The entire Ming Dynasty, including the seven western provinces, the Nanyang Divisions, Nuergan and other regions, the regular employees of the Ministry of Railway Engineering, excluding eunuchs and prisoners of war, as well as cheap labor from overseas, totaled 2 million people.

No one dared to think of 2 million young men 30 years ago, not to mention the average annual income of each worker was 22 yuan, which translates to 40 million yuan a year, not to mention the cost of track maintenance.

In addition to eating food, people can't do without salt.

Traditional agrarian societies were unable to support complex management systems due to the efficiency of the local government, so they collected taxes through salt, and salt merchants were undoubtedly the wealthiest group.

The Ming Dynasty entered the industrial society, the guarantee of food and people's biological resources, became the premise of industrial development, then the price of salt must be suppressed, with the supplement of industrial and commercial tax, the Ming Dynasty no longer needs to regard the salt tax as a top priority, of course, the salt tax is still an important tax of the imperial court.

The Beijing-Hangzhou Grand Canal crosses the Qiantang River, and the East Zhejiang Grand Canal, although it does not belong to the Beijing-Hangzhou Canal water system, it is an extension of the Beijing-Hangzhou Canal, which plays an important role in the economic circulation of Zhejiang.

The Zhedong Canal starts from Xixing Town, the ancient ferry port of Qiantang River in the west, flows through Xiaoshan, Shaoxing, Shangyu, Yuyao and Ningbo, and flows into the East China Sea in the south of Zhenhai City, with a total length of nearly 600 miles, which is a traffic artery in the east of Zhejiang.

Nowadays, canals, post roads, and railways go hand in hand, among which the canal is still the boss, with a history of 1,000 or hundreds of years, and the shortest railway, but there is a trend of catching up.

The merchant ships transporting refined salt in the canal are constantly transported out of Taizhou, the capital of Yangzhou.

In the past, grain was precious, materials were unevenly distributed, output was limited, and it was not easy for any non-agricultural labor force to maintain on a large scale, so although Taizhou was already a production base of sea salt in the early days, the output of salt was still not high.

Historically, Taizhou was near the river and coastal area, rich in sea salt.

Liu Bi, the king of Wu in the Western Han Dynasty, "that is, the mountain casts money, and boils the sea for salt", for which a salt river was dug to transport sea salt from the seaside salt field of the ancient Hailing; In the Tang Dynasty, Taizhou was already the largest production base of sea salt in the country.

In the Song Dynasty, Taizhou produced and sold the first salt in the country, and the Ming Dynasty's Lianghuai Salt Transportation Division was directly located in Taizhou. At the beginning of the Qing Dynasty, Taizhou was still the main distribution center for salt merchants along the Yellow Sea.

Therefore, in today's Yongle Dynasty, Taizhou salt supplies the world.

One after another, the salt factories under the Daming Industrial Bureau not only provide refined salt for Daming, but also provide many jobs, including dual-income families and single-worker families.

New and beautiful buildings have been built in the new town, with yellow glazed tiles on the eaves of the balconies, white facades and black roofs, and small three-colored buildings adorned with locust trees, which are as dazzling as pictures.

When the children return home by bus after school, the new town quickly comes alive with children playing in squares and parks, and elderly people helping with household chores and childcare at home.

Many children who had just walked babbled in groups in the square.

There will be vendors in densely populated places, and the snacks from the north and south of the river exude an attractive taste, making the children's gluttonous saliva flow, what Monkey King Zhu Bajie's sugar man, hair cake, tofu flower, candy, raisins, etc., there is always one attraction.

The focus of the Zhedong Canal is Xixing Town, an ancient town that is a bustling commercial port on the edge of the Qiantang River, and important products from the rich Ningshao Plain are transported to Kyoto through the Xixinggu Ferry into the Qiantang River.

Envoys and merchants from the Gounu Kingdom, the Ryukyu Kingdom, the Goryeo Kingdom, the Nanyang States, and even the unknown countries in the open sea, they went ashore from Ningbo, changed to river boats, and also entered the Qiantang River from here to pay homage to the Ming Emperor.

Because of the growth of transportation, the carrying capacity of the canal could not be supported, and although there was a railway, there were still many officials in the imperial court who were unwilling to give up the canal, believing that it was necessary to expand the canal.

