Imperial Master of the Ming Dynasty

At night, Jiang Xinghuo sat alone in front of the lamp, holding a book and reading quietly.

This book is "Hydrological Records of Taihu Lake", which is an ancient book he found. He has made a thorough study of the hydrological conditions of Taihu Lake in past dynasties.

He looked through the ancient scrolls, stopping from time to time to record a few entries.

Suddenly, there was a strange movement outside the door.

Jiang Xinghuo looked up and saw that it was Song Li who had returned after a long journey.

"Big Ben, sit down."

Jiang Xinghuo smiled slightly and asked Song Li to sit down.

Song Li didn't have time to take a breath before he said with a joyful face: "National Master, all the craftsmen from the Nanjing School are here!"

Hearing this, Jiang Xinghuo perked up and immediately stood up: "Let's go! Let's go and greet him!"

The showers have just stopped, and now the moon is as bright as water, illuminating the dark corridor.

On the ground of the county government office, patches of water accumulated one after another, and the stars reflected in them, twinkling and intertwining.

At the end of the corridor, Jiang Xinghuo saw more than a hundred craftsmen gathered together in a dark crowd, including those from the Inner Court War Bureau and the Ministry of Industry's Ordnance Bureau. Everyone was carrying bags and boxes as they shuttled through the yard. Inside.

The leader is a man in his thirties, named Sun Kun, who is the head of the Department of Cleaning and Cleaning in Dushui, Ministry of Industry.

The Dushui Qingli Department is the department with the largest authority in the Ministry of Works. Unlike the Yingxiu Qingli Department, Yuheng Qingli Department, and Tuntian Qingli Department, which only have one doctor each, the Dushui Qingli Department has five doctors.

This is because the Dushui Cleaning Department is in charge of river water conservancy, seawall embankments, bridges, boats and vehicles, ice storage and other matters. It has very heavy powers. It is divided into Duli Department, River Defense Department, Bridge Road Department, Weaving Department and other departments. Sun Kun is the The person in charge of the river protection department is considered a professional counterpart.

"Master Imperial Master!"

"You're finally here!"

Jiang Xinghuo hurriedly greeted him.

Sun Kun saluted Jiang Xinghuo and Song Li with his hands raised, revealing a trace of unconcealed tiredness: "The Yangtze River waterway from Nanjing to Songjiang Prefecture is not that far away, but the rain is too heavy now. In the past, walking along the Yangtze River was smooth sailing. Who knew it would take longer to get there now.”

After that, he pointed to the craftsman behind him who was carrying supplies and said, "But fortunately, I have everything."

"Did you bring the gunpowder?" Jiang Xinghuo asked. This was the question he was most concerned about.

"I brought it with me. Eunuch Zheng helped load several large ships. He was watching it personally at the dock of Jinshanwei. It's just that it's difficult to transport it to Huating County now."

"There is no need to transport it to Huating County."

Jiang Xinghuo breathed a long sigh of relief and said to Wang Bin who appeared from the shadow in the corner: "Send someone to pass on my order and entrust eunuch Sanbao to lead the ship loaded with gunpowder. Pull the anchor from Jinshanwei and go back a little detour, from Wusong If the boat reaches an impassable tidal flat, it should be as close as possible to Dahuangpu, and there will be civilians to help move it there."

Sun Kun was stunned. He only knew that the imperial master asked to bring most of the gunpowder in Nanjing's city inventory, but he didn't know what it was used for. Now that he thought about it, it was probably to blow up the barrier lake?

"Could it be that the Imperial Guard wants to blow up the barrier lake accumulated in Dahuangpu?"

Song Li next to him said: "That's exactly it."

Sun Kun hesitated for a moment and then asked again: "It's easy to say that the Dahuangpu will explode, but the water is not easy to control. Unless a slope is dug in advance to let the water drain in a certain direction, even so, it can't be released." The water can easily spread around, destroying farmland on both sides and forming a lake again."

Jiang Xinghuo said simply: "Reinforce the original dams on both sides of the river around Shanghai Pu, so that the water from Dahuang Pu can rush towards Shanghai Pu."

Sun Kun's heart suddenly twitched. A water conservancy professional official at his level naturally knew about the water control plan planned by the Imperial Master and Song Shilang, and the officials of the Ministry of Industry also clearly understood that the Taihu Basin and Jiangnan Zhuang The key to water control in the government is to dredge the downstream river channels, that is, how to make floods flow smoothly into the sea.

The lower reaches of the Wusong River are too silted up, and re-dredging is too expensive. In other words, it is almost impossible to reuse the old Wusong River route, and a new one must be opened.

Therefore, the plan of the Imperial Master and the Song Dynasty Minister is to focus on opening up Xiajiapu, diverting water from the upper reaches of the Wusong River, and entering the Yangtze River via the Liujia River; and also focusing on digging Fanjiabang to connect it with Dahuangpu and connect the rivers and lakes in the eastern part of Taihu Lake. The water, especially the water from western Zhejiang, is discharged into the Yangtze River along the Huangpu River. This will naturally improve the water discharge situation in the lower reaches of Taihu Lake and change the water discharge pattern. In the past, the Wusong River was the main discharge channel, and gradually became The Huangpu River is the main outlet.

But the problem is that the current statement of the National Master is different from the planned plan!

"Then it will be poured directly into the Wusong River waterway."

Sun Kun tried his best to say: "The Wusong River waterway is already heavily silted downstream. If water is poured into it, the waterway will be completely destroyed. Some farmland on both sides of the river will also be submerged."

"According to the urgency of the matter, the court will pay compensation for the farmland that was flooded in Dahuangpu and Wusong River due to this irrigation, and the people within a few miles of the two sides of the river will also be relocated in advance."

