I

  Chapter 123 121【Lack of food】

  Yongyang Town, General Military Mansion.

  Fei Chun hurried in and threw his big hat on the table: "A group of refugees have come back and are clamoring for land distribution."

"This is a good thing," Zhao Han said happily. "The war was so fierce before that the common people were scared away by the officers and soldiers. Even though we have half a county, there are less than 50,000 people in Dingkou, so we need to be called back." Just a few."

   "Food, there is not enough food!"

Fei Chun's job is to supervise the money and food. He said depressedly: "After the Xiao family donated the soil, many landlords followed suit. Their land was divided, but their money and food were not confiscated. The vagrants who came from Fucheng, The refugees who came back from Anfu and Taihe have no food in their hands, and they even have to borrow seeds from the government. The local tenants don’t have much food in stock, and it will be the season of shortage!"

The more Fei Chun said, the more anxious he became: "You still have to run so many schools and provide lunch for the students. Except for Wuxing Town, the mayors and heads of household departments of all towns came to me to ask for food. I went to Where does food come from?"

   "Haha," Zhao Han got up and poured tea for Fei Chun, and comforted Fei Chun with a smile, "Don't be impatient, don't be in a hurry."

  Fei Chun took a sip of hot tea, moistened his throat and said, "The school must be stopped. Even if it is really necessary, it must wait until the summer grain collection."

   "Everything can be stopped, but the school cannot be stopped." Zhao Han said.

  Running a school really doesn’t require much money and food. It’s full of children aged 7-12, which barely counts as four years of compulsory education.

  Now there are only more than 40,000 people under Zhao Han’s rule (over 12 years old), and only more than 3,000 school-age children aged 7-12. How much can you eat for lunch every day? It only consumes 200 stones in a month.

   Moreover, the teaching content is mainly about literacy, and the requirements for teachers are also very low. It is nothing more than popularizing elementary school on a large scale.

  Four or five teachers can teach a town.

  Books do not consume much pen and ink, and chalk is used as chalk to write and teach on black wooden boards. Students who have money prepare their own pens and ink, and even study at home, and they don't look down on public schools at all. In families with no money, parents use their hair to make brushes, and students practice calligraphy on wooden boards by dipping in water.

  As long as you are determined, there are always more solutions than difficulties!

  The real food consumption is a large number of refugees, vagrants and tenants, who have to rely on Zhao Han to borrow food to survive.

  Warming his hands with a teacup in his hands, Fei Chun gradually calmed down. He said, "There is another way, and that is to ask the landlord for grain!"

  Zhao Han asked: "How long can our food storage last?"

   "Before I was very optimistic, thinking that I could last until the summer grain harvest," Fei Chun said, "But more and more refugees are returning to their hometowns. If this trend continues, there will be a food shortage in March, and it can last until April at most."

   Zhao Han thought carefully for a moment and said, "Then borrow grain from the landlord."

   "Borrowing grain? Just collecting grain directly!" Fei Chun is in charge of supervising the money and grain. He doesn't want to have grain in the future and return the grain to the landlord.

"Listen to me," Zhao Han said with a serious expression, "Since these landlords are obedient and honestly hand over the land, we can't keep our promises. If you spit on a nail and say what you say, these landlords will be safe and secure. There will be no precarious worries."

  Fei Chun asked, "Do you really want to borrow food?"

  Zhao Han nodded and said: "Call Mr. Pang and the others some other day, and let's set up a food store."

   "What is the grain line?" Fei Chun asked in confusion.

  Zhao Han explained: "We build warehouses and store grain. Anyone can store grain in it, and pay them interest on a monthly basis. Farmers who borrow grain also have to pay interest. But the interest must be low, and usury is not allowed!"

  Fei Chun tried to understand: "For example, I am a landlord. I store the grain in the grain bank. After a few months, I can take it out and get the interest from the grain bank?"

   "Yes, that's it." Zhao Han said.

"Oh, my brother," Fei Chun suddenly felt a pain in his head, "storing food is consuming, and mice will come to eat it, and rice worms will come to eat it, and it may be damp and moldy. Is there any interest for the stored food? I don't charge storage fees. It’s all for saving face! This is a loss-making business!”

  Zhao Han said with a smile: "Now we are saving grain to borrow money, and we can save money to borrow money in the future."

   "The bank?" Fei Chun's eyes lit up.

  Zhao Han nodded: "It can also be called a bank."

  The bank of the Ming Dynasty originated from the Zhengtong period, and mainly engaged in the exchange business of silver, official money, and private money.

  During the Jiajing period, there was a flood of private money, the imperial court banned the exchange of copper coins, and large-scale bankruptcies across the country.

  In the early years of Wanli, the existence of Qianzhuang was allowed again. Even, the money houses all over the country have essentially become the issuing terminals of official money-the imperial court casts copper coins, and the money houses buy money with silver to help the imperial court issue new money to the market.

  During the reign of Chongzhen, Qianzhuang was very similar to the banks of later generations.

  Large banks have established remittance business in different places, and money orders even have the function of credit circulation (similar to checks).

  In the vast rural areas, there are countless money exchange shops or money rice shops, where silver, copper coins, and grain can be effectively exchanged.

  Zhao Han said: "Qianmipu cannot be in the hands of the landlord, we have to take the opportunity to get it."

   "Insufficient manpower!" Fei Chun complained.

  This is a technical job. Both silver and copper coins have good or bad quality, so it must be checked by experienced masters.

Zhao Han said with a smile: "So first set up a grain bank, and then run the bank when it grows bigger. You take people, go door to door to borrow grain, write down how much grain you borrow, and sign receipts to these landlords, promising that after the summer grain is harvested, you can Return the principal with interest. From now on, farmers will borrow grain from grain banks. There are two urgent tasks, one is to overcome the grain shortage, and the other is to establish credit."

