Daming Yuanfu

Chapter 21 Material Prices (Part [-])
Gao Xiaozhuang hurriedly said: "When I first came to the capital, I had nothing to do. I went to help the kitchen for two days. I heard from the second master that the price of cattle and sheep in the capital is cheap, which is different from ours in Henan. It is said that it is from Xuanda." The frontier army was very poor, so they had to secretly do some small business with the Mongols, selling some pots and pans to the Mongols. Unexpectedly, those Mongols were probably poorer than the frontier army, and others I don’t have anything, and I’m not very willing to sell horses. I’m only willing to use some cattle and sheep to make up for it. But although there are quite a lot of people in our frontier army, we can’t eat the many cattle and sheep, so we have to do a second-hand transaction. The capital’s side It’s the biggest place to buy and sell, and in the end, the price of cattle and sheep in the capital dropped again and again, and in the end it was even cheaper than pork!”

When Gao Wushi heard this, he was really... shocked!
Right now, Ida’s tribute has not happened yet, and the Nine Sides and the Mongols are still in a state of complete hostility. They start wars all year round. The two sides have dozens of battles on the border every year. The large and small troops are dispatched over ten thousand. Dozens of people, anyway, in short, they will never stop.I never thought that there is such a secret mutual market!This... If this fucking is on the line, it's not an exaggeration to call it traitorous!
However, Secretary Gao is a pragmatic person after all. After calming down and thinking about it, he doesn't think it's strange--not that it's not surprising to be traitorous, but it's not surprising in terms of the economic situation of the frontier army.

After all, it seems that in just one or two years, I Da's tribute will happen, and according to the records, this matter was jointly decided by Gao Gong and Zhang Juzheng.Both of these two are pragmatic, and they withstood the verbal criticism of a large number of Qingliu in the court. In the end, the Ming court reconciled with Altan Khan on the condition of a mutual market, and stopped fighting on most of the northern border, which made good progress for the future Wanli Zhongxing. external conditions.

Gao Gong's and Zhang Juzheng's governance philosophies are actually quite compatible. The most important point is to be as pragmatic as possible, seek practical results, and seek practical results. Unless the problem of face is completely unbearable, put it aside first.As for the matter of offering tribute to me, if it wasn't for the benefit—or even the great benefit, they certainly wouldn't insist on agreeing to it at the risk of infamy.

So, where is the benefit?
Let's not talk about anything else, just talk about the price of cattle and sheep in this area, that is also part of the profit!
What's more, the business of selling "pots and pans" to Mongolia to obtain beef and mutton food will itself promote the production of "pots and pans".To produce pots and pans, we must increase the output of pig iron, and to increase the output of pig iron, we must hire more workers to mine and forge iron. Isn't this a good thing?In the era of Secretary Gao, all the piles and piles were all stimulating employment!But they are all real political achievements!What's more, on the premise of stimulating employment, it also improved the living standards of the people. If such a good thing was put in power when he was in power, I am afraid that only mentally retarded people would reject it, old man!

Of course, Gao Wushi also knows that things are naturally not that simple. At least the private actions between the frontier army and Mongolia must not have been carried out by grassroots leaders, not to mention that this business has already grown to the point where it can affect the price of meat in the capital. !
As for the fact that the frontier army only sold some pots and pans... Humph, Secretary Gao said, do you think I just graduated from kindergarten?

But this matter is not something he can intervene now-let alone intervene, he can't even intervene.You must know that the huge interests involved, the large number of people involved, and the wide range involved can definitely be described as amazing. I am afraid that even if Gao Gong has the intention to deal with it, he may not dare to act rashly. He is a little kid. If you dare to get in, I'm afraid even Gao Gong will be killed.

Forget it, forget it, I don't have the ability to take care of this matter for the time being, let's let it go for a while, and wait until I become a politician in the future. Right now, it is more serious to get the big business of making money.

Gao Wushi calmed down and pretended not to care too much: "Well, that's what happened... Then, the raw materials I need are quite cheap?"

Gao Xiaozhuang hesitated for a while, and said hesitantly, "Then... not."

Gao Wushi rolled his eyes and asked, "But the fixative—er, I mean, those spices are expensive?"

"That's really too expensive!" Gao Xiaozhuang snapped his fingers in surprise and said, "What ambergris is said to be divided into three types: top, middle and bottom. The top grade is three cents more expensive than gold, and the middle grade Even low-grade ambergris is more expensive than silver, and even a tael of silver can’t buy low-grade ambergris of the same weight!"

Gao Yushi sighed, this is actually within his expectations, after all, ambergris itself is rare, and it can only be obtained by pure luck, it is strange that it is not expensive.Although I was a little disappointed, but because I was mentally prepared, it was still acceptable, so I asked, "What about the other things?"

