In the Ming Dynasty, if ministers encountered urgent matters, they could temporarily misappropriate money and food.
For example, Wang Qiong, the Secretary of the Ministry of Revenue at this time, had been the Zuo Shilang of the Ministry of Hubu six years ago, and was transferred to the position of Minister of the Ministry of Personnel five years ago because of the emperor's appreciation. At this time, because the border officials urgently misappropriated Taicang silver and did not return it overdue,
Wang Qiong, who had been transferred from the Ministry of Household Affairs to the Ministry of Personnel, was also held accountable and sent to Nanjing to live a free life.
Wang Yuan is now patrolling the river on the emperor's order, and Wang Qiong, the Minister of Household Affairs, is one of his own, so it is easy to apply for project funds. Anyway, these grains and part of the customs currency will have to be transported to Beijing sooner or later, so it will be easier to pay directly in Linqing.
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The Chaoguan side was more difficult to deal with, and the official in charge was reluctant, but still agreed to give some as long as Wang Yuan signed and stamped it.
The grain transportation was unexpectedly smooth. The water transportation generals in this section of the river wanted to hand over all the grain to Wang Yuan immediately. This guy had already been fined three months because of the delay. Seeing that navigation was reopened, he was fined again after a few days.
block up!
The previous suspension of flights was due to flooding.
The current suspension of navigation is because the river control in Henan has been effective. The governor of the river, Liu Kai, dug the river on the south bank to release floods, and repaired the dam on the north bank to block the breach. This resulted in a reduction in the water volume of the Yellow River that spread to Shandong, and accelerated the sedimentation of the Wei River.
of accumulation.
As a result, the rivers near Linqing are now blocked in large areas, and tankers and merchant ships are stranded from time to time.
The further time goes by, the more serious the river will become blocked, because the dry season is about to begin. If the dredging work cannot be completed, navigation will not be resumed until next spring when the rain increases.
There were several months in between, which was enough to deduct a year's salary from this canal transport general. If it caused a food shortage in the capital, he would probably be imprisoned!
"Scholar Wang, how much food do you need?" Liang Xi asked.
Wang Yuan said with a smile: "Although Liang Shen will transport the goods, they won't be able to transport them all in a short while. As for how much food I need, I won't know until the project plan is drawn up."
"If the project is huge, you can leave more time for Bachelor Wang." Liang Xi even dreamed of throwing the blame away.
Last year, more than a thousand water transport ships were burned in Jining, and Shen Fucong's responsibility was minimal. The Liang Xi in front of him ranked second in responsibility among the water transport generals. The first one was Gu Shilong, the general in charge of water transport and the Marquis of Zhenyuan.
This man is very unlucky. His boat was burned last year and his voyages were cut off twice this year. He has been fined until next summer. During this period, he has been guilty of meritorious service, but his guilt has increased. It feels like he borrowed a usury loan and will never be able to pay it back in his lifetime.
But Beijing continued to supply grain, and Liang Xi could not just wait for navigation. He had to organize water transportation for officers and soldiers, and transport grain overland to Dezhou, which consumed people, food, and was time-consuming... It was very troublesome. I wish Wang Yuan could take more of the grain. Anyway, the court would pursue it.
You can also push it to Wang Yuan when you get up.
It's a pity that Wang Yuan didn't accept the move.
As far as the efficiency of land transfer is concerned, there are hundreds of water ships waiting in Linqing, and Liang Xi can't finish the transportation in a month or two (too few manpower).
Wang Yuan stood on the deck, directing the students to take small boats, place benchmarks in various rivers and river banks, and use trigonometric functions to measure the height of the nearby terrain. Even Wang Yuan didn't bother to do the calculations himself, and just threw them to the students to do the questions. He could only treat them as students.
When the data are different, Wang Yuan will perform calculation and verification by himself.
"Just let the river silt up?" Wang Yuan asked.
Liang Xi said helplessly: "What else can we do? The governor of the river channel is controlling the water in Huanglinggang, and he has to transport grain by land. The silt in the Wei River can only be ignored for the time being."
Wang Yuan reminded: "If the silt is not cleared in winter, it will be more difficult to clean up when the water rises in spring."
Liang Xi said: "I am not afraid of rising water in spring. Navigation will definitely be possible then. I am afraid that there will be insufficient rain in late spring and the canal will be stranded again due to sediment."
This is a very embarrassing thing. The governor of the river is far away in Henan and has no energy to come to Linqing to do things. The water transport soldiers and civilians here in Linqing also have the responsibility to clean up the river, but their greater responsibility is to transport the food quickly by land!
The Wei River is stagnant there, and no one is taking care of it. It blocks all merchant ships from the north and the south. I don't know how much economic losses it will cause.
Among them, there are also merchant ships transporting cotton for Wang Yuan. Now is the cotton picking season. The fastest way to transport cotton from Shandong to Tianjin is to take this waterway!
