Eunuchs who traveled through the Qing Dynasty

In fact, Xueyao is really the kind of conservative and self-respecting girl. Although she has been his assistant for such a long time, she only asks some academic questions and doesn't say a word.Sometimes Rolto made two jokes on purpose, but she didn't even smile.Her father was murdered to death by a foreigner, and it is estimated that it will be difficult to untie this knot in her life, let alone have any thoughts about this foreign devil.It's a pity that she overlooked one point: there is such a kind of love in this world, called wishful thinking.

After more than half a month, Xueyao was not feeling well, so she rested for two days.On the morning of the third day, as soon as he entered the laboratory, he saw Rorto kneel down on one knee with a plop, his face as tight as a purple eggplant, trembling and speechless for a long time.Xueyao was taken aback. She knew that the foreign devil had committed a crime in England, so she hurriedly said, "What's wrong? Did people from your country come to arrest you?"

"NO! NO!" Rolto shook his head like a rattle, took out a piece of crumpled paper from his arms, and said, "I, I love you! You are my sunshine, you It is my life! O beautiful goddess, please listen to the poem I wrote for you..."

Xueyao is a typical woman with three obediences and four virtues, who has ever seen such a direct confession in this life?After being stunned for a long time, he finally came to his senses, his hands and feet were cold, and he picked up a bench, ping-ping-pong-pong.Rolto's physique is not very strong, but this guy has been used to being beaten for many years, and his body is really strong. While holding his head there, he yelled in broken Chinese:

"what!

You ask me how much I love you,

How much I love you,

you go think about it

You take a look,

the moon represents my heart……"

This day, Xiao Ran was wandering around the palace with nothing to do.When I got up early, I felt restless, and my eyelids kept twitching.Just as he was about to go to the central palace to pester Yu Ting for a while, suddenly Bao Lu ran over angrily, sweating profusely, clutching Xiao Ran's hand, speechless for a long time.Usually Baolu is a person who can take things seriously, when Xiao Ran saw his appearance, he knew that something big must have happened, and his heart skipped a beat.

"Hurry, hurry back, Xueyao, she hanged herself..."

When Xiao Ran's head slammed, he felt his eyes go dark, and he almost sat down on the ground.Before he had time to ask what was going on, he staggered towards Xiao's mansion.When he arrived at the door of the house, there were servants waiting there. Seeing his distraught appearance, he quickly told him not to worry, saying that Miss Xueyao was fine, but she was just a little frightened.

Fei ran to the bedroom to see that Xueyao was crying, when she saw Xiao Ran, she threw herself into his arms, her tears were like a flood breaking a bank.Xiao Ran took a closer look, and it turned out that it was just a red tie drawn around his neck, he thought it was discovered in time, so it didn't cause a catastrophe.

At this time Xueyao was crying so hard that she couldn't speak, and the servants told the story in a hurry.It was only then that Xiao Ran realized that Xueyao felt that she had lost her manners, her chastity had been tarnished, and she had no face to live because of Luo Erto's confession.

You must know that Neo Confucianism was very popular at that time, and Chinese women were very conservative, adhering to women's morals, talking about three obediences and four virtues, and respecting three virtues and nine virtues.It is a great sin to be glanced at by other men on weekdays, let alone Rolto's direct confession?From Xueyao's point of view, this kind of spiritual insult is no different from physical violation.

When Xiao Ran heard this, his lungs almost exploded with anger, so he casually copied a jujube tree with a candle in it, and went straight to the laboratory to kill it.As soon as he entered the courtyard, he heard ghosts crying and wolves howling, and saw Rolto hanging upside down from a tree stripped naked, while Ma Chao and Wang Meng were beating him mindlessly with whips and benches.If it wasn't for waiting for Xiao Ran to come back, he would have sent him to see God long ago.

In this icy and snowy place, the foreign devil was completely naked, his body was already frozen blue and purple, and soon he was unable to breathe.Seeing Xiao Ran arriving, Wang Meng quickly pulled out his waist knife and handed it to him.