Gao Xiaozhuang replied: "The beaver incense that the young master mentioned, the younger one ran to more than a dozen stores, and they all said that they had never heard of it. Later, a Liaodong drug dealer who went to Chuji Medicine Store heard it interesting, and came to talk to him about it. A little about the beaver thing..."

It turned out that the Liaodong drug dealer had traveled all over Liaodong. He once saw a kind of raccoon living in the river in the northwest of the former Nuergandusi Sachhewei. The fur is excellent, no less than mink fur, and there is a special feature, that is, there are a pair of sachets in front of the anal glands, and "sesame oil" can be squeezed out of the sachets, but the smell of the sesame oil is strange, not good. It has to be dried in order to emit a wonderful fragrance.But Gao Xiaozhuang only heard Gao Wushi say a name, and he didn't know if it was the castore incense mentioned by his young master, so he didn't dare to confirm it.

After listening to the explanation, Gao Wushi suddenly remembered that the name beaver was actually a mistake. This thing actually lived in freshwater rivers. In his previous life, he had changed his name to beaver before he crossed over. It was only because of habit in the spice world that he named it a beaver. Still called castoreum.Moreover, the species of beaver is very rare in China, and the number in Russia and Mongolia is not large. The real main producing country is Canada.Of course, there were also many distributions in Europe, but unfortunately, because beaver skins are very precious, they were hunted and almost became extinct.

When Gao Wushi heard this, he thought it would be difficult to handle. It seems that there is no one in Daming who runs the business of beaver incense, and there are probably quite few people who even know about beavers.

In fact, in theory, he could also consider discussing cooperation with the Liaodong drug dealer and ask him to organize people to go to the beaver distribution area in the upper reaches of Heilongjiang to collect incense, but think about it or forget it.After all, the value of beaver fur is easier to be accepted by people in this era than the value of castoreum. If the beaver is overkilled like in Europe and the species is extinct, isn't he an indirect sinner?Naturally, the ancients would not think about protecting the ecological environment, but it is still very important to him. After all, he is a person who was brainwashed by bombing in his previous life...

It seemed castoreum was hopeless, so Gao Wushi had to ask, "What about civet incense?" He didn't ask musk first, because musk must be sold, and although the price will not be very cheap, it is still in this wild animal. In fact, the years that are quite rich are not outrageously expensive.However, Musk has a big problem, that is, it is dangerous for women.

I remember when Secretary Gao came home one day, my mother happened to be watching "The Legend of Zhen Huan". In the play, Zhen Huan was pregnant for the first time, and the emperor was very happy, but unfortunately Zhen Huan was scratched by a cat.Deeply afraid of falling out of favor and status, Ling Rong tried his best to give Zhen Huan a bottle of Hen Hen Gel, a family tradition, and told Zhen Huan that the medicine was very effective in removing scars.In fact, Lingrong put a lot of musk in the Shuhen glue, hoping that Zhen Huan would use the medicine for a long time to remove the scars, and use the aroma of the medicine to harm the fetus in Zhen Huan's womb and cause her to miscarry.

At that time, Secretary Gao was a little speechless, Musk is so powerful?So I picked up my mobile phone and searched on Baidu, and found that musk is actually very common in daily life, such as: plasters, perfumes, air fresheners, and even foot powder, etc., almost all contain musk ingredients, the only problem is, musk really can Cause miscarriage?Secretary Gao read some articles seriously, and came up with the following comprehensive views:
First of all, natural musk and synthetic musk are different.Natural musk is the secretion of the glandular sac between the navel and genitals of male musk deer. After drying, it is not only a precious spice, but also a valuable medicinal material.In addition to promoting blood circulation and relieving pain, dredging meridians, resuscitating the mind, it can also be used to induce labor and give birth.And artificial musk is a kind of medicine and medicine ingredient that can replace natural musk. The musk that Secretary Gao could come into contact with in his daily life in his previous life was usually artificial musk.

Natural musk has relatively strong medicinal properties, and long-term exposure or direct consumption does have the effect of causing abortion in pregnant women.But almost all of the musk seen in daily life is artificial musk. Although it will have more or less adverse effects on pregnant women, it is far from as serious as that shown in TV dramas, and it does not cause miscarriage immediately after smelling it.Generally speaking, even if it is natural musk, only pregnant women who are immersed in the aroma of musk for a long time will have the chance of inducing miscarriage.Occasionally smelling the smell of musk perfume and musk ointment will not cause miscarriage.Of course, pregnant women must be able to ignore the preciousness that people cherished children in the past.

The effect of musk is like this, so for Gao Pragmatic, who is making soap and focusing on high society sales in the early stage, it has basically announced goodbye to it.

Imagine this crime: "Practical offering soap, the emperor's favor, constant use, is extinct."

Well, that would be a lot of fun.

(End of this chapter)