The last part was the burial. Ali’s coffin was let down into the previously dug pit. Then, the Chief Knight made all the militia members line up in front of the grave. Regardless of whether they were from the first team or the replacement, everyone had to step in front of the grave and throw in a shovel of earth into the grave. While queuing, the 200 hundred militia members stepped into their already all too familiar four columns. When it was Van’er’s turn, he suddenly felt that the shovel had become somewhat heavy as he
took it. He could feel that all the members around him were watching every movement of his, making him slow down.
When he finally stood to the side, Van’er could see with his own eyes that the next person in line was now under the same pressure he previously felt.
The tombstone was a rectangular piece of white stone, and there were also some words written on it, but he couldn’t read them. Ali wasn’t the first one who was buried in this place. Next to his grave stood another similar tombstone, covered by snow. When Van’er was leaving, he saw the other new Vice-Captain Brian standing in front of a stone, slowly pouring a pot of ale on the tombstone.
Van’er couldn’t help but think, if this becomes my last destination, it wouldn’t be so bad.
“Your Highness,” during the return back to the castle, Carter suddenly began to talk, “what you did… “
“Was inappropriate?” continued Roland.
“No,” Carter thought for a moment, but in the end he only shook his head and answered, “I don’t know how to say it, but I think no one has ever treated his employees like this — they have neither a title nor a family background, and most of them don’t even have a last name.”
“But in the end, do you think what I did was right?” asked Roland once more.
“Well…” Roland smiled and laughed, he certainly knew that this kind of ceremony had a strong appeal to Carter, who was also always fighting for and protecting him. When people start to think who they are fighting for and why they are going to war, such a ceremony could be good motivation. For Carter, this change had an even greater meaning, now this kind of honor wasn’t just a privilege for the nobility. During these times, the common people could already get the same training and teaching the nobility got, but now the civilians could also receive the honor of defending their homeland. The doubled sense of achievement was
absolutely inexplicable.
Of course, the introduction of the public funeral was just the beginning, Roland thought, he still had many ideas that could be used to enhance the collective sense of honor, such as
using flags, playing military songs, establishing a heroic example and so on.
It wasn’t possible to produce such spirit out of thin air. Roland would only to be able to increase their sense of belonging step by step and always instilling the idea, until it gradually took effect. In order to ensure that the pension project was set in motion and reliable, Roland had arranged all of it by himself. Within the Town Hall, he had set up a group of people who were responsible for the payment of the food and charcoal.
The further along Roland got on his way of upgrading Border Town, the heavier the pressure became on his shoulders. Even so, it seemed that the mining project and upgrading the people’s living conditions was on the right track. With sufficient grain reserves, so far no one had starved or frozen to death. Compared to other towns and cities, this seemed to be a miracle, even in Graycastle, some people had to die during the winter. Even knowing all this, Roland thought that Border Town was still lacking in many places.
His goals were much higher than this, but his range of operation had already reached his limit. His Assistant Minister Barov and his more than a dozen apprentices who he had brought with him were now controlling all the financial and administrative management of Border Town. If Roland wanted to further expand the department, just recruiting some management staff wasn’t possible. Roland had already asked Barov if he still knew some protégées colleague or favorite pupils, but the answer he got poured cold water on him:
“Even if I knew some, they wouldn’t want to come. After all, Your Highness should know what kind of reputation you have right?”
Well, that sounds kind of reasonable, but it was really depressing.
When they were back in the castle backyard, Nightingale emerged out of the fog immediately giving Wendy, who was standing in front of the shed, a warm hug. Lightning was walking around the unfinished steam engine, looking at it, but when she saw Roland, she immediately pestered Roland to assemble and install the autonomous machine.
Seeing all this, Roland thought that all his hard work was worth it.
Chapter 69 Cannon System
Four days later in the backyard.
Two deep holes were dug in the ground. Each hole was in a circular shape, and the deeper it went, the narrower its radius became. At ground level, its diameter was around 40 cm but its deepest part expanded to only 26 cm. These holes were the molds that Roland intended to use to produce his cannon prototypes. The inner walls of the holes were baked and hardened by Anna. She burned it so long that its surface was without any flaws, just like a shell. She began to harden the shell at the bottom and took all the air bubbles and scum with her as she moved upwards. During history, there were several sizes of cannons; Roland roughly remembered that the so-called six pound and eight pound cannons got their name from the weight of their shells. Roland’s first step for producing a cannon was to produce several twelve-pound balls, and then calculate their sizes according to the diameter and the wall thickness of the cannon’s shell.
In the absence of measurement tools, Roland simply created his own custom standard. He took an iron rod and separated it into many small parts with the width of the smallest phalanx of his ring finger, hoping to come close to one centimeter. After that, he created many copies of the iron rods.
The diameter of a twelve-pound iron ball, when measured with the new iron ruler, was around twelve centimeters. Because of this, the thinnest wall of the shell had to be four centimeters, and the rear end which was used as the detonation chamber would need to be seven centimeters thick to prevent self-explosion. As for length, there were many different kinds of cannons, like the cannons used on battleships, modern tanks, or antique front-loading artillery, so he really did not know which to choose.
Taking into account that the shorter the tube, the lighter the cannon would be and the more materials could be saved. Roland dismissively waved his hand, I will just build a cannon with a length of 1.5 meters; if the tests results aren’t satisfactory, I will adjust the length later.
When the cannon was originally invented, it was built with a wooden core and strengthened with iron rings, just like a barrel. Roland still remembered that this kind of cannon had the risk of air leaking and self-explosion, thus it would be better to mold the cannon bodies completely at once. When drilling out the cannon with a steam engine, there was no difference in producing a 6-pound cannon or a 12-pound cannon.
The so-called caliber was just a concept to differentiate between their sizes. If the muzzle was bigger, it became a 12 pounder. Everything beyond that couldn’t be used as field artillery. But the exact weight of the shells or the cannon balls wasn’t important as long as they shoot in a straight line. After all, he was only getting ideas from history and not replicating it.