Brother Zhu Youxiao

Chapter 396 The First Industrial Revolution

"Woooo..."

In the afternoon of the seventh day of February, the siren sounded in Mentougou.

Because of the valley terrain, the sound of the whistle could be heard several miles away, and Zhu Ciran, who heard the sound of the whistle, hastily opened the window and stuck his head out.

His expectant eyes didn't show for two seconds, and he didn't even see clearly the Armament Academy on the horizon, so he was pulled back vigorously by a hand.

"Come back and sit down, open the window at will to be easily attacked by assassins."

Li Dingguo muttered and closed the window, while Zhu Ciran looked at Zhu Youjian with bright eyes:

"Uncle Qi, is the fourth version of the steam engine coming out?"

"Not yet. This should be the whistle caused by the third version of the steam engine high-pressure boiler experiment."

Zhu Youjian sat down and dealt with the memorial, and Zhu Ciran immediately asked urgently like a sponge absorbing sea water after hearing it:
"What is a high pressure boiler?"

"The high-pressure boiler is..." Zhu Youjian paused, and after realizing it, he frowned and shifted his gaze from the memorial to Zhu Ciran:
"Why do you ask this? You don't need to worry about this, as long as you finish your homework first."

"I'm just curious. I've finished my homework." Zhu Ciran took out his homework and handed it to Zhu Youjian as if showing off.

Zhu Youjian glanced at it, and then explained: "A high-pressure boiler is a boiler whose steam gauge pressure is higher than that of an ordinary boiler."

"What is the pressure? Why use a high-pressure boiler? Is this boiler any different from boilers for heating such as fire walls and floor heating?" Zhu Ciran asked quickly.

Zhu Youjian felt a little uneasy when he looked at his anxious appearance, feeling that excessively enlightening the other party's interest might cause the other party to "not do business properly", so Zhu Youjian frowned and said:
"These things are found in physics textbooks, just read them carefully."

"Do you have it?" Hearing that there were physics textbooks, Zhu Ciran immediately turned around and searched on the carriage's bookshelf.

Although Zhu Youxiao and Zhang Yan did not want the three princes to go to government schools, Zhu Youjian arranged for them to teach them the same textbooks as government schools, and added Chinese studies.

Zhu Ciran searched on the bookshelf, and then found the book "Fundamental Physics", and then opened the catalog to find the basic knowledge about boilers and air pressure.

While reading it, he said, "Uncle Qi, why can you write these things that cannot be seen in other books?"

"Let's read in peace..." Zhu Youjian was helpless. Facing the "Zhu Shiwan" who had a hundred thousand whys in front of him, he just wanted to be quiet and finish the remaining three memorials before arriving at the Military Armament Academy.

"Oh..." Zhu Ciran didn't feel dissatisfied after being called to be quiet, but flipped through "Fundamental Physics" with great interest.

Compared to him, Li Dingguo next to him was much more mature, so he didn't need anyone to urge him, so he picked up a copy of "Politics" to read after Zhu Ciran was quiet.

This book was written by Zhu Youjian, but this book is not circulated in the market, and there are only three copies.

One is the one in his hand, the other is in the library of Prince Qi's Mansion, and the last one is on Zhu Youxiao's bookshelf.

Based on Li Dingguo's military talent, Zhu Youjian deliberately asked him to read this "Political Treatise" while studying.

The science and technology of Ming Dynasty is advancing, and in the future, there is not much need for simple military generals, but for generals like Xiong Tingbi, Sun Chuanting, Hong Chengchou, Yang Wenyue, and Wu Aheng, who are sympathetic to both civil and military affairs.

Zhu Youjian intends to train Li Dingguo to be his successor. He has calculated according to the time set by his brother, and estimated that when he is 45 years old, he will go to America and take over Qi.

When he was 45 years old, Li Dingguo was just 35 years old. Whether he served as the governor of the Shangzhi Governor's Mansion, the governor of any army, or joined the cabinet to assist the government, there was no big problem at this age.

Therefore, in the face of Li Dingguo's inquiries, he always tried his best to answer, for example, right now...

"Your Highness, when I read "On Politics" and "On War", I always feel that there are some similarities. Why? There is also the sentence at the beginning of "On War" that 'war is the continuation of politics'. Can you explain it to me?"

Li Dingguo looked at Zhu Youjian, and Zhu Youjian, who was working, also stopped his pen when he heard the words. He was just about to answer, but saw Zhu Ciran holding "Fundamental Physics" with great interest, and immediately greeted him:

"Ran'er, listen to the answer to this question first."

