horizontally on a sash plate. Its ignition mechanism is the same as the super-large-volume organ gun in front of Yin Feng.
, Use a fuse rope to cross the tail of 25 guns, and just ignite the rope head, it can be fired one after another quickly. The average firing rate of the Leka slaughter is about 7 rounds per second, with a range of more than 1,000 (914 meters), and a weight of 1,300.
Pounds (589KG).
Yin Feng quickly walked to the huge weapon, looked up and down, left and right, sighing in his heart: Look, the talent that the Chinese invented and created in firearms has not disappeared, although there are only a few dozen Chinese on Taiwan Island,
And they have just started to study firearms, but they have already followed the laws of firearm development.
Yin Feng knew that the biggest problem of this "organ gun" is that it is too large, inconvenient to operate, and inconvenient to use under field conditions.
In Yin Feng's memory, this super-large organ gun appeared in Europe at that time. There was a Vandenberg ferry gun that actually arranged 85-450 barrels! It can be fired almost at the same time. Its recoil is so high that it can be imagined, but the shooting accuracy is inverted.
It's true. The UK once tried a 191 barrel ferry gun, but 90% of the bullets hit 6 feet X 6 feet [182.88cm X 182.88cm) of target paper on 100 yards (91.4 meters). What's the trick?
It is because it is too heavy, and the infantry is afraid and dare not take it seriously, so they have to load it on a ship. Before the metal shell is fixedly loaded, it cannot be imagined that there will be automatic weapons that use gunpowder gas energy, so early
Rapid-fire weapons can only be limited to making many barrels line up to fire volleys or fire sequentially.
These young people from the China Technical School are now standing behind the "organ gun" and looking at their big boss Yin Feng nervously. These people have been so "crazy" in manufacturing and researching firearms for only two years.
The emergence of this weapon made Yin Feng's confidence in cultivating his firearm design master soar.
He walked to these technical school graduates, with four people in total. He smiled and nodded, "What do you call this guy?"
The four young men looked at each other, and the oldest on the left stood up: "Report to the big boss, we call this weapon 'storm gun',..."
A young man on the right, who seemed to be the youngest, rushed to say, "It's more formal to call the multi-tube gun queuing..." Then, the boy found himself a little abrupt, stuck out his tongue and smiled, and retreated. Yin Feng laughed: "I see The names are all very good, what are your names?"
The four young people, starting from the thin left, were named Lin Qing, Zhang Xiaohai, Wang Gong, Li Hetian in turn. They were all children of craftsmen from all over Fujian.
"Come on, experiment and see how," Yin Feng suggested with a smile. His attitude encouraged the four teenagers. They acted quickly and aimed at the target with the turntable mechanism under the wooden frame: one person tall 150 steps away Half a human-wide wooden board.
Lin Qing lit a section of the fuse at the back of the wooden frame, and immediately the flames were divided into five lines, igniting twenty combs in each row in turn. The sound of "bangbangbangbangbangbangbangbangbangbangbangbangbangbangbangbangbangbangbangbangbangbangbangbangbangbangbangbangbangbangbangbangbangbangbangbangbangbangbangbangbangbangbangbangbangbangbangbangbangbangbangbangbangbangbangbangbangbangbangbangbangbangbangbangbangbangbangbangbangbangbangbangbangbangbangbangbangbangbangbangbangbangbangbangbangbangbangbangbangbangbangbangbangbangbangbangbangbangbangbangbangbangbangbang The thick smoke completely enveloped the entire gun rack in a few seconds.
In just a moment, the 100-rail gun was shot, and the target target - the wooden board was completely shattered into pieces of wood strips.
The audience around included the infantry guards who had just completed the training mission and some leaders of the company's factory department. Seeing this amazing result, they forgot to speak for a while.
Lin Qingqing cleared his throat and bowed to Yin Feng and said, "What the students did is still a preliminary design, this kind of gun..."
Yin Feng continued: "This kind of gun is too heavy, too large, and it is inconvenient to install ammunition, which is a disadvantage."
Lin Qing and others showed sudden enlightenment expressions on their faces, and bowed with conscience: "The big boss is really a sharp head, the lesson is,"
Yin Feng's vanity was slightly satisfied and he hurriedly said, "However, this is a weapon that China has never had since ancient times. This is your invention. You will be famous for all ages. We can use this weapon to guard the city walls and fortresses, or Used to cover the siege, I hope you can invent more and better weapons based on this rainstorm gun, Brother Li Yue,"
Seeing that his subordinates were praised so much, Li Yue happily stepped forward and said, "Big Head, these young people need to be rewarded,"
"Yes, I have to give a reward and pass it on to the Human Resources Department. These four young people became the company's craftsmen and enjoyed the company's share dividends. They all assigned them to the Weapon Research Department, and worked with those foreigners to study new firearms."
The four people were shocked. They never expected such a reward. Even Li Yue was stunned and it took him a long time to react: "Is this appropriate?"
"Of course it's appropriate, they have the qualifications," Yin Feng said firmly: "It's decided that way,"
This incident quickly spread throughout Taiwan. For students in technical schools and various craftsmen, this kind of reward is simply unimaginable. Before that, you can become a shareholder of the company by relying on technical achievements. This is simply for them. It was a strange story in heaven. Now, this is a fact, so many people look at the craftsmen with admiration.
Yin Feng also began to rectify his arms and began to make strategic adjustments to the counterattack of Manila.
First of all, the relationship with the Fujian government and the Ming Dynasty must be maintained, but it is necessary to prevent trouble from the Ming government. Therefore, in addition to appropriately displaying force, it became Lin Xiao's Work priorities.
Secondly, Yin Feng began to expand his army and prepare for war, and he would fight back to Luzon in three years. This was his promise with the Chinese company. In addition to strengthening infantry weapon replacement and tactical training, at the end of this year, Yin Feng's second battleship The "Flying Tiger" with three masts, 900-ton class and 40 cannons was launched in Wanggang and is undergoing trial sailing training.
In addition, attacking Manila will inevitably affect the interests of Western maritime powers, so it is necessary to strengthen diplomatic work against Western powers. This is a bit complicated. For this reason, Yin Feng thought hard at his home for many days.
On this day, the fleet that was attacking the coastal areas to chase and suppress thirteen pirates returned. On this trip, they sank, burned nearly 100 pirate ships from each family, and captured more than 1,000 pirates. However, Yuan Jin and Li Zhong were not in it. They both ran away again.
Yin Feng suddenly had an idea about what to do with these more than a thousand pirates.