Chapter 53 Lack of Grain and Grass

When the brothers were drinking tea in the council hall to celebrate Jia Ling's efforts to get so much material support for Shi Bin, the officer in charge of the grain and grass hurriedly ran in to report that the grain and grass of the five battalions of Master Jia in Jingzhou had not arrived for more than ten days, and the grain and grass in the warehouse were only enough for five days, and if the cut part could barely last for eight days.

Shi Bin changed color after hearing this, and said angrily: "Didn't you send someone to urge?" Can something so important be made so urgent? ”

Zhao Gang even kicked the grain manager out with a kick regardless of it, and scolded: "You idiot, how can you do such a thing? Food and herbs are insufficient, how can you only make it perfunctory for eight days? What kind of battle is there to fight, you don't have to fight those bunnies to run away on your own! ”

Seeing Shi Bin's expression, Zhao Gang gritted his teeth and glared at him, and the grain manager could only stand there trembling and silent. For fear that one accidentally really angered this Commander Zhao and directly slashed him with a knife.

After thinking for a while, knowing that the grain officer might be to blame, Shi Bin asked softly: "Please tell me in detail, why did the more than 2,000 stones of grain and grass we robbed run out so quickly?" ”

"My lord, you don't know how much it costs. Our food is not as good as that of rich and noble families, basically there is no oil and water, all of them rely on rice grains to support their stomachs, and they are all adult strong men, each person is at least one and a half pounds of rice a day. And the adults formed ten battalions of troops in only half a year, which is 5,000 people. Counting the various consumptions, it is at least eighty stone meters a day, and it doesn't take long for more than two thousand stones. ”

After saying that, Shi Bin and a few brothers knew that such an army of 5,000 people had such a large consumption of grain and grass in a month. It seems that the supply of grain and grass has to find another way, although the money is good, but in this troubled era, the money is useless, and filling the stomach is the most important thing.

Zhao Gang was very embarrassed and smiled at the grain officer as an apology, his smile was more ugly than crying, which made the grain manager even more uneasy, as if he was watching some fierce beast coquettish.

Knowing that the grain officer didn't want to stay in this house for a long time, Shi Bin smiled and ordered him to go to various places in Tanzhou to raise grain immediately, except that he couldn't take it by force, as long as he could get grain and grass. After receiving the order, he flew out as if he were flying.

As soon as the grain officer left, Shi Bin's face immediately became gloomy, he didn't think that Jia Yidao deliberately manipulated him, but this kind of feeling of making people pinch their throats was very bad. If you don't change this situation, you will have to be at the mercy of others forever.

After thinking for a while, he opened his mouth and asked Wang San: "Brother Xian, our Hunan is the land of fish and rice, how can we not afford to raise only 5,000 soldiers and horses?" The eldest brother was really puzzled. ”

"Big brother, you have been in the mountains for a long time and don't know the suffering of this peasant, the Great Song Dynasty is now seriously annexed land, and almost all the good land has been acquired and forcibly occupied by those bureaucrats, landlords, and businessmen, and these people have a way to be exempt from taxes. What the farmers are left with is a few acres of thin sky, but they have to use their harvest to support the grain and grass of the entire Tanzhou. Wang San sighed, looked at the teacup in his hand and said dejectedly.

"That's true, but this excesses can also subsidize some of the miscellaneous taxes, right?" Shi Bin asked.

Hearing Shi Bin's words, Wang San said with a wry smile: "Big brother, these harsh taxes have not entered the national finance or the local finance, but have entered the pockets of private individuals, so there is no such possibility as you said." ”

People's hearts are not enough to swallow elephants, and at this time, such a sentence flashed in Shi Bin's mind.

"As a result, more and more farmers are fleeing, the land is becoming more and more barren, and the agricultural tax that can be collected is naturally getting smaller and smaller, so it is impossible to collect taxes in the current way." Wang San smiled bitterly.

Shi Bin, who studied foreign languages in his previous life, didn't know that there were so many people who could be exempt from taxes before, just that those people only needed to make fewer payments. In this way, we can understand why no one is willing to go back to continue farming, and it turns out that life is better than death.

Li Chao, who was holding the official document, took out the information about taxation and showed it to Shi Bin at the signal of Wang San, so that he understood that all meritorious people in the Ming Dynasty could have privileges, Jinshi could have 2,000 acres of land tax-free, Juren had 400 acres of tax-exempt, and Xiucai also had 80 acres of tax-free.

But Shi Bin still wants to squeeze some oil and water out of these guys, maybe asking Meng Heng or Jia Yidao to help will have an effect, and I believe that he can get some support.

"Who can help your brother give advice, not to ask for a continuous supply of grain and grass, at least let us tide over this difficulty, and ensure that our five thousand people will have no worries about food and grass in a month or two?" Shi Bin asked.

"Big brother, aren't those merchants going to pay us a dart master's fee? Let's just let them pay the grain, why bother to turn it into gold and silver treasures? Don't bother everyone! Zhao Gang said impatiently.

"Brother Zhao, that's a businessman, it's just a lot of yellow and white things, but there is not much grain and grass, I'm afraid it's not easy to do." Yi Jun answered.

Li Chao laughed after hearing this: "I know what to do when the two of you say this, when we ran out of grain and rice, we went to the town to loot, and those merchants who took the waterway We didn't collect all the money, and generally had to collect grain and rice as road money." ”

Can you still ask for food? This surprised everyone except Liu Xiao.

