The Wanli Emperor of the Ming Dynasty was extremely rebellious

Chapter 268: It’s been a long time since I raided the house
His Majesty is going to build roads in the capital!

The next morning, at about 1 a.m., just as the sky was getting light, the capital city suddenly exploded like a pot of boiling water, with cheers ringing out.

Because the Jinyiwei had posted notices all over the streets and alleys of the capital at night.

To be honest, the roads in Beijing are really not that good.

There are not many cobblestone roads these days. There are only a few main streets in the capital that are cobblestone roads, and the other streets and alleys are dirt roads.

Dirt roads are afraid of long periods of rain and long periods of strong sunshine.

If it rains for a long time, the dirt road will become bumpy and muddy, and people will be splashed with mud when cars and horses pass by.

If the sun is out for a long time, the dirt road will become dusty. When the wind blows hard, it will be like a sandstorm, with dust everywhere.

Those streets paved with stone slabs are actually not that good, because the stone slabs will break after being crushed by carriages and other things for a long time, and the bottom will become bumpy after being washed by rain for a long time. Once the bottom is bumpy, the top will become bumpy.

Building a road is actually quite expensive. Even if you just dig up the dirt road, level it, and then cover it with a layer of river sand, it will still cost a lot of labor.

I don’t know how long it has been since the roads in the capital were repaired.

There is no way. There are too many roads in the capital, at least thousands of miles in total. I don’t know how long it will take to repair them, let alone how much labor it will cost.

This time, His Majesty not only wanted to build roads, but also recruited young and strong men in the capital, and paid them one tael of silver per month.

The common people were naturally overjoyed.

Working at the door of this house earns one or two taels of silver a month, which is considered high.

The capital is not Nanjing. There are many ways to make money in Nanjing, so the wages are high. There are fewer ways to make money in the capital, so the wages are much lower than in Nanjing.

Women and children had to work day and night for two months to earn only one or two taels of silver. Young and strong men could earn a dozen cents a day by doing hard labor, which was considered good. They could not even earn half a tael of silver in a month.

This one tael of silver per month was really high. In the past, when the wages of craftsmen in Nanjing were still nine cents a month, the wages of craftsmen in the capital were only six cents a month.

When the common people heard the notice, they were overjoyed and told each other about it. All the young and strong people who were free went to the neighborhood head to sign up.

Only a few days after the notice was posted, more than 200,000 people signed up, which means at least another 500,000 or 600,000 taels of salary.

It would cost more than one million taels to build a road in the capital. The emperors of the past naturally did not dare to build it, because the court's annual tax revenue only totaled more than four million taels.

Someone will say, wasn’t there free labor available for conscription in the past?

This is a joke. Labor conscription is time-limited and civilians only need to serve one month of labor every year.

Even if 500,000 young and strong men were employed, it would take more than a month to repair the thousands of miles of streets and alleys in the capital. Moreover, it was impossible for there to be 500,000 young and strong men among the population of about one million in the capital.

If we calculate by household, there are only about 200,000 to 300,000 households in the capital, and there are only about 200,000 to 300,000 young and strong people who need to perform labor. It will probably take half a year to repair this number of people.

Therefore, previous emperors did not build roads in the capital on a large scale.

This should be the first time for Wanli.

Originally, the people in the capital thought that the roads were just leveled, made solid, and then covered with a layer of river sand.

Who knew that soon countless craftsmen came to the streets and alleys and asked them to dig the roads at least half a foot deep. Those streets paved with stone slabs had the stone slabs lifted up and the roads dug to a foot deep!

Moreover, the road cannot be paved blindly. The width of the paved road is fixed. Small alleys are paved in two steps, one side at a time, and large streets need to be paved in several steps.

This is not a big deal.

Just as they finished digging, the craftsmen came pulling a strange-looking carriage. The iron rollers on the back of the carriage were as thick as waists. After rolling back and forth a few times, the roadbed they dug was compacted.

The craftsmen even hammered down two rows of wooden boards on both sides of the planed roadbed to frame the roadbed.

At this time, the soldiers of the Shenji Camp also began to pull in gravel, the soldiers of the Shenshu Camp also began to pull in black bricks, the soldiers of the Imperial Guards also began to pull in coal, and the soldiers of the Shenwu Camp lined up neatly next to the gravel and black bricks, seemingly waiting for something.

What are they waiting for?

After all this was prepared, a group of even stranger carriages came in from Deshengmen.

