The great man will live forever

Chapter 20

"Sir, we have found a few old men farming and a few cows you asked for. There is still uncultivated land 60 miles west of the city."

The first one to come back was Xiong Da, who was relatively reliable in his work.

"Meet the General!"

Although they lived near Chang'an, they rarely went to the city and saw very few dignitaries. They knelt down to Liu Han in fear and was quickly helped up by him.

Seeing the person who could be his grandfather kneel down in front of him, he felt heartbroken and resentful.

"It's okay, no need to kneel down. How old are you? What are your names?"

"My name is Liu Laogen, I am 45 this year."

"General, my name is Zhang Asi. I am 48 this year."

"My name is Wang Ergou. I am 43 years old this year."

After hearing their ages, Liu Han suddenly felt something stuck in his throat.

He thought they could be his grandfathers, but it turned out they were just his father's generation.

These farmers in the Western Han Dynasty are only about 45 years old on average, but their faces look like 70-year-old people.

Their faces are full of traces of time, and every wrinkle seems to tell their hard work and suffering.

Their eyes may once have been clear lake blue, but now they are only filled with endless vicissitudes and hardships of life.

The deep dark circles around the eyes seem to have been lacking adequate sleep for a long time, making them look older.

There is also hair, which is messy on the head, like dead grass in winter, dull and dull.

The hands are rough but not strong, and every callus and scar represents his hard work in the farmland.

The clothes on his body are all made of the most ordinary fabrics. They are dark in color and old in style. There are holes in some places, and the edges of the clothes are frayed and worn.

Their backs were slightly stooped, as if the burden on their shoulders had weighed them down.

There is also skin, which should have been the healthy yellow color of yellow people, but now it looks a little dark and rough.This is the result of years of hard work in the fields and a testament to the hardship of life...

That kind of morbid unhealthy condition made Liu Han feel that they might not survive for a few years.

In this era when the average age is only in their 20s and 30s, they can live to be in their 40s and almost 50s, which is considered a relatively long life.

Liu Han also asked some other related questions. He was also considered a history buff in later generations, but he was relatively vague about some details or many things.

He discovered three points. The first point was that there was no waterwheel.

The second point is that they use straight-shaft plows to plow the fields. He learned this not long after he traveled through time.

The third point is that they have long been using the feces and urine excreted by people or animals, accumulating it into feces, and using feces to fertilize the land. He thought this was something after the Tang Dynasty.

It stands to reason that he has traveled through time for more than 10 years and should have discovered it long ago, but he was the younger brother of the acting king when he was born. Although his brother and sister-in-law were not kind to him, they did not lack food and drink.

Then he came to the capital to find Huo Qubing, and he didn't miss anything to eat or drink. He said he was rich in clothes and food, but he didn't care at all. The only thing that made him hard was to practice martial arts and archery with Huo Qubing every day, and then read and read.

But these hardships seem to be nothing compared with the pain of the farmers who work in the fields every day, with their faces facing the loess and their backs turned to the sky, and the pain of not having enough to eat and not having enough warmth to wear.

A person who has been soaked in the honey pot of fine clothes and fine food for a long time will rarely see the suffering in the world.

People have been standing in the clouds for too long. They are probably very stingy and unwilling to take the time to look down, so there is a saying that why future generations will not eat meat?
It is most likely unrealistic to expect that a person who has good food and clothing every day can immediately understand the pain of farmers. There are some, but such people are rare, only a few among tens of millions of people.

Such people are almost like living Bodhisattvas, born with a good heart. If they do not have a high enough status, they will not survive long in the world of intrigues and intrigues, and will only be eaten without even the bones left.

At this moment, Liu Han suddenly felt a little guilty. He felt that he should have cared about the lives of farmers earlier and built as many simple tools as possible for future generations.

But it's not too late now, he already has enough status and money to support himself to make what he wants.

After chatting with these farmers for a while, Xiong Er came again with a blacksmith and a carpenter. Their lives were slightly better than those of the farmers, but not much different.

It is enough to show that having a better craft, whether in ancient times or in later generations, can always make one's life better.

He described it according to his own memory and asked the blacksmith and carpenter to build the most famous curved shaft plow in later generations.

China has a long history, and the history of farming is also very long.

The grass that people first used is the most primitive agricultural tool.

Initially, Lei was used to poke holes for sowing seeds, and Shu was used to dig soil.

In order to overcome their respective shortcomings and complement each other's advantages, people tied the grass to the end of the grass and became the grass.

The function of the grass is to dig and excavate the soil, but it cannot walk forward and continuously turn over the soil.

Later, in order to solve this problem, people tied a wooden stick horizontally to the wooden handle of the grass, so that one person could control the grass from behind.Another person pulls the plow forward, and the grass has the function of excavation and continuous turning of soil. This is the prototype of the plow.

The wooden stick tied horizontally is the straight shaft.

When bronze and iron were invented, the wood, bones, stones, etc. at the front were replaced by bronze or iron, and the efficiency of excavation was greatly improved.

This was the original straight-column plow, which was used during the Qin and Han Dynasties until the curved-column plow appeared in the Tang Dynasty to replace it.

Compared with the previous straight shaft plow, the curved shaft plow has several major improvements.

