Great Song Super Scholar

Chapter 373 Inspecting Jintian
Three days later, the big ship gradually arrived at the northwest corner of Kunzhou. Fan Ning stood on the side of the ship, silently watching the deep blue calm sea, with flocks of seagulls circling overhead, like countless snowflakes flying on the sea.

"A-Ning, what are you thinking?" Zhu Yuanfeng came up from behind.

Fan Ning smiled, "I have been thinking about the next development of Kunzhou for the past two days."

"You want to completely turn Kunzhou into a state of Song Dynasty?"

"Not entirely. In fact, I want to make Kunzhou a model. In the future, when Da Song develops overseas, he can refer to Kunzhou's development experience, which can greatly increase the possibility of successful overseas development."

Zhu Yuanfeng frowned slightly, and asked puzzledly: "Kunzhou is a relatively cold place, suitable for raising horses, and can also grow wheat, but for example, the Song Dynasty established an overseas state in Nanyang, which is in the tropics, and Kunzhou has experience. How can I copy it over here?"

Fan Ning smiled slightly: "The so-called experience is what to do, but how to do things, how to recruit labor, how to develop resources, how to manage people, how to build cities, docks, etc. With this ability, in the The foundation can be established smoothly anywhere.”

Zhu Yuanfeng nodded with a smile, "So that's the case. I can understand it this way. This kind of development ability is indeed very important."

After thinking for a while, Zhu Yuanfeng said again: "I think you value development resources very much."

Fan Ning said lightly: "I have a very good relationship with Wang Anshi, but this time I got married, he is in the capital, I sent him a wedding post, but he didn't come to my wedding, what is the reason, the third grandfather thought Yet?"

Zhu Yuanfeng shook his head, and Fan Ning said: "Wang Anshi is a staunch reformer, and I am a reformer. We can say that we are in the same bed with different dreams, or we can say that we have the same goal. Make the cake bigger, and then distribute more to the people when distributing new cakes, so that things can be moistened in the reformation, and finally succeed, but where does the flour for making the cake come from, that is, to find resources from overseas, gold, silver , minerals, timber, grain, livestock, jewellery, etc.”

Zhu Yuanfeng sighed: "This is your dream, and I also hope that it will succeed one day!"

In the afternoon, the boat arrived at Bailongchuan, and the originally desolate wilderness became lively, and tents could be seen appearing in the distance.

Bailongchuan is the largest gold field discovered in Kunzhou so far. Kunzhou allowed five private gold mining families to concentrate here, including the Zhu family, Cao family, Gao family, Yang family, and Pang family. The mining right of the river section, and the government and the opposition postponed the taxation of private gold mining in Kunzhou for one year, so seizing the opportunity in the first year has become the most urgent task for the five families.

Brothers Mingren and Mingli are of course also mining gold here, but they have been allocated a section of ten miles from the river section of Zhu's family. The time is three years. In two years, the two brothers will end their gold mining in Kunzhou. Start a new business again.

There is a good natural harbor about ten miles away, about twenty miles away from Bailong River, the big ship berthed in this natural good harbor, everyone got off the boat, and the horses were also pulled out from the bottom warehouse.

Fan Ning pointed to this good harbor and said with a smile to Zhu Yuanfeng: "This is the reserved land of Jin County. This year, I plan to develop a small town here first. After the imperial court approves, I will directly build the city wall."

"Developing a small town, what do people do for a living?"

"The initial consideration is animal husbandry and logging!"

Fan Ning said with a smile: "Jingzhou is on the other side of the strait, about [-] miles away. They can go to Jingzhou to graze and log. The Kunzhou government will subsidize them with food and fish every month."

"What about the land?"

Zhu Yuanfeng questioned: "The people in Tang County and Han County have land, but the people in Jin County don't. Can they accept it?"

"Of course there will be land. This is promised by the imperial court, but it doesn't have to be used to grow food. You can grow some fruits and vegetables. There is plenty of sunshine and water here, so it should be good to grow melons and fruits!"

Just as he was talking, Jian Meizi rode over and said to Fan Ning: "The little madam wants to pay for my aunt to go to the big ship, and my uncle is going to inspect the mine, so I just go by myself. The little madam said she won't go with me."

"Okay! The old man and I will be back in two or three hours."

Fan Ning and Zhu Yuanfeng urged their horses to run to Bailongshui twenty miles away. ． ． ． ． ．

Since the release of labor employment ten days ago, the five major families have submitted applications to the state government one after another. Fan Ning approved all of them on the same day. In addition to the clansmen in the Jintian family, each family also sent more than a dozen confidantes to assist in the management, such as cooking for the laborers, purchasing, supervising labor, etc., and each family also signed a security agreement with the Overseas Economic Bureau. The barracks will send certain soldiers to maintain law and order.

If nothing happened, the government would generally not intervene in private gold mining. Fan Ning came to Bailongchuan today not to inspect in an official capacity, but to accompany Zhu Yuanfeng to check the gold mining situation of Zhu's family.

