The day after Fengzhou's victory over the locust plague, Duan Xiushi received an urgent eagle letter from Guo Song, in which Guo Song told him that locusts were afraid of the smell of sulfur, and that Fengzhou had defeated the locust plague with smoke, fire, and sulfur and saved Jiuyuan County.

At this time, Duan Xiushi was anxious about the locust plague, nearly half of the wheat fields around Lingwu County were infested with locusts, and the farmers were fighting in the wheat fields, but to no avail, seeing that the pieces of wheat were eaten up, the hated farmers simply set fire to the wheat, and burned the immature wheat and locusts to death.

Duan Xiushi's letter from Guo Song was a treasure, and he immediately ordered a large amount of sulfur to be taken out of the military warehouse, and ordered the soldiers to mash it into powder and sprinkle it around the wheat fields where the locusts had not yet entered and in the wheat fields.

The effect was really good, although it did not completely stop the locusts, but the number of locusts in the wheat fields decreased significantly, and a few days later, the locusts in Lingzhou flew across the Yellow River and flew towards the pastures at the foot of the Henan Mountains in the west.

Duan Xiushi immediately wrote a letter to Shuofang and the states where the locust plague occurred in Guannai, promoting the experience of Fengzhou in exterminating locusts, and for a time, the price of sulfur in various places skyrocketed, and merchants saw a business opportunity and purchased sulfur everywhere to transport it to the disaster area.

It cannot be said that the experience of Toyoshu is necessarily suitable for all localities, but the sulfur does have an effect, and the prefectures have saved at least two to three percent of their grain by sprinkling sulfur powder to drive away locusts.

In late September, Yan Zhenqing, the pacification inspector, accompanied by Duan Xiushi, the envoy of Shuofang Jiedu, made a special trip to Fengzhou to learn about Fengzhou's experience in fighting locusts.

At this time, the wheat field has turned yellow, and it will be the harvest season in half a month, Yan Zhenqing has been full of devastated farmland all the way, and when he arrived in Jiuyuan County, he saw an endless golden wheat field, the wheat waves were undulating, and people walked in it with a particularly relaxed heart.

"The golden wheat color is really eye-catching, and it makes me feel ten times better all of a sudden."

Yan Zhenqing said to Duan Xiushi with a smile: "I praised Lingzhou for its good grain preservation before, but compared to Fengzhou, Lingzhou is still much worse, and there is no sign of locusts coming here at all." ”

Duan Xiushi did not take the credit of Guo Song, he said calmly: "If there is no experience in Fengzhou, the farmland in Lingzhou is also barren, in fact, as far as I know, the experience of Fengzhou is far from being as simple as discovering that sulfur can drive locusts away." ”

"Oh?"

Yan Zhenqing said to Guo Song next to him with great interest: "Can Guo Yuanjun give us a brief talk about the experience of fighting locusts in Fengzhou?" ”

Guo Song smiled slightly: "In fact, the experience of Fengzhou is three points, very simple, of course, the details are very rich, simply put, the first is to be well prepared, the second is to mobilize the people, brainstorming, the third is to grasp the big and let go of the small, and concentrate manpower and material resources to protect key areas." ”

After a pause, Guo Song continued: "This time we concentrated all the people and soldiers of Hebin County in Jiuyuan County, Feng'an County, Yulin County and Shengzhou in Fengzhou, and cut down thousands of acres of pine branches alone, and established two defense lines in the east and west of Feng'an County, although we did not hold the first defense line, but at least thirty percent of the locusts were exterminated, and the second defense line we found the effect of sulfur to drive away locusts, and finally used sulfur to defeat the locusts, forcing them to fly to the northern grassland, and preserving the fertile land of Jiuyuan County. ”

"How did you find out that brimstone can repel locusts?" Yan Zhenqing asked again.

