In June, the rain is abundant. Pen | fun | pavilion www. ｂｉｑｕｇｅ。 infoThe mountains and rivers around Qinzhou are broken, the mountains in the east and south are verdant, but the west and north are full of loess, and when the rainstorm comes, the torrent of sediment flows out of nowhere. In this season, the surrounding area is quite dangerous to outsiders who are not familiar with geography, and even the Qiaodaoxiang army in the Lufang belt has stopped the surrounding topographic survey, and only operates around the county towns of Chengji, Longcheng and Qingshui.

There was no shortage of money, materials and manpower in his hands, and Chong Shiheng proposed to build the outer city of Qinzhou and expand the scale of the city, but Xu Ping vetoed it. The most important thing now should be to renovate the surrounding roads, erect bridges in key places, and build irrigation facilities in open areas, so as to build the area around Qinzhou into a grain and grass supply base to the west. Building a city is defense, Xu Ping doesn't need to defend in Qinzhou now, and if he wants to build a city, he must also build it to the west. With the military strength now in Qinzhou's hands, there is not much threat to the surrounding areas.

It is not true that tens of thousands or even hundreds of thousands of troops have been gathered in the accounts of the Qiang tribe, and there may not even be a thousand soldiers in armor among the tens of thousands of people.

Pure military strength, now Qin Fenglu is enough, and more soldiers are not to deal with Fanqiang, but to target the party.

On this day, the torrential rain was pouring down, Xu Ping and Wang Gongchen stood under the eaves to watch the rain and discuss this year's harvest.

All the grass creation, the need for manpower has not yet arrived, this year the field work is to enclose the land, roughly renovate the infrastructure of the field, grain planting is not yet talked. Almost all of the plants in the ground are alfalfa and sorghum. Alfalfa is used to raise draft animals such as horses, donkeys, and mules, while sorghum is used to raise cattle and sheep, as well as to make wine.

There is no shortage of livestock in Qinzhou, but in the past, the Han people rarely kept them in captivity, and when they needed it, they bought it from the surrounding Fanluo, which was quite convenient. The biggest cost of buying horses from Qinzhou was not the cost of buying horses, but the cost of rushing from Qinzhou to the capital. The cost of each horse to the capital is dozens of times, plus the wear and tear of the road, it is not worth mentioning compared to the money to buy a horse.

Perhaps it was Xu Ping's obsession, he thought that buying horses was unreliable, too unstable, and if he wanted to obtain a reliable source of war horses, he still had to rely on the imperial court to raise horses themselves. There are many places suitable for raising horses around Qinzhou, mainly on the gentle slope and summit highlands of Xiaolong Mountain in the west, as well as the remaining veins of the Qinling Mountains in the south, and there are many natural grasslands. However, most of them are summer pastures, and there is still a lack of a lowland pasture for breeding horses, and Xu Ping has not yet decided where to set them.

Watching the pouring rain pour down to the ground, Xu Ping said to Wang Gongchen: "This year, the camp has covered a lot of land around Qinzhou, especially the land that has fallen a lot, has it caused them uneasy?" ”

Wang Gongchen shook his head with a smile: "What's uneasy?" We spilled a lot of money, and the tea silk cost a lot. They did not value the land very much, and as long as they gave them possessions, they happily offered the land. ”

"The Qiang people also have to eat, drink, and Lazar, and if they have no land, what will they do for a living? Without moderation, you will eventually get into trouble. ”

Wang Gongchen said: "Most of the Tibetan people are nomadic, living in pursuit of water and grass, and the land here is gone, so they change places to graze." Although there are also people who learn from the Han people to farm, they are too extensive and mostly rely on grazing cattle and sheep. However, these people sell their land and sell them very well, but they don't keep their promises very much, so the Shuai Mansion should pay attention to it. ”

Xu Ping asked strangely: "Why don't you keep your promises?" According to the old law, the Tibetan people were not allowed to trade with the Han people, but it was relaxed during the Tiansheng years, and they were only allowed to buy and sell in the city, and they had to be guaranteed by the tooth people. They just want to regret it, and they can't find someone to trade with, can they still go to trouble the tooth man? When Qinzhou didn't dare to hit them? ”