Fan Ning was more cautious. He didn't go to other families, but went directly upstream. Thirty miles upstream was the Zhu family's mine field, which was also the area with the highest gold content. More than a dozen large tents are warehouses, which are filled with various food supplies. Several large stoves have been built on the open space, and five cooks are busy cooking. This is a camp for 400 people. Meals alone are a major project, requiring five It takes a chef to go all out every day to complete it.

"Third Master!"

The chef who was steaming the rice suddenly saw Zhu Yuanfeng and Fan Ning coming on horseback. He was surprised and delighted, and rushed forward, "Third master, young master, why are you here?"

"I'm here to see everyone!"

Zhu Yuanfeng asked with a smile: "A Yuan, get used to it here!"

"Fortunately, although it's a bit lonely, it's still bearable."

"Work hard for two years, the Zhu family will not treat you badly, and you can buy a good house in Changzhou County when you go back, and your wife and children will have their own home."

These twenty or so entourages are all servants of the Zhu family's old house. The three leaders each have [-] guan a month, and the others each have [-] guan a month. After two years in Kunzhou and returning home, each of them can Saving a sum of money is also the motivation for them to persevere.

"Master, I will try my best to persevere."

Zhu Yuanfeng nodded, "The two brothers, and Zhu Sheng?"

"The two younger brothers are just ahead, and the Erya Nei has to walk another ten miles to see them."

"Keep busy, let's go and have a look."

Zhu Yuanfeng and Fan Ning urged their horses to go north, and when they walked about two miles, they saw a large group of Japanese workers panning for gold in the water. They first dug up the river bottom sediment with wooden buckets, and then rinsed it in the water with a fine dustpan. A few gold sands were found. In fact, it is a serious waste to do so, but Akihito and the others only want to do it for another two years, so they adopted the rough gold mining method.

Mingren and Mingli are like supervisors, patrolling more than 100 laborers washing sand. In fact, they also have several supervisors, who were sent to them by the Zhu family. This time, more than [-] people from the Zhu family followed Zhu Sheng. Need, and the other part is to support Akihito and Mingli.

"Mingren!"

Zhu Yuanfeng waved his hand and shouted, Ming Ren's eyes lit up, and he ran over,

"Old man, why are you here?"

"Look at what you said, can't I come to Kunzhou?"

"That's not what I mean. I mean that seeing the old man in Kunzhou, I really have the feeling of suddenly seeing spring, and everything becomes better." Ming Ren said with a glib smile.

"Look at your mouth, I don't know how many catties of soybean oil you ate today, forget it, I don't bother to talk to you, I'll go see Zhu Sheng!"

Zhu Yuanfeng urged the horse to go north, but Fan Ning got off the horse, handed the horse to an overseer, and asked Ming Ren, "How is the gold mining going these past few months?"

Akihito shook his head, "It's obviously not as good as last year. Last year and the beginning of the year, the gold dust content was very high, and it has almost halved from April to now."

"So did you find the reason?"

"Mingli and I both know the reason. It's Mingli who is here alone. I can't see those Kun people. They pick up two grains of gold sand and they will greedy for one. Sometimes Mingli sees it and dare not provoke them too much. , These guys are very fierce, if you mess with them, something might happen, Ming Li can only swallow his anger."

"Kun people also greedy for gold sand?" Fan Ning asked in surprise.

"Why not greedy?"

Mingren said indignantly: "At first they were relatively honest, but after a winter, they all became treacherous and slippery. At least they all know that with gold sand, they can go drinking, shopping, and playing with women. Things they will let go?"

"What about these Japanese laborers?"

Fan Ning looked at the two hundred workers who were busy, and asked, "How do you prevent them from stealing gold?"

"I will withhold their wages first, and I will tell them the ugly words. I will work honestly for a year. If no gold dust is stolen, I will reward each person with a tael of gold. I will search you every day when work is over. If you steal a grain of gold sand, Not only can they not get the reward of one tael of gold, but also their wages are gone, they are not stupid, they can only steal half a tael of gold at most, if they steal too much, they will be found out, and the gains outweigh the losses, so they simply work honestly."

Fan Ning came to the river, watched the workers digging sand, and gradually frowned.

"Does Ah Ning think there's something wrong?"

"Isn't it a bit too wasteful for you to dig sand like this?"

"There's no way, we've only been doing it for two years, and the river section is still so long, so it can only be rough."

"I'm not saying that you waste river sand, but that you waste manpower. Is it necessary to use 100 people to dig sand?"

"Then what can you do?"

Fan Ning thought for a while about how to pan for gold in future generations, and said to him: "Look, the water in this river is not very urgent, and the water volume is not too large. You can dig a diversion channel next to it, such as about Baizhang, and let the river make a bend. Then flow into the river, block the two ends with mud bags, and scoop up the river water, so that you don’t have to dig up the river sand, and you can directly pan for gold in the river, isn’t that a good way?”

Mingren thought for a while, this method is really good, it is called sharpening the knife without cutting firewood by mistake, why didn't he think of it, he hurriedly shouted: "Second brother, come here!"

(End of this chapter)