Guo Song smiled and said: "It is actually very accidental to find that sulfur can drive locusts, but it is inevitable to think about it, we originally lit pine branches to drive locusts, but the locusts died too much, and the fire was directly extinguished, we in order to increase the fire, we sprinkled bean stalks and sulfur powder and other flammable and ignitive things on the second line of defense, but I didn't expect that by mistake, the breath of sulfur burning made the locusts very afraid, they did not dare to cross the fire and smoke like hitting the wall, turned the direction and flew away to the north, we found that the sulfur repels locusts. ”

Yan Zhenqing nodded happily and said: "Very well said, please ask Guo Yuanjun to write a detailed report and let me bring it back to the imperial court, maybe the imperial court can sum up its experience and promote it to all places." ”

"If the country needs it, we are willing to do a little bit for the imperial court."

Yan Zhenqing laughed, "Okay! I look forward to your report, so I'll have an explanation when I go back. ”

When everyone came to the military field, Yan Zhenqing was shocked by the endless military field, and asked for a while: "How many acres of wheat fields are here?" ”

"There are about 150,000 acres of wheat fields, and tens of thousands of acres of black bean fields have already been harvested."

"How much is the yield per mu?" Yan Zhenqing asked.

"About 300 catties!"

Yan Zhenqing quickly estimated in his heart, he was surprised, this is 3780,000 stone grain! The army simply didn't need so much, and he immediately had an idea in his heart, just because the food of the imperial court could not be transferred, then use the grain of Fengzhou to help the victims, isn't this the best plan?

Guo Song saw Yan Zhenqing's thoughts, so he pointed to the busy farmers in the wheat field and said: "These farmers who are busy in the military fields are all ordinary people from Hebin County and Yulin County, and they also have a large number of women, children and old people peeling beans in the city. ”

"That's not much, at most 30,000 people! And the thousands of hectares of fertile land in Mintian? Don't be so stingy, help the court, and the court won't forget you. ”

Guo Song simply said: "It's okay to help the imperial court, but I want practical things, my conditions are very simple, increase the number of troops to Fengzhou to 15,000, so that we can deal with Xue Yantuo's army independently." ”

"And how much grain can you come up with?" Yan Zhenqing asked.

"Mintian also has 1,500 hectares of wheat fields, about 300,000 stone of harvest, plus nearly 100,000 stone of grain stored in our warehouse, I can support the imperial court 400,000 stone of grain, how about it, can the imperial court add another 9,000 troops to me?"

Yan Zhenqing pondered for a moment and said: "I can't agree to you immediately, but I will fight with the imperial court, and the imperial court is also profitable, and the food interests of 400,000 stones, I believe that the imperial court and the Son of Heaven will consider your request." ”

Duan Xiushi shook his head and said with a wry smile: "I've seen enough, Shuo Fangjun has always only had six thousand people, how many years I have applied is useless, you have been in office for less than a year, will the imperial court agree?" It's not enough to just exchange benefits, the key is to have a good reason. ”

"There is indeed a good reason for the lowly position, please Yan Xiangguo and the Jiedu envoy come with me."

Guo Song took the two of them to the south, walked for about twenty miles, and everyone came to the Yellow River, Yan Zhenqing and Duan Xiushi's eyes lit up at the same time, and there were two big ships moored in the Yellow River, and it could be seen that the newly built big ships had at least two thousand stones.

Yan Zhenqing urged the horse forward, and found that the boat had not been completely launched, and the craftsmen were busy painting.

"Guo Yuanjun, what are you doing..... In shipbuilding? Yan Zhenqing asked in surprise.

"Apparently yes!"

Guo Song smiled: "Yan Xiangguo forgot? The imperial court had approved the construction of a wharf, a storehouse, and a shipyard, as well as a road from the wharf to the county seat, and in fact we were going to build ten ships first, and we had timber ready, and we were also going to start construction of the warehouse and wharf as soon as possible. ”

Guo Song pointed to the location of the warehouse in the distance, where the white line had been drawn with lime, and the location of the wharf where the wooden stakes were ready to be driven into the water, and continued: "When it freezes in winter, we will continue to mine stone from Daqingshan in the south, and start to build warehouses and wharves in earnest after the beginning of spring." ”