Wang Gongchen shook his head again and again: "Jingluo, you have been in the Shuai Mansion a lot these days, and you think of these people too kindly. I once heard a song in the city, that is, to buy the land of the Tibetan people, do you want to listen to it? ”

Xu Ping motioned to Wang Gongchen to listen to it, and Wang Gongchen learned to sing: "The soldiers entered the market to compete for the field, and the Han people wanted the field and had no money." Youtian was sold and went to Tibet, but it led Qiang to come to Koubian. -- From the previous dynasties, these Qiang liked to sell their fields to the Han people in the vicinity. After the field was sold, he got the money in his hand, so he drank every day, and when the money was used up, he went to the surrounding mountains to lure those who were not attached to the court out to plunder. When the war was over, there were many ownerless fields, so they went to occupy them again, or those who had made meritorious contributions in the battle with Shengqiang were also given land. After that, they sold the fields, and so on, which was the way some of them made money. So this year, we have no obstacle to buying land from Fanluo, but in the next year or two, Qinzhou will prevent them from going to the surrounding areas to attract Shengqiang to come and make trouble. ”

Xu Ping was silent for a while before he said in a deep voice: "Don't worry, I won't give them such a chance." However, these people sold their fields and had no food and clothing, and Qinzhou could not let it go. Let's wait until the fall, and this matter will be settled along with other matters. ”

Fanluo is not necessarily a nomadic people, there are also a large number of Fanhua Han people, and there are many people who cultivate land. But now that it has been cultivated, the living customs are similar to those of Fanqiang, even if they farm, they are mostly half-herding and half-farming. For herders, the most important thing is the water and grass, not the land. These nomads and half-herders don't take the land seriously, whether it is the Han people or the government, saying that they want to buy them with money or property, they sell it happily. When the land here was gone, they went nomadic to other places, and many conflicts between tribes began from this.

Of course, the worst thing is to sell the land, spend the money, and take advantage of the convenience of the same clan to lure the Qiang from the surrounding mountains out to loot. They act as guides, and they make a profit first, and the court quells the rebellion, and they make another profit from it.

It is precisely because although the Fan people were willing to sell their land, but the consequences caused by this are endless, the previous governors of the state played, and the imperial court forbade the Han people to buy land from the Fanluo. Xu Ping came here to open up, and the Shangjuan court abolished this ban, so that in addition to the surrounding idle fields, the camp could also buy the land of Fanluo. Originally, I thought that it was just that the people of Fan had no food and clothing after selling their land, and they could find a way to find them a job that could support their families, but I didn't expect that Xu Ping's idea was too simple.

The rain kept falling, Xu Ping changed the topic and asked Wang Gongchen: "There is a great drought in the Sichuan Gorge this year, and there may not be much grain transported to Qinzhou from there." I see that your palindrome to Pang Cao said that Qin Fenglu can support it, is there any specific arrangement? ”

"It's nothing more than relying on the grain storage on Shaanxi Road to last for a year. In addition to the share allocated to us, I also consulted with the Shaanxi Road Transit Envoy if Qinzhou could exchange pasture for their grain. Even if the grain is not willing to be exchanged for us, it can also be exchanged for horse feed from several other roads in Shaanxi. I've already asked, and most of the stored horse feed is soya beans, and some of them can be replaced with alfalfa. After we get the beans, we can use them to extract oil, and the soybean meal can still be used as feed. With oil, the army can save a lot of food. ”

Xu Ping smiled and nodded: "This is also a way, the other soldiers eat by handing out rice to the soldiers, and let him make his own food." We have men in the army here who specialize in cooking, and we can control it with oil. People, once you have oil and water in your stomach, the amount of food will be reduced all of a sudden. Not only for changing beans, but also for livestock around Qinzhou, as well as for cattle and sheep. It's a good idea to exchange grass for beans, and other places can do the same. ”

In this era, stir-frying was not popular, and Xu Ping did it, and it was only limited to a few prosperous places around Liangjing. Different cooking habits are one of the reasons, and the other is the lack of oil. At this time, the biggest use of soybeans is not to extract oil, but to use it as a concentrate for horses, and the most used oil is sesame oil. Because the biggest use of oil is to light the lamp, soybean oil is not easy to use.

(I recommend my friend Sima Baishan's official article "The Age of the Great City", which is very interesting to write about a poor and white town growing into an international metropolis.) ）