"Cousin, you can't favor one over the other!"

Li Chengqian came in the morning, and when he had dinner in the evening, Li Tai came again.

While naturally sitting down at the table where Tang Ping and them were having dinner, he opened his mouth and called.

"What's wrong with you?" Tang Ping knocked on the chopsticks he used to hold the braised pork, and then gave him a large chopstick of green vegetables.

He is originally prone to obesity, but he also likes to eat meat and high-carb things.

"The prince is short of people, you give him an idea, and in almost half a year, you can train a large number of basic craftsmen for Datang." Li Tai looked at the green vegetables in his bowl, and reluctantly put them in his mouth while eating, saying, "I am also lacking!" ”

Eating here in Tang Ping is not a saying that you don't sleep, eat and speak.

"What are you missing?" Tang Ping asked curiously.

"Iron shortage!" Li Tai put down his chopsticks and said seriously: "Don't you know, now we need iron to build steam engines, iron to build ships, iron to build cars, iron to build fire guns and cannons, and all other weapons and tools." ”

"It's just that the contract you owe to Fusang still gives them some iron in exchange for gold and silver......"

"Hey, you kid still feel a loss by exchanging iron for gold and silver?" Tang Ping asked with some dissatisfaction.

"Of course, there is no loss, after all, the price of gold and silver is much higher than the price of iron." Li Tai explained: "But we are short of iron! ”

"Cousin, you don't know, I'm a piece of iron now, and I can't wait to break it into ten pieces to use! What we are making now can be done without iron, but it is still far from enough! ”

Li Tai said with a sad face: "Not to mention that you gave the prince an idea, after half a year, we will have more craftsmen, and many things will have to increase production capacity, but it is difficult for a good woman to cook without rice, you must have iron to make it, right?" ”

"Didn't I give you a lot of maps for iron ore?" Tang Ping asked strangely.

"The map is there, but it's not that easy to dig up!" Li Tai was a little helpless: "Cousin, don't you have that kind of place with high iron ore content, rich yield, and easy to dig?" ”

"I ......" Tang Ping was about to say no, when he suddenly thought of a place, and said, "I really know a place." ”

Originally, Li Tai just said casually, with high content, rich yield, easy to excavate, to

Isn't it long overdue to excavate such a place?

I didn't expect Tang Ping to really have it.

"Where?" Li Tai didn't eat any more and asked excitedly.

"...... to the South"

"Miao Man or those small southwestern countries? I will go back now and ask my father to issue an edict asking those countries to cooperate. ”

"Neither, further south, to the sea!" Tang Ping said: "It's Australia. ”

"Australia? Where is Oceania? Li Shimin put the globe in the Hall of Virtue in his office, of course Li Tai had seen it, and his ability to never forget it immediately remembered where Tang Ping said Australia was.

"Yes!" Tang Ping also remembered that it was not too difficult for Datang to go to Oceania now, in this case, why not go there to open a mine?

You must know that Oceania is really a place favored by God, Australia's iron ore belongs to the open-pit mining area, a lot of iron ore is not only of good quality, but also exists in the area near the surface layer, the difficulty of mining is very small, the way of construction is not difficult, just take the pickaxe to dig.

Therefore, you don't need any craftsmen to mine there, as long as you have strong labor with the strength of a master, there is no problem.

Tang Ping turned on his mobile phone and looked at the mineral situation in Australia with Li Tai, and Li Tai said ecstatically: "You still have a way, cousin!" ”

"So, cousin, can you go to the local area and hire some locals to help us mine the ore?"

"Hiring locally?" Tang Ping was a little puzzled.

"Yes, you see, if the workers go so far, even if they use our steamboats now, they will have to float on the water for more than a month. You're going to have to get people home once a year or two, right? It's been another month or so! ”

"And so far away, we still have to be responsible for the health and safety of those workers, right? So I figured we could hire local people to mine for us, and then we would just have to send some soldiers over to garrison it. In addition, the soldiers in charge of guarding the mine can also follow the mine ship back every time they are on duty. ”

Tang Ping saw that Li Tai was talking like the truth, and it was very reasonable, and suddenly felt that something was wrong.

"Are you fooling me?" Tang Ping asked Li Tai: "Listen to what you said, I have to go there in person."

？ ”

Tang Ping had already reacted at this time, I was afraid that this Li Tai had long known that Australia's iron ore was suitable for mining, and he deliberately came here to fool himself so that he could be tricked.

"Hey, hey, hey!" Li Tai smiled and said, "Cousin, do you think you can understand the Tang dialect of the natives on the island of Australia?" I'm afraid that I can't find a translator, isn't this the only one who can work hard? ”

Tang Ping was angry: "I just came back from Fusang, and I have only been in Shanghe Village for less than two months, and you want me to go out again?" ”

"Cousin!" Li Tai pretended to be pitiful: "But we are really short of iron, look at it, look at it, I brought all the documents of the Ministry of Household and Industry, and it is clearly written how much we produce and consume every year." ”

"You see I almost died under the mine last time I was digging iron ore, if you hadn't come to save me, maybe I would really be gone......"

"Alright, alright!" Tang Ping held his forehead and said, "I'll bring people over at most, and then contact the locals, and I'll come back after the conditions are good." ”

"Don't worry!" Li Tai patted his chest and said, "As long as my cousin gets the locals in the past, we will take care of the rest." ”

After speaking, he was afraid that Tang Ping would regret it, so he hurriedly slipped away without eating.

Tang Ping was helpless, he also knew that the development of Datang was a little unbalanced, and the rapid development was accompanied by the scarcity of resources and talents.

The gold and silver mines he brought back from Fusang can inject a large amount of money into Datang, and Datang can start many new projects, but the consequence is that the resource gap is even greater.

However, he only studied in high school, Australia is a country that sits on a minecart, and he really doesn't know what the specific situation of the local aborigines is.

After checking on the Internet, Tang Ping was directly dumbfounded.

Because he thought that there were many aborigines in Australia, but in fact, Australia's written history is only a few hundred years.

In this more than 1,000-year-old Tang Dynasty, what was the situation on the island of Australia, not to mention that he couldn't find out, even those historians could only infer it through many relics.

The only thing known is that the Australian Aborigines are called Tasmanians.

As for more, it's all - unknown!