Xiao Ran looked at Rolto's appearance, but couldn't bear to make another move.After all, he has experienced it in later generations, and he knows that this fellow only has admiration for Xueyao.Confessing love to a woman is a very sacred thing for foreigners, without any insult or disrespect.And the drug development is at a critical moment, so he can't be killed just because of this, right?After pondering for a long time, he cut the rope with a knife and released the foreign devil.

Ma Chao and the others were in an uproar immediately, and they shouted: "Did you just let him go like this? You dare to bully Madam, it's not an exaggeration to chop it up with a knife!" He Laoliu said: "That's right. If I had known this, I might as well take advantage of the fact that my lord didn't come. , kill this bastard with one knife."

Xiao Ran was angry and funny, he didn't know how to explain it to everyone, so he had to warn everyone that the matter ended here, and no one was allowed to mention it again.At the same time, he ordered people to carry Rorto in, and made medicine for him to drink.Looking at this guy's miserable appearance, it is estimated that he will not be able to get up in ten and a half months.

Although Xueyao was wronged in every possible way, but after Xiao Ran tried to enlighten her, the matter was considered over.Xueyao refused to be Rorto's assistant no matter what she said, but she couldn't let go of the experiment, so Xiao Ran asked someone to get another set of equipment, let her continue to study here, and asked the servants to go back and forth when she encountered something she didn't understand send word.

As for Rolto, after closing the door of hell and touching the threshold, he should have lost his mind, right?But this guy has a stubborn temper, the more he thinks of Xueyao's pretty appearance, the more he feels that life is precious and love is more expensive.As soon as his body got better, he was about to move again.Taking advantage of the opportunity of passing messages back and forth, he wrote a paper full of love poems and sent them over.The servant was also illiterate, and when she handed it to Xueyao for a look, her hair stood on end with anger, and she went straight to the laboratory to kill her.

As soon as he entered the door, Rolto thought that his persistence had finally moved the other party, and he was ecstatic to hold hands.It happened that there was a bottle of mixture of concentrated sulfuric acid and concentrated nitric acid next to it, Xueyao grabbed it and splashed it on the head.Rolto was so frightened that he hurriedly covered his head and face, but his hands were splashed a lot, and he screamed in pain.It happened that Xiao Ran was also in the mansion on this day, so he hurried over to see this guy's infatuation, and felt hateful.Looking at his hands, there was already a big blister, which was as red as a roasted pig's trotter.

But Rorto, half of the cotton robe was wet, quickly took it off, and happened to put it next to the charcoal basin.There was a huff, and the cotton robe started to burn violently, and the place that was stained with the acidic solution was burnt clean in an instant, without any smoke or ashes.

Everyone was stunned by this strange phenomenon. For a long time, Xiao Ran was the first to jump up, "Nitrated cotton! This is nitrocellulose!" He picked up Xueyao and turned around seven or eight times. Shouted: "Good wife, you invented smokeless gunpowder!"

As I said before, the firearms at that time used black powder, which would produce a lot of smoke when shooting, which would affect the aiming of the next round.Moreover, when the black powder burns, it produces more residues, which corrodes the barrel and affects the shooting accuracy.And smokeless gunpowder has no residue after burning, and does not produce smog or only a small amount of smog.The use of smokeless powder can increase the range of the projectile, improve the straightness of the ballistic and the shooting accuracy.It can be said that the birth of smokeless gunpowder paved the way for the development of ammunition.Until the beginning of 1890, the military rifle bullets of European countries basically evolved from large-caliber black powder bullets to smaller-caliber smokeless gunpowder bullets, but now it is 30 years earlier!

Xiao Ran had only heard about nitrocellulose, but he didn't know how to make it. He didn't expect Xueyao to inadvertently make it out. If it wasn't for Rolto's entanglement, he wouldn't be able to get it out for a while. Woolen cloth.Immediately, Xiao Ran ordered Wang Mengkuai to return to Beijing to bring Dai Tong here, and he and Luo Erto stepped up the research and development of smokeless gunpowder.