Zhu Gaochi did not do it himself, no matter how the governance also needs the experience of officials, generation after generation of exploration, the accumulated experience through written records into the Wenyuan Pavilion, will be the precious wealth of the Ming Dynasty.

In the early days of Yongle in history, the palace was destroyed because of thunder and fire, and Wenyuan Pavilion was implicated, and the officials risked their lives to rescue Wenyuan Pavilion's books, and the greatest wealth was always knowledge, not gold, silver and jewelry.

Therefore, the Ministry of Engineering undertook this major project, during the period of canal expansion, the transportation of ships was more inconvenient, most of the modes of transportation were changed to railways, but the railways were not blocked, and some relevant scholars thought that the imperial court was quite wasteful, and the Grand Canal seemed to have little effect.

In fact, it was true, and by later generations, the canal was already a broken river overgrown with weeds and duckweed.

However, the repair capital has already been repaired, and it can't be abandoned halfway, so the imperial court can only continue to build it, and those officials who once supported the repair of the canal have also begun to keep silent and no longer regard it as their own merit.

At all costs.

The workers on the canals, the workers of the salt works are still hard at work.

Just like the slender man who still exists on the canal, no matter what era it is, no matter what kind of goods it pulls, pulling fiber is not a leisurely stroll after all. Now, of course, they are not here to fill their stomachs, and they don't have whips flying in the air, but just to marry a daughter-in-law and build a new house.

Then, it is difficult for anyone to tell how much of this shoulder is sweet and how much is bitter.

In the square, several elderly people are complaining together, and children not far away are playing by themselves.

"It costs at least two or three hundred yuan to build a two-story house, plus decoration and furniture, and although the price of food has not risen much, the money has not been spent, and a single yuan for a casual trip to the city is gone."

"Reading in school is not expensive, but the cost of the study tour has to be paid, and new clothes have to be bought every year. I went to the hospital with a pain or something at home, and although the doctor was not expensive, the medicine was not cheap.

"Life is getting better and better, but it is getting more and more difficult, your own family can't be much worse than other people's families, otherwise who is willing to marry their daughter and endure hardships, we old people can only help do housework and help take care of the children."

The old people gossip, basking under the sun, although their faces are complaining, they are wearing the local fashionable hemp craft shoes, almost a pair of feet, wearing on the feet to walk in the wind, and light, dry, obedient, so take a "raw, wind" name. Nowadays, it has drifted to the feet of women at home and abroad, and this shoe is very popular in Nanyang.

Some of the more industrious old people are still weaving in their hands, and the woven baskets are sold in the market for some money to subsidize the family.

Nearby ancient imitation Song Dynasty kiln ceramics, the glaze is simple, the color is old, the shape is vivid, it is also a traditional local craft, which is sold at home and abroad.

The acres of land are concentrated in the hands of the health center, and those military households with 100 acres of land at home, although they are farmers, are already an enviable group, they rely on their own labor, although the price of grain is not high, but there are many acres of land, and life is stable and comfortable.

The weir in the distance is a dam that is stuck across the river.

Since the Zhedong Canal is blocked between the Qiantang River, Cao'e River and Yongjiang River, the water level of each section is different, so a series of weirs and dams must be built to solve the problem of water level difference.

On the Zhedong Canal, there are many larger weir locks. The grinding weir, the so-called "grinding", is to use the bottom of the ship as a fulcrum in turns, step by step.

If the ship is loaded with cargo and passengers, it has to be emptied and reloaded, which is time-consuming and laborious.

This ancient shipping project is a remarkable innovation in the history of world shipping, and since then it has connected the voyages of different water systems.

Use the winch to tow the boat across the dam, the mud is the lubricant, the water is the lubricating oil, in order to reduce the friction between the bottom of the boat and the stone dam, and then use the rope to drag the dam little by little, and when the manpower can not pull it, there are also oxen to drag it.

It then becomes a sluice gate, which transports the vessel by releasing water.

The huge turntable of the sluice gate needs more than 20 oxen to pull up the heavy huge iron gate, and the principle of modern canals in later generations is exactly the same, except that the electricity used.

The Ming Dynasty did not have electricity, it used animal power, and now that there is a steam engine, it is natural to use the steam engine, which is also the main reason why the officials of the imperial court made wrong judgments.

