To be honest, people at this time did not have much experience, because it was too troublesome to build terraces, and ordinary officials did not even bother to organize people to reclaim the wasteland on the plains, so how could they think of building terraces.

Although labor can be conscripted for free in these years, there is also a time limit, and the time for ordinary people to serve free labor is only about half a month a year.

Therefore, in general, local officials will choose some achievements that are short-term and produce relatively quick results, such as building roads, digging canals, and so on, and some even directly conscript laborers to build houses for themselves or relatives and friends, and use public equipment for private purposes, so that in many places they cannot find free labor when they want to do serious work.

At first glance, the construction of terraces is a time-consuming and laborious project, and naturally no one wants to do it.

If Yang Cong hadn't dragged more than two million taels of dirty silver at hand, it is estimated that he would not have made a fuss on the terraces, this guy, digging a barren mountain into terraces, think about it.

No, after the four villages near the Longji Terraces, more than 300 households, and a total of more than 300 laborers were gathered, Yang Cong was a little bigger.

Human beings seemed so small in front of nature, and more than three hundred laborers, plus hundreds of guards and officials he brought, a total of four or five hundred people, stood under the barren mountain like a swarm of ants standing in front of elephants.

How long does this guy, such a small person, have to dig a canal more than ten miles long, and clean up such a barren mountain dozens of feet high?

He doesn't want to do a project that takes years or even decades, he can't stand it for half a year, or even more than two months, he doesn't have so much money or food to recruit people to work, mainly because this is just a pilot, and then it will be promoted to the whole Guangxi and even the entire southwest, the time is at least several times that of here, if this project is half a year or even a few years, then he probably can't see the people in the southwest live a life of food and clothing.

The so-called "everything is difficult at the beginning", looking at the huge mountains and distant water sources, Yang Cong really has a feeling that he doesn't know where to start, such a large amount of work, such a small number of people, can it be completed in a month or two?

Fortunately, he has a very tenacious personality and is not afraid of difficulties, and when he encounters such a problem, he not only does not retreat, but becomes high-spirited.

Yu Gong with the family dare to move the Taihang Wangwu Ershan, he controls the power of the five provinces, and has countless resources in his hands, will he be stumped by this terrace?

Of course not!

He pondered carefully for a while, and then asked, "Mingju, how many people will it take to repair the canal here in a month?" ”

Huang Guangsheng looked at the young and strong laborers gathered in front, and then looked at the water source in the distance, and then estimated: "These more than 300 people are all used, everyone gets up early and works hard at night, and it is estimated that it will take more than a month." ”

Well, Huang Guangsheng is an expert in this area, he has not only served as the deputy envoy of the inspection, but also served as a political and senator, and is responsible for the construction of water conservancy, and the time judged by his professional vision is definitely no problem.

It would take more than 300 laborers to dig a canal, so what about the barren mountains?

Yang Cong looked at the huge mountain, and thought of Yugong moving the mountain again.

When Yugong moves mountains, men, women and children can go up together, why can't he do it at this time, someone will definitely come to pay for his work.

Thinking of this, he said directly to Long Shengzhi County: "You order someone to go to each village to inform you, all those who can work, regardless of men, women, old and young, will come, and the official will give them the start of the work, except for the young and strong laborers, men, women and children are counted as half a worker, and the grain will be distributed directly, and one worker will have one stone of grain a month." ”

At this time, he had already ordered people to buy grain from Nanzhili, Zhejiang, and Fujian, and more than 2 million taels could buy more than 3 million stone of grain, and all the people in Guangxi could hold out for more than a month even if they were all in battle, not to mention those who were old and could not move, and those who were small and had no strength.

When Longsheng Zhixian heard this, he naturally sent someone to spread the notice, and it didn't take long for the people in the nearby village to run here like crazy.

In these years, the family is basically about five, except for the children who are still playing with the mud and the old people lying on the bed, everyone else can basically do some hard work, this I heard that the governor gave a month and a half stone of grain wages, this is also a must, usually their family can not eat half a stone of grain a month, such a good thing, it is a fool not to go!

As a result, almost all of the four villages, the whole family, old and young, as long as they could run, came, and thousands of people gathered.

This time there are enough people, not only are there enough people to clean up the barren mountains, but even if it is digging a canal, Yang Cong has doubled the number of people for Huang Guangsheng, so that they will not have much trouble completing it in more than a month.

Next, Yang Cong personally went into battle and commanded everyone to start cleaning up the barren mountain.

First of all, the trees and weeds on the mountain have to be cut down, hoeed clean, and then the boulders on it have to be cleaned up, either pushed down from the mountain, or directly broken to make ridges, and finally, the biggest workload is to dig terraces, that guy, dig the hillside into a circle of cultivated land, the workload can be imagined.

Yang Cong still underestimated the difficulty of cleaning up the barren mountain, originally he thought that cleaning up those trees was difficult enough, because not only did the trees have to be cut down, but even the roots had to be cut out, and it was difficult for several people to kill a tree a day, although there were not many trees on the mountain, there were still thousands.

Unexpectedly, it is more difficult to clear weeds and shrubs, that guy, there are not many trees on the barren mountain, weeds and shrubs can be all over the mountain, and the whole mountain is carefully planed, it will be fatal!

At this time, some people muttered that it would be nice if they could set the fire on it all, and it would not take a day to burn it all out.

However, no one really lit a fire to burn it, because these mountains do not exist alone, they are all mountains connected to each other, and if you set fire to this mountain, the other mountains next to it will definitely follow suit, and once the mountain fire burns, it will be terrible.

However, fortunately, Yang Cong thought of another way, that is, to dig the isolation zone, dig a circle of several zhang wide isolation zone at the bottom of the mountain, so that there is no need to worry about the spread of the wildfire, anyway, regardless of the bottom of the mountain and the top of the mountain, it has to be cleaned as clean as the isolation zone, just dig a circle at the bottom of the mountain, and the workload is not as good as the original.

As soon as he came up with this method, in less than three days, the weeds and shrubs of the entire mountain were burned to the ground, and of course, all the useful trees were cut down beforehand.

This is followed by the clearing of stones and the digging of terraces, which is not a clever one, only a little bit.

More than a month later, the canal was completed, the terraced fields were almost dug, and the common people of the four villages went into battle to carry water together to irrigate the land in the terraced fields, and the paddy fields were almost completed.

This time, the four villages near Longji Mountain have hundreds of acres of land at once, although it is a little harder, but the basic food and clothing have been solved, of course, if they think better, they can continue to dig the nearby barren mountains, anyway, these barren mountains have no resources, basically all belong to the imperial court, with Yang Cong in charge, they can dig how they want.