Number of People

  Chapter 679 E-Zijuan takes the first step

  Wang Yingxiong left.

  But Feng Ziying fell into deep thought.

   To be honest, he doesn't like Da Zhou's firearms troops.

All kinds of miscellaneous and low-quality firearms are mainly used, the level of training is low, there is a lack of scientific training methods, and corruption is rampant within the army. Changes and guarantees must be carried out to be possible.

Compared with Jianzhou Jurchen's army that mainly uses cold weapons, the Great Zhou army is at an absolute disadvantage in terms of the same number of combat power. This is why the 100,000 troops in Liaodong Town and the 80,000 troops in Ji Town add up to 180,000 troops. When facing the Jianzhou Jurchen, the army seemed stretched and embarrassed.

Of course, this has something to do with the special geographical location and terrain characteristics of Liaodong Town and Ji Town. After all, thousands of miles of borders have to be guarded, and each guard post needs to garrison troops. , it is indeed a bit difficult.

   But this is only one aspect of the reason. The main factor is the weakness of the overall strength brought about by various problems within the Great Zhou Army.

  The use of firearms is an inevitable trend. The more unwilling to accept new things, the more disadvantaged they will be in the future.

Now there is such an opportunity, plus my father first went to Liaodong, Liaodong's current firearms unit is weak, even if it is abolished, the opposition and resistance encountered will be much milder. If the method is better, it may be possible to achieve reorganization and reorganization. Purpose.

In fact, matchlock guns may have gradually begun to give way to flintlock guns in Europe, but on the map of East Asia, matchlock guns are still a new type of weapon that is extremely advanced and has not yet been popularized. In the Great Zhou army, this is the gap.

  Facing Jianzhou Jurchen, who mainly focus on riding and shooting, if they can really create a combat-capable musket force in Liaodong Town, it may really change the situation of the entire Liaodong war.

   "So you think I should accept these three thousand guns?"

Feng Tang listened carefully to the fact that Feng Ziying took an hour to introduce the differences between the Lumi gun and the Huomen gun in detail, as well as the advantages and convenience of the Lumi gun over the Huomen gun, and even mentioned a few things. The problem, this made Feng Ziying realize that her father doesn't seem to be as disgusted and resistant to this kind of hot weapons as she imagined.

   This also lifted Feng Ziying's spirits.

"Yes, just now my son also introduced to you that there is an essential difference between the Lumi gun and the three-eyed gun, which rely on burning iron rods. One person can operate it. Of course, it takes a long time of training to achieve it, but it is very important for the arm strength bow. There are no special requirements for the technique, and its time to mature is far longer than that of training an archer, so my son thinks that this should be the most suitable weapon for the current Jiubian, and my son also heard from some sea merchants that Japan has already started to equip bird guns. In fact, it is this kind of Lumi gun, and the Xiyi people even began to popularize this kind of Lumi gun decades ago, and now they are ready to eliminate this kind of fire gun that we seem to be the latest."

   Feng Tang was taken aback by Feng Ziying's words, and others were fine with it, but Feng Tang trusted his son's words, "The Xiyi people are starting to eliminate this Lumi gun, so what do they use?"

"Father should know that it is a self-generated firecracker." Feng Ziying replied calmly: "It's just that their self-generated firecracker is not as short as the one father gave me, but as long as this Lumi blunderbuss, or even longer. Power and ease of use, father can imagine how convenient it is."

  Feng Tang sighed, he had seen the power and convenience of self-generated firecrackers before.

This kind of short-handled self-igniting gun is easy to carry. Although it lacks in power, it is an absolute weapon for killing people within two or three feet. It is conceivable that if the barrel is lengthened, the charge will be more, and the gunpowder will be more powerful. As the power increases, its killing power can naturally extend from two or three feet to twenty or thirty feet or even hundreds of feet.

   But Da Zhou is obviously unable to make this kind of self-generated firecracker, not to mention the other kind of impact ignition device which is extremely delicate, and the coil spring, which is extremely difficult and complicated to make, and can only be processed by hand.

   "Ziying, I understand what you mean, but can we Dazhou make self-generated firecrackers?" Feng Tang asked back.

"Certainly not now. The complicated devices on the self-generating guns are mainly processed by watchmakers and their apprentices in Xiyi. We can't even make that kind of clock in Dazhou, so we have to import it from Xiyi. Come in, let alone this kind of large-scale production at every turn, but in Xiyi, watchmakers are very common, so their apprentices began to enter various workshops after graduation, including this kind of workshop specializing in making firecrackers, in order to make this A self-generating musket."

Feng Ziying is very clear that at present, even the handicraft manufacturing industry in Dazhou has distanced itself from Europe, especially the more sophisticated processing and manufacturing industries such as clocks and watches. Simple lathes that provide support have appeared, such as thread lathes and gear processing lathes, etc., and the development speed was faster in the seventeenth century, but he only knew a general history, and he knew nothing about the specific lathe principles and manufacturing techniques .