They saw the advantages of the steam engine, but ignored the power of the railway. The canals here can be replaced, unlike the canals in other places.

The opinions of professional scholars have once again proved that large-scale projects in the imperial court are no longer something that can be easily decided by the court officials, but must be fully investigated and planned.

At that time, His Royal Highness the Crown Prince liked to use various theoretical organizations and survey departments, such as the Social Theory Research Office, the Workers' and Peasants' Population Distribution Project Group, and the Social Population Distribution Estimation Numerical Model Projection Group.

After this great lesson, the cabinet also began to pay attention to it and adopted the model of His Royal Highness the Crown Prince.

So this lesson seems to be worth it in Zhu Gaochi's eyes.

Then back to the North.

There were many large-scale coal-producing areas in ancient China, and there are historical records of coal mining in Shanxi, Henan, Shaanxi, Sichuan and other places.

However, we have to mention Shanxi, the coal seams in Shanxi are mainly distributed in the Upper Carboniferous Taiyuan Formation, the Lower Permian Shanxi Formation and the Middle and Lower Jurassic Datong Formation, and a small number are distributed in the Mesozoic Jurassic Datong Formation and the Cenozoic Old Tertiary Formation.

Due to the perfect cooperation of the four conditions for a long time, Shanxi Province has unique coal resources, and finally formed six major coalfields of Datong, Ningwu, Xishan, Hedong, Qinshui and Huoxi, as well as five coal-producing areas of Hunyuan, Fanzhi, Wutai, Yuanqu and Pinglu.

The low cost of coal mining, the concentration of coal resources, and the good quality of coal mines have played a vital role in the industrial development of the north.

It's just that Shanxi's industrialization is too little, and it needs to stimulate economic development, which is inseparable from the industry, and second, the north also needs Shanxi's coal mines.

So now, there is a supply of coal mines from the Saibei region and the vassal states of Goryeo, and the control of coal mine development in Shanxi and Beiping has been brought up by Zhu Gaochi again.

"Although the coal resources in the Saibei region and Goryeo are also abundant, the conditions are not as good as those in Shanxi, and if the production chain is transferred, it will lead to an increase in mining costs, and because of the lack of supply from Shanxi and other places, I am afraid that there will be a coal shortage in the whole country."

In the Wenhua Palace, Song Li, the secretary of the Ministry of Industry, said worriedly.

Counting from the twenty-fifth year of Hongwu, the industrialization of the Ming Dynasty has entered the thirtieth year, and there have been unimaginable changes in the past.

The core of industrialization is energy, and Daming's energy is coal mines.

"Although shipping has been developed, the cost of coal mine transportation from Goryeo to Daming has been pressed to the extreme, but compared with the railway, continue to develop Shanxi's coal mining industry, the advantage is still incomparable."

Natsuhara Yoshichi also came up with his idea.

However, compared with Shangshu Song Li, Xia Yuanji is exceptionally low-key.

This official, who is famous for his water control in history, is also one of the officials who mainly promoted the expansion of the canal project, because of the loss of this matter, he is a little unconfident.

Zhu Gaochi certainly knew what they were thinking.

But he had to think about leaving a rich "legacy" for future generations.

Later generations said how the rice country is, in fact, in Zhu Gaochi's view, the rice country has indeed done well in many aspects, but if it is said how advanced the rice country is, Zhu Gaochi does not think so.

The operation efficiency of the United States is too low, and the waste of energy in the world is the most serious country.

The reason why the rice country is rich and strong is mainly because the rice country occupies unique conditions, and the per capita resources are too rich, not how advanced the rice country is. On the other hand, in the East, Guanzhong was undoubtedly one of the richest places in the world thousands of years ago, but because of thousands of years of development, there was no doubt that the original rich resources were lost.

But there is one country that has done well in the last century.

With his advantage, the country mainly uses the world's resources, but saves its own energy.

It's just that it's only been a few years, and the United States, which has so many massive advantages, has become unsustainable, and has released the decree restricting its own energy exploitation, becoming the third largest oil producer in the world.

In short, the loser is too fast.

And to maintain its own civilization advantages, learn from each other's strengths, based on the present, make every effort to develop, and forge ahead together, such a China is a soldier who surrenders without a fight, and makes the opponent helpless and collapses.

Therefore, Zhu Gaochi patiently explained.

