Becoming a stepmother of three children gives me space

The biggest threat to the Central Plains dynasties has always come from the grasslands.

In the early days of every dynasty, when the military was strong, the kings would launch northern expeditions to eradicate the threat from the grasslands, but the results were not satisfactory.

It’s not that we can’t win, it’s that after winning, we can’t govern.

Nomadic peoples live everywhere and will run away if they cannot win. There are no cities or natural barriers on the grasslands, so it is impossible to station troops for a long time. When the army withdraws, they have the opportunity to come back and continue to harass the border.

If you want to station troops for a long time, you must build a city. Building a city on the grassland requires far more financial and material resources than the new city being built in the capital.

Moreover,

No matter how much money is invested in building a new city in the capital, it can generate economic benefits in the short term, increase employment and tax revenue. However, building a city in the grassland has no economic benefits and is more of a strategic significance.

The imperial court must have subsidized grain and silver every year. Perhaps in the long history of hundreds of years, this was a major plan that was beneficial to the Central Plains.

But no emperor had the courage to do this.

To control the grasslands, it is not enough to build one or two cities, but dozens or even hundreds of cities. No feudal dynasty can afford to do so.

The most likely possibility is that the imperial court's finances were dragged down, and by the time any results were seen, the dynasty had already changed.

Hutou Cliff is a typical example.

The imperial court must have the ability to build a pass if it gritted its teeth. If there is no benefit, no one will agree. Building a city on the grassland is much more difficult than building a city on Hutou Cliff.

There is Beisheng Pass to the north of Hutou Cliff. The surrounding environment is safe. If you build a city on the grassland, you need to be on guard against the surprise attacks of the northern barbarians at any time.

During the construction period, heavy troops must be deployed for protection.

The cost of food and money for the soldiers alone is an extremely terrifying figure, which the court cannot afford.

cement,

It will completely change the status quo.

The army is fighting in the front, and a city will be built in the next three days. Theoretically, they can push forward and drive the northern barbarians to Siberia, forcing them to jump into the sea.

Zhou Jin and Dabao were extremely excited at the thought of the grassland being completely managed.

"The temperature has dropped, so we can start the kiln now."

"Then let's go."

Zhou Jin and Wu Chunfeng worked together to open the cave. A wave of heat hit them, but they didn't care at all and stared at the dark cave.

The heat wave completely dissipated, and Xiao Yunxi used a rake to rake out a pile of small granular objects from the kiln.

"Did it succeed?"

"It should be....done, right?"

Xiao Yunxi was a little uncertain.

Burning cement is simple to say, it is to calcine limestone and clay, or add slag, coal slag, fly ash, and decompose at high temperature to form new compounds.

The books in the space have proportions, temperature and time. In actual operation, the error is large, especially in temperature control.

Without a thermometer, there is no way to control it precisely. Most of the ones that were burned in the past two days were due to insufficient temperature or excessive temperature.

Fortunately, there is Wu Chunfeng,

He often made elixirs, which required controlling the temperature, and he was quite sensitive to temperature. After summarizing his failures, he finally found some tricks.

The material fired in the cave is not cement. The raw material is taken out, dried, and ground into powder, which is cement powder.

Next is the moment to witness the miracle.

Mix cement and yellow sand in a ratio of 1:2, add water, mix evenly, and then conduct three sets of comparative tests.

The first group, walls built with traditional adhesives such as ash powder and glutinous rice, and cement walls,

The second group is the traditional city wall, with walls on both sides and a hollow in the middle, filled with loess, concrete walls, surrounded by wooden boards, four iron rods inserted in the middle, cement, yellow sand and crushed stones mixed and poured in.

The third group consists of two walls built with stones from the mountain.

When the temperature is around 20 degrees, cement needs at least 5 hours to dry. In summer, when the temperature is above 35 degrees, it only takes two hours. The temperature in Beijing in May is above 25 degrees.

I guess by evening we’ll know whether cement is truly successful or not.

On the way back to Zhuangzi, Wu Chunfeng had a hundred thousand questions in mind.

"When?"

"What does it mean to mix cement with pebbles?"

"Can it really dry out at night?"

Xiao Yunxi did not answer, reality gave the answer.

After dinner, Wu Chunfeng couldn't wait to test the strength of the cement.

boom!

I kicked the concrete wall hard, but it didn't move at all.

boom!

The stone wall was also motionless.

Bang bang bang,

Concrete piles are very stable.

“It’s so strong!”

Wu Chunfeng is a martial artist with great strength and explosive power. The cement wall is intact and does not shake at all, which is enough to prove its solidity.

Two of the walls, built in the traditional way, were kicked down. The city wall was thicker and very strong.

of course,

It’s not that traditional adhesives are inferior to cement, but that traditional adhesives dry slowly. This is the biggest advantage of cement.

The cement was fired successfully and large-scale production officially began.

50 miles from Xiaojiazhuang,

This resettlement site for refugees from the northwest is 80 miles away from the capital and belongs to the area of ​​Xishan. The imperial court demarcated this area and approved the construction of a county town here.

It turned out that the emperor was unwilling to agree and wanted the refugees to be dispersed and settled in the prefectures around the capital.

The refugees were recruited by the workshops, and the workshops paid for their resettlement. The imperial court wanted to relocate the people, but the workshops refused to move and asked the imperial court to pay for their resettlement themselves.

The Minister of Revenue cried for his parents and hit his head against the pillar in the Golden Palace to try to stop the emperor's idea.

The manor where Zhou Jin built his workshop was just 10 miles outside the capital. The distance was too close for the emperor to sleep.

After consultation,

The refugees were settled in a place 80 miles away from the capital, and the construction of a county town was approved. The workshops were moved to the county town, and all the money for the construction of the county town was provided by the workshops.

The location of the imperial court's approval is very particular.

It is 60 li away from the Changping Guard stationed in Changping County, 100 li away from the nearest guard post at Baiyangkou, and only 30 li away from the new military camp.

The resettlement site was surrounded by heavy troops, but the emperor was still worried. That morning, the resettlement site received an imperial edict, which roughly meant that the emperor was gracious and compassionate to the people.

The King of Qin was sent to the northwest to help the people, to contact workshops to provide jobs for the people, and to allocate land for the people to build houses. In short, all of this was arranged by the emperor.

The King of Qin just followed the Emperor's orders and completed his mission.

"How shameless!"

Wednesday cursed and swore,

He was responsible for the security of the resettlement site with some new troops. Every day he could hear the people talking about it and thanking the emperor, but no one mentioned the King of Qin's contribution.

My lord and my lady donated money and food and tried their best to rescue the people, but the credit was snatched away by the emperor. It's really shameless!

Shen Wansan was calm.

"People don't know the truth at all, so it's normal for them to have such thoughts. This is also a screening process."

The number of refugees is huge, and there are all kinds of people. Many of them just follow the crowd, but there are also many who are sober and grateful. Selecting this part of the people is the first step.

The emperor's approach actually saved a lot of effort.

the next day,

Shen Wansan selected the first batch of 500 people and sent them to Xiaojiazhuang, and their families would be sent to the village one after another.