The leading equipment and technology in the industry and even lathes have given Europe a technological advantage over East Asia after entering the seventeenth century. This is inseparable from the development of natural science in Europe. Feng Ziying knows this but is powerless Change, this feeling makes him very uncomfortable.

Seeing that his son was very sure that he could not make self-generating firecrackers, Feng Tang also gave up his mind, and even if he could make it, I am afraid that some skilled craftsmen spent a year and a half making one or two, which is of little significance, such as Feng Ziying As the saying goes, it can only be realized if there are a large number of craftsmen and apprentices like watchmakers like the Xiyi people who can concentrate on manufacturing.

"Ziying, do you think it's worthwhile for me to accept these Lumi guns?" Feng Tang was a little moved by Feng Ziying's words, but he was worried that making such a big gimmick would end up as a show, which would affect his own prestige. The damage will definitely be great, and it may even shake its position in Liaodong.

"Father, I think Da Zhou will take this step sooner or later. It is an inevitable trend for Lumi blunderbuss to replace those three-eyed blunderbusses. Even a fool can see the huge gap between them. The key lies in whether you can choose to practice these Lumi blunderbusses." To be honest, for the soldiers of the Lumi guns, 3,000 Lumi guns are far from enough to train an army of Lumi guns. I don’t know the quality of these guns. There will definitely be a considerable amount of wear and tear, so according to my son, if you really plan to train an army of firecrackers that will come in handy and even teach Jianzhou Jurchen a profound lesson, you must buy at least 10,000 firecrackers and a great deal of gunpowder."

  Feng Ziying's suggestion shocked Feng Tang a lot, "Ziying, isn't your suggestion a bit out of line?"

"Father, it is absolutely not out of line. If you want to do it, you have to do it. And even if it is based on ten taels of silver, ten thousand is only one hundred thousand taels of silver. You have to open your mouth and ask for 1.2 million taels of silver." After taking office, what is the one hundred thousand silver?" Feng Ziying disagreed, "To put it bluntly, if you can really train an army of firecrackers and teach Jianzhou Jurchen a lesson, I think three to five million taels Silver rewards shouldn’t be a problem for the court, right?”

"Besides, you also know the current situation in Liaodong Town. You will definitely not be able to move the Li family and the troops attached to the Li family for a short time. The soldiers brought over from Datong and Yulin are limited. They can only be used as the last card. The best way is to Using local materials and training soldiers, whether training cavalry or infantry, is not as fast as training this kind of firecracker army to form an army. Moreover, for the Jianzhou Jurchen who mainly focus on cavalry and archery, once the firecracker army is formed, it will be faster. The army is a natural restraint against it,..."

  Most of them are true, and a few are false. As for her father, Feng Ziying naturally cannot harm him, but it is necessary to properly encourage him to increase his confidence.

  Feng Tang pondered for a while, "Ziying, are you so optimistic about the Firecracker Army?"

"Father, I'm really optimistic. Even weapons like the three-eyed blunderbuss can cause a lot of damage to the Jianzhou cavalry. The Lumi blunderbuss are much stronger, and the practice of these blunderbuss soldiers is also for them to change into self-generating blunderbuss in the future." Prepare, we can’t come to train firecrackers when we can buy or produce self-generating firecrackers in the future, right?”

  Feng Ziying's last words moved Feng Tang.

Although he is not very optimistic about the Lumi blunderbuss, the operation procedures are complicated, the quality is worrying, and the weather has a big impact, which makes Feng Tang feel a bit like a chicken rib, but Feng Tang is very optimistic about the power and convenience of the self-generated blunderbuss. If you can buy it When a batch of self-generated firecrackers arrive, the power of this firecracker can really be displayed in the future.

"In this case, I will go to Chai Ke tomorrow and take these Lumi guns, but what should I do next? Should I continue to buy them?" Feng Tang and the Ministry of War are still arguing, and 1.2 million taels of silver is obviously unrealistic , but Feng Tang felt that eight hundred thousand taels was too little. He hoped to get one million taels, but the Ministry of War refused.

"Well, otherwise, I will contact the workshop owner who escorted this batch of goods tomorrow. The iron smelting and processing workshops in Foshan are indeed much better than those in Beidi. Let's talk again. In terms of price and quality, I Talk to them to see if we can negotiate again to make both of us satisfied, and if possible, order again."

Feng Ziying has never been to Guangdong, but he has heard of the name of Foshan Iron Smelting Industry for a long time. However, if Beidi wants to take the path of coal-iron complex, it is not enough to rely on some businessmen. It needs more talents in this field, so contact It is very necessary.

  Since she is a businessman, then talk about profit, as long as it is profitable, Feng Ziying believes that no one will feel sorry for the silver, and with the backing of Haitong Bank, Feng Ziying also has the confidence.

  (end of this chapter)