"The coal resources in Shanxi Province seem to be unlimited, and it is true at present, but I think it is limited, and if you mine a point, you will have a point less for future generations."

Zhu Gaochi said the beginning, Song Li and the others' eyes lit up, smart people are still smart people.

"Coal mining is not a specialty of the Ming Dynasty, I believe that there are many areas rich in coal mines throughout the world, we have run out, others still have, that is, it has left hidden dangers for children and grandchildren, so we need to walk on two legs."

"The first is to explore the world's coal resources, and we must occupy any area rich in coal resources, and the second is to give priority to the development of coal mines outside the local area, so as to create more favorable conditions for future generations."

There is a tradition in the Chinese nation that everything can be contributed to the family, and this family is of course the descendants.

Even in later generations, there is no shortage of food or clothing, and the reason why he still keeps forging ahead is mainly for his children, hoping to leave more wealth for his children.

The torch has been passed down from generation to generation, so no matter where the Chinese nation goes, whether it is in the primeval forests of Africa or sold to the Americas, even if it is excluded and suppressed, it will not take many generations to still become one of the wealthy groups in the local area.

Then Zhu Gaochi's idea was also no longer objected.

How to transfer the development of coal mining, but avoid the outflow of employment opportunities, and do not harm their own interests and make up for the benefits of others, has become a matter of discussion among the imperial courts.

If it were a group of merchants, they would be against it, because it would harm their interests.

The most panicked are the domestic coal miners.

After thirty years, who is the richest in Daming? .

Coal mill owners are the richest.

Children who have not yet attended social school can answer this question.

Relying on the rise of coal mining, domestic coal mill owners have become the richest people, guarding the cornucopia without worrying about the coal mine not being able to sell, too many unique conditions, so that the coal mill owners have not kept up with the development of the times.

The most famous commercial houses in China, such as Hop Kee and Hop Zhong, etc., the main product of Hop Kee is not the coal mining industry, and Hop Kee has long been transformed into a traditional coal mining firm, which has shown a different kind of brilliance in a fiercely competitive environment.

Twenty years ago, the most powerful Zhangjia coal mine disappeared because of the inheritance tax problem.

Ten years ago, the Great Zhou proprietor in Beiping was also broken because of the inheritance tax, and the coal mine was auctioned.

The country's businessmen could not object to the inheritance tax and had begun to accept it.

However, after the news of the imperial court came out, many businessmen couldn't sleep, on the other hand, foreign businessmen gloated, and the loudest ridicule was Wu Hong, who left Beiping in disgrace because of those who relied on luck to occupy a good position in Beiping early and squeezed him out.

Otherwise, why didn't he do business in the place where the country had the greatest interests, but left the country and came to Goryeo.

"It's really in response to the old saying, thirty years in Hedong and thirty years in Hexi, the imperial court is now going to transfer the coal mining industry, but I occupied a good position in Goryeo early, now look at what those old guys will do."

Hearing Wu Hong's complaint, the proprietor of Heng Yunlai Commercial Bank was worried: "They still have money, if they come to Goryeo to rob us of mines, I'm afraid we really can't compete with them." ”

Wu Hong couldn't help but laugh.

"Where is the world where anyone has money can do it?"

"That's right."

The proprietor of Hengyunlai Commercial Bank nodded approvingly, these people have been rooted in Goryeo for many years, whether it is the Goryeo Governor's Palace, or the Goryeo King of Seoul, or even the local two classes, the relationship has long been inextricably linked, how can it be that those old guys in the country can deal with it.

However, no one can say for sure, and the proprietor of Heng Yunlai's trading house said cautiously: "It still depends on the attitude of the imperial court, if the imperial court supports those old guys, it will be difficult for us to resist." ”

Wu Hong frowned, the old friend's worry was not too much.

"We have made great efforts in the management of the imperial court in Goryeo, including the trade model led by the Daming Industry Bureau, we have always supported it, and we can't help but be emotional."

"In terms of domestic relations, those old guys are better than us, in case they say that the court is moved."

Wu Hong couldn't sit still, and asked a few big merchants from Goryeo to rush back to the capital to inquire about the attitude of the imperial court, and similarly, a large number of merchants from the north went south and also inquired about the attitude of the imperial court.

The total mileage of the railways in Nanyang is finally planned to be no less than 100,000 miles.

