Han Du came to the East Palace, and because of Zhu Biao's special permission, Han Du walked in without any notification.
"My lord, Han Du, pays homage to His Highness the Crown Prince."
Upon hearing this, Zhu Biao raised his head and glanced at Han Du, then lowered his head and said casually, "Get the east and west down, and I will help you send them there."
"What?" Han Du was confused for a moment and suddenly came to his senses. From what Zhu Biao meant, he had misunderstood him and thought that he was here to ask him to help deliver a letter to Princess Anqing.
Hearing the deep resentment in Zhu Biao's tone, Han Du was a little embarrassed. Ever since Han Du and Princess Anqing used Arabic numerals to encrypt letters, Zhu Biao's face towards Han Du had never been better.
Thinking about it, he clearly knew that there must be unknown secrets in this letter, but Zhu Biao couldn't understand any of them. Wouldn't this make him, who prides himself on reading poetry and books, feel uncomfortable?
Therefore, Zhu Biao naturally had no good feelings towards Han Du.
Unless Han Du is willing to tell him the secret of the ghost painting in this letter, but this is obviously impossible.
"Your Highness misunderstood. I am not here to ask for your help today."
"Then what are you here for?" Zhu Biao asked Han Du.
Because Han Du's actions really made Zhu Biao dissatisfied. In the past, when Zhu Biao didn't help Han Du deliver letters, Han Du would come to the East Palace several times to look for him from time to time. But since the time between Han Du and Anqing, he began to write this kind of
After the ghost-drawing letter, Han Du would not come to the East Palace at all except to come to him to deliver letters. This was one of the reasons why Zhu Biao was so angry with Han Du.
Han Du told Zhu Biao that he asked Lao Zhu for cotton and Lao Zhu's instructions.
"Cotton? There should be some stock at the Imperial Mansion." After all the fun, when he heard that Han Du came to him for something important, Zhu Biao immediately put aside his playful intentions and said seriously.
"How many?" Han Du was very anxious. Although Han Du was relieved to find cotton, he was worried about the quantity of cotton at the same time. Now we need a lot of treasure money. If the quantity of cotton is not large, then compared to
The problem is still not completely solved.
"Uh, do you want a lot of cotton?" Zhu Biao's expression suddenly became surprised, he lowered his head and took stock, and said: "The cotton in Huangzhuang is mainly used by the palace, but it can't be used up every year. There may not be much in stock now.
But there are still tens of thousands of kilograms. Is it enough? If not, I will come back and think of a solution."
When Han Du heard that there were tens of thousands of kilograms of cotton, the big stone in Han Du's heart finally fell to the ground. He breathed a sigh of relief and quickly replied: "That's enough, that's enough."
Tens of thousands of kilograms of cotton are enough for the Banknote Printing Bureau to print several months' worth of banknotes. Even then, the banknotes will still need to be printed, and it will be time to harvest this year's new cotton. By then, how much do you want?
, as much as you can charge.
While the big problem was solved, a question emerged in Han Du's mind.
"Your Highness, there is something I don't know whether I should ask or not?"
"Ask." Zhu Biao said nonchalantly, "You can ask whatever you want."
"How come your Highness has so much cotton?" Han Du was very puzzled by this. The main use of cotton now is to weave it into cotton cloth and make clothes.
Of course, now there is an additional use for making banknote paper. However, the cotton required for banknote paper cannot be too much, that is, it is a one-shot deal. After enough treasure banknotes are printed, there will no longer be a need to make banknote paper, unless it is
At that time, there will be new banknotes that need to be printed, so cotton will continue to be needed.
The East Palace alone has tens of thousands of kilograms of cotton stored in it. If all this was woven into cotton, even if everyone in the East Palace wore it, they wouldn't be able to wear it all.
Why did Zhu Biao keep so much cotton?
Zhu Biao listened and patiently explained to Han Du: "Actually, these cottons are not from the East Palace, but grown by the Huangzhuang itself. Because the value of cotton is relatively high, my father issued a decree to encourage people all over the world a few years ago.
Planting cotton even exempts the people who grow cotton from some taxes. Seeing that the emperor likes the people to grow cotton so much, the people of Huangzhuang, whether it is to suit his interests or for other reasons, anyway, the cotton they have grown over the years has been one year.
More than a year. There was so much cotton that the palace could not use up. After all, these cottons belonged to the royal family. The people in the palace did not have the courage to sell them, so they had to store them. As time went by, I forgot about this time.
It’s okay, if you hadn’t mentioned it today, I wouldn’t have remembered that there were still tens of thousands of kilograms of cotton in Huangzhuang that had not been processed.”
After hearing Zhu Biao's explanation, Han Du's first reaction was to be stunned.
When is there still so much cotton that we can’t use it all?
How is this possible, let alone the ancient times when productivity is low now. Even under modern productivity, it is difficult to hear that cotton will be unsalable due to the huge amount of cotton produced. I have only heard that there is not enough cotton.
Cotton can not only be woven into cotton cloth, but can also be filled into clothing to make cotton-padded clothes and quilts.
Thinking of cotton-padded clothes and quilts, Han Du suddenly came to his senses and knew the crux of the problem.
It has been so long since Han Du came to Ming Dynasty that he has never heard of cotton-padded clothes, let alone cotton quilts. Although Han Du did not notice this on weekdays because the weather was getting hotter, Han Du paid close attention now.
After some reflection, I determined that there was indeed no such thing as cotton-padded clothes and quilts in the Ming Dynasty.
No wonder Zhu Biao said that there is no end to cotton. It turns out that people nowadays only use cotton to weave cotton into cotton cloth. Although cotton cloth is better than linen cloth, the clothes made of it are more skin-friendly than linen cloth and warmer than linen cloth. But cotton is really
In order to keep warm, a large amount of cotton must be used to make cotton-padded clothes and quilts.
"There is too much cotton grown in Huangzhuang. Next year Gudu is planning to order them to plant less cotton." Zhu Biao said casually.
There is no doubt about the productivity of Huangzhuang. Huangzhuang is a unique thing created by Zhu Yuanzhang. Zhu Yuanzhang can be said to be a maverick emperor in the past dynasties. Other emperors basically want everything.
Just issue an order for tribute from various places. But Lao Zhu was different. He was the emperor who was most afraid of disturbing the people. Not only would he not issue an order for the people to pay tribute, he even established an imperial village and prepared to farm his own land to support the needs of the palace.
Originally, Lao Zhu loved He Xiaolong Tuan tea very much, but after Lao Zhu learned about the complicated process of making Xiao Long Tuan and the huge expenditure of people's efforts, he not only borrowed his favorite drinking habit, but also
It was decreed that it was prohibited for the private sector to make any more Xiaolong Tuan as tribute.