British government.
"What's wrong? I just left and came back."
In the study room, Xiao Han was still struggling with the art of Ming industry and completed the economics of Ming Dynasty. Faced with such things as industry, Xiao Han also had some difficulties.
After all, if there is a slight difference in the principles of industrial technology, it may be a huge difference.
Xiao Han remembered a lot of things very vaguely, and even if he just had to write a rough outline, it would be very difficult.
At this moment, Zhu Biao, who had left on the front foot, actually came back.
"As you expected, there is news from Lancang."
"The old man King Fa'ang is dead."
"Prince Mo Sentai of Lancang announced that he would carry out King Fa'ang's will and send a mission to pay tribute to our Ming Dynasty. He also announced that Fa'ang would observe mourning for three months and not see outsiders."
Zhu Biao said to these Xiao Han.
"oh?"
"It seems that Mo Sentai is quite smart. He knows that if he directly ascends the throne and shows his face, the murderous clans will definitely find a way to kill him."
"So I just made an excuse to keep my father's filial piety and didn't see anyone. In this way, even if those people want to kill him, they won't find a chance."
"Their mission just came out?"
Xiao Han chuckled.
"Well, this is the news that the members of the Jinyiwei who infiltrated over there saw it and rushed it back. I think they haven't even left the country yet."
"However, after hearing what you said, I'm a little worried. You said, seeing that they can't kill Mo Sentai, those clans will have the idea of robbing the mission."
"After all, as long as this mission cannot deliver the credentials to us, Mo Sentai will not be canonized by us, and they will still have the opportunity to take action against Mo Sentai."
Zhu Biao said.
"hehe."
"I have thought of this a long time ago. I have already made arrangements before. If the Lancang royal family sends a mission to our Ming Dynasty, we will fully protect it."
Xiao Han chuckled.
He didn't receive this news, mainly because he didn't want to receive it, because he had already arranged the relevant matters, so why bother tracking it in real time?
As a result, what he didn't expect was that Xiao Han didn't want to follow him, and Zhu Biao ran over and was followed by Xiao Han passively.
"ah."
"I see. I asked you why there was no reaction at all. It turns out you were already prepared."
Zhu Biao shook his head helplessly.
On the contrary, he thought too much, and Xiao Han was indeed a stable one.
"By the way, how are your arrangements with the Jin Yiwei at the North Mutual Market?"
Xiao Han turned to Zhu Biao and asked.
"It has been arranged. The leader is Mao Xiang, who I transferred from the army."
Zhu Biao said to Xiao Han.
"Mao Xiang, it's him."
Xiao Han narrowed his eyes slightly.
The first commander of the Royal Guards in history, he killed many people while he was in office, but his death in the end was quite tragic.
After all, he is not the prince of Ming Dynasty. If the material of Jinyiwei's knife is not good, it will be broken into pieces.
"how?"
"What's the relationship between Feng Xue and him?"
Zhu Biao was slightly surprised.
Mao Xiang's record in the army was not outstanding, and it stands to reason that he would not be able to reach Xiao Han's level.
"without."
"The main reason is that there are not many transferred from our Ming army, so I usually pay attention to them."
Xiao Han said.
To be honest, he didn't expect that in this kind of Jin Yiwei that he personally modified, Mao Xiang would gradually become the leader.
"I plan to promote him in the future and let him guard the north for a long time, penetrate the Mongolian Yuan Dynasty and protect the mutual market. What do you think of Feng Xue?"
Zhu Biao asked.
"it should be OK."
"Those who come out of our Ming Army should be trustworthy."
Xiao Han nodded slightly.
Xiao Han remembered that Mao Xiang seemed to be executed by Zhu Yuanzhang for colluding with officials and accepting bribes in history.
However, after getting to know these gangsters in the court during the Ming Dynasty over the years, Xiao Han did not think things would be that simple.
After all, Jinyiwei is the sword of the royal family. Xiao Han knows Zhu Yuanzhang well. Since he dares to hand over power to the commander, he must be able to control it.
It’s hard to say about the subsequent emperors, but Zhu Yuanzhang, the Hongwu Emperor, is definitely fine.
Mao Xiang might not know as well as Zhu Yuanzhang about what happened inside Jinyiwei.
In all likelihood, Mao Xiang really offended too many people, and was finally abandoned by Lao Zhu.
After all, Mao Xiang killed more than 30,000 people, but they were all from the powerful class. No one was not related to relatives and friends, and no one was a fuel-efficient lamp.
Such a person, placed in the north, can make people feel at ease.
Moreover, for Bei Yuan, he would not offend powerful families such as Ming Dynasty too much. As long as Mao Xiang didn't think too hard and wanted to climb to Yingtian Mansion, he should be able to die a good death in the end.
As for being killed by Bei Yuan, this possibility is actually not very high. After all, he is not responsible for fighting Bei Yuan.
"It seems that your recent writing of the Ming Dynasty's Industrial Essential Techniques has not been going well."
Zhu Biao turned to Xiao Han and asked.
"Um."
"Engineering is the most practical thing. I write on a blank sheet of paper by myself. I don't know how to write many things clearly."
