"Bow down to the cannon, pay homage to Confucius, the most holy teacher...kowtow! A hundred hits!"
With the shout of Niu Lu, a Hongyi Cannon of the Zhenghong Banner Han Army, King Kong Youde of the Qing Dynasty, King Zhishun of the Qing Dynasty Shang Kexi, Bai Guangen, the Commander-in-Chief, and other Han soldiers of the Zhenghong Banner, Xianglan Banner and Henan The generals of the green battalion all knelt down together and kowtowed respectfully to the twenty red cannons lined up in front of them and the seat of the most holy teacher Confucius placed in the middle of the cannons. In front of the cannon and the tablet, there are incense burners, candles and various tributes.
Kong Youde, who was kneeling at the front of the crowd, kowtowed and muttered: "Grandpa God of Guns bless you, ancestors bless you... Your shots are always on target!"
A group of people behind him, headed by Shang Kexi, also shouted together: "Blessed by Saint Kong... you are always on target!"
"Kowtow twice...the artillery and artillery are safe!" Niu Lu, a member of the Zhenghong Banner Han Army, shouted again.
Kong Youde, Shang Kexi and others kowtowed again... and then shouted together: "Sage Kong bless you... Pao Pao is safe!"
"Kowtow three times...fire the cannon!"
The big guy once again kowtowed to the cannon and the Confucius tablet, and then shouted: "Blessings, Saint Kong... Good luck with the cannon!"
"The ceremony is over!"
After finally kowtowing, Shang Kexi stood up with a heavy heart, walked to Kong Youde, the number one Hongyi artillery expert in the Qing Dynasty, and asked in a low voice: "Ritu, why is it that Confucius still has something to do with artillery worship now? Does it work?”
It turns out that what was just performed was the artillery salute of the Qing Dynasty Artillery Corps - this is not unique to the Qing Dynasty Artillery Corps, the Ming Army's artillery Corps also had to worship, but it was not done before every battle, but only before the cannon. When delivering the goods, bow down and ask the cannon for help, don't blow up the chamber...
Kong Youde's Zhenghong Banner Han Army Artillery Corps was particularly pious in worshiping artillery. They had to bow before every battle. Moreover, his ceremony of worshiping the cannon is still improving, and recently he even went to the memorial tablet of Confucius to worship together.
"Why doesn't it work?" Kong Youde glanced at Shang Kexi, "Confucius is our ancestor, and he cares about everything. Brother Yuanji, haven't you heard that people in Qufu say, 'Blessed by Saint Kong, invulnerable'?"
Because Kong Youde's surname was Kong, he became an ancestor of Confucius, but the Confucius family in Qufu did not recognize it. But the Daqi Deferential King, who was born as a miner, took it very seriously. After becoming a prince, he not only kept a memorial tablet of Confucius in his palace, but also invited Mr. Baoyi (Zhenghongqi's Baoyi slave) to teach him how to read. Practice calligraphy, and now I can recite "The Analects of Confucius".
After hearing about Confucius's "latest method of use" in Qufu, he immediately asked people to prepare a memorial tablet for Sage Kong to use when worshiping cannons - since Sage Confucius cared about "invulnerability", he couldn't control " Are "shots always on target" and "cannons safe"?
Shang Kexi frowned and thought: Qufu is there to protect Confucius and the famous religion. Of course Confucius will appear to bless us. Now we are following the Tatars and becoming traitors. How can Confucius still bless us? Don't have the opposite effect and blow up the barrel of the cannon! I have to stay away when we have sex later!
"Ritu," Shang Kexi asked again, "What should we do now? Fire?"
"Wait a little longer," Kong Youde said, "the auspicious time has not come yet."
Shang Kexi thought to himself: It’s quite particular! I wonder if Fengyang City can be demolished?
Just as he was thinking about it, a burst of rapid horse hoofbeats came over. Shang Kexi looked back and saw that it was Meile Zhang Jingshuozhan of Manchuria Zhenghongqi who brought people over.
Monk Kong Youde is glad to be a prince, Shuo Zhan is just a Meile Zhangjing, and the world minister is a Niulu Zhangjing. But he is an authentic Eight Banners uncle, his surname is Fucha, he is under the Manchuria Zhenghong Banner, and he is also ordered to supervise the war. The two water-filling princes didn't dare to show off to others, and they all stood respectfully to greet each other - they couldn't kowtow, and it would be outrageous for the two princes to kowtow to Mele Zhangjing!
