In the following time, Chen Xu took Shui Qingrou, Ying Shiyan, Meng Wan, the four concubines in spring, summer, autumn and winter, and the three daughters of the concubines to Jingchu under the protection of the domestic servants.

At the end of May, we arrived at Gangneung, the capital seat of Nam-gun.

Jiangling is the Jingzhou of later generations, the poet immortal Li Bai of later generations once had a thousand years of white emperor Caiyun, thousands of miles of Jiangling one day also a quatrain of the ages, and Jiangling was called Yingdu before the conquest of Chu, because it is located in the south of Jishan, so it is also known as Jinan, once the largest city in southern China, and also the longest capital of Chu, the capital was built for more than 400 years, the population of more than 400,000 at the most prosperous time, and later was broken by Bai Qi in the battle of Qin and Chu. It is known as the white plucking in history.

After the destruction of Yingdu, the king of Chu fled north to the city of Yang to build the capital, so far Yingdu was completely abolished, although it was slowly built later, but there was no prosperity and liveliness of the original capital of Chu.

However, the center of gravity of the Chu State was originally in the Jingxiang and Nanyang areas, relying on the Han River and the Great River to communicate Nanyang Bashu and Jiangdong, Jiangxi and other places, so that the Jianghan Plain and Jingxiang area had sufficient population and developed agriculture, and with the unification of China by the Great Qin, the country gradually stabilized, and the people settled down in these years after commerce also prospered rapidly, and Jiangling, known as the thoroughfare of the seven provinces, was also prosperous and lively again, as the county seat of Nanjun, the current permanent population exceeded 200,000, as Nantong Changsha, north of Nanyang, west of Bashu, Adjacent to Jiujiang and Jiangxi's water and land transportation arteries in the east, today's Jiangling is much more lively and prosperous than Nanyang Wancheng.

As the largest county town in the south, Jiangling has a flat terrain and sufficient food, and is close to the Yangtze River, as the traffic point from south to north, here not only brings together a large number of craftsmen and craftsmen from the Ministry of Industry and the Academy of Sciences, but also gathers countless businessmen and tycoons from the south to the north, the key planning of Jiangling Port is as long as three miles, the docks docked reach 100, and the temporary wharf is more, according to Chen Xu's plan, Jiangling will be built into the largest water and land transportation node in the south, radiating the surrounding Nanyang, Ba, Shu, Qianzhong, Changsha, Jiangxi, Jiujiang counties, Moreover, it goes down the river to the East China Sea, so far it completely integrates the Jianghan Plain and the southeast.

The first phase of the Jiangling Port project is planned to be completed in three years, with an investment of 50 million yuan, which is the largest investment project in the Yangtze River basin in the Tantu plan, and in order to facilitate the crossing of the river, it is necessary to build wharves and storage facilities on the south bank of the river. What I saw was a busy scene of tens of thousands of people in full swing under the scorching sun.

River ports, wharves, warehouses, containers, gantry cranes, and shipyards are in full swing everywhere, with mountains of sand, cement, steel, and timber, scaffolding and booms everywhere, this scene not only stimulates all the people, but also all the officials, businessmen and construction teams involved in the development of this project.

Stimulated by this huge imperial court investment, a large number of merchants from nearby counties began to gather in Gangneung City, buying land and buying real estate to enjoy this rare development opportunity together, and various restaurants, merchants, post stations, and Quyuan began to flourish like mushrooms after a rain, which led to a large number of civilian employment, and the development of commerce also stimulated a substantial increase in commercial taxes, and even with the supply of grain, cloth, vegetables and other goods near Gangneung, a large number of farmers began to benefit.

Chen Xu stayed in Gangneung for ten days, not only carefully inspected the construction of Gangneung River Port and other facilities, but also convened officials, steel plants, cement plants, contractors, construction teams and business representatives for two in-depth conversations and guidance, encouraging them to boldly devote themselves to this unprecedented project construction, as long as it is not illegal, everything has been the goal of economic construction. While ensuring agricultural production, we will tap the power of the private sector to the greatest extent, let the general public participate in the construction of this infrastructure, and strive to complete the construction of Jiangling Port as quickly as possible, so as to lay a solid foundation for the rapid development of the Jianghan Plain.

After inspecting Jiangling, Chen Xu set off for a short inspection of the Jingshan Phosphate Chemical Plant.

The main task of the Jingshan Phosphate Chemical Plant established a year ago is to manufacture red phosphorus, but the refining and conversion of phosphorus has involved a relatively complex chemical process, and this process is very dangerous, not to mention that it is extremely easy to have an accident, so Chen Xu did not forcibly require the phosphate plant to increase output, in addition to the requirement to formulate a relatively strict factory system, the main purpose is to continuously improve the industrial preparation capacity of phosphorus through the form of a regular factory, and lay a solid foundation for the future chemical industry.

