Daming: Mixed in Dangzhi County, Beiping

Chapter 125

"It's just that the villain has a question."

Suddenly, Ding Shang asked.

"What questions?" Zhu Di asked.

Ding Shang said in a slow voice: "Your Highness, the four sides of the iron furnace are seamless, so the poison cannot come out, it can only come out along the chimney.

In this way, some houses of villains and others have fire stoves, and the fire stoves are directly connected to the kang.So, is it okay to burn charcoal in the kang? "

"Ok?"

Zhu Di was taken aback, "What is the kang?"

Zhu Di grew up in the south, and had never seen a kang.

"Your Highness, you can tell by looking at the house next door!"

Guo An said.

"Let's go, let's see the kang!" Zhu Di was also a little excited.

Immediately, after taking two steps, they came to the next room.

In the room, there is an extra large clod that is as high as a wheel and as wide as a person, but directly occupies half of the house.

At one end of the kang, there are two stoves built by masonry.

"Your Highness, this is the kang."

Guo An pointed to it and said, "The fire pit has a chimney mouth, which will circle around the kang for a few times, and then go out through the chimney on the wall again."

"Isn't this the Nuan Pavilion?" Zhu Di said curiously when he saw the kang for the first time.

"Your Highness is absurd, the heated kang is no match for the Nuan Pavilion."

Guo An quickly waved his hand, "The kang is only a bed used by ordinary people living in cave dwellings in Shanxi and Shaanxi, and I just borrowed it for use."

Zhu Di asked again, "You mean they will sleep on this kang at night?"

"Your Highness is wise!"

Guo An nodded slightly, "As long as you burn it in the stove for a while, the whole kang will become warmer. And if you burn it for half a day, even if it is the twelfth lunar month of winter, the whole kang will be scorching hot."

"It's so miraculous!"

Zhu Di nodded slightly, "So, our Yanshanwei military camp also needs to build concrete houses."

"Your Highness, it will be next year!" Guo An replied.

"Ok!"

Zhu Di nodded slightly, then remembered something, and asked: "Since there is a kang, why do you still need to forge an iron furnace?"

Guo An continued: "Your Highness, I just feel that the winter in Beiping Mansion is extremely cold, and my house needs some stoves.

In addition, Weichen is also planning to build a greenhouse in the farm and warm it with a stove in winter in order to grow fresh vegetables. "

"Planting vegetables in winter?"

Zhu Di was taken aback for a moment, and then his face was full of disbelief.

"Just based on how the stove can grow fresh vegetables, you can know that since the Qin and Han Dynasties, there have been sages who wanted to grow vegetables in the cold winter.

However, until now, people can barely grow sprouts and chives. "

"Your Highness, that's why I asked the artisans of the Iron Smelter to forge more transparent glass!" Guo An said.

Hearing this, Zhu Di subconsciously wanted to deny it, but when he thought of Guo An's achievements since he started serving as the county magistrate of Wanping County, a fire suddenly appeared in his heart, and he stared closely at Guo An.

"Guo Qing, can you really grow vegetables in winter?"

"Your Highness, as long as the transparent glass that I need can be calcined, I can certainly grow fresh vegetables."

Guo An looked confident.

At this moment, Ding Shang on the side also understood what was going on, and looked at Guo An excitedly.

"Guo Changshi, you asked those craftsmen to circle a [-]-acre field and build a two-foot-high concrete wall every three ridges, just to prepare for planting vegetables in winter?"

"Exactly!"

Guo An nodded slowly, "In the future, these will require a large number of iron stoves to be installed in the greenhouse. When the weather gets cold, coal will be burned day and night to make the greenhouse warmer."

"So, wouldn't that require a lot of coal?"

Zhu Di asked suddenly.

"Your Highness is wise!"

Guo An nodded quickly, "Therefore, I would like to ask His Royal Highness to dispatch and manage to buy a few more charcoal mountains in the next few days. It would be the best if we could buy all the charcoal mountains in the entire West Mountain."

"Buy all the charcoal mountains in Xishan?"

Zhu Di subconsciously narrowed his eyes, he felt sorry for Qian again.

Guo An is good at making money for him, but he is even more fierce when it comes to spending money.

"Your Highness, you will definitely not lose money." Guo An whispered.

"So, after we go back, we will order Hezhong to buy the mountain!" Zhu Di said.

"Your Highness is wise!"

……

time flies.

Soon, another month passed.

On the entire farm, more than 30 concrete houses have been built scatteredly.

It's just that these concrete houses are scattered around the farm in twos and threes.

There are also more than 20 chicken pens, sheep pens, pig pens, and cattle pens built with cement.

Of course, the most noticeable thing is that two-foot-high concrete walls are also built on the [-]-acre farmland near the river.

Hundreds of extremely long low walls divide hundreds of acres of fertile land into small pieces, like a chessboard.

At this moment, a group of laborers and artisans stood neatly in front of the farm gate, looking at Zhu Liang at the gate with burning eyes.

Of course, most of them were staring at the boxes of copper coins beside Zhu Liang.

"The farm house has been built. According to the order of King Yan, all laborers will be rewarded with two pieces of money, and craftsmen will be rewarded with three pieces of money."

"Thank you, Your Highness King Yan!"

"His Royal Highness King Yan is merciful!"

"King Yan will surely live a hundred years..."

A group of hard-working craftsmen hurriedly expressed their gratitude.

Zhu Liang shouted directly, "Don't be crowded, line up one by one and go forward to collect the money."

Hearing this, a group of laborers and craftsmen hurriedly lined up and went forward to collect the money one by one.