If you think about it carefully, it also makes sense, the total amount of goods transported by water is much larger than that transported by land, as long as you remember to bring some extra food each time, you can also have a "harmonious relationship".

Those merchants are nothing more than roaming around these rivers and lakes, and these places are all high-yielding places of grain and rice, why don't we ask them to help us buy grain and rice? As for the dart master fee, according to what Brother Zhao said, replace it with grain and rice, and those businessmen will not suffer a loss. ”

Hearing Li Chao's method, everyone nodded and praised that this method was indeed feasible and a good method. It's just that there is a shortage of food now, and ordinary merchants definitely can't be grain merchants, so it is estimated that it will not last long.

Liu Xiao said: "The bandit's protection fee is simply turned into food." ”

Yi Jun said again: "Those bandits are also non-productive guys, and if they only stay on a mountain, where will they have any extra food?" Yi Jun was right, and everyone fell silent.

Wang San thought for a while and smiled: "Big brother, just give those bandits a message, if you don't pay the grain, the protection fee will be increased, and if you pay the grain, you will get a 20% discount." It is estimated that it can also be solved, after all, they are just grabbing food with us. ”

But Shi Bin was still not very happy, and said: "Although the methods of a few virtuous brothers are good, they can only solve the urgent need. We need to be self-sufficient, not dependent on others, and the best policy is to hoard the grain and rice we buy for emergencies. ”

Thinking of these, Shi Bin came up with a name in his mind - Yuan Nongping. It would be nice if hybrid rice could be cultivated, because now the harvest of this acre of land is only two stones (one stone = 97 kilograms), and in the previous life, one acre of land could harvest about four stones and five stones.

Although I have this idea, I can't help it, and I don't even know how to breed if I don't study agriculture, so I can only look at the field and sigh. So he offered a reward: Whoever could provide a high-yielding crop would be rewarded with five hundred taels of silver.

Shi Bin really wanted to be able to grow some potatoes or sweet potatoes in the field, but that was a matter of the Ming Dynasty, could he go through it again? couldn't help but smile bitterly, and if I thought about it again, I would probably have to go to a mental hospital.

"Big brother, I still have a way." Liu Xiao said.

"Brother Xian, if you have a way, hurry up and say, we have to get food and grass for our army as soon as possible." Shi Bin said with an impatient look.

"We can grow many kinds of radishes and lotus roots. Radish is easy to survive and has a high yield. The thin fields where rice is grown are certainly not very productive, but if you grow radishes in these wastelands, you can produce more food; Although lotus roots are not very hungry, they are more likely to survive. There are rivers and ponds everywhere on Jinghu South Road, so it is very easy to grow a large number of lotus roots. ”

This is probably the most suitable way to be self-sufficient at present, Shi Bin said: "The opinion of the virtuous brothers is very good. I think after these few months, what if we took some time out of my training and let the soldiers go farming? ”

"Good!" As soon as the words fell, Zhao Gang shouted, "Big brother is really powerful, anyway, the soldiers have nothing else except to practice weapon operation, formation and physical fitness, wouldn't it be good to change that physical training directly to farming?" ”

Although Wang San was a little surprised by Zhao Gang's surprise, he very much agreed with his statement: "Big brother, Brother Zhao's words are very correct. Don't look at the farmers in the field bending over and planting the field, in fact, it is very tiring. It's not that I'm really tired, but that I'm just doing one action over and over again, which is also a kind of strong training. ”

Seeing that everyone agreed with this, Shi Bin ordered to pay gold and silver for food, physical training for growing food, and offered rewards for high-yield grain crops.

Of course, this idea is right, and I hope that the merchant will bring some food for Shi Bin to support him. But it reduced the interests of these merchants, so they were still a little unhappy, and many of them started to play a sideshow, just to meet Shi Bin's request.

Zhao Gang saw that the problem of grain and grass had not been solved for a long time, so he was very impatient, so he quarreled with the Chamber of Commerce during the negotiation with the Tanzhou Chamber of Commerce.

Shi Bin didn't want Zhao Gang to do bad things, so he immediately found an excuse to break him away. He invited President Deng to the Yamen of Tanzhou to discuss.

"President Deng, we have been very short of food and grass recently, and I hope you can help. I believe you already know about our plan, and I believe this is acceptable, but many merchants are just coping with it and not really helping. ”

These words made Chairman Deng very embarrassed, and he could only explain: "Commander Shi, you don't do business, you don't know the difficulties, it can be said that you have to be exploited once you pass a level. And now that the price of grain is growing wildly in troubled times, merchants without background are reluctant to do grain business. ”

These were not unexpected by Shi Bin, but now that the food is seriously insufficient, he can't take care of it so much, so he asked if there is a compromise.

Compromise? Chairman Deng looked at Wang San carefully and said, "Commander Shi, Xiao Ke still has a few ways to choose from, but you may not accept it. ”

At this time, whether he accepted it or not, he made a gesture to President Deng to introduce one or two.

"The first is to go to the nearby official granary to buy grain, and the price is mostly not low. The second is to discuss with the governor of Tanzhou, and ask him to change some harsh taxes and miscellaneous taxes to the payment of grain, and of course, to give a lot of benefits to the governor. The third is to ask those merchants to help you buy goods, and it is estimated that you will have to pay a lot of silver. ”

Although it will definitely cost a lot of money, it is good to be able to solve this urgent need. When President Deng left, Shi Bin also gave him a silver ticket of fifty taels to express his gratitude.