Optimus One Pillar of the Ming Dynasty

Chapter 78 Six Yuan and Chapter [-]
After visiting the factory area, chatting on the dam for a while, and admiring the scenery on both sides of the Nanjian River, Wang Daoqiu accompanied Emperor Jiajing and the others back to the iron-making furnace.

After such a long time, after Wang Daoqiu and Emperor Jiajing came back, the molten iron in the iron-making furnace was almost ready.The craftsmen came over to ask if they could open the furnace. After receiving Emperor Jiajing's nod, Wang Daoqiu ordered the craftsmen to open the furnace.

When the fiery red molten iron braved the heat wave and slowly flowed out from the furnace mouth.Emperor Jiajing always had a smile on his face, while Lu Bing looked heartbroken. Originally, [-]% of this belonged to his royal guards, but in order to prevent the emperor from being suspicious...Hey, this is life!

Emperor Jiajing was proud, Lu Bing was heartbroken, and Lao Yan didn't care about the matter and just hung up, just sighing at the shock of modern industry.

When more than ten minutes passed and the large stream of molten iron turned into a trickle, Emperor Jiajing no longer had the interest to watch any more.He turned to Wang Daoqiu and asked, "Are the raw materials supplied?"

raw material!When Emperor Jiajing asked about raw materials, of course he was not asking about building materials, but about iron-making raw materials.Now I ask if the iron-making raw materials are in supply. It seems that Emperor Jiajing's old habit of being obsessed with money has relapsed. He doesn't want the furnace to cease fire.

After understanding what Emperor Jiajing meant, Wang Daoqiu also knew how to come back next, so he said: "When I return to the emperor, we plan to try four furnaces today. The iron ore is all from before the Yongding River freezes. It was transported from Hongshi Mountain to the Wanping warehouse. This furnace has a large capacity. One furnace can smelt 30 kilograms of molten iron and consume nearly 50 kilograms of iron ore. Four furnaces a day are 200 million kilograms of iron ore, and there are still 300 to [-] million kilograms. Kilograms of coke and limestone.”

"At this time of year, there is still nearly a month before the Yongding River is thawed and opened to navigation. During this month, if the furnace is kept burning, 6000 million kilograms of iron ore alone will be needed. This amount is too large. If there are no ships, it will be hauled by oxcarts. , at least [-] vehicles. Your Majesty, this is not realistic."

yes!Bulk commodities like coal and iron are mainly transported by water, not to mention the Ming Dynasty in the 21th century, even in the [-]st century when transportation is very developed.

Just like our close neighbor Mongolia in the 21st century, it is rich in coal and iron resources and is also close to us.But we go around half the world for tens of thousands of kilometers to buy products from Australia and Brazil, and rarely buy products from Mongolia.So why is this?

Excluding those political factors and ore quality factors, let’s just talk about the simplest freight.In fact, it is much more cost-effective to buy coal and iron from Brazil and Australia thousands of miles away than from neighboring Mongolia.

From Brazil and Australia, which are thousands of miles away, it is actually more cost-effective to transport ore to our country than the ore from our close neighbor Mongolia!The reason for this is that the only economic transportation method for Mongolian ore to our country is railway.

Compared with sea transportation, railway transportation has obvious disadvantages.It is normal for an ocean-going ore bulk carrier to haul two to 30 tons of ore at a time.And a train can pull seven to eight hundred tons of ore at a time, which is very good.Moreover, during normal railway transportation, money must be spent to maintain railway lines.For sea transportation, you can travel freely on the sea. The sea will carry you on its own, and you do not need to spend money to maintain the lines.

Therefore, internationally, the shipping quotation of [-] kilometers and the railway freight of [-] kilometers are equal.Therefore, although Mongolia is close to us, the railway lines between them and our economically developed coastal provinces are generally thousands of kilometers, which is equivalent to [-] kilometers of sea freight.

