Destiny Only Han

Chapter 186 To be rich, build roads first

"Why can't the food be taken away?"

In Ao Cang, Liu Ying looked at the official in charge of the grain depot with a bewildered expression, not understanding why he said that.

Under Liu Ying's gaze, the official was sweating on his forehead, and he hesitated for a long time without saying anything.

Pan Gong on the side couldn't stand it any longer, he stepped forward to look at Liu Ying and said, "Do you know how to store grain?"

Put it in a plastic bottle, seal it with peppercorns, or put it in the refrigerator... Two ways appeared in Liu Ying's mind for a moment, but at this time, it was completely impossible, so he shook his head slightly.

When Pan Gong saw this, he was determined, and said with the air of being a teacher:
"Ordinary people store tens or more than a hundred shi of grain in their homes, so they can put it casually, as long as they pay attention to it, all the food will be eaten before it breaks..."

"But it's different among the official warehouses, especially the large grain depots like Ao Cang that harvest the world's millet. The goal of storing grain is to go for three to five years, or even ten years."

Liu Ying nodded: "I know that. Uncle Liu Jiao told me about it in Hanzhong."

"He said that if a country has no savings for nine years, it is said to be insufficient; if it has no savings for six years, it is said to be urgent; if it has no savings for three years, it is said that the country is not its own. Three years of plowing must yield one year's food, and nine years of plowing must yield three years. Food, with 30 years of experience, although there is a severe drought and floods, the people have no food..."

There is food in hand and no panic in the heart, which is probably the truth.

Pan Gong's heart tightened. What Liu Ying just recited, shaking his head, was obviously Confucianism. When he was about to turn around, he would go to the Lishan Emperor's Mausoleum to find the Mohist classics lost by the previous Mohist.

At that time, he would let Liu Ying understand what it means to be famous in the world as famous as Confucianism!
Pan Gong said with a bit of disdain: "Confucian scholars are the best at boasting. If we really want to talk and do practical things, we have to look at our Mohist disciples!"

"For large-scale storage of grain, there are only a few things that need to be solved most. Insects eat and rats bite, damp and rot, and natural germination..."

"So when building a grain depot, first choose a place with a slightly higher terrain, so that it is not easy to accumulate water after rainy and snowy days; secondly, after digging the cellar, you need to light the firewood first, dry the inner wall of the cellar, and then spread plant ash, grass The five layers of bundles, boards, reed mats, and chaff are used to prevent moisture and keep warm.”

Under Liu Ying's shocked expression, Pan Gong became more and more complacent. He pointed to the trees planted next to the grain storage and said:
"Finally, we need to plant this kind of evergreen tree on the sealed soil. If its leaves turn yellow and wither for no reason, it means that the grain in the cellar has rotted and sprouted..."

It turned out to be like this, I thought the trees planted were just for greening... Liu Ying was even more shocked, although the lines were like mountains, if no one told me about these details, she would not understand them at all.

And he also understood one thing, that is why the land annexation problem was so serious during the feudal dynasty.

Because in order to build a large granary that can store grain for several years, not only a lot of manpower and material resources are required, but also a wealth of experience is required.

These points are not what those small families can do.

Therefore, after "overcharging three or five buckets", in order to pay taxes and have no good means of storage, they can only sell the harvested grain at a low price when the grain price is at its lowest point, and then when it is out of harvest or suffers from natural disasters. In times of disaster, buy food from big households at a high price...

In this way, caught in endless reincarnation.

In this way, when the debts are getting more and more, you can only sell the house, the land, the sons and the daughters, and finally sell yourself to others...

Until, hit the local tyrants and divide the fields!

Just like what Liu Ying had seen when she was in Yangdi, the grain merchants, or the large grain merchants controlled by local tyrants, usually took advantage of the harvest of grain and only had tens or hundreds of dollars per stone. It is time to buy a lot, and then wait quietly, and wait until the price of food has doubled before selling it to make huge profits.

Ultimately, they don't have to worry about sales.

No matter in this handicraft age or the information age, there is always not enough food to eat.

For example, people in the beautiful country want to live a peaceful and peaceful life with enough food and drink, but the people in the entire Latin America and South America can only move forward with heavy burdens of hunger and starvation.

In front of Liu Ying, Pan Gong, who was unaware that the other party was already far away, continued to lecture tirelessly: "This kind of action can only prevent moisture and corrosion, but it is helpless against insects and rats..."

I can't do anything about worms, but if rats bite, of course I have to raise cats... Liu Ying came to her senses, when is she going to spare some time to find out if there are any traveling merchants from the Western Regions, and from Central Asia, take cats and cats? Introduced into the Central Plains.

Well, in fact, as early as the Xia, Shang and Zhou dynasties, the countries of the Central Plains had already started doing business with the Western Regions, and even tribes or countries in Central Asia.

It's just that the trade route at this time is not called the Silk Road, but the Jade Road.

As early as the period of King Zhou Mu, for the purpose of showing off his national power, he personally led people from Shaanxi to Xinjiang by car all the way...

