At this moment, Zheng Zhilong already regretted rashly starting a fight with Liu Pei! He didn't expect Liu Pei to be such a difficult and crazy person! He actually dared to fight with people who were more than ten times his strength, and he fought like this

Excellent! But there is no turning back now. If he gives up, he will never be the leader of the sea! The sea does not accept weaklings!

Zheng Zhilong stayed in the room for a long time, and then went out after completely calming down. What he has to do now is to appease his current allies, hoping that they will not waver, so as not to weaken his power again. At the same time, he urges his people to seize the time and continue to track down Liu.

The whereabouts of the Pei fleet.

But the sea is vast, and he kept searching for Liu Pei's lair in the sea relying on wrong inferences. How could this achieve any results?

The time was approaching the end of the month in a blink of an eye. During this period, Zheng Zhilong was surprised to find that he had only lost three ships this month. And they were three ships in a fleet. So Zheng Zhilong guessed whether Liu Pei shrunk.

Returning to his hometown, he doesn't plan to continue to fight against himself? Maybe it won't be long before Liu Pei's envoy comes over. Thinking of this, Zheng Zhilong even felt a little smug, feeling that he had the upper hand.

Other maritime merchants also discovered this situation. Many of them came to the same conclusion as Zheng Zhilong. Only a few people felt that things were not as wonderful as everyone imagined. Liu Peigan was ten times stronger than himself.

How could he retract his hand so easily when there are several times more opponents to fight? The only possibility is that he is resting and accumulating strength. When Liu Pei appears again, it will probably be a big war! But no one said this out loud.

They just watched the next development of things coldly.

It was a dark and windy night, and a strange-looking ship took advantage of the darkness to quietly approach the new island. Not only did this ship look strange, it also had a strange color! From the bow to the stern, the entire ship was black

Yes, even the sails are black! This makes it difficult to spot in the dark, especially after it extinguishes all the lights, just like a ghost on the sea!

If any knowledgeable person sees this small boat, they will be surprised to find that this is a boat that should not appear here! It is the famous clipper boat!

Clipper boats, also known as clipper sailboats or clipper sailboats, are a type of high-speed sailboat that originated in the United States. The starting speed generally exceeds 20 knots! It is the fastest sailboat in history!

The first clipper ship to appear was represented by the "Ann Markin" built in 1832, with a displacement of 493 tons and a horizontal sail rig. Many people believe that she was the first real clipper ship. However,

She still does not have a hollow bow, so in fact she is still not qualified and can only be called a sub-clipper.

On January 22, 1845, the "Rainbow", designed by American ship designer John Griffiths and built at Smith-Diemen Shipyard in New York, was launched. The ship has the hallmark hollow bow of a clipper ship and is recognized as

It is the world's first true clipper sailboat. Although its length-to-width ratio is 5, its speed has not yet reached the amazing speed that future clipper ships can achieve. However, the completion of the "Hong Kong" is still a milestone in the world's shipping industry.

It caused a sensation, and her design features were later imitated by many ship designers. Her birth represented a major leap in the development of sailing ships.

The most famous figure in the history of the development of clipper sailboats in the United States is Donald McKay. He was a ship designer and manufacturer in Boston who developed 33 high-performance clipper ships. This type of ship has a small freeboard.

, less superstructure not only improves the stability of the ship, but also can give full play to the role of the sail. The ship sails almost close to the water, and the aspect ratio is generally greater than 6:1. Its underwater shape is designed to minimize resistance to increase the speed.

, but maintains a certain lateral resistance profile, resulting in a particularly beautiful waterline, and even a concave surface on the bow waterline. The long and sharp curved scissor-shaped bow post presents a posture suitable for racing, and can break waves on the sea.

(Cut the waves) forward to reduce wave resistance, so it is called a flying shear ship.

The bow post also extends the length of the hull. If you extend a sloping bar along the bow post, you can hang more jibs on the bow, which will help expand the capacity of the stay sail; the hollow bow makes it easier for the ship to lift its head in the waves, which improves the efficiency of the ship.