In addition, their railway standards in Mongolia are Soviet-style and are not as wide as our railway tracks.In this way, after their ore reaches the border, it has to be reloaded and unloaded onto our trains, which adds another cost.In addition, the railway transportation volume is too small and cannot meet my country's demand for large steel and coal.Therefore, we travel thousands of miles to buy coal and iron from Australia, Brazil, and not from Mongolia. To put it bluntly, it is not cost-effective!

In the 21st century, transportation of bulk commodities such as coal and iron will mainly rely on water transportation.That's even less so in this backward sixteenth century.The overland method in the sixteenth century relied on human power and animal power. For large and heavy tasks such as transporting iron ore, it would be a joke if you used donkey carts or horse-drawn carriages, which were relatively small in terms of human power and strength.

It can only use an ox cart, but oxen are just like us humans. They get tired easily when doing heavy work.Generally, after pulling for about an hour, you have to stop to rest and eat. Moreover, the current Daming ox cart is entirely made of wood and has limited load-bearing capacity. It can pull six to seven hundred kilograms at a time, and it may fall apart at any time while walking on the road. .

So for a blast furnace like Wang Daoqiu, which consumes 200 million kilograms of iron ore a day, asking oxcarts to haul iron ore from the Hongshi Mountain in Xuanhua, [-] kilometers away, to ensure the supply of raw materials, is simply a dream talk.

So when Emperor Jiajing asked if the supply of raw materials could be guaranteed, Wang Daoqiu directly told Emperor Jiajing that this was simply unrealistic until the Yongding River was thawed and opened to navigation.

What Wang Daoqiu said was the truth, and Emperor Jiajing understood it, so he turned his head and said to Lu Fang, who was in charge of the iron and steel project, said: "Xuanhua Hongshi Mountain has more manpower. If there are not enough prisoners, we will recruit refugees and disaster victims. , local military households. In addition, the ore stacking area on the side of the steel plant must be large enough. Every year before the Yongding River freezes, it must be stacked on the side of the steel plant at least, which is enough iron ore for the steel plant to use for half a year."

"Yes, the slave will take care of it, please don't worry, Master."

"Well, okay, let's leave things like this for now. I'll come over and take a look after the Yongding River is opened to navigation." After saying these words to Lu Fang, Emperor Jiajing smiled again and took out a piece of paper from his sleeve. He handed the big red paper to Wang Daoqiu and said: "Today, the Ministry of Rites sent you the list of Jinshi for the joint examination. You ranked first in high school. Take it. This is the good news that I wrote for you personally. You will be busy at the construction site after the joint examination." , it is also very hard, so you will go back with me today, and I will entertain you, Governor Lu, and Mr. Yan Ge at a banquet in Xiyuan. After the results are released tomorrow, you can go and pay homage to the room master and the seat master according to the etiquette, and then come back and continue to run errands here. You don’t have to worry about the palace examination in ten days.”

After saying this to Wang Daoqiu, Emperor Jiajing confessed to Yan Shoufu: "Feng Yi, according to the ten examination papers that your ministers sent to me after the palace examination, there will be no one named Hui Yuanlang, right?"

The Daming Palace Examination is much simpler than the Huihui Examination, Township Examination, and Boy's Examination.There is no exam on eight-legged essay, nor on law or history.He was the emperor himself as the examiner, and gave the examinees one or two policy topics. After the examinees answered the questions, they were first reviewed by several important court officials, mainly the imperial cabinet scholars.After the important officials of the court read the paper, if they think it is good, they will draw a circle on the paper.

Finally, after the court officials had read each paper, they counted the circles on the paper to figure out which ten papers were the top ten.Then they gave the papers they thought were the top ten to the emperor, and asked the emperor to determine the ranking of the top ten.