"It seems that the Ming Dynasty's industrial skills have to be broken down. Originally, I thought I would work out the theory first and then put it into full practice. But as soon as I wrote it down, I found that I was overestimating myself."
"It seems that we still have to walk on two legs, one step is theory and the other step is practice."
"Let's do this. Let's build a batch of iron-making blast furnaces on a large scale first, and take this as the first step in practice to upgrade our Ming Dynasty's steel industry. I have already written out this part of the engineering skills."
Xiao Han rubbed his eyebrows slightly.
"Ironmaking?"
"Iron smelting shop, our Ming Dynasty is actually very short of steel now, we need it for farm tools and to maintain the combat effectiveness of our soldiers."
"Let's do this. I'll ask Shan Anren to gather the best blacksmiths in the Ming Dynasty."
Zhu Biao agreed and spoke.
"blacksmith…"
"That's okay, I might need their help later."
Xiao Han nodded slightly.
In fact, by the Ming Dynasty, the technology of iron-making was quite mature. The only problem was that they were basically small blacksmith-type workshops without large-scale blast furnaces.
On the one hand, there were no blowers in this period, and the most advanced way of blowing was water-driven blowing.
This technology has been proposed as early as the "Nongshu" of the Song Dynasty.
However, hydraulic power must be limited by water. The greater the hydraulic power required, the more turbulent the water is.
There are generally no people in places where water flows rapidly, so naturally no one would go there to strike iron for the sake of water power.
This has put the blacksmith's craft in a rather embarrassing situation. It can only rely on small furnaces, and many times even have to manually pull the bellows. The firepower and wind power are not very sufficient, and it requires subsequent processing before it can be used. .
The state of the blacksmiths has also given the wealthy businessmen a sense that ironmaking relies on craftsmanship and is not a business that can make money on a large scale.
In this state, it is naturally impossible to promote the development of blast furnaces and mass production of steel.
However, Boss Xiao Han doesn't care about this. If he wants to do something big, he will do it big.
"This time, where do you plan to get the land?"
Zhu Biao continued to ask Xiao Han.
"Well, I don't want Ying Tianfu this time."
"The flow of the Yangtze River in Yingtianfu is too gentle."
"I want to set up a large-scale blast furnace for ironmaking in a place with abundant water power."
Xiao Han said.
To do it, we need to do it in one step, directly increase the water power and abandon the method of people pulling the bellows, and pull the furnace temperature up, which saves trouble and effort.
"ah?"
"Choose a place like this to make iron, right?"
"The transportation of raw materials and finished products is very inconvenient."
Zhu Biao hesitated.
"this…"
"It really needs to be carefully designed. In fact...it doesn't have to be the Yangtze River, but other smaller rivers."
"This is how I think about it. We dig a small river channel parallel to the turbulent section downstream where the water flow is relatively gentle. We transport the iron ore to this section by boat and specifically use bamboo rafts to come down from above and intercept it with nets. This way The water power of the river is not only used to transport raw materials, but also directly used to make iron, and then we send the finished products out through the river."
Xiao Han thought for a moment and said.
It is indeed not an easy task to build a blast furnace on a large scale. The main reason is that it is too embarrassing because there is no motivation.
In fact, Xiao Han had the idea of making a steam engine, but the steam engine was somewhat sophisticated. Even if he knew the blueprint, it was not easy to build. Xiao Han studied it twice and couldn't figure it out, so he went to do something else.
"This...is no small project for you."
"According to your design, if you build more, if you want to be able to supply such a large waterwheel side by side, I'm afraid you will need a river channel at least ten meters wide."
“Building more blast furnaces will lead to more river channels, and we will have to catch up with digging canals.”
Zhu Biao picked up Xiao Han's drawings, and the corners of his mouth twitched.
For the first time, he felt that Xiao Han's decision was a bit unreliable.
"But it's not a big problem. The Northern Territory Exchange has indeed made a lot of money these days. It should be enough for construction, but it shouldn't be able to build a lot."
Zhu Biao thought for a while and said again.
In the end, he chose to believe Xiao Han. The main reason was that Zhu Biao felt that if the blast furnace could really exist in batches, Ming Dynasty's steel output would be doubled several times, so this wave was worth investing in.
Of course, Xiao Han had to do it. If it were someone else, Zhu Biao would probably have beaten him out.
The blast furnace is very useful, but if you provide the money for this big project, I will cooperate with you, thank you.
"Let's put together the money we can mobilize now and calculate it to see how large a hydraulic blast furnace plant can be built at most."
"This can be regarded as the income of the two industrial chains of the British government."
Xiao Han said helplessly and dug out his own accounts. This time it seemed that the two brothers could only do it together.
He had already tried to make the stove as small as possible during the design, but the investment was still mind-numbing, and it was equivalent to a major project.
Moreover, because hydraulic power is unstable over time, a blacksmith may still be needed to patch it later.
It can only be said that the effect will be better than that of a small stove and it can save a lot of effort, but without a blower, it will not be able to improve to the level of the industrial period.
(End of chapter)
