The ceremony of sacrificing to the heavens ended successfully, Sima Yan was happy, and he wanted to hold a grand Yuanzheng Conference on New Year's Day. The Yuanzheng Assembly is an annual gathering of the imperial court to celebrate the New Year. Although it is grand and has a certain procedure, it is not so strictly forbidden and restrictive compared to the festival to the sky, on the contrary, it is much easier and simpler. Its main contents are two - banquets and music and dance. Naturally, the banquet is still in charge of the Taiguan Administration, the Treasure Administration, and the Good Brewing Administration. Music and dance have always been in charge of Sima Yan's close minister, Xun Miao.

Xun Miao himself is a middle school supervisor, but he is very proficient in music, and he has always been in charge of the correction of music and rhythm and the choreography of music and dance in the imperial court. Originally, the music and dance of this year's Yuanzheng Conference should also be guided by Xun Miao, but who knows, Xun Miao suddenly became seriously ill a few days ago, but his illness was not accidental.

When the Jin Dynasty was first established, due to the hundreds of years of war, everything was chaotic, except for the system of weights and measures, music as an elegant art was particularly chaotic, the movement, the rhythm was almost extinct, and it was difficult to find people who knew the rhythm. Xun Miao's musical talent is very high. He believed that the music rhythm formulated by the music officials of Cao Wei in the previous dynasty was not standard, and planned to preside over the revision of the music rhythm himself. The correction of the rhythm must be based on the scale, so before correcting the rhythm, he abandoned the scale of the previous dynasty and built a new ruler as the standard ruler of the Great Jin. The rhythm corrected by Xun Miao has really been praised by many people, and it is much better than the previous dynasty. Xun Miao is naturally beautiful, and claims to be a wonderful eight sounds. Although some famous people such as the Seven Sages of the Bamboo Forest said that the new law he corrected was a little too high, he didn't listen to it at all and disdained it.

Until one day, the imperial court got a jade ruler. This jade ruler was found by a farmer while working in the field, which is rare in the world. The farmer knew that it was not an ordinary thing, and offered it to the magistrate, but the magistrate did not dare to be self-sufficient, so he came to present it to the imperial court. Sima Yan was enjoying the scenery in Hualin Garden with his ministers. A close attendant eunuch offered this thing.

Sima Yan took it in his hand and saw that it was clearly scaled, and it was indeed a ruler, but he didn't know the origin of this ruler. So he asked the ministers.

Xun Miao was in charge of formulating the scale, he first held it in his hand, looked it up and down, and did not speak. The ministers took it in turn and looked at it carefully, and they all knew that this ruler was extraordinary, but they couldn't say why.

The jade ruler was passed from hand to hand, and finally passed to Shu Yan. Shu Yan took the ruler and looked at it carefully: this is a ruler carved from white jade, which is a bit weighty, and in addition to the large and small scales on the ruler, there are also a few vague handwritings. After looking at it for a long time, after all, he was young, and when he saw that the ministers were silent, he stepped forward and said: "The ministers heard that there was a jade ruler in the Zhou Dynasty, as the only ruler in the world, which has been passed down from generation to generation, and all the princes and countries have used this ruler as a measurement standard. But later, this ruler did not know where to go, coupled with the decline of the Zhou Dynasty, the princes went their own way, and gradually, the measurement standards were very different. Later, although Qin Shi Huang unified weights and measures, the scale at that time had already deviated from the ruler of the Zhou period. Now hundreds of years have passed since the first emperor, and it has undergone a chaotic number of rules, and the standard number of scales has been changed, and the ruler at this time does not know how much it deviated from the Qin period. ”

"Oh?" Sima Yan heard what Shu Yan meant, and said happily, "In your opinion, this jade ruler is Zhou Shi's ruler?" ”

"Weichen didn't dare to conclude, just guessed."

As the only ruler handed down from ancient times, the appearance of the jade ruler of the Zhou Dynasty is undoubtedly an auspicious omen. Sima Yan was naturally full of hope that this ruler was the real jade ruler of the Zhou Dynasty. But hope is hope, and there must be a reason to convince the world. He took the jade ruler over again and observed it repeatedly, but he still couldn't see the way at all.