Therefore, although the Jingshan Phosphate Chemical Plant has been established for more than a year, there is not much red phosphorus refined and manufactured, only less than 2,000 catties in total, and there have been two white phosphorus burning and a distillation kettle explosion accident during the period, resulting in a total of more than ten deaths, most of them are prisoners and slaves, but there is also a supervisor among them.

The fact that there are less than 100 people in this plant shows that the danger of the chemical plant is not sensational.

The news of these three incidents was sent to Xianyang, and Chen Xu could only order the formulation of a stricter factory system to avoid risks, but small accidents still emerge one after another, the most common is phosphorus poisoning, the refined white phosphorus must be preserved with cold water, once exposed, it is very flammable in the humid and hot air of this summer in the south, and the toxic gases released are easy to poison.

Since the production of red phosphorus in the laboratory in Xianyang, Chen Xu asked the craftsmen of the Academy of Sciences and a group of alchemists to make a flammable and safe match, so now relying on the production capacity of the Jingshan Phosphate Plant, another match factory has been prepared near the phosphate plant after the beginning of spring this year.

The construction of the match factory led to the development of some simple industries in the local area, and also brought some opportunities for local civilians to earn money, such as making matchboxes, making matchsticks, making packing boxes, and so on.

This named and Jingshan brand matches are packaged in small wooden boxes, and the side is coated with a friction agent mixed with ore powders such as red phosphorus and sulfur iron quartz, which can burn under friction with the gunpowder on the match head, which is relatively safe to use, and the matchsticks are made of flammable pine wood, which is relatively easy to ignite, unlike before, you need to pray for the blessing of Taiyi Xianzun before scratching and ignition, in Chen Xu's opinion, it has completely reached the opportunity to replace the very difficult flint with large-scale manufacturing and promotion. The only bottleneck is that the production of red phosphorus is not up to par.

But fortunately, the demand for red phosphorus for matches is not large, and the current can meet the manufacturing scale of the match factory, the match factory has recruited more than ten workers, all of whom are female workers, and can now make about 300 boxes of matches per day, although these matches are sold to the outside world, they are mainly supplied to some large cities such as Xianyang and Luoyang, and the supply exceeds demand, and the supply of private people is completely insufficient.

However, after this inspection, Chen Xu decided to increase the scale of investment in the phosphate plant and match factory, and strive to increase the daily volume of matches to about 1,000 boxes, so as to greatly increase the supply of the market.

A year later, Chen Xu hoped that the daily output of the match factory would reach 3,000 boxes, and in order to achieve the envisaged target capacity, Chen Xu arranged for people to return to the Xianyang Academy of Sciences to gather a few craftsmen who were familiar with mechanical manufacturing to design a machine that could automatically cut matchsticks and quickly apply match tips.

The most convenient thing for this kind of large-scale manufacturing is the machine, not only fast but also safe, the most important thing is that the profit of matches is low, the price of a box is less than five dollars, the labor cost is too high, and the machine will definitely lose money, but even if it is a loss, it cannot be promoted on a large scale, because five dollars is still too expensive for ordinary people, and they can't afford it, even if they save money, they will be used up in about one or two months, and they need to spend dozens of dollars of match money in a year, and ordinary families can't afford it at all. Therefore, Chen Xu's idea is to reduce the retail price of a box of matches to two yuan, as long as the cost is low enough, this price has the possibility of large-scale promotion.

In mid-June, Chen Xu set off on a boat down the river, went to Dongting Lake for a few days, and took his wife and concubine and daughter to Junshan Island in the heart of the lake. In the scorching summer, I live in the dwellings on the island, watch the waves of the cave for 800 miles during the day, lie down at night to watch the stars and the moon and listen to the vast water of the lake, and when I encounter heavy rain, I will bathe in the wind and listen to the rain on the island, the wind and the sun will be beautiful, and I will be able to pick lotus roots, fish and shrimp to make all kinds of delicious food, and live a good and comfortable life.

The county seat around Dongting heard that the Marquis of Qinghe came, the local fishermen rushed to meet Junshan, for a time the cruise ships in Dongting Lake were like weaving and the sound of people was noisy, the eight hundred miles of Dongting were very lively, a large number of fish, shrimp, crab snails were sent to Junshan by enthusiastic fishermen, and countless local officials and celebrities in Changsha squires and businessmen also landed on the island to meet Cong, Chen Xu did not refuse, talked warmly with these people, and also held a grand barbecue dinner on the lake beach, for a time the whole Junshan was noisy and lively day and night, and the lights were bright all night.

Soon after Chen Xu left, the people near Dongting spontaneously donated money and property to build the Taiyi Temple on Jun Mountain to commemorate the heroism and enthusiasm of the Marquis of Qinghe to visit Dongting, and this Jun Mountain Night Banquet has also become a good story for a while, and it will be held once a year in June, but this is already a later story.