At the end of June, Dapanbao.
After a month of uninterrupted training, the more than 80 Dunjun soldiers of Dapanbao have made rapid progress. At least among the various Huolu Duns and Tunbu under the jurisdiction of Wangjiazhuang, they are already the strongest soldiers.
However, the weapons used by the Dunjun in the fort were mixed and worn out, so Liu Yan recruited people from all over the place, and also asked several craftsmen from Wang Wen Town to expand the military workshop in Dapanbao. Chen Xun also took people there A large amount of iron and coal were bought from the Qianhu Station in front of Xiahe Village to make standard spears and Yanling knives. Liu Yan immediately began to gradually replace the outdated weapons in the hands of the Dunjun.
At this time, many buildings in Dapanbao have been built, leaving only some scattered corners that still need to be carved. All that remains now is to build the fort wall.
For this reason, Liu Yan personally led people to drive an ox cart back and forth between Dapanbao and Qianhu Station in front of Xiahe Village, and bought several batches of wood and various materials. Zhang Yi took people there to mine stones for a period of time before, but because it was too laborious and took up a lot of manpower, Liu Yan asked everyone to come back directly.
As for the stones needed to build the fort wall, Liu Yan planned to purchase them all directly. Anyway, he now had some money, so it was enough to buy these building materials.
However, although there is no shortage of wood and stone nowadays, building the fort wall requires a large amount of loess and rammed mud.
During the ramming process, digging the soil, mixing the mud, removing the clay, and drying it also required a large number of manpower.
Liu Yan just mobilized all the military households in Dapanbao to help. More than 200 people, both men and women, went into battle. The families of the craftsmen also came out to work. As long as they came back from working in the military camp, everyone had to participate in the construction of the fort wall. , For this reason, Liu Yan also stipulated that the end time of military camp work should be advanced a little earlier.
"Sir, the bluestone is used as the wall base. It needs to be polished first and rammed to build the fort wall. It also needs to be glued with slurry."
In the evening of that day, in front of Liu Yan, a large number of men and women carrying dustpans and baskets were running back and forth along the fort wall to carry earth. Some craftsmen were instructing the men of Dapanbao to polish the stones, and some craftsmen were instructing the men to ram the fort wall. . The scene was in full swing.
At this time, besides Chen Xun and others, beside Liu Yan was the old craftsman who made the large waterwheel. Although he was a carpenter, he was also proficient in civil engineering and masonry.
"Juice bonding?"
After listening to the old craftsman's words, Liu Yan was a little surprised. He didn't know that slurry was needed to ram the fortress wall, and what was this slurry?
After the old craftsman's explanation, Liu Yan understood.
It turns out that in ancient times, the city wall was built by mixing loess slurry, river sand, lime, and glutinous rice slurry in a certain proportion to make a triple soil. The fort wall built in this way is durable and strong and difficult to damage. In some places, dog urine is even added when building walls. The locals believe that this can ward off evil spirits. Of course, for Liu Yan, dog urine is fine.
Loess and river sand were fine, but Liu Yan couldn't help but feel heartache at the thought of using a large amount of glutinous rice. Chen Xun and others next to him also showed pity. They were usually reluctant to eat glutinous rice, but they didn't expect it to be built into the fortress wall.
However, according to old craftsmen, fort walls built in this way can be strong and durable and can last for hundreds of years. Moreover, this was also the most common wall-building method in ancient times. In some big cities or palaces, they built fort walls. When wrapping bricks, in addition to adding a large amount of glutinous rice juice, a large amount of brown sugar, egg white, red beans and other substances are also added to make an adhesive, which costs countless money.
After listening to the old craftsman, what else could Liu Yan say? He only said one sentence: "We must maintain quality and quantity." Then he patrolled everywhere again.
According to the planning and calculations of Liu Yan and other craftsmen, the fort wall of Dapanbao was slightly smaller than that of Wangjiazhuang, with a circumference of one mile and dozens of steps. The fort wall was about ten meters high, and the city foundation was five meters thick without bricks. There is a south gate facing south, with a tower built on top of the gate, an urn outside, and a protective ditch.
Outside the fort, Liu Yan is also planning to build a school ground for soldiers to practice, as well as a martial arts hall for officers to sit and command and rest.
Inside the fort, the streets and alleys are planned to be paved with mountain stones, with drainage ditches on both sides also paved with stones. Since the terrain of Dapanbao is high in the north and low in the south, if it rains, it will be easily drained and there will be no risk of water logging. At the same time, a stone pit was built outside the south gate. In the future, accumulated water would be discharged directly from the inside of the fort into the stone pit through water channels. The water would be used for people and livestock in the fort, and could even be used for future field irrigation.
This idea was thought up by Liu Yan. After discussion, the craftsmen thought it was feasible and admired Liu Yan's whimsical idea.
After the streets are built, since pieces of land have been planned in advance in the fort, in the future, military households or foreign residents in the fort who do not want to live in barracks can purchase land from Liu Yan and use it in the divided land. They built their own houses on the blocks, and eventually all the people in the fort jointly built temples, stages and other public buildings.
With the design of Liu Yan and the craftsmen, the military households of Dapanbao only need to work hard. Liu Yan and others estimate that it will take about two or three months to build the fort wall.
High-intensity work requires a large amount of rice. Although Liu Yan cannot let everyone eat white flour, he can feed himself with millet cereals and black flour pancakes. High-intensity labor also requires meat, otherwise the physical strength cannot support it and it is easy to urinate blood.