For this reason, Sun Kun had nothing to say.

But as an official who knew the inside story, Sun Kun was skeptical about whether the imperial court had money.

The Taicang Bank of the Ministry of Revenue is running out of money. It has to build the Yongle Ceremony, flood control and disaster relief, build a fleet of treasure ships, and prepare to conquer Annan. Where does the money come from?

But unlike Sun Kun, Jiang Xinghuo certainly has the confidence.

Where does the money come from? Of course it comes from a manual workshop.

The most urgent task now is to transport food to the army on the front line. If the army can quell the civil unrest of the White Lotus Sect as soon as possible, it means that hundreds of thousands of people can be freed from the control of the gentry and the White Lotus Sect as soon as possible, and let They adopted the work-for-relief method, allowing men to build water conservancy projects and women to work in factories and weave. In this way, not only could the floods in Jiangnan be cured, but the Ming Dynasty would be able to receive more taxes more stably, and the first batch of big businessmen could also be cultivated. A large-scale cotton textile industry emerged.

Next, when the Ming Dynasty's army goes overseas, it will naturally find a market for these cotton textiles, and won't the money come out?

The cycle went full circle, the trapped people were rescued, the emperor expanded his territory, the army achieved military success, the goods were marketable, the people who worked for work received their wages and improved their lives, and China made great strides into the first era of industrial change. How perfect.

So, take a long-term view.

What's the point of paying some money to the farmland that has been flooded by self-initiated irrigation?

The lives of more than 100,000 people are at stake, and that is the most important thing.

If the chaos is put down one day late, countless more people will starve to death!

"The most important thing is to blow up the barrier lake of Dahuangpu first, connect Dahuangpu and Shanghai Pu, and open up a navigation channel for the grain stranded in Huating County to be transported against the Wusong River to the front line. As for the old route of Wusong River, originally It will be abandoned, and we will naturally organize manpower to excavate Xiajiapu and Fanjiabang later to completely rectify the Wusong River water system."

The Imperial Master thought carefully and explained clearly to him, the actual executor, so Sun Kun naturally had nothing to object to.

"Are these craftsmen still skilled?"

In addition to blasting, what is to be built this time is the large-scale water conservancy network of the Wusong River, which involves various materials and equipment. Naturally, carelessness is not allowed, so the Ministry of Industry sent almost all experienced and skilled craftsmen to participate.

Sun Kun smiled broadly: "Of course, these craftsmen are all carefully selected by me..."

While the two were chatting, someone suddenly shouted: "Hello, Principal Jiang!"

Several people came hand in hand. The leader was Liu Sheng, the commander-in-chief of the Left Army, followed by Zhang Anshi, Zhu Yong, Xu Jingchang and other military academy students.

"You are here too."

Naturally, the more helpers, the better. Starting from the incident in Changzhou Mansion, Jiang Xinghuo felt that he had too little help and was a little overwhelmed in dealing with various things.

Liu Sheng did not wear armor this time, only wearing the uniform of a military attache. He cupped his fists and said: "Principal Jiang, we brought a new type of matchlock muskets, as well as five small bronze cannons. The cannons were thrown on the ship and they did not dare to unload them. The matchlock muskets are equipped with It was in a box and carried all the way from Jinshanwei."

Xu Jingchang: "That road is simply not for people to walk on."

Zhang Anshi: "The blisters on my hands are all worn out."

Zhu Yong: "Don't act like a bitch."

The three boys also chanted a few times.

"There aren't so many complaints on the road. These guys are asking for credit from the principal."

Liu Sheng smiled and explained, then said: "Principal, let's go see the firearms first!"

Jiang Xinghuo nodded slightly and said: "I know you have worked hard all the way. If the rain stops, the firearms can be sent to the front line, and they will have to be manipulated by you to show off their power."

Xu Jingchang and Zhang Anshi smiled happily, while Zhu Yong rolled his eyes.

Liu Sheng brought Jiang Xinghuo to the front yard.

Next to the stables in the front yard of the Huating County government office, a large-scale warehouse was built before. There were various utensils piled in it, including wooden, iron and ceramic utensils, as well as many bottles and jars and other miscellaneous things. There were more than 600 in total. The items have now been cleaned up.

The military cadets and some accompanying auxiliary soldiers were carrying boxes of new matchlock muskets in. The wooden boxes were tightly tied with double layers of raincloth with ropes to ensure that no water would enter.

"Principal, come here and watch."

Liu Sheng said and walked to another room, took out the key and unlocked the door, then opened the door and walked in.

Squeak——

The heavy wooden door was slowly pushed open with a soft sound.

There were more than ten large boxes in the center of the room, stuffed to the brim.

Wang Bin drew his sword and pried open a box and saw that inside was a Yongle-style matchlock blunderbuss. The skilled craftsmen of the Bingzhan Bureau, following the instructions given by Jiang Xinghuo, quickly produced the first batch.

Although there is no lathe, the advantage is that there are many craftsmen in the war, and they are all skilled. They are used to making firecrackers. Now they have slightly improved the firecrackers and made them in groups. Even if they are "hand-rolled", the speed is not slow. In addition, With the cooperation of the Ordnance Bureau of the Ministry of Industry, the production capacity was quite extraordinary. In just over a month, after working around the clock, more than a thousand matchlock muskets were produced.

PS: [Important reminder (there is no charge for this content)] Chapters 316 to 356 are about the rectification of officialdom and the suppression of rebellions in Jiangnan. They do not contain any theoretical knowledge. They are all practical content. If you are not interested, you can jump directly to Chapter 366. "Class" will contain theoretical knowledge content from now on.