"Speculation is never convincing. Since you say it's a Zhou Shi jade ruler, is there any way to prove it? If not, even if it is really a ruler of the week, and Maxima is in front of you, what is the use of not knowing its Bole? ”

"Back to Your Majesty, since Weichen said that it is a Zhou Shi jade ruler, he naturally has a certain degree of certainty. The handwriting on the jade ruler can prove that, of course, these handwriting are too vague to convince the public. But in addition, there is a way to prove it. ”

"What method? Tell me about it. ”

"It's black millet that is made from royal sake. At that time, black millet was the main edible grain of the Zhou people. All weights and measures are based on the number of grains of black millet as the standard. A hundred grains of millet are closely arranged in a row, and their length is the standard of one foot. Correspondingly, the standards for the formulation of Jialiang and weigh-off are: the standard of 24,000 grains with a volume of one liter; The weight of 2,400 grains is the standard of one tael. ”

When Sima Yan heard this, he was very surprised: "The ancients used this as a standard for weights and measures, which is really wonderful. No matter how chaotic the world is and how the weights and measures system changes, no matter how many years later, this method can always be used to correct the standard. It's just that this method is not rigorous enough, because the millet particles and so on are uneven, some large and some small; Moreover, there is nothing wrong with correcting the volume and weight, but to correct the scale, it involves the gap between the particles and the particles, how to solve this? ”

"What Your Majesty said is true, but since it is a standard used as a yardstick, of course, it must be as rigorous as possible. The 100 grains should be evenly disaggregated, and they should be arranged one by one, without gaps or staggered overlaps. If the whole process is done meticulously, then the final result should not be wrong. Xun Zhongshu is an expert in this area, if your majesty does not believe it, you can ask Xun Zhongshu. ”

Xun Miao heard Shu Yan, a young junior, talk about it in front of the emperor, and he was already a little displeased, and he had the heart to reprimand him, but he didn't dare to attack easily in front of the emperor. At this moment, when he heard Shu Yan point at himself, he took the opportunity to attack and scolded loudly: "Ignorant boy, you take it for granted!" As far as I know, since the disappearance of the legendary ruler, there is no unified standard of scale in the world, and most of the vassal states of the previous dynasties have formulated their own standard according to this law, but their standard of scale is very different, and some are very different. How do you explain this? ”

Although Shu Yan was reprimanded by Xun Miao, he didn't flinch at all, he said unhurriedly: "That's the mentality of the ruler is not correct." I think that as long as people are fair and serious, there will definitely be no mistakes. ”

Seeing that Shu Yan was so calm, Xun Miao was even more angry: "Okay, well, since you kid thinks that this jade ruler is the ruler of the world, and you are proud of your wisdom and knowledge, then in front of Your Majesty, you will use your method to demonstrate it on the spot, if the length of the jade ruler with a hundred grains of millet is consistent with the length of this jade ruler, you can prove that it is the ruler of the world." If not, you will be punished for the crime of arrogance and deception! ”

Sima Yan was also very interested and immediately agreed. Shu Yan was young and vigorous, and he wanted to confirm the authenticity of this jade ruler, so he also gladly accepted it, and then went to the granary to get the black millet. Wei Qian and the others sweated for him.

The matter of Shu Yan wanting to confirm the jade ruler spread quickly, and after Xiao Mo heard about it, he felt fresh, and second, he couldn't rest assured that Shu Yan couldn't stop it, so he also rushed over. Shu Yan saw Xiao Mo coming to help him, and his heart became more steady.

It would be easy to say that it would be easy to directly pick out a hundred medium-sized grains at once from the mountains of black millet, and it would not take much time at all, but that was obviously not rigorous enough, and Shu Yan certainly didn't do that. He and Xiao Mo made two sieves, one with a slightly larger aperture and the other with a slightly smaller aperture. Use a sieve with a large pore to first remove the larger grains, then use a sieve with a small pore to sieve off the smaller grains, and then select a thousand more standard millet grains by hand from the remaining medium grains, remove the 500 grains that are larger and smaller from the 1,000 grains, and remove another 200 grains from the remaining 500 grains in the same way. In this way, the remaining 300 grains of millet in the end are not visible to the naked eye. Of course, even if you are carefully selected, there will still be subtle differences in these grains, but there is no need to worry, because these millet grains with very small differences will not all be large or all small, they will fluctuate around the mean, and they will neutralize themselves to a state of equilibrium.

