Chapter 173: The Steam Engine Goes to the Countryside

The world is big, and people's circumstances are different.

Just when the people in the city of Ili were besieged by a large army and struggling to support.

In North China, however, it is a different problem.

Baoding County.

There is a strange question.

In the Ming Dynasty, Baoding County was not in Baoding Province.

Baoding County is under the jurisdiction of Shuntian Mansion, and later divided into Tianjin Mansion, which will be southeast of Shuntian Mansion and north of Hejian Mansion. In this way, although Baoding County is separated from Baoding Prefecture, it is under the jurisdiction of Tianjin Prefecture.

And the whole triangle is in the west of Tianjin, south of Baoding County.

In general, the water conservancy project centered on Shuntianfu is one of the best in the Ming Dynasty.

In addition, the place where the water conservancy project is done well is Jiangnan.

Jiangnan is the accumulation of hundreds of years.

And near Shuntian Mansion, it is Zhu Qizhen who has tirelessly added bricks and tiles over the years. Tianjin Prefecture was the key area of the Five Rivers and Three Lakes Project.

Even Tianjin Mansion itself was divided because of water control.

Every year, the Ministry of Industry allocates maintenance costs, there are tens of thousands of taels, up to many remote provinces and a province, and Shuntianfu is not to mention, it is the first to complete the reform of officials, directly collect housing tax, shop tax, etc., miscellaneous commercial taxes, as Beijing becomes more and more prosperous, Shuntianfu pays more and more taxes.

In the best year, the balance is 100,000 taels, which is more than a province like Guizhou.

The household department also specifically discussed whether to increase the share of taxes paid by Shuntianfu, but was finally denied by Zhu Qizhen.

But even so, the money of Shuntianfu is not the money of the officials of Shuntianfu, at the feet of the Son of Heaven, the Metropolitan Procuratorate, Jinyiwei, Dongchang, and the Criminal Department are all staring.

Therefore, when the Shuntianfu officials serve for a short time and change positions frequently, many times the biggest problem is to spend money.

Therefore, maintaining the appearance of Beijing City and repairing water conservancy are all things that Shuntianfu Yin likes to do.

The Lugou Bridge alone has been renovated several times.

It's not that the Lugou Bridge is bad, after all, the Lugou Bridge has been rebuilt by Yongle for ten years, and it has only been a few decades, and it has also been repaired once in the early years of orthodoxy.

It's that the Lugou Bridge can't accommodate the flow of people.

Each rebuilding widened the bridge deck.

Generally speaking, if the water conservancy is well repaired, the locust plague will not be easy to break out. It seems that after the founding of the People's Republic of China, the locust plague was almost extinct in China, relying on the large-scale water conservancy construction after the founding of the People's Republic of China.

And the movement of locusts has a trajectory.

East Asian locusts generally fly from north to south to warmer places.

The first wave of East Asian locusts should develop in the Mongolian steppe and then move south, lay eggs in the Huanghuai area, the second wave broke out, and then continued south, reaching Hainan Island is already the fourth wave.

And this time the locust plague

The outbreak started in Shandong.

So, even if the locusts migrate around, the chances of going north are not too great.

However, this does not mean that there is no problem here.

The biggest problem here is drought.

The triangle lake with hundreds of miles of blue waves is still there, and it still looks refreshing. Although this man-made lake is much smaller due to the drought, there are still tons of water.

It's just that no matter how much water there is, it can't be irrigated in the cultivated land, and it is useless.

Even if someone struggles to fetch water manually, a burden, a load of water, but it is a drop in the bucket and does not play a role.

Looking at the original traces of the water line, and the current traces, although they are only one or two feet, they are enough to make everyone a waterwheel or something, and it is useless.

If it's like this on weekdays, maybe it's really helpless.

But now Baoding County has seen something new.

"One-two-three, hey, one-two-three, hey." The neat beat was played, and on the official road, countless people gathered together, looking at more than 100 sweaters, shirtless, and even some people just took a white cloth to wrap their lower abdomen.

Everyone was sweating profusely, steaming hot, and their blood was pumping, one by one, next to each other, so that the air was filled with male hormones.