Liu Yan also stipulated that all those who participated in the construction of the fort wall would eat meat for one day and vegetarian food for five days as they did during the land reclamation last year. They would be given breakfast porridge in the morning, and every ten people would be given a glass of wine every seven days. In addition, there would be a little wages. Not much, but enough to make these military households happy.
With a Shangguan like Liu Yan and the construction of their own home, although the work was very heavy, everyone was very motivated. However, Liu Yan estimated that if this continued, after the fort wall was built, more than half of the two thousand taels of silver he had accumulated would be spent. Fortunately, there is a soap workshop, so Liu Yan has a source of income.
Since the establishment of Dapanbao, the life of the military households in the fort has been obvious to all. Although they have to work every day, everyone can have enough to eat. In this era, this is not easy.
Moreover, Liu Yan, the superior officer of Dapanbao, had a reputation for caring for his subordinates, being kind and capable. Through word of mouth, Dapanbao became more attractive to everyone, so some civilians and military households came to join Liu Yan one after another. .
Liu Yan's demand for population would never be satisfied. He accepted all those who defected and asked Zhao Min to register them one by one and give them the military household registration of Dapanbao.
Of course, some of these people are still registered as deserters from other Qianhu Stations. Accepting them will inevitably cause a series of disputes in the future, but when it comes to his own mouth, how can Liu Yan extrapolate it? It is still accepted correctly.
One day, Liu Yan was discussing matters with Chen Xun, Wang Bo, and Zhang Yi in the flag hall, while Wang Yue led others to watch from the observation deck. Suddenly Wang Yue saw something and hurriedly came over to report to Liu Yan.
It turned out that a group of refugees had gathered towards Dapanbao, and Liu Yanwen Wenxu hurriedly led everyone out to investigate.
Liu Yan couldn't help but be surprised when he saw this group of refugees. There were about ten families with more than fifty people in this group of refugees. They were the largest number of people who had come to seek refuge in Dapanbao during these times. Seeing that they were all in ragged clothes, with sallow complexions and thin muscles, and all spoke with the same accent, they seemed to be from the same village.
These people stood in front of the south gate, looking at everyone around them with fearful eyes, but at the same time their eyes were full of hope. The leader, an old man, stepped forward and knelt on the ground, begging Liu Yan's men and asking them to join Liu Yan to farm here.
Around them, some working Dapanbao military households were giving them pointers and discussions from time to time. Looking at these miserable refugees, the Dapanbao military households discovered their happiness, thinking that they were just like them back then, but now they can eat Being well-fed and clothed made them speak louder.
When Liu Yan and his party came out, they saw a circle of people surrounding the refugees. Wang Yue walked up and shouted loudly: "What are you doing? You don't have to work anymore?"
The soldiers dispersed with a bang and continued to do their work, but everyone's ears were raised high, always paying attention to the movements here.
When the refugees saw a young military leader coming out to yell at everyone, he seemed to be very powerful, and everyone shrank subconsciously.
Liu Yan smelled the sour smell of these people who had not bathed for many days, and glanced at these hungry people. From men to women, from old people to children, everyone's eyes were full of expectation. He asked: "Where did you come from? ?Where is your family name?"
One of the old men came out to kowtow and said in a trembling voice: "I came from Yanzhou. My family suffered a disaster and the land tax was heavy, so I had to escape from famine. I was passing by here and heard about your kindness and righteousness, so I came to seek refuge with you. I hope you will Take it in.”
After saying that, the crowd of refugees immediately kowtowed and begged again.
Chen Xun had been paying attention to Liu Yan's expression. When he saw him nodding slightly, he walked forward and said loudly: "My lord, I am merciful and willing to take you in, but you must remember the rules of our Dapan Fort. When you come to the fort, you need to All must join the military household, and those who do not want to will be expelled immediately!"
"In the future, our camp will organize you to reclaim wasteland, borrow oxen, plows and other equipment, and allocate fields in the future. In the first year, everyone will be exempted from taxation in the fort. In the second year, one dou of grain will be collected for each mu of farmland. , to pay for the cattle tools and other silver previously borrowed. From the third year on, we will collect two dou of grain per mu, are you willing?"
These refugees from Yanzhou have all heard the rules of Dapanbao. In today's world, having enough food and clothing is the most important thing. How are civilian households better than military households? Not to mention that they will have their own fields and cattle to allocate. From then on, everyone can live a stable life. The military households in front of them are examples.
At that moment, everyone kowtowed and said, "It's all up to you!"
Liu Yan asked Chen Xun to arrange for these people to go down and cook some porridge for them to eat first, and then let them go to the river to take a bath to prevent any bacteria from being brought into the fort. In addition, he also ordered Zhao Min to register these people one by one and issue them military households. From now on, they will be the military households of Dapanbao.
Liu Yan also arranged barracks and dormitories for these new military households. After these people rested for a few days, he let them work on building the fort wall. With these newly added people, perhaps the construction of the fort wall could be faster, and so on. After the fort wall was built, it was time to organize these new manpower to reclaim the wasteland.
Finally, Liu Yan took a look at Zhao Min's brochure and was surprised. From the beginning of the year to now, there have been more than 30 new military households with more than 100 people. Even the original military households and craftsmen households now have hundreds of households in Dapanbao, with a population of more than 400.
Now the population size of Dapanbao is basically the same as that of Wangjiazhuang, and Liu Yan can't help but feel proud.
