Datang Nongsheng

Chapter 144

People's hearts are all driven by profit, this is what Li Shimin does not want to see, eager for quick success will cause big problems, and the Sui Dynasty was destroyed like this, Li Shimin saw this, so he was very worried.

Sometimes he would look at Sun Xiangfu with a complaining look, because it was this kid who made the country more and more difficult to govern.

Sometimes, he is very grateful to Sun Xiangfu, without the many things he has done, there are so many smiling faces of the common people in the relevant land.

Miwei sent him a message some time ago, saying that Xingfu Village was about to sow the second season of this year. The surrounding people, including the tenants of the rich and powerful families in Chang'an, all rushed to watch it, and the number exceeded [-].

Brother Sun Dali presided over the planting. They not only removed the guards, but also prepared thirst-quenching tea for those who came to watch and learn the planting techniques. Buy a bowl of rice porridge with minced meat in the public house in Xingfu Village to satisfy your hunger.

They did not hide these secret techniques of getting rich as treasures like other families did. The young man named Sun Erli carefully explained to everyone the skills of growing melons. It is said that these seeds can grow a kind of Chinese cabbage and cabbage with an yield of several thousand catties per mu, especially the Chinese cabbage, which is not afraid of being buried by frost and snow. It is the most crunchy and sweet to eat.

Not only that, due to the slight drought in Guanzhong this year, many crops that require a lot of water cannot be planted. The two brothers also called on farmers to pay attention to ditches to divert water. drought tolerant crops.

Li Shimin is looking forward to seeing what will grow on the idle land in Guanzhong every year after the autumn harvest. Therefore, he is more supportive of the series of actions in Xingfu Village.

Also a few days ago, more than a dozen counties in Guanzhong came to report, saying that they did not know how to collect taxes. Because of the reservoir, thousands to tens of thousands of acres of land in each county were planted with broccoli and other fish plants. , These grasses are different from food, and can be harvested almost every day. How does the court collect taxes on this new crop?Send people to guard their fields every day to see how much fish and grass they sell, and then tax one for thirty?Or count how much fish and grass they sell in a year, calculated on an annual basis, and the tax is one for thirty?Anyway, no matter which method is not suitable.

Finally, after discussing with the ministers, Li Shimin decided to collect the average grain tax collected by Zhongtian. As a result, within three days, the counties reported that the farmers who planted fish and grass had paid all the taxes for this year. , One water of copper coins, settled on the spot, you know, this is just July, and there is still one and a half months before the autumn harvest!Where did these people get so much money?

Li Shimin sent secret guards to investigate and found out that these fish and grass farmers sell fish and grass to feed workshops everywhere every day, and each feed workshop settles with them in cash. In just half a year, [-] acres of Yongye The common people who have planted fish and grass in their fields at least get fifty guan forage money from the feed workshop.

Even if the [-]-acre field encounters a good year with good grain prices, how much can the grain produced be sold for?At most forty or fifty guan, you know, it’s only July, and those fish and grass fields are said to be able to harvest fish and grass for three to four months, that is to say, farmers who plant fish and grass can earn more than [-] guan this year. .

A farmer with an annual income of [-]?

Li Shimin didn't even dare to think about it before. Sun Wuji, Minister of the Ministry of Household Affairs, regretted setting the tax rate low. The officials are probably about to rebel.

However, Li Shimin finally rejected Changsun Wuji's request to re-establish the taxation of these fish and grass fields. Storing wealth for the people is one of his governance concepts.Moreover, the secret guard told him that the people who grow fish and grass are very hard. Every day, the whole family has to go to battle to cut fish and grass and send them to the workshop. The labor load is several times that of ordinary farmers. For such a high income, they also Pay the equivalent sweat.

Li Shimin doesn't like to take advantage of ordinary people, he only likes to take advantage of people like Sun Xiangfu who are too able to make money, just like the simple and honest Yu Chigong, he doesn't have as many ways to make money as other powerful people, so Li Shimin treats him Qin Qiong's reward is the most generous. Qin Qiong has been very rich recently. Even if he had the merit of offering armor, Li Shimin only praised him verbally.

Today, when Li Shimin thought of this incident, his stomach felt very uncomfortable. Even though Sun Xiangfu was not in Chang'an, he still sent a message to Yu Xiuer. No matter what, after the autumn harvest this year, the fields of the Royal Farm must be seen. When it comes to crops, otherwise, the family law serves, who calls Sun Xiangfu a retainer!
Yu Xiu'er wanted to laugh when she received this oral order. He knew that her husband's status in the emperor's heart was getting higher and higher, so she hurriedly sent a letter to Xingfu Village to get Sun Erli ready.

Of course, Sun Xiangfu in Lingnan didn't know these things. Today was a big day for Xuanzang to go to sea, and Sun Xiangfu deliberately came to the pier to see him off.

In order to ensure his safety, Sun Xiangfu lent him the Happiness to travel. Then, in order to keep the Happiness safe, Sun Xiangfu had to be accompanied by the guards. Afterwards, he really wanted to see what kind of country Tianzhu was, anyway, the whole world couldn't satisfy his curiosity.

