After a while, I heard Emperor Chongzhen shouting with joy: "Okay, okay, okay!"
The progress of science and technology, to future generations, is an insignificant increase in speed, but in the eyes of current people, it is a leap in speed. How can they not be shocked and unhappy?
Why was the territory of ancient China always about the same size?
It's not that the emperors of all dynasties were only satisfied with such a large place, but because of the limited transportation, the rule of the dynasty could only be so large, and no matter how big it was, it would be powerless.
If nothing else, let’s talk about the Ming Dynasty. At the beginning, from the northeast, Nuergandusi was nominally in the Arctic Ocean. In the south, Annan and Dongwu were both the Xuanwei Department of the Ming Dynasty, and even Annan was directly a province directly under the jurisdiction of the Ming Dynasty.
However, the distance was too far. After the heyday of the dynasty, these distant places became separated from the Ming Dynasty. Being out of reach is one of the main reasons.
Now with this train, the control distance of the Central Plains Dynasty will be greatly expanded. As a ruler, a new round of territory expansion will become possible!
In addition to this, the central government's control over local areas will also become more powerful. This is something that these senior officials in the court can understand at once.
The most basic one is transporting food. In the past, if transportation was by horse-drawn carriages, once the route was long, the food consumed on the road would be much higher than the food transported to the destination. However, with this train, the consumption of food on the road will be greatly reduced.
Maybe Zhang Mingwei's idea of inventing the train was more based on people's livelihood. But as rulers, the first thing they see is definitely the angle they want most.
But different routes lead to the same goal. In short, this train that improved ancient travel is very popular.
Thinking of this, Emperor Chongzhen could no longer sit still, and immediately waved his hand and said: "Gentlemen, let me go and see together!"
"I obey the decree!" In the Wenhua Hall, excited voices responded in unison.
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Emperor Chongzhen led the civil and military ministers out of the palace in a hurry and headed to the train station outside the capital.
As for the people in the capital, knowing that they would see a train they had never seen before today, they had already waited along the railway line outside the cordon.
Because there were so many people, many people ran ten miles away from the capital to have a suitable position to watch the upcoming train.
While they were chatting about what this long-rumored train looked like, suddenly, someone heard a strange noise. When they heard the sound and looked up, they saw a centipede with thick smoke walking along the railway. The railway is coming.
"That's it, is this the train?"
"It looks like a centipede, very long!"
"It seems a bit fast, much faster than a carriage!"
"There seem to be people up there, so many people!"
"Not only that, the back seems to be full of stuff, tsk tsk, this definitely beats the carriage!"
"..."
Amid the discussion, the train approached, then moved away, and continued on its way to the capital.
Zhang Mingwei and others did not sit down, but stood in the train and watched the scenery. Although the weather at this time was already very cool, no one was willing to go down to avoid the wind.
Taking a train for the first time is always new. Even Zhang Mingwei is no exception. This is his first time riding this kind of train!
Along the way, they looked at the scenery, pointing, talking and laughing with pride.
As for the onlookers outside the cordon, the people in the car were already numb and accustomed to this. It can even be said that the more people see it, the prouder they become.
Slowly, we finally got closer and closer to the capital. The tall city walls could already be seen, and the crowd of people watching outside the cordon became thicker and thicker.
"Beep..."
The whistle sounded long, like the roar of a dragon, spreading far away.
Before arriving at the train station, I had already seen Yu Jia over there.
Song Yingxing directed his son to slow down in advance and finally stopped slowly at the train station.
Zhang Mingwei had already seen Emperor Chongzhen grinning from ear to ear with joy, just standing there and giggling, without any composure that an emperor should have.
The civil and military ministers behind him also had shocked faces, staring at the carriages filled with food behind them with incredulous expressions.
Although they already knew in advance what the train would bring. However, seeing it with their own eyes, the pulling force of this train was beyond their imagination!
Zhang Mingwei and Zhu Yuyao got off the bus with all the staff of the steam unit to pay tribute to Emperor Chongzhen and complete the handover ceremony.
"Good, good, good!" Emperor Chongzhen praised again and again, "I spent so much money, it was worth it, haha, it was worth it!"
At this time, you can no longer see his distress, there is only joy on his face.
Afterwards, Emperor Chongzhen took a red pen, went to the front of the train, nodded his eyes, and named the first train in the Ming Dynasty, Shenli No. 1.
During this process, Zhang Mingwei accompanied him throughout the process. Zhu Ainao, on the other hand, went to her mother's side, watched all this, and quietly answered her mother's curious questions.