Not far away, Zhu Di and Guo An looked at it for a while, nodded in satisfaction, and walked towards the [-]-acre fertile field where the low concrete wall had been built.

Looking at the fields in front of him that had been flattened by those hard laborers, Zhu Di said again: "Guo Qing, now Beiping Mansion is getting colder, if we don't sow seeds, these vegetables won't be able to grow in the cold winter! "

During those few years in Fengyang Labor Reform, Zhu Di's knowledge of farming is no less than that of some old farmers.

Guo An sighed softly, and asked Ding Shang, "Old General Ding, how many more days can we delay?"

"Reporting to Guo Changshi, if we don't plant vegetable seeds in these fields for half a month at most, the soil in the fields will slowly freeze, and the vegetable seeds will not be able to germinate!" Ding Shang replied.

Hearing this, Guo An pondered for a moment, and then said: "Your Highness, since that's the case, let's send people to plant vegetables on these ridges."

"Ok?"

Zhu Di was taken aback, and looked at Guo An with some doubts, "Aren't you waiting?"

Guo An said helplessly, "Your Highness, I have been waiting for a month. Now, if I wait any longer, I will delay the good opportunity of planting, no matter whether I can finally calcinate the transparent glass that I need, it will be too late.

And all these warm walls built by a group of craftsmen and hard labor are in vain. "

Zhu Di asked: "Then how to build the greenhouse you mentioned?"

During these days, Zhu Di was more concerned about building a greenhouse and growing vegetables in winter than Guo An.

Just explaining to Zhu Di, Guo An explained it more than ten times.

Naturally, he also understands the importance of the transparent glass to the greenhouse.

Therefore, Zhu Di directly urged him several times.

Guo An gritted his teeth, with a look of resignation, "If after five days, the transparent glass still cannot be fired, then fire the glass with the best transparency, and you can count as many vegetables as you can grow."

In any case, he will try to grow vegetables in winter.

He didn't want to eat cabbage and radishes all winter, or even next spring.

Zhu Di also said boldly: "In this case, we will accompany you crazy for a while, and you will only lose a few thousand taels of silver.

In the past few months, we have already earned money from the textile machine and cotton business alone. "

"Thank you, Your Highness!"

Guo An was grateful.

"Your Highness, Your Highness..."

At this time, Zhu Liang, who was supposed to distribute money to a group of hard laborers and artisans outside, ran in with a happy face.

"What's the matter?"

Zhu Di will be in a low mood because of the greenhouse.

Seeing Zhu Liang's reckless appearance, he asked directly angrily.

Zhu Liang sneered, and quickly reported: "His Royal Highness, good news, the person from Tieye, the transparent glass that Guo Changshi wanted has been calcined."

"what?"

"Is it really calcined?"

Zhu Di and Guo An were overjoyed for a moment, staring at Zhu Liang.

Zhu Liang nodded again and again, "The brothers from Tie Ye did report like this."

Zhu Di didn't ask any more questions, but said directly: "Let's go, Iron Works!"

"Yes, Your Highness!"

Zhu Liang, Guo An and others hurriedly followed.

When they arrived at the iron smelting office, they saw that Zhong Huo, the manager of the iron smelting office, was already standing at the door, waiting with a happy face.

Seeing Zhu Di, Guo An and others arriving, he hurried forward to report.

"The villain sees His Highness, and has seen Guo Changshi. The kind of transparent and impurity-free glass that Guo Changshi asked for has already been calcined by craftsmen."

"Stop talking, take us there quickly." Zhu Di said directly.

"As ordered!"

Zhong Huo hurriedly led the way.

Several people turned around and came to a house at the farthest corner of the Iron Smelting Institute.

Inside the house, there were more than a dozen elderly craftsmen, surrounded by a large piece of light gray, but unusually transparent glass, all excited and amazed.

However, as Zhu Di and Guo An came in, these craftsmen quickly retreated.

"It's really transparent glass!"

"This glass can actually see things on the other side directly from one side without hindrance."

Zhu Di and Guo An were overjoyed.

Seeing this, Zhong Huo, who was closely behind him, felt relieved, and hurriedly stepped forward and asked, "Dare to ask Guo Changshi, can this glass be used?"

In the past two months, because of this piece of glass, the pressure that he, the manager of the Iron Smelter, has been under has been increasing day by day.

In the past few days, I couldn't sleep all night and all night, and there were several fire bubbles in my mouth.

"It works!"

Guo An nodded slightly.

Although this piece of glass was not as good as what he wanted, it was still enough for the sun to irradiate and sterilize the vegetable seedlings!

"That's good!"

Zhong Huo immediately beamed with joy.

Similarly, Zhu Di on the side also followed Guo An's words, and his face was overjoyed.

"This time, if you have meritorious service in calcining glass, Zhonghuo will reward you with a hundred taels of silver, and all craftsmen who calcined glass will reward you with ten taels of silver!"

"Thank you, Your Highness!"

"Thank you, Your Highness!"

In the whole room, one kneels down directly.

"Okay, no need to be so polite!"

Zhu Di waved his hand casually, then looked at Guo An: "How many pieces of glass this size do you need to build a greenhouse?"

"The more the better!"

Guo An said.

Zhong Huo was in a daze, how much was that?

"Calcinate thousands of pieces first!"

Guo An seemed to understand Zhong Huo's doubts, and said again, "Even if the greenhouse can't be used up, it can be installed on the windows of cement houses."

"In the windows?"

Now, Zhu Di, Zhong Huo and others couldn't help being stunned again.

……

(End of this chapter)