Huangzhou north of Hengzhou to the south, the two states at the junction of the river bank, the Yangtze River from west to east turns a big bend here, rushing to the southeast direction, the Chiting water that originates from the Dabie Mountain also enters the river here, and forms a large sandbar in the middle of the river for a long time. Pen, fun, pavilion www. biquge。 info

On the northeast bank of the Yangtze River at the outer edge of the bend, the river water flows into an estuary, flows to the southeast, and then flows into Ba Shui for more than dozens of miles east of Xiyang City, and this river is the Santai River.

The sandbar in the center of the river is in front of the Santai estuary, like a wall to prevent the direct impact of the river, so the water flow at the estuary is stable, and more than ten miles upstream is the Chiting water into the estuary, so the ships on the channel between the two estuaries are like shuttles.

Many cargo ships heading to Xiyang City enter the Santai River here along the river, then enter the bifurcated canal halfway, enter the Beida Lake of Xiyang City, and finally berth at the lakeside wharf in the north of the city to load and unload goods.

There are comings and goings, and the ships loaded with goods from the lakeside wharf in the north of the city enter the Santai River along the forked canal and enter the Yangtze River upstream, so the safety of the entrance to the Santai River is particularly important.

Boats need to be dispatched in and out, so as not to crowd into a mass to block the river, and in order to prevent thieves from driving boats into the Santai River and attacking Xiyang City downstream, it is also necessary to guard the mouth of the river.

There are camps on the east and west banks of the estuary, and there are small wharves moored in both villages, both to prevent the thieves on the shore and to prevent the river in the waterproof, to go downstream along the embankment, there are beacons every few miles, one is used to transmit the beacon fire and the other is to guard the embankment.

Since the completion of the construction of river embankments and river embankments in Huangzhou, countless wastelands are no longer threatened by floods, and it is a foregone conclusion that they will be reclaimed into fertile land.

Hao Wubo, who presided over the construction of water conservancy facilities, looked at the embankments on both sides of the Santai River and sighed with emotion, not only the embankment, but also the embankment connected by the embankment on the west side of the Santai estuary, which also cost the efforts of many people.

In order to keep this painstaking effort, it is necessary to have the necessary camps and beacons, and it is also necessary for the merchants to enjoy the convenience brought by the water conservancy project.

Cargo ships entering the estuary need to pay a "toll" of five wen, of course, only those who come in need to pay, and those who go out are exempted, and the money collected every month is used as a "subsidy" for the relevant expenses of the personnel stationed here.

"How is the embankment broken?"

"Shangguan, there is no big danger, some damage has been repaired."

"The rainy season is coming, and all preparations for flood control must be stepped up, and stones and tools should be prepared along the river everywhere in case of emergency." Hao Wubo specially emphasized this: "The number should be clear, so as not to be greedy!" ”

"Shangguan rest assured, the stock of every beacon is clearly remembered, and he is not afraid that someone will fish in troubled waters."

"Have the gates of the estuary been checked?"

"I've checked it, and I switched it on and off a few times the day before yesterday, and it's very flexible and sturdy."

"Since it has been checked, all the people present at the time have signed and drawn their drawings and filed them in the state government, if there is a mistake at that time, this official will be the first to be unlucky, and none of you will want to run!"

"Shangguan rest assured, we will never be perfunctory."

Hao Wu Bo can't help but not care, there are several key points of the full set of water conservancy facilities, one of which is the entrance gate of the Santai River, once the river water rises sharply in the rainy season, the gate must be closed, so as to avoid the river water pouring into the Santai River and the farmland on both sides of the downstream, and even the surrounding area of Xiyang City will also suffer.

If the river can't rise, the water level of the lake near the banks of the Santai River in Xiyang County can't rise, and the rainwater can be quickly discharged to avoid waterlogging.

At the entrance of the Santai River, the embankment on the west bank is connected with the embankment that comes from west to east, the starting point of the embankment is here, all the way along the river bank to the downstream stretch, to Longtou Mountain and then through the south of Xiyang City, until the side of Bakou.

Then turn north along the west bank of Bakou, to the mouth of the Bashui River in Santai River, connect with the embankment on the south bank of the Santai River, go all the way to the northwest and return here, most of the boundary of Xiyang County in Huangzhou has now been surrounded by the river embankment and the river embankment.

Countless fertile fields are all in this "wall", and the several sluice gates at the mouth of the Santai River are related to the net worth of hundreds of people, and they must not be lost.

Although there are people stationed, Hao Wubo has sent more people to inspect from time to time, and today he even visited the scene in person, along the official road next to the river embankment, which can be regarded as a spot check before the rainy season.