"Oh..." Hearing Zhu Youjian calling himself, Zhu Ciran reluctantly put down the book in his hand, and then got involved in the topics of politics and war without energy.

Seeing Zhu Ciran's lazy appearance, Zhu Youjian could only sigh from the bottom of his heart, and then explained

"War is politics, and war itself is an action of a political nature. Since ancient times, there has been no war without politics."

"Politics has developed to a certain stage and can no longer proceed as usual, so war broke out to remove obstacles on the political road."

"When the obstacle is removed, the political goal is achieved, and the war ends."

"If the obstacles are not cleared, the war must continue to be carried out."

"Put simply, politics is war without bloodshed, war is politics with bloodshed, and war is for politics."

"For example, in the current South Asian feudal vassal war, why did the country want to fight a place far away from the sea?"

After Zhu Youjian explained, he asked questions like a school exam, while Zhu Ciran rushed to answer:
"For gold and silver, for land, for the population market!"

Zhu Ciran only saw the superficial things, but he is only eight years old now, so it is not bad to be able to say these things, but Zhu Youjian set his sights on Li Dingguo.

Facing the question, the ten-year-old Li Dingguo did not answer directly, but said after thinking about it:
"For the sake of resources and the market, the other thing is to enshrine the vassal king and remove the internal unrest factors of the original kingdom. This will not only solve the problem of the vassal king, but also obtain land, gold and silver from the vassal king."

Li Dingguo said more comprehensively than Zhu Ciran, but he also missed many key things.

In this regard, Zhu Youjian bowed his head to deal with the memorial, and added:
"In order to maintain the suzerain-vassal system of the Ming Dynasty, an economic circle belonging to the suzerain-vassal system of the Ming Dynasty was established to ensure the legitimacy of the Ming Dynasty."

He said, while Li Dingguo nodded his head half-understood, while Zhu Ciran felt that he was listening to the scriptures.

Seeing that Zhu Youjian didn't speak, he secretly picked up "Fundamental Physics" and read it.

Seeing this, Li Dingguo also picked up "Politics" again, while Zhu Youjian was having a headache for the memorial in his hand.

The memorial in his hand is from the Ministry of Household Affairs, which was written by Bi Ziyan.

This memorial is full of crying for poverty, and the reason for crying for poverty is that Bi Ziyan has his eyes on the tens of millions of taels of gold and silver in the national treasury.

Of course, the household department is indeed poor.

After the tax was collected in autumn last year, what surprised people was that Tian Fu did not receive 500 million shimimai, but only 900 million shi.

The reason is relatively simple, that is, the severe drought in several provinces has led to the failure of food harvests in various places.

Although it has rained since the beginning of spring and the drought is subsiding, the people who lost their harvest due to the severe drought last year still need the court to solve their income and food problems in the months from spring planting to autumn harvest.

In Bi Ziyan's memorandum, it is clearly stated that at least 700 million people will be affected by the disaster and need to survive until the autumn harvest. Counting the victims in Shaanxi, Shanxi, Huguang and Guangdong, a total of about 300 million people will be affected by the disaster.

This accounted for one-eleventh of the population of Ming Dynasty was affected by the disaster, which naturally put a great financial test on Daming.

The plan given by the cabinet and the six ministries still continues the "relief with work" plan formulated by Zhu Youjian.

Based on the construction of the cement plant in the south of Yingzhou, Yingzhou can export 60 stones of cement per month and build [-] miles of cement roads under the guarantee of its own construction.

Therefore, the proposal given by the Ministry of Industry is to directly transfer the 60 surplus cement in Yingzhou to Huguang and Nanzhili, especially Jingzhou, Xiangyang, and Yunyang in Huguang, according to the annual quota of 720 million shi. Sanfu.

At present, only these three prefectures in Huguang are directly affected by the disaster. Using the annual production of 150 million shi cement in Huguang and Nanzhili, plus 720 million shi in Yingzhou, can solve the employment problem of local people and build The [-]-mile mansion road kills two birds with one stone.

According to the estimates of the Ministry of Household Affairs, there are more than 100 million people directly affected by the disaster in Huguang and Nanzhili, and more than 300 million people who have lost their grain harvest, totaling about 470 million.

The standard given by the Ministry of Industry is that each region has a construction period of 120 days, wages of 140 renminbi, 280 million workers are expected to be recruited, and public funds for disaster relief are [-] million taels.

This seemed good, but Zhu Youjian became suspicious.

Involving Cement Fudao, Nanzhili, and Huguang, he couldn't help but care about this matter.

Who knows if Bi Ziyan united with the local gentry to provide relief with work and use gold and silver from the court to benevolent to the common people?

