Dominate the Country

The New Year has arrived, and the whole of Nanjing is buried in snow.

The snow this year is particularly heavy. Chen Ming had already transferred enough rice to the north when he heard the Beijing Imperial Astronomical Observatory report around the winter solstice - there might be heavy snow in the northern border this winter. Thanks to the bumper harvests in Nanyang, Annan and Siam this year, China is now the least lacking in rice. Conservative estimates show that the grain reserves in granaries across the country are enough for the people of the country to eat for three or four months.

This is what Chen Ding calculated, based on the amount of two kilograms of rice per person per day, a very crude number. But he wrote a very large article around this number - the main idea is that the grain depot has too much rice reserves.

There is no need for county-level grain stations to maintain such a large grain reserve.

With such a large grain reserve, the grain and rice that flow into the market every year [stale grain processing] can greatly impact the market grain price. In recent times, grain prices have been rising, but the fluctuations in grain prices have also increased, which is directly related to the amount of stale grain processed in this local grain depot.

Chen Ming is still sending people to investigate.

In addition to the allocation of rice and grain to the north, there were also significant mobilizations of grain depots in the northeast, northwest, Inner Mongolia, and Gesu. The grain departments in these places must always be prepared to face the snowstorm.

Chen Ming issued an order to the local government that once a disaster occurs, the local government must deal with the resettlement, living, and post-disaster reconstruction of the affected people.

Although it is not the same as before, many families, including those in the city, did not have overnight food at home. Once they encountered severe weather such as snowstorms, they had no work for a long time, and there was no rice at home. It was common for the whole family to starve to death.

Whether in the Ming and Qing dynasties, when winter came or when there was a shortage of food, some kind families, or those who deliberately bought reputation, would set up sheds in and outside the city to take in refugees and set up porridge shops to help refugees.

In this situation, many ruffians took advantage of the opportunity, and naturally there were more people committing crimes in the world.

Because no one wants to be starved to death, right?

Now the livelihoods of Chinese civilians have improved a lot, but even in the richest places, there are poor households. The emperor has three poor relatives.

Chen Ming asked his subordinates to prepare as much as possible, on the one hand to appease the people and win their hearts; on the other hand, it was also to let the local government take the opportunity to count the number of poor people, so that officials could feel the troubles of poor households, and when they were looking for people to immigrate to Southeast Asia, North America, and Myanmar next year, the local government could report more people.

Moreover, thousands of years ago, China had only given porridge and medicine for disaster relief in all dynasties, and did not count clothes. Chen Han has now added this item. Li Xiaomei is still very concerned about this, and she is more strict about the charity accounts. If anyone dares to touch the money in it, Li Xiaomei will definitely kill him.

Because she knows very well that this "charity" is the emperor's invitation to buy her reputation, and the benefits will not only make her own position as queen stable and unshakable, but also greatly benefit her precious son.

Being a mother is strong, and with Li Xiaomei's status, what else can she ask for? Naturally, it is the position of the prince of her precious son. The highest pursuit of a queen is to let her son inherit the throne.

And she is also a person who follows the old lady to worship Buddha every now and then. Doing good deeds is to accumulate blessings for her and the children. The Bodhisattva is spiritual and will bless you. Whoever dares to intervene in this matter will ruin her foundation and her son's future, and that is to seek death!

When it snowed heavily in the south of the Yangtze River, of course, porridge sheds were built in Nanjing City. In just three or five days, the snow accumulated to the calf. The heavy snow frightened Chen Ming himself and he couldn't sit still in the palace. While there was nothing in the palace, Chen Ming took the queen to go outside the palace in person.

The carriage was plain and unpretentious. Whether it was wood or carving, it was just average. The solid steel sheet cotton deck inside was not afraid of bullets at all.

The carriage, which looked simple on the outside, was decorated in an extraordinary way. Chen Ming and his wife were dressed differently. Chen Ming was just wearing winter clothes, which looked very thin, but no one knew that there was a layer of soft deerskin under the thin coat. With Chen Ming's physique, it's enough to wear such thick clothes in winter.

As for Li Xiaomei, who was sitting next to her, of course she wouldn't wear the queen's robe, but she was wearing a purple mink coat. If someone saw her, they would definitely not think that this ordinary carriage was really ordinary.

There was a charcoal fire in the carriage, and there was no smoke.

Through the window, the couple looked at the queue in front of the porridge stall. What made Chen Ming happy was that the queue outside the porridge stall was not very long, and the people who came to drink porridge were not pale, and even the clothes they wore were relatively normal, but there seemed to be mostly elderly people, and of course there were also a few ragged people.

"Master, Madam, many of these people are from nearby families. It's not that they really can't eat, but they don't want to cook."

"Look over there, there are piles of melons, vegetables, fruits, dry goods, and groceries, which are brought by these people."

