open sea

Chapter 851
“Not salty enough!”

The little emperor was eating in front of the deck with chopsticks in one hand, the big sleeve of his left hand was pulled up to his shoulder, and he was holding dried beef jerky in his hand, staring at the official document on the sail and said: "It's not the military rations that you brought me, or the Your military rations are not doing well?"

The beef jerky was put back on the plate, and the little emperor had a look of concern for the country and the people: "I told you when the first phase of Beiyang's supply ship came back that the Banner Army didn't like sauce pancakes. It should be salty, the Academy of Medicine has researched it, sweat contains salt, and people need to make up for the salt running away from their body.”

"The last time I ran for four miles in full armor, I couldn't take it anymore. I was sweating like a bucket, and my heart was beating like I was about to die. I drank two cups of salt and sugar water to slow down. My banner army is flying all over the world. Gunners have to carry at least 36 kilograms, how much sweat do they have to sweat that day?"

Wang An bowed his head and said: "Grandpa, this beef jerky was ordered by the imperial court last year and is a new product on the market this year. Qi Shuai is preparing for war in Ji Town. The governors outside the Great Wall and the common people are terrified. They will not come according to the military rations. If they do, they will worry that the heavenly army will have a standing ration, and they will go out to fight there.”

As he spoke, Wang An narrowed his eyes and smiled with a rare joy rarely seen in the Forbidden City, and said, "This is the first time in decades!"

The little emperor Bei'er proudly raised his head, put his hands together and said, "That's natural!"

The nine sides of the imperial court are tearing with blood, and the wounds are scattered everywhere. The most important thing is finance.

Is Jiajing year poor?Is Long Qingnian poor?What about Wanli Year?
The little emperor can now pat his chest and say: Grandpa has plenty of money!

Pride to pride, raised his hand to hold the bowl and snorted two mouthfuls of millet porridge, pushed the bowl aside and looked at it but felt it was a pity, squeezed the chopsticks and put the sea cucumber tribute from Jinzhouwei at the bottom of the bowl to chew, pushed the bowl and picked up the edge of the pen While writing, he muttered indistinctly: "The dried meat is too hard. King Shunyi outside the Great Wall and the governors of other tribes all know that the mouth market will not allow dried meat to be tributed in the coming year. There is a shortage of cattle in the country. The tribute cattle will be used by the court to fold the fodder into cloth and silk. , pearls...not right."

The little emperor crossed out the cloth, silk, and pearls, thought for a long time with a brush in his hand, and continued to write: "Cotton cloths of various colors, fine-quality Suzhou and Hangzhou inner and outer silks and satins, and overseas precious pearls are all in exchange for the price."

Seeing this operation, Wang An was a little confused. These names kept turning in his head, and he subconsciously asked: "Your Majesty, what is the difference between this cloth and finely woven cotton cloth of various colors?"

Hearing the words, the little emperor unconsciously raised his eyes and pursed his tongue. His mouth was full of fur. He frowned and looked at the brush in his hand angrily. He exhaled fiercely with his nose and complained: "I'm afraid that I'm afraid of the problems that I suffered when I was a child." It's not going to get better—separation? The separation is going to be big!"

Putting down the brush, little Wanli raised his chin and asked, "How did the cloth come from?"

"On the loom."

"Well, now you have two pieces of cloth in front of you, one is introduced as being woven by a loom, and the other is described as finely woven cotton cloth of various colors woven by seven generations of Su family weavers at twelve hours, which one do you think is more expensive? "

"Sense, it seems that the latter one is more expensive?" Wang An's face was full of difficulties, and he didn't know whether it was because the little emperor couldn't express clearly or what happened. Anyway, he felt that there seemed to be no difference between the two pieces of cloth: "I don't know why, it seems It’s just a bit more expensive later.”

"now it's right."

"Cloth is still cloth, silk and satin is still silk and satin, and pearls are still pearls. Besides, all the cloth in the market is produced by weavers. The number of weavers in the Ming Dynasty is at least seven generations. It might be eight or nine generations. They are all weavers, but they will sound good. Wouldn’t it be better for one horse to go over two horses? Because it sounds good.”

Wanli said, turning the sail in front of him towards Wang An, pointing to a page of official document clipped on the sail batten for him to read, and said: "The letter sent back by the ship supervisor in Nanzhili, the pearl of Sulu Kingdom is in Yangzhou. The ones sold like this only sell [-] pieces a month, and the quality is not very good."

"But someone specially introduced that this pearl was collected by pearl hunters who went to the sea thousands of miles away from the Sulu Country's Pearl Pool in the last month. It is a treasure that has been treasured by the Sulu Palace for decades. Half of the beads were given to me as a tribute—people rushed to buy them, and the one with the highest price every day got it, and the cheapest one cost 50 taels, which was actually eight or nine coins.”

Wang An frowned, and asked Wanli cautiously: "Your Majesty, Nanyang hasn't paid tribute pearls to the palace for nearly a year, right? This, this..."

The little eunuch knew that Chen Mu loved money, but this way of using the emperor to deceive people was a serious crime.

But the little emperor didn't care, waved his hands and said: "It's true, half of the beads were indeed paid to me, but when Su Lu was just leveled, thousands of them were paid to me when they were of good quality, and I can't even count them. The other half is sold in the market, and it doesn't say that the pearls are picked that month, nor does it say that the tribute to me is paid monthly."

And the most important thing is that it sounds hard work to go to Zhuchi in the twelfth lunar month, but there is no winter in Sulu!
"Let me make statistics, this month there are 130, 140 military bureaus in the five provinces that produce less than [-] flintlocks; there are seven, eight, nine, and eleven military bureaus that produce more than [-] rods per month; The highest ones are Xuan and Bei, and the Nanyang Weijun Weapons Bureau—[-] and [-] shots?"

Xiao Wanli also felt that the output of the Nanyang Military Weapons Bureau was abnormal. Other places, such as Xuanfu, produced less than 700 rods last year. Beiyang only produced more than [-] rods last year because of insufficient iron ingots. The Nanyang Military Weapons Bureau produced one The month is as good as others for a year?

I found out the official document and read it carefully before I understood what was going on. After a long time, the Nanyang Defense Weapons Bureau was only in charge of supervision and assembly. Every other item, even a small piece of Wangshan sight, was made elsewhere. .

South, North, Fujian, Guangdong, and Xuanda can produce more than [-] flintlock guns in one month. Er's Xuan Mansion has thrown off a lot, and this kind of manufacturing ability makes the little emperor very gratified.

"You should learn a little bit. In the future, you will make statistics like this every month, counting all the output of the five provincial military bureaus. The same is true for removing Xuanda and the shipyards in Zhejiang. Their guns and armors are all counted. , let me know the situation at a glance."

The little emperor said to Wang An, turned the sail of the boat to one side contentedly, and said, "There is one more thing I want you to do, find a few honest, reliable, and honest people to go out of the palace on my behalf, and go to various places to buy winter clothes Five, forget it and can’t afford it... let’s start with [-] sets.”

"Then take my commandment and winter clothes and go to Xuanda, and the five guards in Wanquan will distribute the winter clothes on my behalf. Winter is coming, and I will reward the sergeants with domestic currency, so that they can guard the border with peace of mind."

"The winter clothes issued by the imperial court, they dare to be greedy up and down, but they can't be sent to my banner army; you send someone to remember, and you have to send them to the banner army hand in hand. Outsiders are greedy for ink, and the military law does it; you are greedy for ink, what does the military law of the Fourth Army say?" Come on? Yes, it’s the first offender, leaving a whole body.”

(End of this chapter)