Daming Yuanfu

Chapter 282
Gao Wushi doesn't quite remember how many people I answered after the Hannaji incident in history. He only remembers that I answered a few key passes and made no big moves after a little testing. .

But right now, I'm not sure if I will still choose this way. Gao Wushi is really not sure when Gao Mo says so.

The reason for the inaccuracy lies in nothing else but Gao Pragmatic's own actions.

Historically, in the past few years, due to the continuous disasters in the core area under its rule, its strength actually means that it is strong from the outside and doing its best in the middle - it still has combat effectiveness, but the economic situation of ordinary herdsmen is very miserable.

How miserable is it?After Wang Chonggu became the governor of Xuanda, Ma Fang proposed to Wang Chonggu to recruit Mongolian knights to strengthen the army.As a result, in less than a year, two to three thousand herdsmen who were unable to live in Mongolia came to vote. Among them, Ma Fang selected more than 200 young men with excellent riding skills to join the army.In addition, more than 1000 Han people who fled north also returned.

You know, in the past few years, Han people have always fled north to Mongolia, and unless the Mongols failed in the tribal civil war and became homeless, not many people fled south.This year, the situation is actually reversed, which shows how serious the disaster situation in Mongolia has become.

I answer, of course I am also in a hurry, otherwise I wouldn't have gone south to rob twice in a row in the past half a year this year.

It is a pity that the two southward raids did not achieve good results. Although the Shanxi-Gyeonggi line of defense composed of Ma Fang, Zhao Ke, and Qi Jiguang did not dare to say that there were no loopholes, it did make me say that the two southward raids were almost impossible. Maintain no loss - if the resistance encountered by robbery is strong, there will be losses.

Therefore, in the history of this situation, I answered that it must be a head-to-head lawsuit. If you fight, you may lose money. If you don’t fight, your grandson will definitely be scolded by Kehatun It is said that they will lose prestige both inside and outside the tribe.

However, the emergence of Gao Shishi made the situation in my answer a little better than in history. After all, Gao Shishi wanted to buy horses and always had to pay in exchange. Although he tried his best to export "high-end industries" as much as possible, the Mongolian nobles were not all fools. In addition to being fooled into buying a lot of silk and other things by highly pragmatic people, they will still buy some necessities for the herdsmen under their own name.

This kind of trade, if you look at each transaction separately, it is naturally a drizzle, but if you look at it together, it is a huge amount.

Of course, although the high-practical smuggling team expanded rapidly, it would not be able to satisfy the entire Monan Tumochuan tribe. It could even be said that it could only meet a small part of their needs.However, even this small part is enough to make the various ministries under Alda go from "a large number of starved herdsmen" to "a small number of starved herdsmen".

You know, the pressure I face is completely different when one hundred herdsmen are starved to death a year than when thousands of herdsmen are starved to death a year.That's why Gao Pragmatism is worried that I Da will adopt a different stance in this incident than in history because the pressure on his head is not as great as in history.

Therefore, after thinking about it for a while, Gao Wushi asked Gao Mo: "Did you go to Fengzhou River this time, apart from getting close to Bahanaji, did you observe the livelihood expenses of ordinary herdsmen in Tumo River? I mean , They have suffered disasters in the past few years, is it serious enough to be unsustainable now?"

Gao Mo nodded and said: "Yes, this time we went north, not from Datong, but from the Laoying Fort in the southwest of Datong, passing through Laoniuwan Fort, and upstream along the Dahe (Yellow River), in Liancheng, Junzijin, Tuotuo stayed in the three places for a short time, and then walked northeast along the Dahei River, first went to Dabansheng City to meet Bahannaji, and then went to Fengzhou Chuanhanting with Bahannaji."

"On the way, we met no less than dozens of tribes of different sizes. Generally speaking, the situation of the larger tribes is slightly better, and they can barely get enough food and clothing. The smaller tribes are miserable. It can be said that There is no food for the day and no clothes for the year. Especially the young ones find that they are in short supply of iron, which is unimaginable."

