Daming Town Haiwang

Chapter 1202, Daming Bell
In the capital city, as the new year is approaching, the entire capital city is gradually entering into a sea of ​​festivities.

Major factories, workshops, commercial firms, etc. began to pay out annual wages and year-end bonuses one after another. When they got their hard work for a year, everyone's faces were naturally filled with smiles.

With a bulging pocket, it is inevitable that he will have more confidence when he is away from home.

Merchants in the capital also saw this opportunity. At the end of the year, they decorated their stores very festively, and at the same time, they also held year-end promotions.

The streets here are full of people, and the howling cold wind can't stop everyone's enthusiasm for shopping.

In the imperial palace, in the Golden Luan Hall, Emperor Hongzhi was also having an early court meeting with his officials to conduct a year-end summary. Seeing that the New Year holiday is about to begin, the things that should be arranged must be arranged well, so that they can celebrate the New Year happily.

Liu Jin looked at Zhu Houzhao who was standing at the front. This guy has never liked going to the morning court, but today it is extremely difficult. To promote his newly developed clock and watch, he actually came to sit in the advertisement in person.

Well, after all, this guy is still doing what he likes to do. Going to the morning court is just an illusion. It is the same as when he was selling mirrors. It is mainly for advertising and selling his own clocks and watches.

Liu Jin gently rolled up his sleeves and looked at the watch on his wrist.

This is the latest work of the Daming Watch Firm led by Zhu Houzhao - a watch, um, this watch in Liu Jin's hand is the second watch of Daming, and the first watch is in the hands of Zhu Houzhao.

There is basically no big difference between the watch in my hand and the watches of later generations. The only difference is that there are four pointers on it, and one more pointer pointing to the hour.

Therefore, this watch can not only tell the time, but also can see the time at once. It is a fusion of the characteristics of Daming. In addition, the decoration on the outside is also made of auspicious clouds and auspicious colors, without the cold feeling of machinery. , more warm colors.

"It seems that everyone is not in the mood to go to court early, and they all want to go to court early for the annual holiday."

Looking at the time, it was only ten o'clock, but no minister had stepped forward to play a role.

"There is something to play, nothing to retreat~"

After Li Dongyang reported the duty arrangements of various ministries and yamen at the end of next year, no one stood up for several minutes, Xiao Jing also opened his voice and shouted loudly.

After waiting for a few more minutes, still no ministers came out to play a role. Xiao Jing and Emperor Hongzhi looked at each other, and when they were about to raise their voices to call for retreat, Zhu Houzhao stood up.

"Father, my son, I have a gift for you."

Zhu Houzhao said solemnly.

Hearing Zhu Houzhao's words, Liu Jin's eyes went dark, don't talk about sending the bell, otherwise, although Emperor Hongzhi is not sick, he will probably be half dead with anger.

"Oh, what gift does the prince want to give me?"

When Emperor Hongzhi heard this, he was slightly surprised. He was surprised that Zhu Houzhao came to the court today, and he still had a gift for himself.

"Not only you, father, but I also prepared a gift for everyone above the third rank in the imperial court."

Zhu Houzhao said pretending to be mysterious.

"The prince also prepared gifts for everyone."

Emperor Hongzhi and the ministers in the court immediately laughed happily.

"Prince, if you have any presents, take them out quickly, and don't keep it up."

Emperor Hongzhi looked at Zhu Houzhao lovingly. Seeing that Zhu Houzhao was about to become an adult, it was rare for him to know how to give everyone gifts.

"Everyone follow me outside first."

Zhu Houzhao still pretended to be very mysterious, and took the lead to walk to the square outside the Golden Luan Temple.

Emperor Hongzhi and his officials immediately found it interesting, and they were all guessing what kind of medicine was sold in the prince's gourd.

Anyway, now it can be regarded as retreating from the court, and there is nothing to do. Emperor Hongzhi looked at the officials, nodded, got off the dragon chair and took the lead to go outside.

The ministers also followed Emperor Hongzhi, and soon came to the square outside.

At this time, on the top of the city tower directly in front of Taihe Square, a drum-like building was covered by a big red cloth.

Well, this is the work of the prince. Zhu Houzhao is the only one who can build the bell tower in the palace. Anyway, Liu Jin has no choice.

"What kind of medicine is sold in this gourd, Prince?"

After leaving the Golden Luan Hall, Zhang Mao came to Liu Jin's side, touched Liu Jin lightly and asked.

"We'll find out later."

In fact, Liu Jin has already guessed about half-baked, but he still has to keep selling.

This made Zhang Mao on the side immediately upset. This Liu Jin was going too far, and even dared to play tricks on him.

Then he looked at the red cloth on the tower in front of him, thought for a while and said, "Is it related to the thing covered by this red cloth? It has been more than a month."