Liu Wu went out to inquire about it, and ran back with a strange look on his face. It's strange that there are such people. Was it the few dollars left over from the coal money, or was he reminiscing about the hard times in the past?

Chen Ming looked in the direction he pointed. On the right side of the porridge stall, there were two eight-person tables put together, with two large winnowing baskets on top. There were indeed a lot of vegetables, fruits, vermicelli, dried bamboo shoots, potatoes, etc. in them.

Li Xiaomei asked Liu Wu to bring a bowl of porridge.

This is vegetable porridge, with some shrimp skin floating in it. Chen Ming stirred it with a spoon and found kelp and tofu. It tasted okay. Although it seemed a bit coarse, there was no sand or soil in it. Rice, red beans, mung beans and red dates, the main ingredients were boiled together with several things.

Liu Wu walked around outside for a while, and white snow fell on his hat. The snow this year was really heavy.

By the time of the New Year, news came from Northeast China and Mongolia that both places had suffered white disasters. But because the local government had prepared in advance, the overall loss was much less. As for those families who did not listen to the advice, they deserved the heavy losses.

Therefore, the year of Chengtian in the ninth year was destined to be tight outside and loose inside. There was a snowstorm outside, and the conclusion of the Sino-Western War had not yet been concluded. Of course, there could be no singing and dancing in the New Year. But in fact, there was nothing.

However, when the New Year came, it was necessary to reward the soldiers and comfort the generals who worked hard to lead the troops outside, and Chen Ming would reward their families.

The list of guests for the palace banquet this year has been expanded a lot.

Not only the Fengtian Palace, but also the harem. The harem is like a microcosm of the previous dynasty. When Chen Ming invites someone, the female relatives of the family who are qualified must also come in. Moreover, many generals who are away on the battlefield have their wives, and the women must also be invited. Generally speaking, it is more lively than the Fengtian Palace.

After a period of preparation before the New Year, the news of Chen Ding's marriage has spread throughout Nanjing. Although no one knows who will be the winner, many people are watching, and it is true.

In addition, as Chen Ding's marriage was mentioned, several people in the royal family who were of marriageable age were also targeted by the court officials. The emperor's remaining sons are still young, but the emperor's brothers and sisters are not young. The older ones have been set, and now the only ones left are the youngest ones.

If you can't marry a prince, you can marry a prince; if you can't marry the princess of the current emperor as a daughter-in-law, you can marry a princess of the emperor as a brother-in-law. They were all targeted openly, and there was no need to hide it anymore.

You have to know that these princes and princesses of the Chen Han Dynasty are worth a fortune. If you marry a prince, you will be the queen, a real queen, not a princess; if you marry a princess, you will also have your own territory. Although the fiefdom is small, it is a place with beautiful scenery. Whether you develop it yourself or contract it out to a business, it is a lot of money.

All of them are "local rich men", real "local rich men".

On the 15th Lantern Festival, the palace held another banquet. This time it was a real family banquet, and only the surname Chen was entertained. Chen Hui brought up something that Chen Ming was a little surprised about, and his brothers couldn't sit still.

After all, they are all teenagers. Each of them is interested in their own territory.

Now Chen Han is clearly going to take a big bite of the Spanish territory in North America. For such a large area, it would be enough to seal off three or four people, not to mention one or two. So they found Chen Hui, and Chen Hui took the opportunity of the fifteenth day to inform Chen Ming.

"If we demarcate the territory for them early, they can invest in it with peace of mind."

Chen Ming returned to the Qianqing Palace and talked about this with Li Xiaomei at night. Li Xiaomei agreed: "Father is right. My brothers are old and are about to get married. It is beneficial to settle their hearts early." More importantly, if we demarcate the territory for these brothers-in-law, it can also tempt the people in the harem to follow suit.

Fighting for the throne is a high-risk and high-return business. The return and profit are amazing, and the risk is also amazing.

As long as there is a little timidity, and there is a beautiful future ahead, it can share a part of the danger.

Chen Ming did not think so far for a while. This matter is not important to him.

On the contrary, the royal fiefdom can also inspire the ministers to be more eager. This can stimulate the nobles and ministers more than sending Chen Jing to North America.

The next day, Chen Ming opened a cabinet whose key was held by him and took out a map from it. This was a map of North America with more than a dozen blocks painted in different colors.

Most of these blocks are located in the United States, and there are only three in Canada, namely: Vancouver, Ottawa and the west of the Great Lakes.

Chen Ming's younger brothers alone have six people, and Chen Ming's own sons have ten so far.

Although North America is large, it is not so good to be divided into sixteen countries. Moreover, Tokyo, Hanjin and New York on the east coast of North America are still points that Chen Han has to maintain in Chen Ming's plan. So this map division also makes him anxious.