"Oh?" Gao Wushi's expression changed, and he asked, "To what extent is it lacking?"

Gao Mo said: "Bigger tribes, such as those with nearly a thousand households, probably have a dozen or twenty iron pots in the whole tribe, and cooking is done in turns. Smaller tribes, for example, only have one or two hundred herdsmen. Even if there are two or three hundred herdsmen, the entire tribe may only have seven or eight iron pots—those iron pots are used almost all day long, and there is no free time at all.”

Although Gao Yushi knew that the Mongols were seriously short of iron, and the history books even said that sometimes two small tribes would fight for an iron pot, but he really didn't know that the total number of iron pots was so low that he couldn't help but Somewhat surprised.

However, Gao Mo was still introducing, saying: "This time we met a herdsman from a small tribe on the road. When his two sons separated, because of the lack of pot, they had to break a pot and divide it into two halves. Each took half. This man also had a daughter, who was not yet married and had to leave some dowry, so she was given a small iron basin, which was probably only a little bigger than the bowls we usually eat. His daughter was very happy Thanks again and again to my father and two elder brothers. In addition, we also met many herdsmen, because they did not have a pot and their status in the tribe was not high. Meat for food."

Gao Wushi thought for a while and asked, "I remember that the pig iron used to make iron pots should be difficult to use, right? For example, melt the iron pot and then make arrows?"

Unexpectedly, Gao Mo said: "Young master, this issue has to be looked at separately. If you say it's not possible, it's not right. No matter what kind of iron he wants to make arrows after melting, it is actually possible, but the problem is that it is not cost-effective. , very uneconomical."

"Oh? How to say?" Gao Wushi was not angry.

Gao Mo explained: "According to my little knowledge, the pig iron used to make iron pots is of poor quality, not too hard and has many impurities. This kind of iron is much better. The Mongols have a very low level of smelting. Although they have the help of Han'er from Daban Shengcheng, they are still far behind Daming. If they use iron pots to melt molten iron to make arrows I'm afraid there won't be three or four taels left in a catty of iron, but it takes a lot of work, so... Anyway, I have never seen this kind of situation. And Gao Yu deliberately raised this question to the shopkeeper Cao, Shopkeeper Cao said that unless the Mongols are crazy, they would only do this, because they don’t even have iron pans for food, how could they melt the iron pans to make arrows?”

Gao Wushi said indifferently: "Isn't it a way to make arrows to rob our Daming?"

"Ha, it's true, but the problem is that the looting at the border has not been effective in the past few years, and many tribes have expressed dissatisfaction with it. For example, the tribes that took Hanaji for themselves followed my answer a few years ago. He went south to plunder and lost nearly two hundred strong men, but the things he grabbed were not enough, so he muttered in front of him all day long that the deal was not worth it, and it was far better to do business with us—otherwise, how could we win over so easily? Hanage?"

When Gao Mo said this, he said seriously: "I don't know if the young master knows, but the title of this Hannaji in Tumochuan's [-] households is Dacheng Taiji, which is quite a high position, so he is actually in a certain place now. To some extent, it can be said that he is one of the leaders of the Tumochuan pro-Ming sect."

"No wonder..." Gao Wushi nodded, thinking in his heart: Hanaji is one of the leaders of the pro-Ming faction, so I will be so nervous when he descends, but the nervousness in my answer is not necessarily simple He is not worried about internal instability, but because I have always hoped to reconcile with the Ming Dynasty and do business in a safe and stable manner. Therefore, after Hannaji was brought to the Ming Dynasty, he was afraid that this reckless grandson would be seen as more serious in the past few years. The reckless Ming Ting was cut off directly.

A few years ago, the Ming court cut off the heads of Ida's envoys at every turn, but those envoys were not of high status, so they would be chopped off if they were chopped off. "The initiative to Nantou was cut off by the Ming Dynasty, so I can no longer suppress the internal voices against reconciliation with the Ming Dynasty and the mutual benefit of tribute, so I can only bite the bullet and fight against the Ming Dynasty.

(End of this chapter)