Chapter 329 Bus Line and Smokey Monkey
After the first steam locomotive began to run successfully outside Yongding Gate, Xu Jie, the prime minister of Shuntian Prefecture, prepared to purchase a batch of steam locomotives to replace the original carriage and horse racing.
This can not only improve the transportation in the capital, but also save transportation costs for the people.
For the people at the bottom of the capital, in the past, a carriage could carry only a small number of people, so the cost shared equally among individuals was high. But now, if Shuntian Prefecture changes public transportation to steam locomotives, a large steam locomotive can carry If there are more than a dozen or even dozens of people, the cost shared equally among individuals will be lower.
In this way, many civilians who could not afford carriages and horses no longer need to walk on foot. Especially after heavy snow covers the capital city in winter, people can switch from walking to traveling by car, which can effectively and greatly facilitate people's lives.
“Dear colleagues, promoting steam locomotives will not only allow more people to travel by train and improve the chaos of chaotic and arbitrarily charged carriages, but also improve the sanitary conditions of the capital;
The major streets in the capital are littered with horse manure every day due to the large number of vehicles and horses. When it rains or snows, the city is filled with filth, making it difficult to even get off the ground. Last year, a plague even broke out because of this. Fortunately, in Under the guidance, it was brought under control in time by spreading lime and strengthening sanitation management;
But for this reason, sixteen people died and the financial loss reached 560,000 silver dollars. Now just to clean up these horse manure, Shuntian Mansion spends nearly one million silver dollars every year! If we promote steam locomotives, we can avoid urban pollution caused by horse manure, reduce the cost of street cleaning, and effectively avoid the occurrence of more plagues. ”
Xu Jie strongly advocated the promotion of steam locomotives at his Shuntian Mansion meeting, and officially prepared to order a batch of steam locomotives for public transportation.
After Zhu Houzhao heard about it, he strongly supported Xu Jie's behavior of keeping up with the times. Therefore, he invested 300,000 silver dollars from the Royal Taxation Bureau's internal funds to participate in the shares and supported Xu Jie's purchase of steam locomotives to establish the Shuntianfu Public Transport Company.
As soon as the emperor invested, other chaebols also followed suit. They all seemed to regard the emperor as Buffett of the Ming Dynasty. But because of this, Xu Jie's Shuntianfu Public Transport Company received an initial investment of no less than one million yuan, and it was also officially approved by the Royal Industrial Company. A batch of steam locomotives were purchased, and a group of drivers trained by the Royal Industrial Company were also recruited.
This day.
The first batch of steam locomotives in Shuntianfu were officially put into operation. Although many people came to watch the steam locomotives again, they were still a little timid and did not dare to go up.
After entering the city, worker Liu Fu wanted to find a horse and carriage agency to take a bus to Deshengmen, but he accidentally discovered that the sign at the bus stop above said "Yongdingmen" station, and he became curious for a moment.
As soon as Liu Fugang walked onto the platform, he took a few glances at the painting of a lady bathing on the platform. At this time, he didn't know it was an advertisement. He saw the maid holding soap in her hand, with the words "Thirty-seven precious medicinal materials, drive away" written next to it. Crow's feet" and other advertising slogans.
This era is not yet the Internet era. When he was about to go to Deshengmen as soon as possible to visit Miss Xiaoli in Liuyue Pavilion, he heard a clang, and then he saw a steam locomotive appearing in front of him.
The door of the steam locomotive suddenly opened. Inside, a young woman wearing a blue cloth cardigan and an ebony hairpin opened the door gracefully and asked Liu Fu and a group of workers behind him: "Is anyone getting on the train?" ”
Liu Fu looked at the black and shiny steam locomotive, just like when he saw his wife taking off her clothes on a wedding night. He couldn't help but stretched out his hand, but he still pulled it back suddenly. Now he heard this young woman say this Asked, he asked curiously: "Sister, can I go up?"
Liu Fu smiled honestly as he spoke, and then pointed to the car.
This young woman is naturally a conductor. Starting from the Zhengde Dynasty in the Ming Dynasty, as the status of Cheng-Zhu Neo-Confucianism was gradually affected, the idea of differentiating men and women gradually became more popular. Except for some traditional scholar-bureaucrats who still insisted that women stay at home, the court had Women are allowed to go to school and work, and special schools for women have been established. In addition, some positions are also open to women.
Now this young woman is obviously a woman who has received some education in the new era. Although she is currently just a conductor, her appearance really surprised the people outside the car. Even Liu Fu felt a little ashamed in front of her. stand up.
