- After speaking, Chen Ke said that Qinzhou was going to set up a money supervisor and a change of affairs, and handed over to them the right to package taxes for ten years...... These exciting news told Li Fan and Zhou Dingqian: "The sales momentum of Dali bonds is very good, and in this way, the Bianjing Qian finally has sufficient funds." The shareholders decided to invest an additional 800,000 yuan to Sihai Firm! ”

This was really a pleasant surprise, and the two were naturally overjoyed. The difficult history has finally become a thing of the past, and the four seas business is about to usher in great development!

"You two go your separate ways." Chen Ke ordered in a deep voice: "Shopkeeper Zhou stays here, builds a dock, recruits shipwrights, and makes preparations for Qinzhou Port." Of course, there is no income without trade, and we can run the surrounding routes first. Although Jiaozhi opposite Qinzhou Port is not a big market, it is still very profitable to sell tea and silk from the Great Song Dynasty and exchange it for gems, ivory, and mahogany there. The meal has to be eaten one bite at a time, and this Jiaozhi alone is enough for us to work for a few years. ”

Zhou Dingqian nodded in response, and Chen Ke turned to Li Fan again: "You give all the work at hand to Lao Zhou, I will give you a guard of 200 people, and the five new ships will also be given to you, you hire sailors yourself, buy goods, and then follow Na Aziz to the Western Ocean." After a pause, he said: "This trip, there are three tasks. The first is to be proficient in the use of star drawing techniques and star drawing charts. ”

"Astrology?" Li Fan's eyes widened and said, "Where can I learn this magic skill?" ”

"Don't worry so much, anyway, I'll teach you when I go back, but I also have a very shallow mastery, if you don't understand anything, just ask Aziz, don't be polite to him. But don't ask him in front of anyone and get him in trouble. ”

Li Fan understood, and Zhou Dingqian glanced at each other, and they both saw ecstasy in each other's eyes. It's really a master, a top trick! Lord Chen actually took down the star pulling technique, which means that the merchant ships of the Four Seas Merchant can really reach the four seas!

"The trade routes of the Arabs are going to be cut off." When they were happy, Chen Ke continued: "The ocean of the future." It belongs to our Great Song Dynasty, although our Four Seas Ship started late, but it entered the ocean first. can take the lion's share. Therefore, you must master the art of star pulling, and when you return, you must be able to drive from the Persian Gulf back to Qinzhou Bay independently. ”

"Hmm." Li Fan nodded heavily and said, "I know." ”

"Except for the route. After I arrived in Baghdad, I got back all the books printed in the Wisdom Pavilion, as well as the scholars and translators who had worked in the Wisdom Pavilion...... Of course, this is mainly Aziz's mission, but you also have to keep your eyes peeled and don't let him mess with me. ”

Li Fan nodded again, and Chen Ke said again: "The last task is to establish a connection with Christendom. Of course. Now that the Arab world and Christendom are in serious opposition, it is not good for you to come forward directly, but you can turn to a country called Axum, which is the only Christian country in the Arab world. They are weak, but they are suitable to be our intermediaries. ”

"What kind of Axum is this, will it be affected by the pond fish?" According to Li Fan's understanding, if there is really a war there, such a weak country will definitely be wiped out. ”

"No, it won't. Because the legendary Ark of the Covenant is kept in the cathedral of Axum, which is a common sacred relic of the two religions," Chen Ke shook his head and said: "The sacredness of the Ark of the Covenant is inviolable, so they will not attack Axum." ”

"The Ark of the Covenant, the Ark of the Covenant of the Lord?" Zhou Dingqian suddenly said excitedly: "Listening to the rabbin's preaching, that is also a holy thing that we give to the happy people!" ”

"How can it be your family?" Li Fan couldn't figure it out.

Zhou Dingkun briefly talked about the origin of the three religions.

"This is really interesting, the three of you are originally of the same origin, huh?" Li Fan scratched his head and said, "Then why do you have to fight for life and death?" ”…,

"Such a profound question, you have to study it yourself......" Chen Ke gave him a roll of his eyes and said to Li Fan: "You can tell the rabbis in Bianjing everything you know...... Of course, I don't say you'll do the same. ”

Li Fan smiled embarrassedly, sighed, and said: "Jerusalem is going to be a war again, I hope Lan will not let our lives be clouded with gunsmoke......"

"Hopefully he'll stay awake." Chen Ke smiled slightly, he didn't care. The heart said that it was just right to leave, and the Bianjing money number was Lao Tzu!

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

After explaining the task, Chen Ke said goodbye to the two and returned to Guizhou with Wang Han. When I returned to Guizhou, it was already October, and the Hongshui River had entered a dry period. Until April of this year, there was only half a year to start construction, and once April passed, the water rose and miasma, and its dangerous situation made people talk about the tiger and had to stop work.

Chen Ke then joined Shen Kuo and Bai Chongli, the representative of the Bianjing Qianhao, and led the people gathered in Guizhou to the Hongshui River Project. Long before the construction, Shen Kuo and Su Song had already traced the river and surveyed beach by beach. The two of them led the survey personnel to climb the heights and trek through dangerous obstacles, measured the water nature, analyzed the shape of the beach, and surveyed the waterway of more than 1,200 miles, totaling 125 beaches, 84 beaches that should be repaired, and the most dangerous eight, 35 dangerous beaches, and 41 secondary dangerous beaches.

