Landlord of the Tang Dynasty

Chapter 187 Gossip
"Uh... this is road construction, alas, let me tell you this..." Xu Qing said: "People have meridians and blood, and the country..."

Therefore, Xu Qing spent an hour explaining the importance of roads to local economic construction, and spent another hour explaining the importance of economic construction clearly, and everyone nodded with half understanding.Seeing the effect, Xu Qing almost yelled: You are the worst class I have ever led!
After arranging the yamen, everyone returned to their own county, preparing to mobilize manpower and material resources to deal with the unexpected flood of victims.

At this time, a rumor quietly spread in the city of Cangzhou: the government will purchase a large amount of food and clothing in the near future to deal with the disaster, and, in order to prevent merchants from hoarding goods, the government will increase the market price.

No one knew where the gossip came from, and when asked about the "people inside", they all kept silent and were very cautious.As a result, everyone said to their faces: the gossip is unbelievable, but in the field, they are trying their best to deliver things to Cangzhou City.

One spread to ten, ten to hundreds, and this piece of news quickly ignited Hebei prefectures and counties like the wind fueling the fire.All major grain stores and cloth merchants expressed great concern.Director He Jian wrote to ask, but there was no text, this matter is even more mysterious!And it's getting worse...

The ins and outs of this rumor were naturally manipulated by Xu Qing.Xu Qing was very fortunate to accept Gouzi, a little boy, what a child said.The news of the high price of grain was sent out through the mouth of this kid.In the children's words, the strong wind blows away, and no one can follow the source and touch the instigator.

The more people tell a lie, the more people will believe it, and the more people believe it, the "truth".

The second day after the rumors spread, Xun Xueer, Huang Shimei, and Xiaoyue came to Xu Qing worriedly and asked, "Sir, are you in a hurry to spend money recently?"

"Ah? No..." Xu Qing was confused. Is this to sell loans?

Xun Xueer said: "Xu Lang, don't lie to us. Recently, there are rumors that the government will collect grain at a high price. We don't know how much money there is in the government?"

Huang Shimei continued: "Xu Lang, you should tell us about this difficult matter. You brought back a lot of money from Liaodong. If it's not enough, my jewelry is very expensive and can be worth some money!"

Xiaoyue said weakly: "Yes, yes, I have it too, I have it too..."

Seeing the anxious look of the three girls, Xu Qing couldn't hold back a puff, and laughed loudly: "Hahaha, so that's the case, haha, so it's the case, I'm dying of laughter, hahaha..."

"What's the matter?" The three women were puzzled, and asked together: "Does Xu Lang look down on our women? We also know that the Qi family runs the country and helps the victims, okay?"

"Hahaha..." Xu Qing stopped laughing: "Hi ladies, Xiaosheng is being polite..."

"Look, he's not serious anymore!" Huang Shimei raised her eyebrows and said to the other two girls.

"What's going on?" Xun Xueer asked.

"Have you heard the news that the government will spend a lot of money to collect grain at a high price?" Xu Qing asked back.

"Yes, is the news false?"

"The news is true, or I spread it

, but it is not all true. "

"Could it be true that harvesting grain is real, and the high price is fake? It's absolutely necessary, Brother Xu, you must be trustworthy when doing business, even if it's the government..."

"No, no, the high price is also true..." Xu Qing pretended to be profound: "The high price is true, but the large sum of money is fake!"

Xu Qing paused and said, "Who said that if you ask a high price, you have to spend a lot of money?"

"What do you mean?" the girls asked blankly.

Xu Qing said his plan softly: "People must learn to think in reverse. It is said that rare things are expensive, and many things are cheap...Take grain merchants as an example. Raising the price can attract grain merchants to transport grain. If you delay If you don’t sell it, the grain merchants will not leave until they make money, so more and more grain merchants will come. There will be more and more grain. Once there is more grain, it will naturally have to be sold at a low price. The price will be much less than usual!"

"Besides, the news of the high-priced acquisition is not written in black and white, and the official seal is just a rumor!"

The three daughters, especially Huang Shimei, were dumbfounded when they heard this. This Xu Qing is simply a profiteer among profiteers...

A bucket of three Wenqian, a bucket of five Wenqian, and a bucket of eight Wenqian!One tael of silver for one stone!One, two, three, one stone!Rumors are rooted in everyone's greed, and they are skyrocketing.One, two or three silver coins and one stone grain, even in the spring famine season, it is less than this price!
The grain merchants who heard the news were all stunned... Now the general price of grain in all states and counties is eight qian silver a stone. Of course, when selling to outside grain merchants, the price will increase as a rule.Especially this kind of temporary emergency food purchase, it is natural to be ruthless.

After all, there is still less than a month before the autumn harvest, and the food stockpiles will soon depreciate, and at least they will lose money by then.What's more, food is such a thing, if you store it in your hands, it will be wasted every day.In vain!
Although Cangzhou requires grain merchants to transport the grain to Cangzhou City, what is a little shipping cost in the face of huge profits at such a short distance?
Because Xu Qing had written a letter to other states and counties before, asking them to help mobilize food supplies.Other states and counties will certainly not be willing to spend their reserves in vain, but they just heard the news.Therefore, all goods shipped to Cangzhou do not need to pay customs duties!