Because the Ming Dynasty Palace Examination only determines the rankings and does not brush candidates, the court officials and the emperor read the original papers of the candidates, and they did not seal or obscure the names.Therefore, it is clear at a glance which paper was written by which candidate.When Emperor Jiajing said this to Yan Song, his meaning was very clear. He wanted Yan Song, the chief minister of the cabinet, to use his connections to rank Wang Daoqiu's paper among the top ten in the palace examination, and then he would decide Wang Daoqiu's ranking.

Yan Song was a veteran in the officialdom, and he had matured with age, so he naturally understood what Emperor Jiajing meant.So as soon as Emperor Jiajing finished speaking, Yan Song raised his hand and replied: "Hui Yuanlang, a young genius, can be the first in high school in the joint examination. If he can't even make the top ten in the palace examination, then there may be a traitor here. It was intentional. The veteran is the chief minister of the cabinet and will never let such a scandal happen. Please rest assured, Your Majesty."

"Well, that's good, that's good. Ai Qing is also an old minister. I can rest assured that Ai Qing is doing things."

"Your Majesty, Yan Song, thank you for your trust."

After receiving Yan Song's hint and assurance, Emperor Jiajing looked at Wang Daoqiu with a meaningful smile, and almost engraved the words "Boy, how are you? Lao Zhi will treat you well!" directly engraved on his face.

Seeing Emperor Jiajing's small appearance, Wang Daoqiu also said with emotion at the right time: "Your Majesty, I was the leader of every case in the county examination, government examination, and courtyard examination, and won a small three yuan. Later, I won the Jieyuan in the county examination, I won the top prize again in the examination that just ended, if you reward me with another top prize, I will get the top prize with six top prizes."

Six yuan and the first!When Wang Daoqiu said these words, Emperor Jiajing was shocked.You must know that in the nearly 200 years since the founding of the Ming Dynasty, there was only one Liuyuan Dynasty, and that was Huang Guan during the Hongwu period of Taizu.Moreover, this Huang Guan, after Zhu Di, the founder of the Ming Dynasty, conquered Nanjing City, he took his family and drowned themselves in order to die for Emperor Jianwen and vowed not to surrender to Zhu Di.

A top scholar with a rank of six yuan would rather die with his whole family than surrender to Zhu Di.There is no doubt that this had a very bad political impact on Zhu Di.Therefore, after Zhu Di ascended the throne, he cut off all Huang Guan's fame in the name of a rebellious minister and traitor.This means that Huang Guan's sixth grade was not recognized by the Ming Dynasty officials after Zhu Di.

The most outstanding scientific examination results currently recognized by the Ming Dynasty are the Shang Yuan, Jieyuan, Huiyuan and Zhuangyuan during the Zhengtong Dynasty.Moreover, since the Ming Dynasty, the only one officially recognized is Shang Ren.

So now Wang Daoqiu said that he was in the sixth element, which made Emperor Jiajing excited.After all, it is so rare to get the sixth grade and get the sixth grade, and once Wang Daoqiu gets this six yuan, then when the history books of later generations record this matter, they will definitely add his reign name and say that he is Wang Daoqiu of the Jiajing Dynasty. Won six dollars in a row.So doesn't this just publicize Emperor Jiajing's achievements in culture and education?

Thinking that his reputation would last forever, Emperor Jiajing, who originally wanted to reward Wang Daoqiu as the number one scholar, now became even more determined to let Wang Daoqiu succeed in the sixth grade.

So Emperor Jiajing, who had made up his mind, said seriously to Yan Song: "Master Chief Assistant, it's been almost 200 years since the founding of the Ming Dynasty, and it's time for me to achieve the rank of Liuyuan."

Emperor Jiajing's tone was very serious when he said this, and his title to Yan Song was also cold and official.With Emperor Jiajing's current attitude, Yan Song understood that Emperor Jiajing was not discussing with him, but giving an order.If he can't do this well, then it's probably time for his first assistant to give up.

Understanding how seriously Emperor Jiajing took this matter, Yan Song also bowed his hands to Emperor Jiajing very seriously and said, "Old minister, I obey the order."

(End of this chapter)