The disgraced official I took care of was actually Zhu Houcong's childhood friend.

Chapter 351

In fact, there were quite a few people who shared the same thoughts as him, but most of them only dared to think about it in their hearts and would never dare to say it out loud. In their view, no matter how this commander showed his abilities, their children would definitely have to learn Confucianism, because Confucianism was the orthodox way and could lead to officialdom through the imperial examinations.

Zhou Chu naturally knew what these people were thinking, but he didn't say anything. Instead, he waved his hand and had someone bring over the hot air balloon that had been sewn from sheepskin over the past two days.

Zhou Chu didn't make a very big hot air balloon, but it was big enough to carry a sheep into the air.

For the first hot air balloon experiment, Zhou Chu did not plan to send anyone on board immediately, since there was no experience and many uncontrollable factors.

Zhou Chu first had his men quickly inflate the hot air balloon with dry grass on the combustion platform. When the balloon was full of gas and about to take off, Zhou Chu had a sheep placed in the basket at the bottom of the balloon. Then he cut the ropes binding the balloon, and the balloon wobbled and floated into the air.

The crowd below gasped in amazement at the sight, especially the eight- or nine-year-old children, whose eyes shone with excitement and some looked on with adoration.

Even Wang Yangming was somewhat shocked. He hadn't expected Zhou Chu to select students who wanted to study the study of things in this way. But then he thought that perhaps only in this way could everyone see the importance of the study of things.

"Everyone knows about Kongming lanterns. If you enlarge a Kongming lantern, this is what it looks like. I named it a hot air balloon. As you can see, this is just the most basic one. If we continue to develop it, we can take people into the air. This is an application of the study of natural phenomena."

Zhou Chu said loudly.

After Zhou Chu finished speaking, the students who were not very interested in the study of natural philosophy all had eyes full of curiosity.

"Hot air balloons are just one application of the study of natural phenomena. Next, I will show you another application of the study of natural phenomena."

As Zhou Chu spoke, he had someone bring over two bronze hemispheres, each edged with natural rubber.

This wasn't something made on the spur of the moment; it was something Zhou Chu had planned long ago. Back in Suzhou Prefecture, Zhou Chu had the craftsmen of the Southern Garrison Command make these two hemispheres. Hemispheres were easy to make, but natural rubber was very difficult to obtain.

At that time, there were no rubber trees in Annam or even the whole of Southeast Asia. If you wanted natural rubber, you had to go to more distant regions such as Malaysia to find it.

To this end, Zhou Chu specially ordered the Xuanwu Army to send a ship to the Malay Archipelago to obtain a lot of rubber from the local natives, and also specially introduced rubber trees to Annam and other regions for planting.

In addition to the two hemispheres, Zhou Chu also had the craftsmen of the Southern Garrison Command make a bronze syringe according to his requirements, which was used to draw water from the two hemispheres.

Zhou Chu had both hemispheres filled with water, then aligned and sealed. One hemisphere had a water outlet hole, which was plugged with a copper cone wrapped in rubber. Zhou Chu used a syringe to extract all the water from the hemisphere through the hole, and then plugged it again with the cone.

At this moment, the students were all completely confused. Not only them, but even Wang Yangming couldn't understand what Zhou Chu was going to do.

At this moment, under Zhou Chu's command, the Imperial Guards brought in more than a dozen horses, and first tied two horses to each side of the two hemispheres.

"Everyone, watch carefully."

After Zhou Chu finished speaking, he cracked his whip, and the four horses instantly started moving forward, but the forces from both sides canceled each other out, and they could not move.

The two joined hemispheres remained completely still in the middle, showing no sign of being pulled apart.

Upon seeing this, Wang Yangming had a flash of inspiration and immediately understood what Zhou Chu was doing; it must be the atmospheric pressure mentioned in that book.

When Wang Yangming first saw this part, he didn't quite understand it and found it very profound. How could there be pressure in the air? Now, seeing it, he suddenly realized something and felt enlightened.

The others were dumbfounded. They never imagined that two copper balls joined together could not be separated even with four horses. It was too exaggerated and completely beyond their comprehension.

Zhou Chu then had the number of horses on both sides increased from two to four, and repeated the process. The two hemispheres remained perfectly still when put together.

Even Wang Yangming was dumbfounded; he never expected that atmospheric pressure would be so terrifying.

The students and their parents were completely stunned. Although they didn't understand the underlying principles, they felt that this spectacle was something they had never heard of or seen before.

In the end, Zhou Chu had the number of horses on both sides increased to eight, and with a flick of the whip, the horses on both sides gave it their all.

Bang!

With a loud bang, the two hemispheres were finally pulled apart, and the horses all fell to the ground due to the sudden loss of strength.

"This is called air pressure, also known as air pressure intensity, and it is also an application of physics."

Zhou Chu looked at the students whose eyes were shining and smiled.