Shen Congdao thought about it in bed all night, stayed up all night, and rushed to the county town in a sedan chair early the next morning, ready to sell the grain he had hoarded at a low price. Pen ~ fun ~ pavilion www.biquge.info

The loud questioning on the "Shandong Daily" really scared Shen Congdao.

Of course, Shen Congdao knew that the behavior of "copying the gentry and forcibly opening a warehouse to seize grain" was too arrogant, and if the gentry of Jin Guogong did this, the gentry of the world would hate Jin Guogong even more. If things come to that point, I am afraid that the princes in the court and the Son of Heaven will inquire about the affairs of Shandong.

The Son of Heaven gave Li Zhi the right to pay for the disaster relief, and if Li Zhi forcibly robbed the gentry of grain for disaster relief, the Son of Heaven would probably deprive the Jinguo of the right to collect commercial taxes.

"Shandong Daily" has been propagating the protection of private property rights all day long, and the Jinguo Public Court has always said that private property rights are sacred and inviolable, and if the Jinguo Gong robs the gentry's grain, won't Li Zhi slap himself? Although the gentry's hoarding of grain is sabotaging Shandong's disaster relief, the gentry's buying and selling are all fair, they are all bought in the market, and the accumulated grain can be said to be legal.

But not afraid of 10,000, just in case.

What the gentry hoarded, after all, was such a sensitive commodity as grain. In case the Duke of Jin Guo gets angry, it doesn't matter so much, and sends troops to forcibly raid the gentry's property, it will be troublesome.

This kind of behavior sounded a little impossible before, after all, Li Zhi talked about the legal system and order everywhere, but under the intimidation of "Shandong Daily" for several days, Shen Congdao felt that the possibility of being raided was getting higher and higher. The tone of the Shandong Daily is getting harsher and harsher day by day. If tomorrow's front-page headline becomes "Jinguo Gong Copied Jinan's Illegal Grain Hoarding Gentry", Shen Congdao would not be surprised at all.

The loss of family wealth is a small matter, and it can be saved in the future. If the house is raided and destroyed, the matter will be big.

Shen Congdao finally stopped hesitating and rushed to the county town to sell the seven thousand eight hundred stone grain in his house.

This time, Shen Congdao was really bankrupt. His family's savings of nearly 40,000 taels and his family's big mansion in Qingzhou City have all been turned into these 7,800 stone grain. Now he sells grain under the intimidation of the Shandong Daily, and he doesn't know how much silver he can sell.

Shen Congdao has a grain store in the county town, he found the shopkeeper of his grain store, and asked: "Shopkeeper Xi, if I want to sell all the more than 7,000 stone grain now, what price can I sell it for?" ”

Shopkeeper Xi blew the beard on his lips and said, "Boss, now is not the time to sell grain. In the past few months, it is said that more than 2 million stone of grain was sold to Shandong, and all of them were bought by the gentry of Shandong. Now that Tianjin has public sweet potatoes for disaster relief, no longer buy grain, and the grain on the market in Shandong has suddenly become more than demand. ”

In addition, Shandong Daily has been constantly publicizing these days, saying that in the future, Jinguo Gong will vigorously develop water conservancy facilities and expand the planting area. It can be seen that Shandong's grain output will increase in the next few years, and there will be no shortage of grain. With this outlook, food prices are declining these days. ”

Hearing the words of the shopkeeper Xi, Shen Congdao sighed. Li Zhi can be said to have used the power of the newspaper to the extreme, and when he secretly sold grain to the unjust boss who hoarded grain, the Shandong Daily Daily exaggerated the drought and shortage of grain in Shandong every day, which deceived the gentry who hoarded grain. Now that the grain is rotten in the hands of the gentry, Shandong Daily began to introduce the future grain surplus and vigorously suppressed grain prices.

Li Zhi monopolized public opinion in Shandong, and the price of grain in Shandong was like a marionette manipulated by the Shandong Daily, up and down, hollowing out all the gentry's silver.

Shopkeeper Xi sighed and said, "Owner, I don't know how many rich people have come to our store to ask about the price of grain in the past few days, and they all want to sell grain. Now the old men who have food in their hands feel that the grain is hot, and the price is constantly pressing. ”

"Yesterday, the Weng family's grain store has pushed the price down to one or two ninety-nine yuan. But now that "Shandong Daily" is so fierce, vigorously denouncing the gentry who hoard grain, who dares to take over at this time? The Weng family's rice noodles cost one or two nine dollars and one stone, but no one bought them. ”

Hearing the news that no one in the Weng family bought one or two or nine dollars and a stone, Shen Congdao's face turned white and said, "It has fallen to such a low price? ”

The shopkeeper said, "Yes! Owner, I think it is better to transport the grain to Beizhili to sell. The current grain price in Beizhili is about 224 yuan a stone, and the price of our large-scale sale will be lower, even if we can get 223 yuan of silver. Counting the road expenses, as well as the banknote tariff for crossing the checkpoint, you can get one or two or eight dollars per stone for transporting grain to Beizhili and selling it. ”

"Compared to not being able to sell it in Shouguang County, you can sell the grain at once when you transport it to Gyeonggi."

Hearing Shopkeeper Xi's analysis, Shen Congdao took a breath. The price of grain in Qingzhou Mansion has fallen to the floor price, and now it is more cost-effective to transport grain all the way to Beizhili than to sell it in Shandong. However, it is not easy to transport grain to Beizhili, to organize people to transport, to contact sellers, but also to transport the silver back thousands of miles, all kinds of affairs are very cumbersome. If you encounter thieves along the way, the gains outweigh the losses.

In any case, transporting grain to other provinces to sell is the last resort.

Shen Congdao sighed and said: "The shopkeeper will sell it in Shouguang County at the reserve price of one or two or eight yuan, if there is really no one to buy it, we will transport the grain to Beizhili." ”

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On the second day of September, Shandong, which had been dry for seven months, finally ushered in a large-scale rainfall.

The heavy rain seemed to have been held back for a long time and burst out all at once, breaking through the sky. In the rumbling thunder and dazzling lightning, the rain rushed to the earth with enough strength, and fell on the dry Qilu land one by one. The rain fell on the hard, dry and yellow wasteland, on the dry and cracked riverbed, on the fields where there was no harvest, and all at once the dry land became full of water.

Rainwater seeps through the surface soil, seeps downwards, and gradually seeps deep into the soil.

The so-called spring rain is as expensive as oil, which refers to the importance of spring rain to rice sowing in the south. Although the heavy rains in Shandong fell in September, the main crop in Shandong is winter wheat, and September is the time for sowing. The heavy rain at this time is as precious as the spring rain in the south of the Yangtze River.

The people of Shandong watched the pouring rain and sang and danced. The people who had been in drought for a long time rushed outside their houses to enjoy the rain despite the heavy rain, laughing. There is no air pollution in this era, and the rain is the cleanest. The women took all the pots and pans outside the house to receive water and enjoyed the gift from heaven.

Many people flocked to the Dragon King Temple with umbrellas, thanking the Dragon King's men for their mercy and only working for seven months. In the next year, I am afraid there will be no more drought.

While the people were rejoicing, they were also a little worried.

Now the Tianjin National Public Disaster Relief is giving each person a pound and eight taels of sweet potatoes to eat every day, which is enough to keep the people from starving to death. But when winter wheat is sown, heavy physical work is required, and where can this catty and a half of sweet potatoes support the farmers' labor?