"Let Cui Yingyuan check Nanzhili to see if there are so many affected people in Nanzhili."

Zhu Youjian explained to Wang Chengen, and then he lowered his head and continued to read Bi Ziyan's memorial.

In the follow-up report, millions of people were affected by the disaster in the four prefectures of Guangdong. Bi Ziyan asked Jiaozhi to transfer 150 million stone cement to Guangdong for work relief.

As for Shaanxi, Shanxi, and Xuanfu in Northern Zhili, a total of 800 million people were affected by the disaster in the three places, Shanxi was the most affected, with more than 340 million people affected, Xuanfu more than [-] people, and Shaanxi more than [-] million people
In these three places, the wages are priced at ten coins, and the three places recruit 100 million taels of silver in Shanxi, 20 in Xuanfu, and 100 million in Shaanxi. The construction period of the three places is 150 days, and the relief fund is 400 million taels of silver.

Not only that, the Ministry of Industry invited the Yuma Supervisor to transport grain from all over the country to Shanxi from March to stabilize the price of grain and maintain the price of grain at [-] yuan until September.

In September, after the sweet potatoes in Northern Zhili matured, another 500 million stone sweet potatoes were dispatched to Shanxi for direct disaster relief.

In other words, the imperial court now needs to directly transfer 740 million taels of cash.

In addition, if we want to stabilize food prices in Shanxi and Shaanxi, and let the more than 800 million people affected by the disaster in Shanxi and Shaanxi have enough food, we need at least 400 million shi of rice and wheat. In addition, we need to adjust 500 million shi of sweet potatoes in the future.

Rice and wheat will be wasted, especially if it is transported to the inland, even if it is transported by water, it will be transported to Luoyang at most. There are more than 600 miles left, and at least a quarter of the grain will be lost.

In general, it is 740 million taels of silver, 3000 million shimimai, and 700 million shi sweet potatoes.

It's almost 400 million taels of silver after all the discounts, so it's not surprising that Bi Ziyan cried poor.

Last year, the imperial court received 900 million shimimai and more than 900 million taels of tax silver. However, this year, the expenditure for the six ministries alone was 800 million taels, and the military pay was 300 million taels. The total expenditure was 100 million taels.

Therefore, at the beginning of the year, the imperial court had already applied to Zhu Youjian to allocate more than 200 million taels of minted silver from the Finance Department.

But even so, there are still more than 100 million taels of silver and 1504 million taels of gold.

If copper is added, the price of the three items converted into silver is more than 200 million taels of silver.

This is the amount of Huanglong's 170 million taels of gold, 500 million taels of silver and more than 100 boxes of jewels. If the gold and silver ships from the Navy's Governor's Mansion arrive, the gold and silver minted in the national treasury will reach more than 700 Ten thousand taels.

As the secretary of the household department, Bi Ziyan naturally knew how many coins, gold and silver were hidden in the national treasury, so it was not surprising that he was jealous.

It's just that he is jealous, but Zhu Youjian can't.

Although there are a lot of minted gold and silver, there is a problem, that is, they are all gold and silver brought back from overseas. If they are put into the market at once, Daming will encounter inflation in an instant.

To be honest, the Minister of the Household Department of the Ming Dynasty did a good job in increasing income and reducing expenditure, but his financial awareness was poor.

The treasure banknotes are such a sharp weapon that it is no one to be discarded by the emperor and the Minister of the Ministry of household affairs. After the treasure banknotes were discarded, Zhu Youjian had to use gold and silver coins to restore the trust of the people little by little, and dug him a big one. pit.

Not to mention the minting of coins, just considering the total amount of money in Ming Dynasty at the moment, the sudden release of tens of millions of taels of gold and silver from outside is enough to have an impact on local prices.

The total amount of currency in Ming Dynasty, that is, gold, silver and copper coins, these three items add up to silver, and the value of the currency will not exceed 25 billion taels of silver.

Of course, these are the ones that are circulating in the market, and those that are buried underground are not counted.

But even so, releasing tens of millions of taels of foreign silver in one go with a total currency of 25 billion taels of silver would undoubtedly be a devastating disaster for farming civilization.

Ming’s silver inflation turned into a silver crunch because of the 30-year war in Europe. Now it’s hard for Zhu Youjian to solve the problem of silver crunch. If he releases too much gold and silver, it will lead to inflation.

It's good to say that it's released in the south, because the population in the south is large, and it can accommodate a lot.

But in the north, especially in Shanshan, where the economy is almost non-existent, the release of so much silver is a bit suspected of inflating prices, because it is difficult for silver to circulate, and it is also difficult for Huangdian to transport supplies.