His coachman is the founder of Zhao State, Zaofu.

The famous Yumen Pass is also named after the Hetian jade brought back from the Western Regions passed through here, so Liu Xiaozhu conveniently set up a checkpoint here to collect taxes.

As a cat lover in the cloud, Liu Ying felt itchy in his heart, but he knew very well that it would take at least three to five years to wait if he wanted to really attract cats.

In later generations, Lu You wrote a poem, in which a few famous lines are: Stomach lying in a lonely village without self-sorrow, Shangsi defends Luntai for the country.Lying in the middle of the night and listening to the wind and rain, the Iron Horse and Glacier fell into a dream.

But in fact, there is still the first half of this poem. The firewood in the stream is soft and warm, and Li Nu and I don’t go out.

Lu You, old cat slave...

As for the so-called raising dogs to catch mice?

In fact, the main breed for catching mice was a terrier bred by the British in the eighteenth century.

In the Victorian period, a well-known gambling activity in bars was to put rats in cages and let the dogs catch them, and the one who guessed the correct number won...

But it depends on human efforts, the British can do it, and the Han people can do the same.

The so-called training a dog to catch mice is nothing more than using the natural hunting and chasing instinct of dogs. When a dog catches a mouse, it snatches its prey away, rewards it with favorite praise and petting, and then does it several times to form conditions. reflection.

Thus, an excellent licking dog was born...

Thinking of this, Liu Ying explained in detail the method of training small hounds to hunt mice with the officials in charge of Ao Cang that she had imagined.

Beside him, Pan Gong admired sincerely: "Sure enough, when it comes to this kind of fun, it's your Liu family who are good at..."

Liu Ying gave him a look and didn't speak. Pan Gong, like old Liu, had the same hobbies as cockfighting and dog fighting, but he was not good at learning. He was defeated in front of the invincible general.

The so-called winner is king, the loser gets the pot.

During that time, Liu Ying ate stewed chicken almost every now and then...

After explaining the matter of raising dogs to catch mice, he was actually a little depressed.

After running such a long distance, the matter was not done.

His original plan was to move all the grain stored in the Ao warehouse to the Luoyang warehouse.

After all, in his memory, Xingyang seemed to be defeated by Xiang Yu, but Luoyang in the west never fell.

But according to Pan Gong, it is not easy to store grain on a large scale, and the Luoyang warehouse has been completely abandoned long after the super-large warehouse in Ao warehouse was repaired.

Well, there are only three or two scattered granaries that are still in good condition, mainly used to store the wages of local officials.

At this time, the salaries paid by officials were mainly in kind, that is, the "Grain System".

For example, a high-ranking official with two thousand shi at the county guard level will receive two shi 120 hu per month, which amounts to [-] shi of millet a year.

Thirty kilograms per stone, based on the lowest price of grain, calculated at two yuan per catty, is more than 20 yuan a year. If you consider the relationship between productivity, your annual income will be at least 50 yuan!

Therefore, whether it is ancient or modern, Kaogong is a broad road...

As Liu Ying, who was close to the finish line when she was born, she couldn't help but put her hands on her hips proudly. Amid the bewildered expressions on the faces of Pan Gong and others, he quickly adjusted his plan.

Since the grain stored in Ao Cang cannot be moved, and considering that Chu and Han have fought for hegemony in the past few years, it is necessary to repeatedly transport grain from Guanzhong to here.

Then, the Luoyang warehouse must be refurbished and used as a transfer station.

Just relying on the productivity of this period, according to the method Pan Gong said, after the Luoyang warehouse was repaired, King Xiang would have changed from one to five...

But Liu Ying has one thing that can change everything.

cement!

A granary built with rammed earth is inconvenient and time-consuming. If it is replaced with a concrete structure and quicklime is added to prevent moisture, the Luoyang granary can be fully operational in a very short period of time!
As early as when he was in Hanzhong, Liu Ying considered the follow-up Chu-Han tug-of-war, so since then, the cement produced by the coal and iron trading company has been sealed up and has not been used.

The reason is that this moment comes in handy.

Although his original plan was to strengthen Xingyang.

But don't worry about that, laying the road from Hangu Pass to here first, and Luoyang warehouse is the focus now.

Due to the huge drop, the Yellow River is not directly navigable from Guanzhong to Luoyang.

Items such as grain, grass, luggage, etc. are all transported by land.

In land transportation, people eat horse chews, and the loss is very large.

After a long period of time, this is a very impressive figure.

Therefore, improving the level of the road surface and increasing the traffic speed can effectively reduce the loss.

Since it is impossible to open source, it is better to reduce expenditure to the extreme.

Fortunately, the road from Guanzhong to Luoyang was built by the Qin Dynasty with great effort.

The road is wide and the foundation is well laid.

In this way, Liu Ying only needs to simply level the land and directly pave it with cement.

While walking, Ji Xin came quickly.

"The King of Han is back!"

(End of this chapter)