It has directional stability in waves. The tapered waterline of the rear body transitions harmoniously to the narrow rounded tail, blending harmoniously with the graceful bow shape.

What is more obvious about this type of clipper ship is that the sail area is very large. It usually uses 3-4 masts with fully equipped sails. It often uses high masts, with a height of up to 3/4 of the length. There are also moon sails and moon sails hung on the top sails.

Stay sails sometimes have outriggers on both sides of the ship, called wing masts, which can be hung with wing sails, which increases the lateral extension area of ​​the sail. On a 3-mast clipper ship, the front mast is farther from the stern of the ship, so

A slightly shorter spline can be used to reduce the interference between the sails. It can be seen that the lateral size of the sail greatly exceeds the width of the ship.

Although the clipper ship can run fast, unfortunately, it cannot be used as a warship! This is because the bow of the clipper ship can split the waves and prevent the waves from hitting the deck. In the past, ships could not sail in the ocean, so they did not pay much attention to this.

Point, in addition, before World War I, the speed of ships was generally slow, so the waves were not very obvious, but as the speed became faster and faster, ships with a forward tilt angle were prone to have their bows buried in the sea, which was very dangerous. Therefore, fast clipper ships

Destined to be a merchant ship only.

This small clipper boat was specially requested by Liu Pei from a master craftsman.

They built it. Originally, Liu Pei only considered building a few smaller clipper ships as messenger ships. After all, Liu Pei's current territory is too scattered, and he has to travel back and forth between Shandong and Liu Pei from time to time. If

It would be convenient to have a fast ship. So Liu Peipei arranged to build three scaled-down versions of the clipper ships. Unexpectedly, as soon as the war started, the clipper ships would come in handy! To communicate between the fleets, to transport the seriously injured

, emergency supplies, they did a great job!

The black clipper boat lowered its sails and slowly approached the side of the cliff on the new island, then slowly stopped. A small boat was put down on the boat, and six people rowed the boat close to the bottom of the cliff. One person got up and clung to the vines attached to the cliff.

What are you looking for here?

Soon, the man found a thick camouflaged rope among the vines. Six people climbed up the cliff along the rope. All six people were wearing black clothes, black trousers, and black scarves covering their faces! It was impossible to climb up the cliff at night.

Can't see their presence clearly.

After reaching the cliff, several people dispersed without discussion. After about an hour and a half, the six people regrouped at the top of the cliff and climbed back to the boat along the rope. They covered the rope and returned to the clipper boat, and the boat

Raising the sail, it quickly disappeared into the darkness before dawn.

At this time, the new island has become a supply depot and anchorage for Zheng Zhilong's side. Zheng Zhilong did not want to attack the new island at first. He knew clearly that an isolated island was meaningless. As long as he eliminated Liu Pei's maritime power, this

The island will easily fall into his hands. And by keeping Liu Pei's man there, he will prevent others from getting the island first.

But as the war progressed, Zheng Zhilong needed a victory to boost his morale! So he thought of Xindao at this time. As long as he captured Xindao cleanly and beautifully, he could use this victory to prove that he could defeat Liu Pei.

Ability!

But what drove him crazy was that when the team he sent landed on the new island, they discovered that the people on the new island had disappeared! But except for a "Trespassers Die" sign on the beach, all the people inside

This facility is very well preserved. It seems that Liu Pei thinks he can come back here again.

Liu Pei not only expanded the cottage, but also built a large barracks on the dock. His subordinates reported to Zheng Zhilong that the cottage and barracks were fully equipped with tables, chairs and beds, as well as food and condiments. It seemed that the people inside were just going out temporarily!

At first, Zheng Zhilong thought Liu Pei would poison the food and water left behind. However, after careful inspection, no signs of poisoning were found. The pirates tried the food and found no problems. This made Zheng Zhilong confused about what Liu Pei was thinking.
Chapter completed!