Rolto was very obsessed with chemistry. When he saw such a miraculous thing, he was so excited that even women forgot about it. He devoted himself to the experiment. After the experiment, the results were confirmed to be correct, and finally the first batch of nitrocellulose was produced.But this gunpowder is unstable and prone to explosion.Taking advantage of his little knowledge of the history of gunpowder development, Xiao Ran racked his brains for three consecutive days and three nights. After repeated experiments, he finally discovered that dissolving nitrocellulose in ether and ethanol, and then adding an appropriate amount of stabilizer, becomes a glue. The stability of gunpowder is controlled by pressing tablets, cutting strips, drying and hardening.Finally broke through this major difficulty, the world's first smokeless gunpowder was finally born!

♂ Volume 5 Military Age ♀

→Chapter 040 - The Era of Great Inventions←

When Dai Tong heard the news, it was as if ten or eight gold ingots fell from the sky, not to mention his excitement.I wish I could have wings and rush to Chengde as fast as I can.Seeing Xiao Ran, he didn't even have time to greet him, so he opened his mouth and said, "Where's the smokeless gunpowder? Where is the smokeless gunpowder?"

Xiao Ran smiled and said: "You old guy, seeing gunpowder is closer than seeing me!" He said and took a pack of gunpowder cut into strips, and handed it to him.Dai Tong took out a pistol casually, filled it with gunpowder skillfully, compacted the bullet, and slammed a shot at the wind lamp hanging on the corner of the pavilion tens of meters away.The lantern was shaken violently, and the paper that was tightly pasted was smashed to pieces, and it floated down with a rustle, and even a corner of the glazed tile was knocked off.

Xiao Ran yelled angrily and punched him: "Old man, what if our lantern doesn't cost money? Don't say I blackmail you, 32 coppers, lose money quickly!"

Dai Tong was stunned for a long time before he slapped his forehead: "There is really no smoke! My dear, this gunpowder is so powerful! In the past, at this distance, I could hit two or three shots with ten shots. It can be hit, and the power is really great! I will try to shoot two more shots."

"Fuck you, I want to go back to your house and try it." Only then did Xiao Ran understand why his house was dilapidated, and even the window paper was stuck with a quick patch.The old guy of emotion tried his gun at will, shooting whatever he caught.

"Cut, look at how you feel so distressed! You can give birth to cubs with a lot of money, and a broken lantern is like a baby." Dai Tong curled his lips and said, "Well, let me show you something, even if it is Pay for your broken lantern!"

While talking, he carefully took out a long wooden box from his bosom, opened it, and found a row of paper rolls about an inch long and the thickness of a finger.There was also a lot of cotton stuffed in the box, probably for fear of being shaken.

Xiao Ran wondered: "What is this?" Stretching out his hand to take it, Dai Tong was startled, and hastily withdrew his hands and said: "Ancestor, please be careful! This scroll contains gunpowder, bullets, and thunder mercury. Watch out, it's about to explode!"

"Ah, this is... a bullet!" Xiao Ran blurted out.Only then did he remember that the world's earliest fixed-load bullets were indeed rolled from paper tubes.With this fixed-loaded bullet, the breech-loading gun can be developed in a real sense.So that means... Xiao Ran's eyes lit up, and he suddenly shouted: "Rifle, you made a breech-loading rifle!"

Dai Tong laughed loudly and said: "You boy, ghost spirit, you really can't hide anything from you! That's right, this is the breech-loading rifle bullet I made." Then he asked the old family member Dai He to go to the saddle to pick off a bullet. The tightly wrapped long cloth bag was opened, revealing two black and oily spears.

One of the two guns is 1 meters long, has a caliber of 26mm, and weighs 9 kilograms. It has a wooden butt, and a horn-shaped rear sight and front sight are installed on the barrel.Raised rifling can be seen faintly inside the barrel.

The other gun is 1 meters long and weighs 52 kilograms. It is basically the same in structure as the previous one. It also has a 6mm caliber, but the aiming baseline is longer, and it uses an aperture-type rear sight.From the design point of view, these all meet the needs of long range and precise shooting, and belong to the prototype of sniper rifles.

