Zhao Yuan, the arrow ridge is lush, Yanbei's posture is stretched high, his waist is stiff and his shoulders are straight, the sound of the strings collapsing suddenly sounds, and the feather arrows shoot out with a streamer and shoot into the deep forest. Nearly a hundred steps away, the archer in charge of the bow and crossbow of the Zhao Palace, walked a few steps quickly, showed his head in the forest, raised his arms and shouted: "Seventy steps missed, six inches to the left!" ”

"The wind is blowing." Yan Bei put down his bow and crossbow and sat down behind the stone case on the side, the towering grass leaves of the trees beside him did not move. He took the lacquered bow from the servant and put it in the box, and presented a small cup full of iced honey syrup. Tian Feng lowered his head and felt the profound kung fu required to be able to say this sentence calmly in the face of his clothes, and coughed lightly: "King, Youzhou has lost 7,426 donkeys to Jizhou. ”

Donkeys, rare and exotic beasts that were paid tribute to the Han Dynasty by the Xiongnu in the past, have been used as strategic materials for the imperial court for a long time after Yanbei issued an order. He ordered the collection of donkeys from all over the country to be raised in Youzhou for several years, that was when he was the great Sima of the Han Dynasty, and now raising donkeys in Youzhou has become a trend. As a result, the donkey has become much cheaper than a good horse in the market price.

Although it is still more expensive than a bad horse, it is less expensive than a ploughing ox.

"How is the donkey in Youzhou, Yan has never asked, how do the people of Youzhou react to the donkey working in the field?" The scenery of Zhao Yuan is excellent, looking to the east can take in the scenery of the prosperous Handan City, and to the south you can vaguely see the Taixue Mansion that stretches for hundreds of miles, during which every gentle official road and every piece of lush farmland make Yanbei feel very good, and the grievances caused by poor archery skills have been resolved, "Leave three thousand donkeys as military cantons for supporting the transportation of war baggage, and the rest will be taken care of by the horse farms of each county to breed and give birth." ”

Tian Feng nodded and said: "Donkeys are very good in Youzhou, they have a docile temperament and are good servants, they are easier to feed than horses, and they are not like cows that are tired and don't work." In the first years, the people could not accept such livestock farming, and many people provided donkeys but went to the land to cultivate the fields themselves, and later the state government forced the people to use donkeys to plough the land, and in the past few years, they found that donkeys are easy to feed, so they can cultivate more land and feed more people. ”

"And in Youzhou, Ma Guan found that when raising donkeys, they can be locked up with horses, and the ones born by the mare are called horse mules, and the ones born by the female donkeys are called donkey mules, which have strong endurance and speed, and are stronger than donkeys, and they are better used for servitude."

Yan Bei's eyes widened, and he couldn't understand that he could still be like this...... If horses and donkeys can give birth to mules with strong endurance and fast speed, and are not easy to get sick and die, will keeping people and monkeys together give birth to humans and monkeys who are stupider than humans and more powerful than monkeys? Get eight or nine thousand of these guys, put armor on them and hold weapons, can you beat Cao Cao to the ground?

"This ...... Then why didn't San Lang send mules to Jizhou, did he want Yan to match them himself? ”

Yan Bei said casually, just frowning to make Tian Feng think that he didn't like it because of this, but in fact he was still thinking about the human monkey.

"Well, because mules can no longer be bred, Youzhou Mu did not send mules to Jizhou, but continued to send donkeys." Tian Feng smiled as he spoke, and said, "And the people don't like mules either." If they buy two donkeys, they will have more in three or five years, and if one of them dies of illness, they can continue to work for them. But if you buy two mules, one dies and one is missing, so they don't care if the mule is stronger than the donkey or can run faster. Now in Youzhou, many people who can't afford to buy horses travel on donkeys, which is much faster. Donkey carts also began to prevail in states and counties. At the beginning of this year, a letter came from Youzhou saying that there are now at least 40,000 donkeys in Youzhou in the homes of people in various counties. ”

"That's a good thing!" Yan Bei shook his head with some regret, "It turns out that the mongrel can't be matched anymore, it's a pity." ”

Tian Feng didn't know what Yan Bei was talking about, and thought that King Zhao was saying that mules could not give birth, so he nodded and said: "It's a pity, if mules can be matched again, it will be easier for the people to accept, they are much more capable than donkeys." ”

"It's enough to have donkeys, what about Jizhou, how many donkeys do you have in Jizhou?"

Yan Bei looked at Tian Feng's regretful appearance like him, and after thinking about it, he still suppressed the terrible thoughts just now in his heart, and didn't plan to say it, otherwise if this strange old man was not happy, he would probably have to quarrel with himself.

He also knew that this idea would be obtained by thinking about it himself, but he could never say that he could not do it, and if he did not say anything else, this thing was too shocking, it was too difficult to put it into practice, and it was not beneficial to not be able to have children.

"There are not as many donkeys in Jizhou as there are in Youzhou, because Jizhou used to be very rich, with many cattle and horses, but there are also tens of thousands of donkeys. In the past, most of the donkeys in the countryside were taken by merchants to Guanzhong for a generation, and the mines there used donkeys to transport iron materials, which was more useful. Tian Feng said with a smile: "But since last year, Jizhou donkeys can't be sold at a price in Guanzhong, Guanzhong war horses are tall, and the mules matched with donkeys are stronger, but the people over there prefer to use mules to plow the land...... There are few people in Guanzhong, and the people are very grateful to the king. ”

In the past, there were many people in Guanzhong, but after Dong Zhuo's rebellion, Li Guo's rebellion, and the relocation of the capital to Yecheng, the people in Guanzhong withered, and the entire Sizhou was only a million people. In the past, there were only one million people in Luoyang, but now the soldiers who moved there in the entire Guanzhong, including Montenegro and Baibo, barely exceeded one million, and the tragic situation can be seen. But the lack of people does not mean that Guanzhong is poor, they have the best land and the most resources, and the mines of Henan Yin alone can supply the ordnance needed by 50,000 troops, which is the real important land of the Yan family.

"Good, good!" Yan Bei nodded and said, "If there were thousands of donkeys in Liaodong back then, maybe Yan would not want to attack the host city." ”

In the final analysis, half of Yanbei's earliest attack on the host city was to avenge the people of Liaodong, and the other half was to rob the slaves and come back to dig the mines.

"It's not a bad thing to have a donkey now, at least next time Xianbei Kebi can dare to commit another offense, San Lang will be able to dispatch troops to fight outside the plug!"

Yanbei once carefully calculated the physical fitness of the donkey, and the donkey could carry hundreds of catties of weight to travel fifty miles a day without tire. The purpose of using donkeys to plough the land is to make more use of the arable land in the country under the current conditions of manpower shortage, but in the final analysis, it is to reduce the burden of baggage when waging war. Donkeys are now not a rarity in the North, and they will soon be able to go to war.

The reason why the northern captives dare to take the border is nothing more than because they are fast and ferocious, if the Han army has higher mobility and better baggage line, who will be afraid of whom in a real fight?

Even if you don't have to be in the north, it is as important as carrying a burden on the battlefield in the south, and this year's Cao Cao can bear it!