In both public and private matters, Wang Yuan had to seize the time to dredge the Wei River.
Wang Yuan said: "General Liang, I would like to take a look at the dredging boat. Maybe it can be improved."
Linqing Prefecture is an important transshipment point for water transportation, and the river is shallow, so it is often blocked by siltation, and dredging boats are always on hand for emergencies.
There are various tools on the dredging ship.
One type is called "Hunjiang Dragon". It is a long wooden pole with four iron leaves installed at the end. It is sunk to the bottom of the water and manually stirred to remove the sediment. However, it can only remove the locally accumulated sediment.
Stir it up and cause it to slide into deeper rivers nearby.
One method is called "Iron Dragon Grasping", which involves tying an iron claw with a rope and throwing it into the water. The boat is driven with all its strength, and the silt on the river bottom is dragged away by the force of the boat's forward movement. It is also just a dragging, and can only control local areas and large-scale siltation.
Doesn't work at all.
One type is called "Dunchuan Rake", which is to build a rake or something like that on a giant wooden pole. Two large ships are anchored and fixed, and the giant wood and rake are located between the two ships, and are dragged back and forth by pulleys by workers on the ship.
, stir up the blocked sediment.
They are all tools for local desilting. However, the siltation of the Wei River this time was caused by the sediment brought by the Yellow River water. It is necessary to wait for the dry season for manual salvage and desilting!
In the next few days, the students surveyed and drew maps, while Wang Yuan was improving the dredging ship. He wanted to build a "chain bucket-type sand dredging ship."
Canvas is used as the track. The track has holes to facilitate the wheel hub. Every other section of the track has an iron bucket and a lifting rod extending into the bottom of the river. There is no steam engine or anything like that. Four workers can rotate the power table like a grinder.
, through iron gears, using the lever principle to easily drive the wheel hub and track.
When encountering a place that is difficult to dredge, you can use the "Hunjiang Dragon" to break up the silt, and then use Wang Yuan's equipment to dig out sand. The excavated sand is sent to the ship through crawlers, and workers can then transport it away.
The efficiency of artificial water desilting is increased by a hundred times.
Wang Yuan immediately summoned Linqing Prefecture craftsmen, carpenters, blacksmiths, and textile craftsmen through Zhizhou Malun to build it strictly according to the drawings.
All that's left is to wait, while the first-class craftsmen make the parts and the second-class students measure and draw the drawings.
To ensure that Linqing Waterway is navigable in all seasons, it is not as simple as digging a reservoir to store water and discharge floods. Otherwise, someone would have done it long ago. The ancient river management ministers were not all fools.
"Second brother," Yuan Da ran quickly to announce, "Mr. Shen is here!"
Wang Yuan was stunned and asked: "Master Shen?"
Yuan Da smiled and said: "That's him. He is now the judge of Jining Prefecture. If you write a letter to the deputy envoy of Shandong Bingbei, the deputy envoy will send Mr. Shen to contact you."
Wang Yuan immediately went out to greet him and shouted from afar: "Sir, I haven't seen you for three years. I want to hurt my students!"
Shen Fucong was more stylish than when he was a master. He was wearing a shabby official uniform and holding a peacock feather fan presented by Wang Jiang. He held Wang Yuan's hand and said, "Brother Yuan has grown taller again. You and I, master and disciple, I say goodbye to Guizhou, but I don’t want to see you again in Shandong!”
"Sir, please come in and talk quickly!" Wang Yuan said with careful support.
Shen Fucong sighed: "Brother Yuan is still filial. I have little talent and knowledge. I can only enlighten you. How can I deserve such respect?"
The relationship between master and disciple moves heaven and earth.
The officials from Linqing Prefecture and the Jining officials brought by Shen Fucong were all moved with emotion. Maybe some of them would go back to educate the younger generation.
There is no one else in the quiet room.
Wang Yuan chuckled and said, "Sir, what does Li Bingxian mean? Is he willing to cooperate?"
Shen Fucong sat crookedly on his chair: "It would be weird if you don't cooperate. Let alone 50,000 people, even 100,000 people can be gathered together. There are too many things under the jurisdiction of Bingbei Road, including temporary relief of refugees. , now thirty to forty thousand victims have gathered outside Jining City, and even the victims from Linqing are running there. Li Bingxian asked you to quickly formulate a project plan, and he can send tens of thousands of victims immediately! "
Yes, people in ancient times were very smart to use work in exchange for relief.
If he didn't have enough power, money and food, Li Chongsi, the deputy envoy of Shandong Military Preparation, would probably have to lead the victims to build water conservancy projects. It is really terrible to have tens of thousands of victims gathered together. If you don't find something for them to do, it is easy to cause trouble. , maybe someone will take advantage of the chaos to rebel!