Zhu Youjian had always thought of exchanging new coins for old coins, and then slowly releasing gold and silver as the population of Ming Dynasty grew, rather than using them as soon as they were available.

Bi Ziyan's idea is very good, but it doesn't apply to the current Daming.

Perhaps he saw the idea of ​​Zhu Youjian arbitrarily disposing of overseas gold and silver earlier, but at that time Zhu Youjian arbitrarily disposing of overseas gold and silver was also because the situation in Ming Dynasty was a tightening of silver.

Now that prices are stable and the currency is stable, it will not be good to use a large amount of overseas gold and silver.

Therefore, for this disaster relief, Zhu Youjian decided to continue using food stamps after thinking about it.

He picked up the ink pen and crossed out more than 700 million taels of silver, and then directly wrote "a day's work, three catties of rice".

Although in this way, Daming needs to transfer more rice and wheat to Shanxi and Shaanxi, at least it will not cause the local economy to continue to be damaged.

but……

"The population of Shanxi and Shaanxi is still too much..."

Zhu Youjian frowned tightly. He has an embarrassing point, that is Shanxi and Shaanxi.

Under four years of continuous severe drought, it was easy to relocate people from Shaanxi and Shanxi, but it was very difficult to relocate people back after the severe drought was over.

It is not difficult to support 200 million people in Guanzhong. The Weishui Plain has never stopped flowing during the 17-year drought in Chongzhen. This means that there is no problem with the more than 1000 million mu of irrigated land in the Guanzhong Plain being used for farming.

If Guanzhong only supports 200 million people, it can still afford it, but the question is where the remaining 200 million people will migrate.

Moved to Hexi, but it seems that the drought in Hexi will break out in a few years later, when the mountains are high and the roads are far away, it will be more difficult to provide relief.

But if they don't move to Hexi, the population in the northwest is insufficient, and the Ming army wants to march west, it will become a moon in the water, a flower in the mirror.

Moreover, the population in the Northwest is insufficient, and it will be difficult to control the entire Western Regions and Central Asia in the future.

Now the most populous, but the productivity and desertification of the Western Regions are more severe than later generations, it is doomed to be easy to defend and difficult to attack.

The Qing army sent troops during the Little Warm Period, and as a result, Hexi, with a population of tens of millions, could not even feed the 3 or 400 people on the South Road, let alone Daming, which was still in the Little Ice Age and had a population of only [-] million in Hexi.

Unless the Ming army can use 1 people to defeat Yarkand and Wala, which control tens of thousands of strings in the Western Regions, they will wait for the train to be built.

The problem in the Northwest is here. Without the population, it will be difficult to conquer the West in the future, and the control over the territory of the West Frontier will be the lowest among all the territories, because there is not enough population.

However, if the population remains, it will cost tens of millions of rice and wheat to feed them every year, which is a dilemma.

"There are still 12 years of severe drought in Shaanxi, and 12 years is enough to reproduce a generation..."

After thinking about it, Zhu Youjian still decided to relocate the people from Shaanxi, and this time to Sichuan, because there are also disaster victims in Sichuan who can move south.

After he made a decision, the carriage also arrived at the gate of the Military Academy City and stopped.

Zhu Ciran hurriedly got out of the car, and Li Dingguo was the second to follow, but he wanted to get Wang Chengen and Zhu Youjian to get off the car with a stool.

Only Zhu Youjian and Wang Chengen were left in the car. Wang Chengen wanted to help Zhu Youjian get up, but he also said at the same time:
"The disaster victims in Shaanxi will move another 100 million to Sichuan, where they will be resettled in Baoning, Tongchuan, and Shunqing in northern Sichuan. As for the more than 40 local people, they will move southward together with the [-] people in Chongqing, Luzhou, and Syria. Yunnan."

"Didn't Sichuan get more than 150 million taels of silver and more than 170 million shimimai after the gentry's property was seized?"

"He ordered Li Banghua to distribute 120 million taels of rice and wheat to the victims as travel expenses to move southward, and another 100 million taels of silver to be delivered to Yunnan, and told Hong Chengchou to use the 100 million taels of silver to properly resettle the 120 million victims."

After Zhu Youjian finished speaking, Wang Chengen also helped him out of the carriage.

But after getting off the carriage, Wang Chengen hesitated and said:

"Your Highness, among the 120 million people in eastern Sichuan, 100 million of them migrated from northern Shaanxi to the south."

"The year before last was a year of stability. Last year, there was a severe drought. Now it's been another year of stability. Just after the spring planting ended, they were asked to relocate. Will relocating twice in four years hurt them too much..."