After tossing around, the embankment and gate were carefully looked at, Hao Wubo was very satisfied with the current situation, and the next thing was to inspect the embankment, the starting point was to start from the mouth of the river, and walk along the embankment all the way to Xiyang City.

Looking up, the river outside the embankment is surging, and then looking into the embankment, but it is a wasteland that has never been reclaimed by anyone, and now it has been reclaimed, although it is still a raw land that has just been harvested badly, but the good days are not far away.

As the agricultural season approaches, many people are already working in the fields, and new ditches have brought in water from the Santai River and dispersed it across the farmland, allowing the land to be fully irrigated.

The abundant iron farming tools and ploughing cattle allowed these lands to be deeply cultivated, and the government's promise of no rent for two years aroused the enthusiasm of the people to reclaim the land.

As soon as the river embankment was completed, the land that could be cultivated in Huangzhou increased several times, and with the land, the people had hope, because they could divide the land by virtue of military merits, and the soldiers' desire to fight became higher and higher.

For today's strange scene, the price spent by Huangzhou (Bazhou) is no longer countable.

The west of Xiyang City is Longtou Mountain, Hao Wubo now looks at the vast area south of the Santai River in the west of Longtou Mountain, because of the river, it is often plagued by the river water that swells in the rainy season, so it is a large area of reeds or wasteland since ancient times.

For thousands of years, no one has cultivated it, and no one dares to reclaim it, and there are dense snails in many low-lying areas.

Where there are snails, there may not be schistosomes, but where there are schistosomes, there must be snails!

The lack of land in Huangzhou refers to the lack of fertile land, not that there is really no land, and if you want to reclaim the famine, you have to build water conservancy, and if you want to build water conservancy, you have to invest a lot of manpower, material and financial resources, and you have to face the terrible schistosomiasis.

It was a little difficult to carry out this big project with the power of a state, but Shi Yu Wenwen, the assassin at that time, decided to grit his teeth and go to it, so he mobilized all the forces that could be mobilized.

Manpower, in addition to the people of the prefectures and counties who served in forced labor, there were also prisoners of war by the Chen army, and slaves brought out from the Dabie Mountains.

Yu Wenwen took the lead in donating a year's official stipends, food and rice, as the rations for the young and strong people who built the embankment, and donated thousands of dollars as funds for the purchase of stones.

Many quarries and lime kiln owners donated stone and lime, and large households in various places organized clansmen to contribute manpower, and then the state government mobilized tens of thousands of people, prisoners of war, and coolies to invest in the embankment project.

The labor force is mainly prisoners of war and slaves who serve as coolies, except for the rainy season, the progress of the project has never stopped, when the farming is busy, the people go home to farm, and when the farming is slack, they come to help, when the official army is not fighting, whether it is the state soldiers or the Hulin army, they all go to the construction site to help.

After several years of continuous efforts, the river embankment and river embankment that stretched for hundreds of miles were finally built, and the stagnant water was drained, lime was put into the snails, and then the land was set on fire, and then the land was plowed deeply, and finally ten thousand hectares of land were reclaimed.

The large-scale division of land has stabilized the morale of the army and the newly relocated immigrants, and everyone is holding back their enthusiasm to work hard to turn the wasteland into fertile land, and Huangzhou's "lack of land and sparse population" has become a thing of the past.

But at the same time, thousands of people were killed, the vast majority of whom were prisoners of war and slaves, and it was not the people who died that did not inspire a large-scale popular uprising.

More than half of these people's deaths were caused by swelling diseases during the construction of river embankments and embankments, and some of them were caused by snake bites or malaria from mosquito bites, and some were caused by various accidents and diseases.

Dead prisoners of war and slaves were not exposed to the wilderness, and the government gave them a place to bury their dead, and those who died of swelling and disease, in order to prevent the continued scourge of schistosomiasis, were cremated and buried in jars after cremation.

They were buried at the western foot of Longtou Mountain, in a cemetery on the outskirts of a newly built immigrant town, and now Hao Wubo walked into a small temple in front of the cemetery.

There is a tablet in the temple, on the book "build the spirit of the deceased", there is a lonely old man living in the temple, sprinkling the courtyard, and incense is on the tablet during the New Year's Festival.

The prisoners of war and slaves who survived, according to the agreement declared by the government in advance, those who performed well were freed and could also share the land, except for a small number of Chen Guo prisoners of war who returned home, most of them became good citizens under the government.

After a few sticks of incense, Hao Wubo turned around and left, he was still young, as the host of the embankment project, the guilt in his heart came to his heart from time to time, looking at the scene in front of him, someone sighed in his ears:

"One will make ten thousand bones wither." (To be continued.) )