For example, the Lower Jiazhou Peninsula can be one, but can Seattle be counted as one?

The current Seattle and Vancouver areas belong to the same development zone.

South of Tokyo [Los Angeles], south of Hanjin [San Francisco], can these be counted as one, and then divided into two more to the north?

Chen Ming wanted to draw a square grid on the map, five horizontal and five vertical, exactly sixteen pieces, minus Tokyo, Hanjin and New York, and add the three pieces of Canada, exactly sixteen.

Just like the provincial divisions of the United States and Canada in later generations, they are all called horizontal and vertical, which is very elegant like Chen Ming's plan.

But the consequence is that someone will definitely be cheated to death.

The most important thing is that Chen Ming now has limited territory. He controls the west coastline of North America, but he has not crossed the Cordillera Mountains at his deepest point when he advances into the inland of the continent.

Anyone who has studied geography knows that the Cordillera Mountains are the watershed of the Americas. It stretches from Alaska in the north to Tierra del Fuego in the south, stretching about 15,000 kilometers, running through the western part of the North and South American continents. Its northern section can be called the Rocky Mountains. In the third major migration after the opening of the westward movement, the Americans in the original time and space plane crossed the Rocky Mountains and flocked to the coastal Pacific region in groups, which can be said to be very spectacular.

Ignore the painful history of the Indians in this. Chen Ming does not need to know this. He only wants the final result.

The Americans' westward movement is very powerful and has achieved great results, but will China's eastward movement also be as it wishes?

At first, Chen Ming also had an impulse, but he quickly suppressed this immature idea.

Too subjective and presumptuous. The difference in conditions, technology and strength between the two sides made the success of the American westward movement the failure of China's rash eastward movement.

The westward movement lasted for more than half a century, but it was divided into three steps. Even if China is much stronger than the United States, it is difficult to eat a fat man in one bite, right?

The initial westward expansion of the United States was to take advantage of Napoleon's inability to defend himself and get Louisiana. It was an industrial expansion based on agriculture and animal husbandry. The reclamation of wasteland led to the large-scale establishment of capitalist farms. Whether from the perspective of the population employment structure in the western region of the United States at that time, or from the level of investment and national income, for a long time, even in the middle and late century, agriculture always accounted for the vast majority of national income. Even in modern times, agriculture still occupies a particularly important position in the economic structure of the western region. For a long time, agriculture in the Midwest provided the raw material basis and consumer market for the industry in the eastern United States, basically forming the prototype of a unified market and economic integration between the east and west of the United States, and the pattern of economic complementarity between the east and the west was basically formed: the manufacturing belt in the eastern region; the grain production and distribution in the Midwest; the mining industry in the remote western mountainous areas, each with its own positioning.

Moreover, when the American westward movement developed to the third wave, the revolutionary change in transportation had matured. The railway became a bridge connecting the east and west of the vast North American continent, which is impossible to achieve in this era.

"What do you want to do?"

Chen Hui looked at the colorful map of North America in front of him, his eyes full of confusion.

Chen Ming had just popularized the geographical topography, weather and climate, mineral resources, and area of ​​these places for him. These territories can be said to have the potential for independent development, depending on how their owners manage them.

But Chen Hui couldn't remember it. There were so many things, how could he remember them?

"Dad, this piece of land is what we have now. Everything within the red line belongs to us. The total area is not necessarily smaller than the Central Plains Han land." From Vancouver to the south, the entire West Coast of North America, plus the southwest of the United States, the total area is really not much smaller than the traditional Han land.

"I plan to give this place, the Lower Jiazhou Peninsula, to the second brother."

"The area south of Tokyo, all the way to the opposite seaside. A cut in the middle, this is for the third and fourth brothers."

It is from the west coast of North America to the east coast-the Gulf of Mexico. The latter, the point that Chen Ming tapped is the location of modern Houston. At this time, it is still a wasteland.

"Where are the fifth and sixth brothers, one in Yatu and the other here."

Yatu is Seattle. Chen Ming can give Seattle to others, but he will not give Vancouver to his brother who has no great feelings. Because the large area north of Vancouver is obviously not conducive to development, at this point in time, those lands are no different from Siberia, all worthless cold wilderness. But in the 20th and 21st centuries, it is a treasure land rich in natural resources.

And another place that Chen Ming pointed his stick at is New Orleans.

New Orleans belongs to New Orleans has a subtropical humid climate, and the local area is rich in sulfur, salt mines, wood, cotton, sugar cane and rice. This is the only highland at the mouth of the Mississippi River, and it was originally the territory of the French. But during the Seven Years' War, a "Fontainebleau Treaty" traded New Orleans to the Spanish as a political gift.

The Spanish have only ruled the area for more than 20 years, and now it is time to change the master again.