These two guns were designed completely according to Xiao Ran's suggestion, regardless of appearance and function, they are roughly the same as modern rifles.Surprised and happy at the same time, Xiao Ran quickly unbolted the gun and put in the paper-wrapped ammunition.The two guns were tested separately, one with an effective range of about 300 meters, and the other with a range of 500 meters, and it can be aimed with precision!

I couldn’t put it down and looked at it for a while, and praised repeatedly: "Okay, good guy! You old guy is really smart, and you made it up so quickly! With this thing, the British and French Allied Forces and the Eight-Power Allied Forces will let them eat it!" Go shit! Old Dai, when will these two weapons be equipped with troops?"

Dai Tong pondered for a while and said: "The problem I was most troubled at first was that the smoke produced by this black powder was not conducive to secondary aiming, but now with this smokeless gunpowder, it can be completely solved. I reckon that if I use this Gunpowder, range and accuracy should be improved! But..."

"But what?" Xiao Ran asked eagerly.

"It's still very early to equip the troops, because we can't mass-produce them at all."

"Damn!" Xiao Ran wished he could knock him down with the butt of his gun.

Dai Tong gave a general explanation: First of all, thunder mercury was invented by the British. The Qing Dynasty itself did not have the production capacity and had to buy it from the UK.At that time, Britain imposed trade restrictions on China's exports, and the arms and military aspects were absolutely blocked.Including the chemicals purchased for Xiao Ran last time, it took a lot of trouble.

Second, with the technology of the Qing Dynasty at that time, it was not possible to produce such high-precision barrels, especially rifled barrels with rifling.In the seventh year of Xianfeng, a batch was purchased from Belgium, but due to poor storage, most of them have been severely corroded.Fewer than 300 barrels are currently available.The United Kingdom, France, the United States, etc., have used diplomatic pressure to force Belgium, Portugal and other countries to implement arms embargo treaties against China.In other words, it is no longer possible to rely on foreign countries to continue importing explosives.

"Fuck you!" Xiao Ran cursed angrily.But he also knew that what Dai Tong said was indeed true.Such an advanced weapon is decades ahead of the West. If it cannot be mass-produced, what is the point of being advanced?While feeling depressed, Rolto said aside again: "If it's just Lei Mercury's problem, I don't know if I can find a way to solve it."

"Really?!" Xiao Ran and Dai Tong almost jumped up excitedly.

It turns out that Lei Mercury was founded by the British priest Alexander?John?Forsyth research was successful.In 1805, Forsyth successfully developed the percussion ignition technology with thunder mercury. After that, he and the inventor of the steam engine James?Watt cooperated and made the world's first percussion gun in 1807.Coincidentally, as a former famous British pharmacist, Rolto knew a thing or two about the production of thormercury.With this foreign devil, it shouldn't be a problem to produce thunder mercury by ourselves!

Xiao Ran grabbed Rolto: "GOOD! VeRARYGOOD! If you foreign devil can really make thunder mercury, I will marry you a wife right away!"

"Ah, really?" Rolto's eyes sparkled excitedly, "You mean, let Miss Xueyao and me..."

"Fuck you!" Xiao Ran kicked him down hard, "That's my wife, how dare you fucking miss it? Be careful I'll shoot you!"

"She's not your wife!" Rolto blushed and protested angrily, waving his arms, "I asked the servants, and they said that you are not married, so I have a chance! My heart only belongs to her Alone, for the dignity of a man, I want to duel with you!!!"

"..." Xiao Ran couldn't bear it anymore, and kicked him away again.

Thunder mercury is also known as mercury nitrate, and the preparation process is actually not complicated.First, pour a thin layer of mercury (commonly known as mercury) into the long-necked bottle, then pour nitric acid, a little hydrochloric acid and a small amount of copper shavings, stir the mixture gently, and heat it slowly for about an hour until the mercury dissolves and turns green. of mercury nitrate solution.Then add ethanol heated to 50°C, a very violent reaction will occur, and after another hour, the crude erythrox will become a heavy precipitate and precipitate.