The young woman nodded: "Anyone can go up, the fare is two cents per person, no matter how far the destination is from here."
After speaking, the young woman looked at the mechanical clock on the car, and then shouted: "The train will leave in half an hour, is there anyone on the train?"
When Liu Fu heard what the young woman said, he hurriedly held the door and got into the car, but he kept touching the railing on the door and refused to let go. He was still smiling, as happy as touching his wife's hand.
In the eyes of ordinary people like Liu Fu, it was obvious that only officials could ride on this kind of iron carriage, but they did not expect that now common people like themselves could ride on it, so they were all very excited.
Some people have clearly arrived at the station, but they still refuse to get off the bus. They are not willing to get off until they reach the terminal station. They seem to think that this is the only way to make a difference, and then they would rather walk back from afar.
Because of this, when the first batch of steam locomotives operated as public transportation arrived at the terminal, they were packed with people. Although the riding experience was not good, the people on the train were very satisfied and began to talk about it. stand up.
So, after people spread the word, more people came to take the steam locomotive the next day, and some crowding accidents even occurred. It was not until a few days later that people began to ride the steam locomotive in a normal and orderly manner. Where should they get off? Where to go when the time comes.
In any case, the operation of steam locomotives was very successful. The people quickly accepted this new thing, and the transportation and sanitation in the capital did change a lot. Every day, steam locomotives can be seen in major streets in the capital. Traveling on main roads and suburban main roads, each station has become a new landmark.
As a result, carriage and horse shops were gradually eliminated, but all walks of life in the capital were very developed, and the elimination of a certain trade did not cause much change.
At this time, officials in the capital also began to use steam locomotives, an emerging form of transportation, to go to court.
Because Zhu Houzhao specially approved the opening of a steam locomotive bus line between the Meridian Gate and Daming Gate in the capital, specifically responsible for transporting these courtiers to the court in the morning, it made it much more convenient for the courtiers to go to court, especially for some of the lower-ranking officials. Officials used to have to get up in the middle of the night to rush to the imperial city, basically not having a good night's sleep.
But now, with this dedicated bus line, even if these low-level officials can't take a nap in a sedan like the important ministers of the court, they can now take a nap in a steam locomotive, and they don't have to get up so early, which is undoubtedly a lot more convenient.
Therefore, when the Forbidden City dedicated bus line was opened, many officials were in favor of it.
However, there are also more conservative officials who cannot accept the operation of steam locomotives in the inner city, saying that it damages the solemnity. Yu Xuan, the Li Keqiang, bluntly said that it is unseemly, and would rather continue walking than ride a steam locomotive. Express your anger about the Forbidden City bus line.
However, this period of time coincided with the royal title ceremony for the emperor's eldest son Zhu Zailei and others, so there were many court meetings about etiquette and the like, so Yu Xuan was miserable as a result. At this time, Xu Jie, the Prime Minister of Shuntian Prefecture, was sitting in the warm spring steam locomotive, enjoying the special refreshments, holding the heater in his hand, talking about the Spring Festival public security and firefighting work with several fellow Shuntian Prefecture officials, and from time to time Glancing out the window, he couldn't help but smile when he saw Li Ke, who was still coughing despite the wind and snow.
"Yu Geishi is really brave! I would rather freeze to death than accept even a cent of the emperor's favor!"
Immediately, Xu Jie said something loudly while Yu Xuan was passing by him. After hearing this, Yu Xuan might have figured something out, or maybe he couldn't bear the severe cold in winter, so he ran away directly with the steam locomotive. He got up, and when the steam locomotive stopped at the next stop, he hurriedly stood up: "Yu dare not not accept the emperor's favor!"
All the officials smiled coldly and said nothing.
Zhu Houzhao also learned about this in the morning, and because of this, he couldn't help but lament that some people are just too stubborn and are not willing to accept new things until everyone has already accepted them and he himself has to accept them.
But no matter what, in the face of the general trend, stubborn people cannot stop the changes in the empire.
Moreover, the Forbidden City bus line also improved the political efficiency of the empire, significantly reducing the lateness rate for imperial court meetings.
The emergence of steam locomotives means that the emergence of steam trains is no longer a problem.
In fact, steam trains are also steam locomotives.
After the court meeting, Xu Jie was retained by the cabinet to participate in the court discussion, which was also attended by officials from the Ministry of Industry, the Academy of Engineering, and the Infrastructure Bureau. The topic of the discussion was naturally about the construction of the first railway in the Ming Dynasty.
Steam locomotives have already appeared, so there is no problem in manufacturing a steam train power system.