The first is to change the straight and long shafts to curved and short shafts, and install a freely rotating plow disc on the shaft head.
This not only makes the plow frame smaller and lighter, but also facilitates U-turns and turns, flexible operation, and saves manpower and animal power...

It can be said that the emergence of the Quyuan plow directly doubled productivity. It used to be able to plow one acre of land a day, but now it can plow two acres of land.

When a person has enough money and power, when he wants to do something, it will be very simple, and it seems that the whole world is making way for him.

And this is not a difficult task at all, just a very small change.

So, within half a day, the blacksmith and carpenter found built the world's first curved shaft plow according to Liu Liuhan's idea.

Seeing everyone's confused looks, Liu Han laughed out loud alone.

Sometimes a seemingly insignificant change can change the entire course of history or human civilization.

"Follow me, the value of this thing is more important than that 500 taels of gold."

Liu Han took the newly built Quyuan plow and the puzzled people to an open space outside the city, which had not yet been plowed.

"On the shelf!"

Liu Han asked two farmers to mount their oxen and prepare to plow the fields.

Wang Ergou and the other farmers opened their mouths. They tried several times to speak, but they still didn't. They didn't dare to offend Liu Han at all.

"My lord, you want to farm the land? Why do you like farming?"

Xiong Da and Xiong Er scratched their heads. Why didn't they realize that Liu Han still had this habit? Is it because he has eaten too much meat these days and wants to relieve his appetite?

Several farmers nearby just thought Liu Han was playing.

"Brother Ergou, is this noble man so curious that he wants to farm?"

Zhang Asi, a 48-year-old farmer, spoke.

"Brother Fourth, please speak in a lower voice. We can do whatever the noble man asks us to do. He likes to farm, so we will accompany him."

"But this is good land, this is the best land."

Liu Laogen didn't feel sorry for anything, he just felt distressed. He was afraid that Liu Han would do something stupid and in the end nothing would be planted, or everything would die, and instead the land would be wasted.

"Sir? You have become fond of farming recently? What's so good about this?"

Xiao Taohong was also puzzled. She had grown up and stayed with the young master for several years, but she had never seen him farming, not even touching the plow.

And is the plow in front of me a plow?Although she has never farmed, she still saw a lot of it when she was a child. This is not a plow at all.

But what surprised them all was that although he was a little unfamiliar with the operation at first, he became more and more familiar with it later.

This thing that doesn't look like a plow actually plows the ground, and it seems to be very useful.

"Practice is the only criterion for testing truth. Come and try my method, then slowly master it and compare it with previous plows."

Liu Han gave instructions to the farmers, then turned to look at the carpenters and blacksmiths.

"You guys are also observing from the sidelines. If you feel that something is wrong or there is something that can be improved, continue to strengthen it!"

At this time, some curious people in Chang'an City slowly followed. There was no way, Liu Han just walked through the market with 500 taels of gold in the morning.

Then in the afternoon, they took craftsmen, farmers, subordinates, retainers, a few cows, and a strange thing to plow the fields. This operation made them really curious.

It even made them wonder, is there gold in the ground?Otherwise, Liu Han, who is already a general and the younger brother of King Dai, goes to plow the fields?

　Before the Tang Dynasty, the heavy, straight-shaft plow was difficult to turn and plowing the land was laborious.In the long-term production practice, the working people in the Jiangnan area improved the inventions of their predecessors and created the curved shaft plow.

　　According to the "Leisi Jing" written by Lu Guimeng, a famous writer in the late Tang Dynasty, the Quyuan plow consists of eleven parts.That is, plow share, plow wall, plow bottom, press mortar, plow head, plow arrow, plow shaft, plow tip, plow comment, plow frame and plow plate,

　　The plow in the Han Dynasty has basically been finalized, but the plow in the Han Dynasty was a long straight shaft plow. It was not flexible enough to turn back and turn when plowing, and it was laborious to lift the soil and was not very efficient. The "Qi Min Yao Shu" written by Jia Sixie of the Northern Wei Dynasty mentioned the long curved shaft plow and the "Weili", but due to unknown records, can only be speculated to be a short-shaft plow; its advantage is that the plow body can swing during operation, it is highly maneuverable, and is convenient for deep plowing. It is also light and flexible, easy to maneuver, and is suitable for small paddy fields in the Jiangnan area. characteristics, so the short curved shaft plow first appeared in the Jiangdong area.

　　Secondly, the plowing and plowing construction are added. If the plowing is advanced, the plow arrow can be directed downwards and the plowshare will penetrate deeper into the soil.If you lift the plow so that the plow arrow points upward, the plowshare will sink shallowly into the soil.The organic combination of the plow shaft, plow arrows and plow construction of the curved shaft plow can adapt to the different requirements of deep or shallow plowing, and can standardize the depth of cultivated land to facilitate intensive farming.The plow wall not only breaks up the soil, but also pushes the plowed soil to one side, reducing the resistance of the plow.The curved shaft plow has a complete structure, is light and labor-saving, and is the advanced plow at that time.Through the Song, Yuan, Ming and Qing dynasties, the structure of the plow has not changed significantly.

　　
　
(End of this chapter)