Chen Ke personally served as the prime minister of the river, and Shen Kuo served as the technical director, and the two were responsible for the overall situation and the inspection of exchanges. Then the civil and military officials of the Ministry of Procurement were divided into beaches to undertake repairs, and they were sent according to the difficulty.

He also allocated 38,400 yuan from Jianggongyin to pay the merchants of the four seas to buy rice in Jiangnan for 100,000 officials and craftsmen; Another 40,000 yuan was allocated to the Guangnan West Road Capital Yard to manufacture and purchase 100,000 steel drills, 40,000 wedges, 18,000 sledgehammers, 15,000 hand hammers, 2,000 catties, and 2,000 pulleys. and a million pounds of gunpowder.

Such a huge and arduous project, of course, requires the use of gunpowder. In the Tang Dynasty, gunpowder was only an incendiary drug, but in this dynasty, it developed very quickly and has gradually transitioned to explosives. The people of the Song Dynasty already knew that if black powder was burned in a closed container, it would explode, but this was the first time it had been applied to blasting.

However, for the gunpowder used for blasting, it was necessary to turn to the Tosakuin, because only the Tosakuin could purchase saltpeter and sulfur on a large scale. Under a recipe of absolute secrecy, they were able to produce gunpowder for four different purposes: flammable, explosive, anti-poison and smoke screens. What is needed for river engineering is naturally the first kind of gunpowder.

In fact, when Chen Ke and Shen Kuo were in Dongchuan, they had studied the formula of gunpowder for the army, and they found that the content of sulfur and nitrate in gunpowder in the Tang Dynasty was the same, which was one to one, but in this dynasty it was one to two, or even close to one to three. It is already very similar to the formula that Chen Ke knew that nitrate accounted for three-quarters of the black powder in later generations.

But for opening mountains and breaking stones, the power is still not enough, but this is difficult for Shen Kuo. After learning from Chen Ke that the performance of gunpowder could be enhanced by improving the purity of the ingredients, he quickly devised a set of methods to improve the purity of the ingredients.

For example, the all-important nitrate making process, in the Duzuo Courtyard, only the natural saltpeter is dissolved in clean water, and then the sediment particles in it are precipitated and removed, which can be used as an ingredient. However, after Shen Kuo took this step, he added a certain amount of adsorbates such as egg whites and red baskets, and boiled them many times in a nitrate solution to adsorb the dregs and saline-alkali ingredients. Then use a fence to remove the adsorbate.

Then put the water glue into the nitrate solution and boil it again, and then pour the nitrate liquid into the porcelain urn to cool and solidify, so that the waste water floats on the urn, then the mud sinks to the bottom of the urn, and the pure nitrate lives in the center. Finally, remove the water and slag, take out the pure nitrate and dry it. Pure nitrate can be obtained in the form of white crystals.

Just using this method to make nitrate, not only is it time-consuming and laborious, but also every 100 catties of natural nitrate, roughly only 30 catties of pure nitrate can be refined, and the cost has gone up all of a sudden. …,

The treatment of charcoal and sulfur is similar, so the craftsmen of the Metropolitan Institute are reluctant to improve despite seeing the huge gap. It was Wang Han who came forward and cut off the thorns, so that they could barely be produced according to the new method. In order to ensure the construction period, Chen Ke also gave in, from the original purchase of 1 million catties to 300,000 catties, but the funds remained unchanged, so that they made a lot of money, and then everyone was happy again.

Coupled with the wages paid to the people, the Hongshui River project has not yet started, and 150,000 taels of silver have already been spent.

In order to catch up with the construction period, Chen Ke continued to burn a lot of money, and he formulated rewards and punishments for each unit, such as the stonemason who opened the stone, he would get a reward of 300 yuan; The porter picks 500 pounds of stones, and there is also a reward of 200 wen; The rest, such as how much the carpenter is rewarded for felling, and how much the carpenter is rewarded for hitting a blast hole, are all clearly marked with prices, and Tong Suo is not deceived......

In the past, the people served as conscripts, and they were not paid, but only took care of food! In contrast, the people are naturally unprecedentedly positive.

For Chen Ke's generosity, the officials were shocked at first, such a big project, if it is done like this, I am afraid that millions of yuan will not be able to stop it! Then there are quite a few criticisms, they believe that once this case is opened, it will be difficult to recruit people for free in the future.

Chen Ke didn't want to argue with them about anything, he only mentioned one point - the Hongshui River stretches for more than 1,000 miles, and the water is turbulent, which is the barbarian division of the past dynasties, and he thinks that the sky is also a moat. Both sides of the river are desolate and treacherous areas, sparsely populated, infested by barbarians, and often do some unfounded deeds. Therefore, from the officials to the people, they are all regarded as daunting, and if they are not tempted by heavy rewards, they will all be hesitant.

This reason is quite sufficient, and with Wang Han's full support, those opposing voices gradually disappeared. However, what they did not expect was that when the engineering team drove into the deep mountains, the barbarians along the coast were not embarrassed, but men, women and children went into battle together and joined the construction of the river section in front of their homes. At this time, people were superstitious, believing that this was God's blessing, so their faith was greatly increased.

As everyone knows, Chen Ke took precautions and shared the benefits of the Hongshui River with those tribes a long time ago.

Partition -

There is still one last chapter in this volume...... (Your support is my biggest motivation.) )