"Mr. Zhang, you will find out later."

Liu Jin smiled.

"Brat~"

Zhang Mao was even more angry, but he had no choice but to look at the prince, looking forward to Zhu Houzhao's next words.

At this time, Emperor Hongzhi and his ministers all came to Taihe Square. Zhu Houzhao looked at it and then nodded slightly to Liu Jin. The other party immediately understood, and immediately asked the people next to him to wave a small flag.

Soon, under the tower directly opposite the Golden Luan Hall, numerous palace guards pulled the red cloth off slowly under the command of the little yellow gate.

As the red cloth fell slowly, and with the sunlight shining, a huge clock tower appeared in front of everyone. This clock tower was very large, with a diameter of several meters. Large emeralds, big jade, and many small emeralds, small gems, etc. are embellished and decorated.

Under the sunlight, these emeralds, gemstones, jade, etc. shone with colorful light.

"What is this?"

Emperor Hongzhi, Liu Jian, Li Dongyang, Xie Qian, Zhang Mao and others looked at the huge clock tower, and they were all slightly dumbfounded. This thing looks very strange.

A round thing, with some words and numbers written on it, and a few needles turning, strange.

Everyone looked at the clock carefully.

"Zichou Yinmao, Chenshi Wuwei, Shenyou Xuhai, one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, eleven, twelve..."

"The hour is engraved on it, and some numbers are engraved on it. What does this mean?"

A minister looked at some words and numbers above, and then read them out.

"What time is it now?"

When Emperor Hongzhi heard it, he seemed to think of something, and immediately asked Xiao Jing.

As soon as Xiao Jing heard this, he quickly winked at the little yellow door beside him, and the other party immediately ran to ask, and soon came back to report: "Report to Your Majesty, it will be four o'clock soon! "

"It's four o'clock?"

Emperor Hongzhi and Liu Jian, Li Dongyang, Xie Qian, Zhang Mao and others beside Emperor Hongzhi immediately looked towards the clock tower, and they could clearly see that the shortest pointer among them was pointing to the position of Sishi.

"Clang~clang~"

At this time, the clock tower rang out bursts of crisp bells, and when it was on time, the clock tower automatically rang the bell to announce the time.

Liu Jin rolled up his sleeves and checked, it was exactly ten o'clock.

"Haha, everyone must have guessed it~"

"That's right, this is the gift I want to give to Father, the first machine in the entire Ming Dynasty that can be used to automatically calculate time - the Daming Clock!"

Zhu Hou looked at everyone's appearance, and immediately laughed happily.

"Big Ming clock?"

Hearing Zhu Houzhao's words, the faces of Emperor Hongzhi and all the ministers couldn't help turning dark. This prince is really speechless.

Fortunately, everyone didn't think too much at this time, but was attracted by Zhu Houzhao's introduction, a machine that can calculate time?

"A machine that counts time?"

Li Dongyang looked at the clock tower carefully again curiously.

"In the past, we used to calculate time by using things like clepsydra and hourglass. Generally, we can only calculate to a certain moment, and we cannot know the specific time point."

"But this machine I invented is different."

"I divide a day into twelve hours, each hour is divided into two hours, each hour is divided into sixty minutes, and each minute is divided into sixty seconds."

"Look carefully, everyone, the longest pointer, it takes [-] seconds to turn around, which is one minute."

"The pointer of the second game, it turns around for [-] minutes, which is an hour, half an hour."

"The third field is the hour hand. It makes one revolution for twelve hours, and two revolutions for twelve hours, which is one day."

"I will take noon as the boundary, and divide the day into two parts. The first 12 hours are six hours, and the next 12 hours are six hours."

"This 1234 corresponds to the hour. For example, it is four quarters of the past time, which is exactly ten o'clock. The clock tower will automatically ring the bell and tell the time automatically."

"In this way, everyone can clearly know the exact time point at all times in the future, instead of using hourglasses, clepsydra and the like to calculate time, which is not accurate enough."

Zhu Houzhao proudly introduced his works to everyone.

Emperor Hongzhi and all the ministers listened carefully and looked at the clock tower carefully.

"This...isn't this amazing?"

"It's unbelievable that there is such a machine that can calculate time."

"Unbelievable~"

All the ministers showed expressions of surprise.

To be honest, everyone didn’t really have a deep concept about this before, that is, try to come as early as possible every morning when you go to court, and other than that, you just look at the sun in the sky and know roughly what time it is.

But now, the clock tower made by Zhu Houzhao can accurately tell you what time it is, how many minutes it is, and what time and minutes it is, which is very remarkable.

　Isn't it a little unlucky to be called the Great Ming Bell?
　　
　
(End of this chapter)