But Bai Guangen is not a prince. He honestly gave Shuo Zhan a thousand dollars, so he should stand behind Kong Youde with his hands down.
Shuo Zhan is a "Second Generation Banner". He is short in stature but very stocky, with a dark face and a beard that reaches his chest. He looks like a capable fighter at first glance. He got off the horse, squinted his eyes and glanced at the memorial tablet, the incense table, and the offerings, and said coldly: "Have you finished praying?"
"I'm done paying my respects..." Kong Youde smiled with a smile on his face.
"When can we start?" Shuo Zhan said, "Prince Su just sent someone to urge us... just give us three days!"
"Three days?" Kong Youde was stunned, "It wasn't seven days before?"
"Prince Su is now saying that three days means three days!" Shuo Zhan pointed to the dilapidated city wall more than three miles away, "It's such a broken city, can't it be taken down in three days?"
"You can take it down, you can take it down!" How dare Kong Youde say no? He quickly turned around and shouted to Niulu Zhangjing, the artillery team under his command: "The auspicious time has come, fire the cannon, fire the cannon quickly..."
Niulu Zhangjing is also Kong Youde's godson, named Kong Sixi. He is in his early thirties, only ten years younger than Kong Youde. In Kong Youde's team, he was walking sideways! Even if a real Manchurian man dared to give Kong Youde face, he would still be polite to him. Because he is a gunner trained by the Portuguese gunner himself! There are very few people in the entire Qing Dynasty now, and he is still the most skilled one among them, able to master the Western methods of distance measurement and sighting.
The reason why the Zhenghong Banner Han Army Artillery Corps is so powerful is because of him!
Hearing his godfather's voice, Kong Sixi immediately gave a loud order: "Your Majesty has ordered, test the cannon immediately!"
Following the order, a dozen shirtless men with pigtails on their foreheads immediately ran over and pushed one of the Hongyi cannons forward - the so-called test cannon, which means test firing.
Only Kong Sixi in Kong Youde's artillery team truly mastered the art of sighting, and he also knew that teaching apprentices to starve the master to death would not teach the true skills to others. Therefore, Kong Youde's artillery team adopted the method of concentrated artillery and unified sighting, and Kong Sixi, a master, was in charge.
Today, Monk Kong Youde and Monk Kexi gathered together 20 Hongyi cannons from two Han army Hongyi cannons Niulu, all of which were under the charge of Kong Sixi.
The first thing that was pushed onto the gun position was a Hongyi cannon weighing more than 3,000 kilograms. It was made of bronze and mounted on a particularly heavy gun carriage. It was very heavy. It was quite difficult for more than a dozen gunners to push it.
When the gunner pushed the cannon into position, Kong Sixi had already measured the approximate distance, and then ordered loudly: "The gun gauge is six points higher!"
Then the two gunners began to use hammers to hammer the triangular wedge wedged between the barrel and the gun frame, gradually raising the gun body.
A gun gauge is a tool used to measure the angle of attack. The long handle attached to the gun gauge is usually engraved with a gun ruler. The gun ruler is about one foot long. It is not flat, but a rectangular parallelepiped. There are many scales engraved on the three sides of the rectangular parallelepiped, and it is also engraved with Latin and Arabic numerals - this is to make it easier for the gunner to use cannonballs made of different materials. (iron, stone, lead), it is designed to quickly obtain the required filling amount according to the shooting angle. Most of the gunners of the Ming and Qing armies who were dawdling around didn't know how to use gun gauges and gun rulers, but Kong Sixi really knew how to use them.
He measured the shooting angle with a musket gauge, and then shouted according to the data on the musket gauge: "Fill the rock bullets with two pounds of medicine!"
The blunderbuss ruler he used was originally from Portugal. The markings were in foreign characters and Arabic numerals, and the weight unit used was pounds. However, Kong Sixi was very good at arithmetic and could convert pounds into kilograms with just a mental calculation.
This kind of ability is unique among the Qing army! So even if others crack the "secret" of Arabic numerals, they still won't be able to use this weapon well...
The gunpowder is packed in a porcelain jar. Use a spoon to dig out the gunpowder one by one. One spoonful is half a catty. If you have two catties, you have to dig out five spoons and pour it all into the barrel. A gunner used a long pestle to poke gunpowder into the bottom of the gun barrel, and then someone inserted a fuse made of twisted paper and gunpowder into the fire door. At the same time, the gunpowder had been compacted, and a wooden code was inserted into the muzzle. Then a hammered stone bullet was inserted...