  Fei Chun felt dizzy all of a sudden, he just wanted to return to Qianshan immediately, and be a servant of the Fei family honestly.

   He doesn't have many literate people under his command, and there is a shortage of warehouses for storing grain. Why the **** is he going to ask the landlord to borrow grain?

   "General Town, please see Mr. Li!"

   "Please!"

  Zhao Han was suddenly overjoyed. He had communicated with Pang Chunlai and knew how powerful Li Banghua was.

  Going out to welcome Li Banghua in, Zhao Han poured tea for the old man and asked, "Mr. Meng An is homesick?"

  Li Banghua was too lazy to go around and asked directly; "When do you plan to attack the state capital?"

   "Within two or three years." Zhao Han said.

  Li Banghua asked again: "After occupying Jiangxi, which province are you going to attack?"

  Zhao Han replied: "Fujian and Guangdong."

   "Aren't you going to fight Nanjing?" Li Banghua had a playful expression on his face.

   Zhao Han laughed and said, "Why should I attack Nanjing? Even if I can defeat it, I will become the number one rebel in the world."

  Li Banghua said: "If you can monopolize Jiangxi, you will already be the number one rebel in the world."

"It's not the same," Zhao Han argued, "as long as I don't attack Nanjing, the Jiangsu and Zhejiang areas, or even Huguang, the court's primary target of conquest will definitely be those rogues in the northwest. If Emperor Chongzhen dares to mobilize a large army to conquer To suppress Jiangxi, if we cannot defeat it within half a year, the bandits and tartars will be able to break through the capital!"

   Li Banghua agrees with this statement very much.

  Jiangxi is too far away from Beijing, and the rogues and Tartars are too close. As long as Chongzhen is still clear-headed, he has to put Jiangxi aside first.

  Li Banghua asked again: "After occupying Fujian and Guangdong?"

  Zhao Han replied: "Consolidate the territory of the three provinces, open up maritime trade, and practice firearms. If you have time, Guangxi will also be taken over."

   Li Banghua got up suddenly and walked up and down the room, as if he was thinking about something, and seemed to be struggling with something.

   After pacing back and forth for a long time, Li Banghua asked: "Do you think the imperial court can wipe out the bandits?"

Zhao Han replied: "The rogues are like leeks. Once you cut off a crop, you will grow another crop. Shanxi and Shaanxi have been plagued by disasters for years, and the imperial court continues to collect taxes. How can the peasants survive? Unless all the peasants in the two provinces are killed, Otherwise, the bandits will never be wiped out."

  In fact, some situations in the north are more serious than Zhao Han imagined!

  Before Chongzhen ascended the throne, the north was already rotten.

  In the seventh year of the Apocalypse, Wu Yingji once recorded his experiences, the general contents are as follows—

  Out of Zhenyang County, Henan Province, I walked for forty miles in a row. All the fields along the way were abandoned, and the fields were full of weeds.

  Wu Yingji asked the coachman: "How much land in this county is abandoned like this?"

  The coachman replied; "It's likely to be nine out of ten. Xixian County is much better, and only 40 to 50% of the land is abandoned."

  When he came to the station, Wu Yingji asked the postman again: "Why don't the people in this county farm the land?"

The postman replied: "There are many horse households in this county, and the horse administration is strict. Those who serve can't afford it, so they can only flee to other places. The people are gone, but the taxes and labor are still there. The government implements the law of continuous sitting. One household sits ten households in a row, and neighbors sit in a row. It’s over, and even sit with relatives. The rich pay for the service, and the poor can only run away, and the whole county has almost escaped.”

  Wu Yingji felt very strange: "Why didn't you sell the land before you ran away?"

  The postman replied: "The corvée of the horse government will be transferred to the landlord. No one dares to buy the acres in this county, so they can only be abandoned."

  Then talk about other tyranny, and then talk about local officials. From magistrates to magistrates, many of them were not Jinshi, and most of them came to buy officials for tribute, and they were exploited immediately after taking office, otherwise it would be difficult to recover the cost of buying officials.

  In a large and wealthy county, more than 80% of the land has been abandoned!

   Not only the tenants could not survive, but the owner farmers and small landlords had to flee. And those big landlords did not dare to occupy the land, and the grain harvest was not enough to bear the horse government corvee.

   Therefore, when the northwestern rogues entered Henan, many Henan people spontaneously revolted.

   Not coerced, but a spontaneous uprising!

  Shanxi is the same.

  After the Shaanxi rogues entered Shanxi, in just half a year, the number of local rebels in Shanxi far exceeded that of Shaanxi.

  How could Li Banghua not know about this situation?

   Many officials in the imperial court know it!

  Li Banghua took out a letter, handed it to Zhao Han and said, "Send someone to Jishuigu Village and give the letter to my father."

  Zhao Han said happily: "It must be done!"

   "Tell me, let me do something." Li Banghua said straightforwardly.

   "There's just a tricky thing," Zhao Han explained the situation of the food shortage, bowed his hands and said, "I'll ask you to borrow food from rich households, sir. They don't trust me for the time being, presumably it shouldn't be a problem for you to get involved."

  Li Banghua said with a smile: "Smart people will believe it. If you don't want to return the food, why do you borrow it? Just grab it."

  In addition to borrowing grain from landlords, Zhao Han also wanted to borrow grain from the government.

  Taihe and Anfu counties have bandits and refugees, and officials and gentry are walking on eggshells.

  Then let them raise money and food, and Zhao Han is responsible for taking the refugees away—Zhao Han got the food and population, the refugees can live and work in peace, and the government and gentry no longer have to worry about it.

   It's not a win-win, but a win-win, what a deal!

  (end of this chapter)