As for rail laying, engineering construction and management, Daming has accumulated a lot of experience because it has been conducting higher education for more than 30 years, and the Daming Engineering Institute has already begun to have experience in rail laying, so there is no problem.
Right now it's just a matter of transitioning from experimentation to actual operations.
According to the final result of the court discussion, a railway track was first laid between Beijing and Tongzhou for trial operation as an attempt to build the first railway in the Ming Dynasty.
Zhu Houzhao approved this proposal. Today, the main transportation in the Ming Dynasty includes sea transportation, water transportation, and land transportation, and no matter which mode of transportation needs to be gathered in Tongzhou, therefore, if a railway is built between Tongzhou and Beijing, it will undoubtedly be beneficial to the Ming Dynasty. Improve transportation efficiency on the busiest transportation lines.
In recent years, there have been too many projects in Ming Dynasty, so the supply of human resources is slightly insufficient, and the prisoners captured from Jiaozhi just made up for this shortcoming.
At this time, Xu Jie, the prime minister of Shuntian Prefecture, purchased 20,000 Jiaozhi natives from Yan Song, the governor of Jiaozhi. These Jiaozhi natives were transported to Tongzhou by water transport. Except for more than 400 people who died on the road due to various reasons, most of the Jiaozhi natives All the strong laborers were transported to Beijing.
"Assign them the most tiring work. They need to work for more than six hours a day. Now the project is tight and we cannot let them idle!"
After Xu Jie looked at the group of Jiaozhi natives imported from Jiaozhi and gave his orders, the supervisors under him began to lead these Jiaozhi natives to get work clothes and food, and the so-called food was naturally nothing more than steamed buns and sweet potatoes.
Basically, after eating, these Jiaozhi natives were whipped by the supervisors and entered the construction site to start work, such as moving rail steel, transporting sand and gravel, etc., while the Han workers were responsible for installing screws and specific technical work, or mixing cement, etc.
……
After the empire's southern corps had begun to basically occupy the entire territory of the Ruan family in southern Cochin, Gui E finally found no reason to continue stalling with the envoy sent by Mo Dengyong, and finally threw out the bottom line, that is, The Mo family was required to retire in the capital of the Ming Dynasty and serve as idle ministers, so the officials were re-appointed by the Ministry of Civil Affairs of the Ming Dynasty. This actually meant that the Mo family and his ruling group lost the power to rule northern Cochin.
Naturally, Mo Dengyong rejected the Ming Dynasty's intention to actually occupy northern Cochin, and also realized the Ming Dynasty's real plan, so he began to proactively contact the Ruan family, expressing his willingness to deprive himself of the throne and re-claim vassalage to Li Zhuang Zong.
But by this time it was already too late. The Ming Dynasty's Southern Front Corps had already surrounded Ruan's headquarters.
At this time, Ruan also took out his last elite soldier - the elephant soldiers.
Yu Dayou and others, who had always been the vanguard, were indeed shocked when they saw the monkey soldiers riding huge elephants in front of them. However, thanks to the appearance of newspapers and periodicals, they were no strangers to elephants. In addition, they Prior to this, they knew that there were elephant soldiers in Jiaozhi through the information provided by the Jin Yiwei. Therefore, although the Ming army was shocked, they did not feel scared. Instead, taking advantage of the weather getting hotter and entering the rainforest area, they directly started firing incendiary bombs to attack the enemy. The entire rainforest burned.
Because the current artillery of the Ming Dynasty has rifling, it means higher range and accuracy. Coupled with the emergence of guncotton, the propellant has been improved a lot, so this kind of mountain mortar can also be operated. In fact, The Ming Dynasty itself also had a mortar-like device in the later period, but now it is just closer. The characteristic of the Ming Dynasty's weapon development is its multi-directional development. Although it is not professional and proficient, it is still a sparrow with all the internal organs.
The incendiary bombs fired from the Ming Dynasty's simple mortars went directly around the jungle and into the elephant herd, igniting the dead branches and leaves in the forest. Suddenly, the entire rainforest turned into a smoky world. .
Yu Dayou and other Ming soldiers only looked at these monkey soldiers with binoculars. The elephants sitting on them couldn't stand the smoke or fire and ran away.
As a result, many monkey soldiers fell down and were either trampled into pieces by elephants, grilled, or smoked like bacon.
The Ming army just retreated a certain distance, and when some monkey soldiers who were about to be roasted or smoked ran out, they immediately captured them and took them to concentration camps to prepare for use as coolies or serfs.
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(End of chapter)