That thing, not only does it have waist-thick iron rollers at the back of the carriage, but it also has an iron box that can hold several people.

What is this kind of carriage used for?
The streets on both sides of the excavated roadbed were crowded with people watching the excitement.

Fortunately, Wanli had arranged enough soldiers from the Shenwu Camp to maintain order in advance, otherwise the people would have to squeeze in front of the carriage to watch.

Then, the carriage began to burn firewood, load coal, asphalt bricks, and stones, and slowly pulled over the excavated roadbed. The onlookers couldn't help but exclaimed when they saw this.

When this carriage was pulled over, the roadbed disappeared and was replaced by a flat black stone road.

The craftsmen seemed to think the road was not smooth enough, so there was a horse-drawn carriage pulling a large iron roller that kept rolling back and forth until the road surface was as flat as a wooden board.

This magical road construction method was the first time that the people in the capital had seen it. Wherever the road construction carriages went, there would be crowds of people, three layers inside and three layers outside.

The people in the capital were watching, and Wanli was also watching. The people were watching the novelty, while Wanli was watching the progress.

He looks at it almost every day.

Early in the morning at about noon that day, he took Duke Peng Qi Jiguang, Earl Yongnian Wang Wei and others to the gate tower of Xi'an Gate and scanned the city with a telescope.

Roads are being built everywhere in the west of the inner city. There are so many common people surrounding the huge carriage, one after another, just like a group of ants.

It's almost November now, and the temperature in Beijing is a bit low, especially in the morning, when the breath you exhale is filled with white mist.

However, this still couldn't stop the people's enthusiasm for watching the fun.

Men, women, young and old almost all got up early in the morning and rushed to wherever there was a horse-drawn carriage repairing the road nearby.

Wanli looked at the completed asphalt roads and asked, "Father-in-law, when will the western part of the inner city be completed?"

This one.

Yongnianbo Wang Wei estimated, "This will probably be completed by the beginning of next month."

This has been under repair for more than ten days.

Upon hearing this, Wanli frowned slightly and said, "The western side of the inner city is only a quarter of the entire capital. Can't it be repaired in half a month? If we calculate it at this time, we won't be able to finish it by the New Year."

This is not calculated that way.

Yongnianbo Wang Wei explained: "Your Majesty, at the beginning we didn't have enough carriages for road construction. Later, we provided three sets a day. As we provided three sets a day, the number of carriages increased, and the speed of road construction became faster and faster.

Moreover, the west side of the inner city is the most prosperous place in the capital. It is full of people, and there are many streets and alleys, which are like blocks of tofu, making it very difficult to repair.

The situation is different on the east side of the inner city. There are many factories of the Ministry of Industry, many warehouses of the Ministry of Revenue, the Ten Kings' Palaces, the Imperial Examination Hall, etc. Usually there are not many people in these places, and there are not as many streets there as here.

I estimate that it will be repaired before the end of November.

The outer city will be even faster, as its streets are not as densely packed as the inner city. Furthermore, the Temple of Heaven and Earth, the Temple of Mountains and Rivers, and the nearby mountains, forests, and lakes occupy nearly half of the outer city. I estimate that construction there will be completed by early December."

Well, at the beginning there were indeed not enough horse-drawn carriages for road construction, which affected the speed of road construction.

Fortunately, it can be completed in early December, so it will not affect the people in Beijing from purchasing New Year's goods for the New Year.

Wanli nodded slowly, then asked, "Sigong, how is the list I gave you going?"

Luo Sigong said carefully: "Your Majesty, the investigation is almost complete. There are still a few more that should be investigated in the next few days."

That's good.

He hasn't raided a house for a long time, so this time he must raid it thoroughly.

Wanli thought about it carefully, then asked, "Don't they have residences outside the city?"

Luo Sigong shook his head repeatedly and said, "No, the outer city is too far away, and they can't delay leaving the palace for too long."

well.

Wanli nodded slowly and said, "Then send someone to secretly watch over them and make sure the news doesn't leak out."

The reason why he spent millions of taels to build roads in the capital this time was because of the income from the confiscation of property.

The eunuchs in charge of the palace are also part of the vested interest group, and these guys should have a lot of money.

He confiscated the money of the vested interest groups and distributed it to the soldiers of the Beijing camp and the people of the capital, which was also a redistribution of benefits.

Moreover, he also repaired the roads in the capital.

(End of this chapter)