Several large logs that could be used as beams were used as supports to hang something holding a wool pad.

This thing isn't too big.

But it weighs 10,000 catties, and it is made of pure iron, which is nothing else, a steam engine.

In order to allow the carriage to be pulled on the track, this steam engine was also designed to reduce its weight, but no matter how much weight was reduced, it was much heavier than a cannon or something.

After transporting this steam engine from Zunhua to here, first on Chi Road, and then on Chi Road, Shangguan Road was originally best mated with a big wooden pad underneath, rolling a little bit.

But the escorts were negligent on the part of the transporters.

The wood underneath should also be a very strong hardwood, which can only be sold temporarily from Tianjin.

It's just that the people are anxious, and now in the wheat fields near Baoding, large tracts of wheat are about to die. Many wheat leaves dry up and turn yellow from the tip of the leaf.

Now the production has been reduced, and then the water can be poured at the moment, and maybe the food rations can be saved, but if it is delayed any longer, there is no salvation at all.

The people are anxious, where are they waiting for logs?

Isn't it just tens of thousands of catties? As soon as the order was issued, naturally there were men out of the ranks, so they resisted and walked home, more than a hundred miles, just gritting their teeth, supporting their legs, carrying their shoulders to death, shouting the number, one step at a time, and carrying it home.

As the commander-in-chief of this operation, it was Chen Yi.

He was the first place in the orthodox nineteenth year of the Hydraulic Institute, and now he is the county leader of Baoding County, specializing in water conservancy affairs about the triangle lake.

This time he

Come pick up this fresh guy.

He saw clearly, and after walking a mile or two, the strength of this group of people was exhausted. He immediately beckoned another group of strong men to replace them.

In this way, wave after wave, more than 100 miles, day and night.

Chen Yi was still shouting the beat at first, and then he used the whistle, one after another, to sound in the night and day, under the light of the sun and torches, never stopping.

Finally, the triangle has finally arrived.

But I saw an old man who was already here.

This is the Ming Dynasty to be edicted.

He was also one of the developers of the steam engine, and even before Belin joined, he was one of the main developers, and Belin joined to solve many problems of thinking and calculation.

But the real big iron guy, little by little, is still a magical old craftsman like Kuaixiang.

The previous research and development of steam engines has not been tested on a large scale. It's just that it was used in Zunhua, and this time in the drought, Zhu Qizhen summoned Bei Lin and asked the steam engine to be put into drought fighting.

The emperor's order, Belin and others naturally attached great importance to it.

All the people involved in the research of the steam engine were sent out to supervise, and Kuaixiang was among them.

After all, this steam engine is not yet mature, and the ghost knows that it has been transported thousands of miles away, and if something goes wrong in the middle, it can't be installed, so it won't be easy to do.

Each faction has the responsibility of finding a way to fix the steam engine if something goes wrong.

Kuaixiang came with the steam engine, but from the gallop down, he threw the steam to these transport, he ignored his old age, rode a horse to the installation site first, in a short period of time, exhausted all means, and even demolished a section of the city wall of Baoding County, before building this machine room.

It's not that Kuaixiang specifically looked for a city wall to demolish, but that many counties in Hebei in the early Ming Dynasty did not have a city wall.

After the change of the civil fort in history, Beizhili only built the city wall on a large scale, and it was really all over the city wall, but it was after the rebellion of Liu Liu and Liu Qi during the Zhengde period.

Today, the situation in the 14th year of Orthodoxy is far less critical than it was in history.

The tile spur didn't even enter the level.

Therefore, the desire of Beizhili to build the city wall is not high.

It's just that Beizhili has slowly become rich over the years. Although I dare not compare with Jiangnan, the county also has some money, and in the local county government, construction is a big plus.

I don't even know who started it, but all counties in Hebei have built city walls one after another.

Of course, the imperial court will not allocate funds, relying only on the financial resources of each county, there is such a situation, the rich counties will repair faster, and the counties without money will repair more slowly.

Many counties have been repaired intermittently, and Baoding County is one of them.

Most of the walls have been repaired. A lot of masonry is where to be placed. It is also official, and it is the most convenient to use.

Kuaixiang is in a hurry, so naturally he is as fast as he can.