Chapter 1316 Development and Micromanagement

Chapter 1316 Development and Micromanagement

Chapter 1316 Development and Micromanagement
As a large county in Yanzhou, the eight counties of Jiyin had a very dense population.

There are more than 21,000 households and nearly 102,000 people. It is a well-known rich place.

There are many large east-west rivers in the county, as well as lakes with huge water storage capacity such as Heze, Lei Ze and Da Ze. The water conservancy and irrigation facilities are complete, the farmland maintenance level is high, and the per mu yield is relatively high.

If this happened in later generations, this would be a “big taxpayer”, and it is the same now.

Henan is a place that is surrounded by enemies. Once you really gain a firm foothold and beat the surrounding wolves so that they dare not pounce on you and bite you, the stamina is really strong. After a long-term confrontation, others have been treated like pants, but you are still eating meat and fish, which is really despairing.

Shao Xun could no longer remember how many times he had relied on Henan's stable grain and silk production to overcome difficulties.

This is the real foundation of the Daliang Dynasty at this stage.

The prefect of Jiyin was Fu Yong, a native of Guanxi, formerly a clerk in the armor department of the General Zhenxi's shogunate.

After Jin Zheng took office as the Military Supervisor, he no longer needed so many staff members, so he recommended some people to serve as local officials. Fu Yong was one of them.

At this moment, he was following behind Shao Xun and introducing in detail: "Last year's autumn harvest collected 122,400 hu of land rent, 61,500 pieces of silk and 60,000 jin of cotton from each household, and another 12,000 hu of grain was stored in the charity granary."

"What about forced labor?" Shao Xun asked.

"Most of it was offset by silk cloth, about 30,000 pieces." Fu Yong replied.

Shao Xun nodded.

Generally speaking, life was pretty good for self-employed farmers in the early days of the dynasty.

After all, there are really too few people and too much land per capita. When your population reaches 100 million, 400 million or even 1 billion, and the per capita arable land area is only one-tenth or even one-tenth of the previous one, but the per-acre yield has not increased tenfold or dozens of times, the per capita grain possession will be greatly reduced, and people will go hungry.

There is actually still a lot of land in Jiyin County, all of which were acquired from wealthy families after the fields were cultivated in previous years, but it needs to be reclaimed.

These lands were called "common lands", and many families let their children drive cattle and sheep to graze or chop firewood, and the counties did not care.

There are many surplus soldiers in the Zuo Jinwu Guard of Chenliu who are very willing to come to Jiyin to open up wasteland. At present, this opportunity has not been opened. The court gives priority to driving them south or recruiting them to serve as soldiers, but the pressure is increasing. There are also cases of small-scale secret reclamation of wasteland.

Perhaps, sooner or later, the ban will be lifted. Shao Xun will try to delay it as much as possible and leave this good deed that can bring him good reputation to the successor king.

"Besides food and silk, what else is there?" Shao Xun asked, looking at the endless forest ahead.

Sometimes you may feel it is very strange to see such a vast forest in Henan.

But this is the reality, it is not developed enough.

Jiyin County is roughly equivalent to Caozhou in the Tang Dynasty. The latter had a population of about 870 at the end of the Kaiyuan period. In later generations, the population of Heze, Shandong Province exceeded million. Compared with this, the population of in the Daliang Dynasty was simply a joke.

The vast forest in front of Shao Xun had probably been cut down in the Tang Dynasty and turned into villages and farmland, just like what he had done in Guangchengze.

The imperial court measured the land in Jiyin, but "land" was only a part of it; rivers, lakes, forests, bamboo groves and grasslands were much more measured.

The nobles would sometimes build a hunting compound. Their compounds were often located near mountains and rivers, covering a large area of ​​mountains, forests, rivers and lakes, and there were many wild animals.

Of course, Shao Zei is no less capable than others.

His Luoyang West Garden was hundreds of miles in circumference and was often used for hunting and military training, which was also a very astonishing scale.

"Your Majesty, our county has many rivers and lakes, and there are a lot of fish," said Fu Yong.

"Why have I never heard of Jiyin fish pickle when I was in Bianliang?" Shao Xun asked.

"The otters are rampant and the people dare not fish," Fu Yong replied.

Shao Xun couldn't help laughing.

Fu Yong meant that there were too many otters and they were too powerful, so the common people did not dare to fish.

"Ridiculous!" he cursed with a laugh.

Fu Yong also said helplessly: "That's what the people say."

Shao Xun shook his head, no longer dwelling on the matter, and asked again, "Has the spring ploughing in the county been completed?"

"It's done."

"What do you plant?"

"Mostly millet, a few plant wheat in the spring."

"Did the wheat seedlings get damaged by frost and snow during last year's severe winter?"

“I haven’t seen much.”

"You should visit more counties to see about this matter, and don't just listen to what the county magistrate and township head say."

"Yes." Fu Yong said embarrassedly.

Shao Xun continued walking along the edge of the forest.

A unit of the Yellow-Headed Army of more than a thousand men had entered the forest, set up a long cordon, and conducted a careful investigation. Shao Xun walked for a while, saw a village, and walked over to it.

Most of the people were confined in the courtyard, busy with their own affairs. Shao Xun did not get too close, lest the soldiers of the imperial guards rush over and order them to close the doors and windows - these people really could do that.

"The endless wilderness is a great place." Shao Xun sighed, and said, "In the past, the Xiongnu invaded Henan. I returned from Luoyang and chased them all the way east. I once passed through Jingyin. The countryside was even more desolate at that time. There were weeds half a person high between the forts. Now there are many villages, which is great."

"This is all thanks to Your Majesty," said Fu Yong.

