I went to the office room and found Wu Shitong and asked, "Old Wu, is there a leather workshop in Yangzhou City?"

"Xia Guan really knows a few families."

"Okay, let's find the biggest one, let's go in the afternoon."

When I arrived at a village called Songjiazhuang outside Yangzhou, I smelled a stench of leather as soon as I entered the village.

"Master, it stinks!" Li Tai and Xiao Changning covered their noses and said.

"This is the means they rely on to make a living, people rely on their own skills to eat without stealing or robbing, don't look at these Tang people with contempt."

"My lord, it's not surprising that they're drying fur on a hot day," said a merchant who had come with the samurai.

When he entered the village, the open field was full of all kinds of animal furs, and Xiao Zheng even saw a few tiger skins.

Not long after entering, a businessman in his fifties greeted him, and as soon as he introduced Xiao Zheng, the businessman named Song De was taken aback, and he quickly knelt down to salute.

Xiao Zheng asked to know that all the surnames on this Zhuangzi are Song, this leather is the family industry, and he took a few people to walk around the village, Song De did not hide anything, and took Xiao Zheng around, Xiao Zheng found that the leather making process on this Zhuangzi is very perfect, but the scale and craftsmanship are much worse than those of later generations.

"Then how much money can you make as a Zhuangzi last year, you don't have to hide it, this official doesn't charge you taxes," Xiao Zheng said half-jokingly.

"My lord has seen the outside, as soon as you arrived in Yangzhou, you have redressed your grievances and eliminated the harm, and the name of benevolence has spread all over the south of the Yangtze River. If you change to a small official, you may also have to think about it, a good official like you doesn't need to hide anything from you, our village mainly makes leather drums and boots or some other small things, but it is much stronger than farming, more than 50 households, and the whole village has at least 500 yuan a year."

"How about that than farming?" Xiao Zheng asked.

"It's much better, it's just that people are ashamed of the low status of businessmen, but it's much better than farming" Song De really didn't lie.

Ordered Zheng Xuanli, and after a while, this guy threw a few crocodile skins to the ground.

Xiao Zheng said to Song De: "Shopkeeper Song, have you ever seen this kind of skin?" ”

"My lord, isn't this Jiao's skin?" Song De said in surprise.

Xiao Zheng didn't speak, and brought two boxes over for people to open them, and they were full of copper coins and gold and silver.

Looking at the confused Song Dexiao Zheng said: "Shopkeeper Song, of course this is crocodile skin, you listen to me, there is no difference between concocting crocodile skin and making cowhide, it is also exposed to the sun to drain the moisture in the skin, pickle to remove the residual oil in the skin and flatten it into pieces after alkali, you can rest assured that you can make it boldly, even if it is all destroyed, I don't have to pay for it." These two thousand yuan is the official's personal idea, I think your leather making place is too small, and it is also messy, I want to expand the scale, and this money is used for expansion. When these crocodile skins are ready, I will sell them to Chang'an, and we will each make half of the money, of course, you also have the right to refuse, I will go to the next one."

"My lord, do you mean to do business with villains?" Song De didn't believe his ears a little.

"Not only you, but you can also bring your peers over to do it together, and this official will never object," Xiao Zheng said with a smile.

"I can do business with you, even if I don't give money, the villain will do it" Song De immediately understood what was going on, if the God of Wealth who sent it to the door didn't accept it, it would be really stupid.

touched the crocodile skin and said: "In this kind of weather, from drying to tanning, the villain will deliver in half a month."

"No problem, I will continue to send it over in the future, and if it is broken, it will be mine."

It took a lot of saliva to ask Song De to accept the money.

The next day, all the counties and counties under the jurisdiction of Yangzhou City posted strange notices, the government in Yangzhou outside the city to collect Jiaopi, each skin two money, but can not damage the Jiaopi, if there is damage, the price is discounted.

All the people of Yangzhou City couldn't figure out what this Xiao Da wanted to do, calculating that the money for a skin to buy grain was enough for a family to eat for a year, and the temptation was not a big boat. But this thing is also fierce enough and not easy to provoke, and it can't damage the skin, how to catch this? However, the notice stipulates that the method of catching Jiao can be learned at the gate of the government.

Zheng Xuanli became a teacher, holding that set of Jiao trapping tools all day long to teach people how to catch this thing.

There must be brave men under the heavy reward, for a time there are gangs of crocodile catchers in the swamp pit area outside Yangzhou from time to time, and those who catch them happily sell them for money, and those who are not caught buy live chickens and fresh meat as bait and continue to work hard to catch them. Although there have been incidents of bites and injuries in the process of catching, compared to the huge team that caught Jiao, it was only an individual case.

In less than half a month, the crocodiles in some small lakes and ponds around Yangzhou City disappeared.

There are some more shrewd ones, seeing that there are fewer crocodiles caught, so they gang up to find the government and open a way to lead to Hongze Lake in Chuzhou, where there are many crocodiles, to catch it.

"My lord's idea is extremely clever, no one thought that the disaster for thousands of years could be solved so easily in your hands, and I will admire the five bodies to the ground," said the warrior Tong as he looked at the hanging pieces of crocodile skin.

"That is, if you rely on the power of the government alone, it is useless for you to wait for another thousand years, the key is to mobilize the power of the people, only the people are our biggest backers, with the support of the people, don't be a little crocodile, this force is enough to destroy the world, not to mention that there are still huge profits here."

I had just come out from under the drying rack when I saw a farmer approaching with an ox cart.

The coachman was stunned when he saw the two, and then he stopped the cow and trotted over, knelt on the ground, kowtowed, and said, "The villain has seen two adults."

"Do you know me?"

"My lord, you are really a noble man who forgets things, villain Huang Erzhu, you released the villain from prison, the villain's sin at that time was to kill the ploughing cow by mistake, you also gave the villain money to let the villain buy two cows, and when I went back, my father was very happy. You see, these are the two cows that the villain bought, and the villain also pulled the skin for the people in the village today, and just happened to meet your two nobles," Huang Erzhu said with a smile.

"Oh, got it. You won't slaughter these two cows this time," Xiao Zheng asked jokingly.

Huang Erzhu rubbed his hands a little anxiously and said, "Look at what you said, my lord, after these two cows were bought, the whole family was grateful to you. If I hadn't stopped you and said you were busy, my father would have been going to kowtow to you. A few days ago, the villain got some lotus root and lotus seeds and sent them over, I'm afraid that if you don't accept them, you will leave them at the door of the house."

"It's okay, I'll take this next time, don't worry about sending it boldly, I'm not as honest as water" Xiao Zheng's words made everyone laugh.

When everyone stopped laughing, Huang Erzhu said a little crampedly: "My lord, the villain knows that you are a miracle doctor, and I just want to ask you for help with something?" You see......"

"But it doesn't hurt to say it."