Now one can imagine how enthusiastic the grain merchants will treat this big deal?Under the temptation of huge profits, everything is not a problem.The grain merchants figured that anyway, Li was going to sell grain. At worst, the trip would be for nothing, but if they were done well, they could make a lot of money and have a good new year!As a result, bags of grain were moved out of the warehouses of grain merchants in various counties, loaded onto ships, and transported to Cangzhou along the waterway...

On the fifth day after Xu Qing received Shandong Daowenyi, the warehouses in Cangzhou City were filled with grain from grain merchants.Grain merchants who came late could only stay in private houses and store their grain in the open air.

After the grain came into the city, various grain merchants or their shopkeepers went to the yamen to inquire.When the yamen heard the news, they were at a loss, so they reported it layer by layer.Some want to arrest those who spread rumors, and some want to buy food according to their tricks.After reporting to Xu Qing's desk, Xu Qing nodded, and the food will be collected in a few days, and the official needs to turn around some funds...

As soon as Xu Qing said this, joy erupted from top to bottom, and the grain merchants all over the city were also happy.This is true, the governor himself agreed!

From morning to night on this day, there was an endless stream of grain ships arriving in Cangzhou.The later bosses and shopkeepers became nervous when they saw the grain ships next to each other in Cangzhou City.

As soon as they entered the city, they hurriedly went to the major grain stores to inquire, and the answers they got were of course without exception, and they all said, please wait a night, and when the governor is ready to collect the money, they will be collected together.

The grain merchants were unhappy, but now that there were more wolves and less meat, everyone was afraid of offending the benefactor, so not only did they dare not say a bad word, they had to show magnanimity:

"It should be, it should be, you must be considerate of the governor."

"Don't be in a hurry, don't be in a hurry, ask the governor how he is..."

"Lord Inspector is really a good official!"

Seeing that it was getting late, the grain merchants went to Qinglou Tavern to have a drink and have fun.In the big fart of Cangzhou City, there are only a few decent brothels and taverns. No matter where the grain merchants go, they will meet a bunch of colleagues.As soon as everyone met, they were naturally very cordial. In almost every restaurant, such a scene was staged:
"Unexpectedly, Brother Ang came here in person. It's a pity that we couldn't drink together during the Mid-Autumn Festival!!"

"Oh, brother Xia Xian, you are here too, long time no see, long time no see..."

"Man, hurry up and add food and wine! Brother, let me introduce you, this is the owner and shopkeeper of the other three grain stores in our county..."

"Long time, long time!"

Although I have never seen it before, it is even more important to show intimacy.

"Long admiration, please take a seat!"

"Please take a seat!" After some concessions, everyone sat down again to start the banquet. After drinking three rounds and eating five flavors, they naturally wanted to talk and chat.Everyone is in the same business, and they came here for the same purpose, going around, and the topic will eventually return to the Cangzhou grain harvest.The information everyone inquired about was similar. After chatting for a while, they found nothing new, so they talked about their respective goods.

"Brother Ang, how much food did you bring this time?" Xiandi Xia asked.

"Not much, just a few dozen stones."

"How much can you earn with dozens of stones, why don't you bring more?"

Angkor Angkor twitched his beard and said: "The big wind disaster, how many people have suffered. As merchants, we have goods in our hands, so we naturally want to donate generously. Who wants that little money?"

Xia Xiandi despises it in his heart, since this is the case, he should bring more.

However, everyone still clasped their hands and said, "Old Brother Ang is right. If one party is in trouble, all parties will support him. No one wants the money."

"Do you know how many disaster victims Cangzhou will receive this time?" Angkor asked.

"Oh?" Then everyone remembered that Cangzhou harvested grain to deal with the disaster victims!That is to say, if there are not many victims, there will not be much food required.

All the grain merchants looked at Angkor, and remembered that he was a local grain merchant, so they respectfully asked: "I don't know, please enlighten me..."

"Hehehe..." Brother Wu ate a chopstick dish, put down the chopsticks, and stretched out four fingers: "Forty thousand..."

"What? 4 people..." Everyone calculated in their hearts, 4 people, even if these victims stayed in Cangzhou for two months, the food they spent would only cost more than 3000 shi!Everyone looked around, and then weighed the food in their hands, scared, it's over!
Everyone said that there were only a few dozen stones, but in fact, there were hundreds of stones, or even hundreds of stones, which is not surprising at all.And how many grain merchants are there?There are at least 40 to [-] people who can be famous... In this way, at least [-]% of the grain merchants will have to make a trip for nothing!
This is not counting those who came later, not counting the local farmers, not counting those small households...

Immediately, everyone couldn't taste the food, couldn't drink the wine, and they were frowning.Seeing everyone like this, Angkor Angkor secretly laughed in his heart, and still persuaded on the face: "Everyone, don't be in a hurry. It will be good if you sell it. If you can't sell the food, there will be no loss. Except for dealing with the victims, the government said Maybe I have to sell grain to fill my warehouse!"

(End of this chapter)