Speaking of this, Guo Song said to Yan Zhenqing: "The development of Fengzhou will become more and more intense, starting next year, a large number of military families will move into Fengzhou, but Xue Yantuo's army is always a sword hanging over our heads, once Xue Yantuo's army suddenly arrives, Shuofang's army whip is beyond reach, our strength is small, we can only shrink into the city, who will protect the families of soldiers distributed throughout Fengzhou, how to protect the wharves, warehouses and various facilities and materials outside the city?" Is this the best reason for us to call for more troops? ”

Yan Zhenqing nodded for a while and said: "At least you have passed my level, I believe that Han Rong and Liu Yan are more reasonable, and the prince will also support you, the only difficult thing to say is Chang Gon, but if Chang Gon opposes, then Cui Youfu will definitely support it, the two will always disagree, so I think your request is very hopeful to succeed." ”

Yan Zhenqing entered the city, but unexpectedly found that tens of thousands of soldiers and civilians in the city were in full swing to build the city, which made him stunned, and asked Guo Song: "This is to rebuild Jiuyuan City?" ”

Guo Song shook his head, "It's not to rebuild, but to increase the height and strengthen the city wall of Jiuyuan City, and then build an inner city wall, and strive to complete it before the spring of next year!" ”

Yan Zhenqing was interested, walked forward to take a closer look, and saw carriages carrying large chiseled bluestone strips to the city, the craftsmen and laborers on the city head were busy like ants, and the craftsmen used lime and flour to make mortar, which was used to build the city wall, and after the mortar was dry, even the knife could not be inserted, and it was extremely strong.

The foundation of the inner city wall has been dug up, and it seems that many houses have been demolished, Yan Zhenqing pointed to the inner city wall and asked: "Since the city wall has been heightened and reinforced, why do you need to build another inner city wall, is it necessary?" ”

Guo Song calmly explained: "Although the land in Fengzhou is fertile and suitable for tuntian cultivation, there are too many foreign enemies and it is easy to be invaded, so there must be a strong fortress to give the people the last shelter, Jiuyuan County is the best choice, and Jiuyuan County was originally built as a very large city, with a circumference of forty-two miles, enough to accommodate hundreds of thousands of people, but in fact there are less than 20,000 people, so even if it is reduced to thirty miles in circumference of the city wall, it can accommodate two or three hundred thousand people, and the impact on the people is not great." ”

"Then how many houses have you demolished, and how do they settle them?" Yan Zhenqing asked, pointing to the remains of the demolished house.

"Back to Xiangguo, originally by the city wall a circle mainly to vegetable fields, in fact, only 120 houses were demolished, some of them moved to the countryside outside the city, part of them went into the inner city, all according to the demolition of the houses twice the compensation of the homestead, everyone has no opinion, as for the vegetable field, we use the land outside the city to compensate, and the inner and outer cities are ready to be used as military camps in the future."

"Where did you get the money to build the walls?" Yan Zhenqing hit the nail on the head and got to the point the essence of the problem.

Guo Song hesitated and said: "We mainly use work for relief to give food to the victims, but they have to pay labor, that is, to quarry stones and build city walls. ”

Yan Zhenqing shook his head, "You don't want to fool me, you can build a city wall with just a little food?" I know that the imperial court has allocated some of the money for the construction of the wharf and warehouse to Fengzhou, but I have not seen any sign of the construction of the wharf and warehouse. ”

Guo Song was helpless, so he had to nod, "The dock and warehouse can be repaired later, and ensuring safety is the first priority." ”

"Hey! I don't even know what to say about you, it's a serious violation for you to do this, and if someone wants to use this matter to impeach you, your kid's official hat really can't be kept. ”

Guo Song said for a while: "I just want to do something practical for the people, just to have a clear conscience, as for my personal career, I don't value it very much." ”

Yan Zhenqing was quite helpless, so he had to glare at him and urge the horse to go to the city.

Duan Xiushi patted Guo Song on the shoulder and smiled: "Don't worry! If something really happens, the two of us will carry it together. ”

Guo Song bowed deeply, "Thank you for your love!" ”

.........