Everyone who was watching, including the common people in the capital and the civil and military ministers, etc., were shocked and discussed, but they didn't say much.
Most people are very excited and happy.
However, a very small part of the people who saw the scene on the train were very unhappy. However, Duke Xingguo took the lead, and the emperor was so happy that their thoughts were not important at all, and they could not oppose it. They could only look worried.
The Shenli No. 1 will undergo maintenance and test runs a few more times before being officially put into use.
In addition, in this era, it was not easy to build railways. It was not realistic to build bridges across rivers and drill holes through mountains, similar to the later generations. Therefore, the imperial court's plan did not include a railway running through the north and south of the Ming Dynasty. Rather, it is only built first on the plains where a large amount of transportation capacity is needed. When the technology for building railways improves in the future, we will connect them again.
In short, with the advent of Shenli No. 1, the world's understanding of new learning has been greatly increased. Zhang Mingwei did not need Zhang Mingwei to refute those voices attacking Xinxue's bragging, as they were forcefully countered by the facts.
It's just a kettle to boil water. Something that has existed for thousands of years is just because of the emergence of new learning, but such unimaginable things have come out of it. Who dares to say that new learning is useless?
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On the Great Wall defense line north of Yongping Mansion, there is a pass called Qingshui Mingyue Pass. At the end of the second year of Chongzhen, Jianlu broke into the pass from here and left the pass from here. In later generations, this place will be renamed Lengkou.
However, at this time, under the leadership of Governor Zuo Yingxuan of Shanyong, this pass had already been built. The Great Wall defense line has long since restored everything it should have.
Outside the Great Wall, there are piers and platforms as outposts, and beacon fires will be lit when the enemy is detected.
On the Great Wall, there were patrol soldiers patrolling back and forth.
At the Great Wall pass, there is a certain size of garrison guarding the Great Wall.
Not far behind the Great Wall, there will be a garrison town, which is the main force of the Great Wall's defense line. We usually train at the station, and when there is a beacon signal, we can rush to the Great Wall for defense as soon as possible.
With such a defense system, it is absolutely impossible for the enemy to sneak into the pass silently. However, if you want to smuggle a few people, it is still difficult to guard against it.
As night falls and the moonlight dims, all kinds of wild beasts begin to come out looking for prey. As the overlord of the earth, humans are resting.
On a mountain Great Wall five miles east of Qingshui Mingyue Pass, after a while, a group of Ming Army soldiers began to patrol along the wall.
This kind of thing is done every day, but it has not happened in the past few years.
In this case, the patrolling Ming army officers and soldiers basically just walked around in a routine manner.
However, what they didn't know this time was that just outside the Great Wall, where the light of the torch could not be found, there was a group of about six people crouching in the bushes, watching them with wide eyes.
When the Ming army officers and soldiers patrolled over and calm returned to the city wall, they saw this group of people moving quietly.
The leader, after reaching the bottom of the city wall, began to wave a flying claw wrapped in cotton.
Just by looking at his movements, you can tell that this man is very skilled at this.
Sure enough, he swung it upwards hard, and the flying claw was thrown onto the top of the city, making a slight noise.
The man listened carefully and found that there was no movement, so he slowly retracted the rope until the flying claws got stuck on the top of the city.
After pulling hard and the flying claws were firm, the man nodded to the others and climbed up first, like an agile ape.
The man climbed up to the top of the city easily. After looking around like a thief, he pulled the hanging rope.
Afterwards, the few people under the city wall went up to the top of the city one after another.
One of the leaders whispered: "Move quickly, there will be patrols coming soon!"
So these people immediately went to the other side of the city wall, fixed the flying claws and started to send people down.
At this time, a group of Ming army soldiers on the far side of the city wall began to patrol again with torches.
After getting close, a Ming army soldier suddenly became excited and immediately shouted: "There is a situation!"
Suddenly, the Ming army soldiers became nervous. Under the light of the torch, a flying claw was seen hanging on the wall.
"Who are they? Come out quickly. Have you seen them?"
The voices of the Ming army soldiers shouted loudly towards the bottom of the city wall, waving torches and trying their best to shine underneath.
But there was no echo, and nothing unusual was found.
If there are flying claws, there must be someone there. I just don’t know if this person wants to sneak out or if he has already sneaked into the customs.
The next day, the situation was reported to the guard, and then to the desk of Governor Zuo Yingxuan of Shanyong.
Seeing this report, Zuo Yingxuan frowned.