"No need to talk about the past." Shao Xun waved his hand and said with a smile: "I feel relieved to see the people of Jiyin living and working in peace and contentment. Isn't it just for the peaceful countryside like this that I have fought for my life and death?"

After saying this, he walked forward along the ridge of the field, stopping from time to time to look around, and even bent down to pick a few fresh wild vegetables, holding them in his hands and tasting them carefully, as if he was tasting his vast rivers and mountains.

******
Shao Xun did not stay in Jiyin City, but camped in the wild.

Tong Qianjin arranged the imperial vehicles on the periphery, and three thousand guards and personal soldiers patrolled continuously.

After setting up the tent, Shao Xun washed the wild vegetables he found during the day, put them into a clay pot, and stewed them with the meat.

When it was almost done, he personally served a bowl and presented it to Zhuge Wenbiao like a treasure.

Zhuge Wenbiao thanked him and took it gently.

Sister Wen Bao looked at Shao Xun strangely, but she soon got a bowl as well. She was so flustered when she took it that she almost knocked it over.

Shao Xun sat cross-legged on a blanket, reading the military report brought by the messenger.

Murong Huang's cavalry appeared on the Lulong Mountain Road, bypassed the town, and attempted to attack from the south, but was blocked by the town's troops.

The two sides fought repeatedly in the heavy snow, with both sides winning and losing. Because it was too cold in the mountains, the Xianbei cavalry was forced to withdraw.

It’s late February and there’s still snow in Yanshan Mountain!
This was not the first time that the Murong clan had tried to enter Youzhou. In early January, Murong Huang led his cavalry on a continuous march across the frozen sea and unexpectedly arrived in Liaoxi, where he defeated a group of Youzhou miscellaneous Hu light cavalry that had entered the county to plunder, beheading hundreds of them.

However, the defeated Zaohu also captured several Murong Xianbei cavalrymen, and learned that Murong Huang had led more than 20,000 cavalrymen on the sea ice to the east in the middle of the twelfth lunar month, landed at Lilinkou (near Yingkou), quickly defeated a local peripheral tribe of Murong Ren, burned, killed and looted, and then went south along the coastline straight to the city of Pingguo.

Murong Ren fought with them, but unexpectedly some soldiers turned against him and Ren was defeated.

Fortunately, thousands of Yellow Head Army soldiers stationed in the camp outside the city shot with powerful bows and crossbows, forcing back the pursuing Murong Huang cavalry and rescuing Murong Ren.

But after this battle, Murong Ren's reputation declined greatly and his strength became increasingly weak.

Murong Huang realized that he could not kill Murong Ren for the time being, so he plundered the place and then left.

Damn it, the sea is frozen, we can’t communicate, and we even have to get information from the enemy.

General Shao Xun put away the newspaper, suddenly laughed and said, "Murong Huang is quite busy."

Zhuge Wenbiao glanced at him, wanting to say something, but felt that women shouldn't interfere in military affairs, so she continued to eat her meat with her head down, only occasionally looking at Shao Xun, paying attention to his expression. And when Shao Xun looked at her, she quickly looked away.

Zhuge Wenbao looked at Shao Xun boldly and said "naively": "Your Majesty, it has been four consecutive cold winters. Is the grassland seriously affected?"

"It's definitely not easy." Shao Xun said, "But Murong Huang has the foundation laid by his father, so he can still hold on for a while."

"I heard that livestock lose a lot of weight in winter, so the horses must be very thin too, right?" Zhuge Wenbao asked again.

Shao Xun looked at her curiously and said, "You have a good idea. Yes, horses are thinner in winter, but they are thinnest in spring. Most of the hay prepared in late autumn has been consumed, and the new year's grass has not yet grown, so life is very difficult. Murong Huang launched an attack in the middle of winter and rushed around, which must have consumed a lot of food. The more he struggles, the weaker the country will be, and the more people will oppose him."

When did the steppe tribes have the ability to launch an attack in winter? Usually, it was after the farming part under their rule had reached a considerable scale and they could feed their horses with concentrated fodder (grain) in the winter.

When Murong Wei was alive, he built schools and engaged in farming. He was much more far-sighted than his son. It can be said that he laid the foundation for the Murong Xianbei to fight for hegemony in the troubled times - unfortunately, this is no longer a troubled time.

"Your Majesty, how do you plan to fight him?" asked Zhuge Wenbao.

"Well, let's use Liaoxi to keep Murong Huang in suspense first and see what he does." Shao Xun said casually.

Halfway through her words, she found that Zhuge Wenbiao had served her a bowl of meat. When Shao Xun looked at her in surprise, Zhuge Wenbiao had already turned away, but his ears were red.

Shao Xun laughed and lowered his head to eat the meat.

Zhuge Wenbao looked at him with burning eyes and said, "Your Majesty, you fight like my father."

"Oh? Where is it?" Shao Xun asked curiously.

"When my father was fighting against the enemy, he often didn't pay much attention to the deployment of troops and talked more about things outside the battlefield," said Zhuge Wenbao.

"This is a very clever military strategy." Shao Xun smiled and said, "It seems that Zhuge Daoming is also well versed in this."

Zhuge Wenbiao gently tugged at his sister's sleeve, as if he disliked her for showing off her knowledge in front of an expert. After all, the man in front of him was the most famous general in the world.

Shao Xun quickly finished eating the meat, then bent over his desk to write an imperial decree, ordering the formation of a Beijing camp, with Li Chong as the Recruiting Envoy, commanding all the troops in Youzhou, and giving him the first micro-management order: continue to harass Liaoxi, but not on such a large scale that people would feel unable to resist, and first see how effective it is.

On the first day of March, Shao Xun headed north from Jiyin, passed Puyang, crossed the Yellow River, and arrived at Dongyu County, officially setting foot on the land of Hebei.

(End of this chapter)