Not counting the cost of railway bridges, only the tiled rails, every mile of railway built by the Ming Dynasty, is also the second generation of railways, from the perspective of later generations, it still belongs to the simple railway, but even so, it is necessary to make 60,000 catties of pig iron, 100,000 li requires 6 billion catties, if you add the consumption of railway bridges, it will probably need to double.

Fifty catties of coking coal are needed to smelt 100 catties of iron, and 100 catties of coal can be fired to 60 catties of coking coal, which means that nearly 10 billion catties of coal are needed.

At the end of the first industrial revolution, Britain's annual coal production was 88 billion catties.

The Mubang Propaganda Division, the Burma Propaganda Division, the Eight Hundred Burma Propaganda Division, the Lichuan Ping-Burma Propaganda Division, Siam, the Gedu Division, Chenla, etc., add up to more than ten or twenty times the area of the United Kingdom, and the population is far more than ten times that of the United Kingdom in the same period.

When the Nanyang Railway project is completely completed, the national strength of the Ming Dynasty will undergo new changes.

There are no new forces in the north, east, or south.

That is to say, the Ming Dynasty has completed the "closure" on the land, and only the declining Wa Kingdom overseas remains, and the Ming Dynasty will completely free up its hands and start the real clan world.

Not to mention cement and other commodities, only the demand for coal mines will be a new source of wealth, and if you seize this opportunity, you will be able to turn over and establish no less than those big commercial houses that are not inferior to those original Zhang Ji Zhou Ji.

The distance from Goryeo to Nanyang is too far, and the coal mines in Shanxi can be transported to Nanyang through the railway, which can minimize the cost of transportation, but the imperial court wants to reduce the mining of coal mines in Shanxi, so where does the huge gap come from?

There is no shortage of smart people in the world.

When many people were still pestering Goryeo, those merchants who were doing business in the South Seas, relying on the news of foresight, quietly set their sights on the New World.

The New World, which later became Australia.

Many scholars rummaged through historical materials, and finally deduced from the records in the book that the merchants and sailors of Quanzhou, who sailed between the east and the west all the year round during the Yuan Dynasty, believed that the new land that was happening at the moment was the most terminal island in the world, and called it "Juedao".

According to the local Aboriginal language, the sailors transliterated the local continent as Rosas, and the area around Darwin Harbour in northern Australia as Mana.

The merchant ships of the Ming Dynasty also landed in Ma and found the place recorded in this historical book.

After many years of trade, merchants brought back news of the abundance of minerals in the area, and after fermentation and the promotion of the Nanyang Railway Project, people finally discovered the huge business opportunities in this area.

Compared to exchanging some gold from the local natives, the local minerals are the most mouth-watering wealth.

The Ming court was the most likely to use domestic goods to lure overseas countries to become vassals of the Ming Dynasty.

From top to bottom, the Ming merchants are also the best at using commodities to get land from the natives.

Unlike the natives of parts of the South Seas, the natives of the island of Rosas are generally welcoming.

Unlike the cannibals on Dayuan Island, it is also different from the fiercely competitive tribal wars in the South Seas, including the collapse caused by the gap between the civilizations of the Native Americans.

Because of the small size of the island, the absence of large livestock, such as no cattle and horses, and the extremely closed environment, did not form a harsh competitive environment, so when they first met the Western colonists, the natives were frightened and curious, but remained friendly and provided assistance to the lost sailors.

In the same way, the Ming merchants also quickly established themselves in the local area.

Everything that the Ming merchants brought was very attractive in the eyes of the natives, and they exchanged the gold used as decoration for goods with the Ming people, and over the years, they were accustomed to this way.

The goods of the Ming merchants also changed the lives of the natives, they began to wear clothes, learned to drink tea with the Ming merchants, learned to use tools such as fire sickles, and the pottery of the Ming Dynasty was one of their favorite commodities, providing them with the convenience of cooking food.

It's another year, and more Daming merchant ships are coming.

The natives have limited mining technology, and there is not much gold in the open pit, and when they heard that the Ming merchants wanted to open mines in the local area, if they agreed, they could give them a batch of goods, and the natives did not object.

What's the use of those barren deserts?

Large tracts of desert were acquired by the Ming merchants with the help of information asymmetry and extremely low cost to obtain the ownership of the land. (End of chapter)