"People can't live anymore, so it doesn't matter if it hurts or not..." Zhu Youjian shook his head.

He has nothing to do, hurting the 120 million people and spending more than 100 million taels to resettle them is better than spending millions of taels to keep the 100 million Shaanxi people alive.

The former hurts the people, while the latter kills the people. Neither of them pleases them.

At present, 100 million people have been relocated, and there are only about 380 million people in Shaanxi.

More than 150 million are in Hetao, 200 million are in Guanzhong, and more than 30 are in Hanzhong.

With this arrangement, at least these 380 million people can live a two-year life after the intensity of this year's drought decreases.

"Your Majesty, welcome Your Highness, Your Highness is thousand years old..."

When Zhu Youjian ordered Wang Chengen, the gate of the Armament Academy opened, and four people, including Bi Maokang, Wang Zheng, Song Yingxing, and Song Yingchang, who had been doing scientific research here, walked out of the city gate wearing round collar robes, with more than a hundred Hanlin doctors behind them.

"Is the fourth version of the steam engine out?!"

As soon as he saw the research group of four, Zhu Ciran rushed forward, while Bi Maokang smiled and bowed in response:
"With a breakthrough, the day when it will come out is probably not far away."

"Hurry up, hurry up, take me to have a look." Hearing that the fourth version of the steam engine had made a major breakthrough, Zhu Ciran immediately begged, making it impossible for people to think that he is the current prince.

"This..." Bi Maokang smiled helplessly, looked up at Zhu Youjian, and Zhu Youjian also came over with Li Dingguo and Wang Chengen.

He heard the conversation between Bi Maokang and Zhu Ciran just now, so he naturally knew about the fourth version of the steam engine, so he asked:

"What's the problem?"

"There are not too many problems, the main problem is thermal efficiency and rotational speed. The current thermal efficiency is around 5.00%, and the rotational speed is 240 rpm. Although it exceeds the third version of the steam engine, it still does not meet the requirements of the fourth version. "

After Bi Maokang mentioned the problem, he said with relief, "Liangfu can solve all these problems, just experiment."

"Really?" Zhu Youjian looked at Wang Zheng when he heard the words. He didn't expect Wang Zheng to be so fast.

"Don't dare to deceive Your Highness." Wang Zheng bowed in response and continued to report:

"Although the fourth version of the steam engine still needs experimental time, we have already calculated the approximate power of the steam engine on the train and ship. It is roughly as follows..."

As Wang Zheng said, he took out two experimental drafts from his sleeve, and after Zhu Youjian took them, he looked at the cumbersome design drawings of trains and ships at the end of the nineteenth century, and sighed that it was not that Ming had no talents, but that no one reused them. , just tap them.

"The fourth version of the steam locomotive weighs 6 jin, travels at 200 miles per hour, can tow [-] jin of goods, has ten carriages and two coals, can carry [-] people, fills water once, and can run fifty miles with two coal cars. "

"The steam engine of the steam engine ship is heavier. After loading the steam engine on a ship with 55 catties and [-] catties, the ship can reach a speed of about [-] miles per hour, and every two thousand catties of coal can run [-] miles."

"Nine thousand ships can carry 80 jin of coal, 40 jin of water, and 180 million jin of cargo."

"Basically, each ship needs to reserve [-]% of the heavy water and coal, and basically load it once, so that the corresponding steam engine of the ship can operate for eight to sixteen days, ranging from five thousand to ten thousand miles at a stretch."

"Of course, this is the result of the experiment in the river. It may be discounted in the sea. We estimate that the efficiency will be discounted by [-]."

Wang Zheng explained modestly, but Zhu Youjian was very energetic after listening:
"Twenty percent off is enough!"

Zhu Youjian calculated that the speed of the Armament Academy is hours, not hours, so after converting the speed of trains and ships, it is basically [-] kilometers per hour.

This may seem slow, but it has achieved the efficiency of the late period of the first industrial revolution.

With [-] coal and water stations installed, materials can be transported from the capital to Jiayuguan, [-] miles away, within seven days, to the Ili River Valley within [-] days, and to Samarkand in Central Asia within [-] days.

If you want to go further west, it will only take 3000 days to go to Moscow, which is more than 22 miles away.

Needless to say, steamships departed from Tianjin and arrived in Guangzhou in 30 days, arrived in Old Port in [-] days, and arrived in Central America in [-] days.

It can be said that Daming is already ready for the construction of the fourth version of the steam engine, which also means that Daming is about to step into the industrial revolution...

　Nine o'clock in the evening
　　
　
(End of this chapter)