The distance is only three or four thousand kilometers. With the sea speed of the Happiness, as long as there is no accident, it will take about ten days to arrive. Just after one round trip, the grain in Sun Xiangfu's experimental field has also been harvested. When the time comes, everyone will return to Chang'an together. .

"See you again, I don't know when it will be, Master, have a good journey."

"My lord, I will send you off, and the poor monk has gone."

The monks are so indifferent, they don't need any affectionate farewell words, and they don't need other people's memory of him. He doesn't even take any money from Feng An. It would be a joke if the country could starve to death.

"This monk is wise, I hope he doesn't die at sea!"

"Don't worry, Daoist, I have confidence in the happiness number, and none of the people on it seem to be short-lived."

Watching the Happiness leave Hong Kong from a distance, Sun Xiangfu didn't let go of the tone in his heart. He provided help for Xuanzang's study path just by hand.

This voyage is of great significance to him. If the Happiness can successfully enter the Indian Ocean, it will have the ability to sail from the Cape of Good Hope in Africa to South America across a sea area of ​​more than 4000 kilometers.

With the hard basic conditions, the rest depends on luck. Offshore navigation and long-sea navigation are two different things. The Cape of Good Hope is adjacent to the westerly belt. The harsh weather environment and sea conditions make it called the Cape of Storms by later generations. Sun Xiangfu wants this During the period when ships crossed the Atlantic Ocean, luck was very important.

"I didn't expect that my heart would be empty after this monk left." Seeing the happiness disappear from sight, Li Chunfeng's words disrupted Sun Xiangfu's thinking.

"The Taoist priest is not going to be inseparable from the master during this time, and has feelings for him!"

"Bullshit, they are all monks, that's where the feelings come from."

"I feel relieved when the Taoist priest said that. So what, can we let go of the patient camp now? If possible, come to Baiyun Lake for a few days! I just have something to discuss with the Taoist priest."

"What's the matter?"

"In terms of academics, I want to study an instrument that can locate at sea..."

When he was in college, Sun Xiangfu once saw a sextant in the Science and Technology Museum. However, at that time, he only roughly scanned the shape of the thing with his eyes, and only knew that it could be measured by observing the angle between the horizon and the celestial body. The latitude and longitude positioning where you are.

If there is a need, an idea, and a direction, then it is necessary to explore slowly. Li Chunfeng is a professional who sees the world in this era. It is natural for Sun Xiangfu to ask him to study together. Therefore, during the period of waiting for the rice to mature on the peninsula During the day, in addition to eating and sleeping, they started to have a lot of academic discussions. Many mathematics and physics knowledge learned in junior high school and high school were also discussed by Sun Xiangfu with Li Chunfeng.

As for learning these unknown knowledge, Li Chunfeng's enthusiasm was obviously higher than Sun Xiangfu's imagination. However, the more he knew, the more doubts he had. Sun Xiangfu did an experiment. The place they chose was on the sea. When two sets of test data and an example were placed in front of Li Chunfeng, he did not fall asleep for three days.

Because he discovered that the world might really be a sphere like a sentence that Sun Xiangfu accidentally said, otherwise, why would he see the top of the island first on the sea, and the sailboat is the same. The most important thing is the angle. The sea level of Guangzhou and Yazhou is not at the same angle as the Big Dipper, nor is it at the same angle as the Ziwei star that he has seen countless times a year.

"Is it really possible that our world is round?"

"All I can say is, it's very possible."

Although Sun Xiangfu said so, he had actually asked the craftsman to plan out a ball for himself with a planer, and began to draw dotted lines on it with a pen. He still remembered the general shape of several major states in later generations. After randomly circled , and then start to mark the latitude and longitude with dotted lines, and use the first degree measured by the sextant as the reference point. Soon, the approximate latitude and longitude will be marked on the entire sphere by him.

When he filled the entire sphere with words, Li Chunfeng snatched the ball and carefully watched all the numbers on the sphere.

"Yes, yes, only if it is a sphere, can we explain the change in angle, but if it is a sphere, why doesn't the water flow downhill? How can people stand still..."

Sun Xiangfu still remembered how dazed he was when he saw Li Chunfeng for the first time, he patted him heavily on the shoulder and said, "Teacher, please take a look."

After speaking, Sun Xiangfu threw a coconut in his hand into the air.

With a "plop", the coconut fell to the surface of the sea.

"Does the Taoist priest know why this coconut can't fly up to the sky, but falls down?"

"Nonsense, because coconuts have weight!"

"Of course I know that coconuts have weight, but if they have weight, why do they have to fall to the ground instead of to the sky?"

"Fall to the sky?"

"Yup!"

"This..." Li Chunfeng's brain froze when asked by Sun Xiangfu.

Fearing that something might be wrong with him, Sun Xiangfu hurriedly said, "Perhaps, our land has suction, and all the rivers, lakes, or birds and animals that exist on the land are sucked to this ground by him, unless they can break free. Its suction, otherwise, would end up sticking to the ground."

Hearing what Sun Xiangfu said, Li Chunfeng became more and more ignorant of this world.

(End of this chapter)