After selecting the millet grains, Shu Yan planned to arrange the three hundred millet grains into three rows one by one, with one hundred grains in each row. The reason why it is arranged in three rows is because Shu Yan wants to see how much error there can be after such a careful selection of millet grains after they are arranged, so as to make a reference, and finally select the line of the median value.

When arranging, each row of millet grains is straightened by a thin thread to prevent bending. It is easy to choose millet grains, but Shu Yan's fingers are thick, and it is not so easy to arrange them tightly. Xiao Mo saw that he was a little stupid, and smiled: "Let me come." ”

That's right. Shu Yan forgot that Xiao Mo is much more suitable for this than me.

Xiao Mo used his dexterous fingers to arrange the grains of millet tightly.

"It's weird." Shu Yan said with a stupid smile while watching.

"What's weird?" Xiao Mo asked.

"You said that you are also a man, although you are not as tall as me, but you are not much shorter than others, why are your hands obviously smaller than ordinary men, and you are so flexible and slender?"

"The world is so big that there are no wonders. It's just that the hands are a little smaller than others, what's so strange about that? ”

"That's right." Shu Yan nodded, but then he remembered something and asked, "I haven't noticed that we have lived together for so long before, in addition to your small hands, are your feet smaller than others?" ”

When Xiao Mo heard this, his face turned red, and he reprimanded in a low voice: "Don't disturb me!" What is the situation now, and you are still in the mood to discuss this! If I am a little negligent, and the arrangement of the millet grains is not standardized, you will lose. In that case, you may be convicted of deception. The sin of deception - do you think it's a joke? ”

"Oh oh, that's right. It's abrupt for my brother. Shu Yan held his breath and condensed, not daring to disturb Xiao Mo again.

After a while, Xiao Mo arranged the three hundred millet grains in three rows, neatly and neatly, without a single flaw. Shu Yan looked at the length of the three rows of millet grains, and the difference between the longest and the shortest was less than half a grain, and he was very pleased. The longer and shorter lines were erased, leaving the median line. Then he returned to the emperor and said: "Your Majesty, Weichen has already set up the most standard 100 grains of millet and asked for a jade ruler for comparison." ”

"Well, I also saw the process you just went through, and it really did it to the extreme. It's hard to get anything more standardized than this, and presumably the teachers and workers of Zhou Shi are just like that. ”

Sima Yan ordered someone to hand the jade ruler to Shu Yan. Shu Yan took it, and it was impossible to say in his heart that he was not nervous at all, after all, the impulsive words had already been spoken. He glanced at Xiao Mo, and Xiao Mo also gave him an encouraging look, and then put the jade ruler parallel to the row of millet grains.

The end and end are both flush and the length is exactly the same.

"Wow!" Xiao Mo was the first to call out, "Brother Shu, you're right." ”

Then everyone also exclaimed: "God, God, it's like it was measured in advance, and there is no gap." ”

Seeing this, Sima Yan laughed happily: "It seems that this jade ruler is really the long-lost Zhou Shizheng ruler!" Xun Aiqing, what else do you have to say? ”

Xun Miao was extremely embarrassed at the moment, and said with a sigh: "This ...... Maybe it's just a coincidence. ”

Sima Yan's face sank: "Coincidentally? You still won't admit it. Anyway, who made you an expert in this area? In this case, take out the ruler you customized by yourself, compare and compare, what do you think? ”

Since the emperor said it, Xun Miao dared to disobey, so he had to order someone to take a ruler that he had formulated, and put it parallel to the other side of the line of millet grains. Aligning one end, and then looking at the other end, will shorten one grain of millet, that is to say, the ruler of Xun Miao is equivalent to the length of ninety-nine grains.

Sima Yan, together with Shu Yan, and everyone were amazed again, and they had to admire Xun Miao's high level. Because we all know that the rulers of previous generations, including Xun Miao's ruler, are very different from each other in length, and now it seems that only Xun Miao's ruler is the closest to the ruler.

Xun Miao didn't expect his ruler to be so close to that jade ruler. Now, he also realized that the jade ruler was indeed Zhou Shi's jade ruler.

Some people died, but not completely......