Chapter 1124: Carrying on the Past and Opening up the Future (Part 14)
Patting the black cannon body, Gao Yuan looked at Ye Zhong, "Although this thing has been made and its power is acceptable, the cannon body is a bit too heavy, maybe it weighs several thousand kilograms, right?"
Hearing Gao Yuan say that the power is acceptable, the councilors behind him all showed disapproval. If this is just about acceptable power, then what does it mean to be powerful? In their opinion, this is already a rare artifact. .
"The gun body is a bit heavier, but with the roads in our country and the tires that have just been used, it is no problem for two horses to pull this kind of cannon for a hundred miles in a day."
"Did we develop this kind of cannon to fight domestic wars?" Gao Yuan looked at Ye Chong with a half-smile, "Have you considered that in the future our pig-pig island-novel... will basically be on the battlefield? On the enemy's land, as far as I know, there are no roads in their country that are as accessible as our Han Kingdom. Even if there are, they are greatly restricted by the weather. When it rains, the roads will be muddy. A cannon like yours will be immobilized and become a target for your opponent."
"Your Majesty is right!" Ye Chong was stunned for a moment, and the joy he had previously been immersed in the power of this cannon slowly faded away, "I understand what your Majesty means, the weight of this cannon will continue to decrease."
"This is just one aspect. You can open your mind a little more and study other types of artillery. For example, infantry artillery is a small artillery that can be carried by one or two infantrymen and run away. Although it is not powerful, it has great application. In fact, it’s quite extensive, right?” Gao Yuan said with a smile.
Ye Chong's face was filled with confusion, "Your Majesty, I've only been working on this thing for a year or two. How long will it take to develop new cannons?"
Gao Yuan smiled and stroked the still-warm cannon body: "With this successful foundation of research, it will be much easier to develop other categories. Learn from analogies. As the saying goes, if you know everything, you can know everything. Just put down the reward. , those who specialize in this stuff will produce good results that will surprise you."
"Security must be done well this time. The Maowei incident must not happen again. We don't want us to work hard to research this cannon and then turn around and have it taken away again." Wu Kai reminded at the same time. road.
"This cannon is not so easy to get rid of!" Gao Yuan smiled: "Gunpowder is only the most basic thing, the threshold is not high, but if you want to make this cannon, you need a whole set of related industries to cooperate. If they Their iron and steel smelting technology cannot reach our level, and they cannot make this cannon."
"Even so, we must be careful." Jiang Jiaquan thought for a while and said: "Your Majesty, this time we are publicly selling the mining rights of mineral deposits in the three counties of Liaodong. Businessmen have bought the mining rights, and there will naturally be supporting facilities. We need to use the facilities to smelt iron and steel. We can’t rule out that Qin Chu’s spies may be here. Once the technology of iron and steel is opened, it will be much easier for them to learn.”
Gao Yuan scratched his head. Everything has its advantages and disadvantages. It is always impossible to cover everything. Opening up the mining rights of minerals, allowing private participation, and lifting the ban on corresponding technologies will greatly increase domestic production capacity and promote economic development. Great development will also bring more income to the country, but the negative side will also show up. As Jiang Jiaquan said, some of the unique technologies in the past cannot be preserved.
"Sir, you are right, but this matter can only be done through tactics. This time, the Oversight Council should have almost wiped out the people of Heibingtai in the Han Dynasty. If you want to restore your strength, I am afraid it will not be possible in a short time. I think that by the time they gain some strength, we have already pushed them too far away. I will let the Supervisory Yuan pay more attention to this matter later." Gao Yuan said: "When Tang He recovers from his illness , so I asked him to be specifically responsible for this matter."
"Tang He just made these mistakes, so it's okay not to punish him. It's because he worked hard in the past and made great achievements, but he was asked to come out to take charge of such a big thing. Isn't it a bit..." Yan Shenghao frowned.
"The Maowei incident is not just his responsibility!" Gao Yuan shook his head, "Tang He is capable, and he has fallen on this once, so he is more experienced than others. Only those who have failed , only then can I be more alert and motivated to do this well.”
Hearing what Gao Yuan said, Yan Shenghao also shut his mouth. After all, the Supervisory Yuan is not under the control of the Council. It is independently under the direct control of Gao Yuan, and the only one with supervisory power over them is the Grand Council.
With their heads full of excitement, a group of councilors gathered around Gao Yuan and returned to Jicheng from the training ground. Their previous dissatisfaction with Gao Yuan for dragging them out of their busy schedule had long since disappeared. Along the way, everyone was discussing excitedly. Regarding the power of this cannon, Wang Wudi was more concerned about the cost of each cannon. He had been dragging Ye Zhong to discuss this issue, hoping to lower the cost of this cannon.
The current structure of the Han Dynasty is that the councilors are all in charge of their own affairs and are extremely busy, and all the ministries and offices are tense under the watchful eye of the idle councilors. If you reveal some flaws, If something goes wrong, in the big council, a big member will definitely jump out to accuse you, and the accused ministries and offices will have to send people to explain it. If it is indeed a problem, then they will have to come back in disgrace to rectify it.
Therefore, now the chief officials of various ministries and government agencies hate and fear these high-ranking legislators from various states who are resident in Jicheng, but they cannot afford to offend them. They have to do their jobs carefully to avoid being betrayed by them. Poke the ass.
Gao Yuan, who was supposed to be the busiest in the Han Kingdom, was actually the most laid-back person in Jicheng. He held a meeting with the councilors every week to determine the issues that even the councilors couldn't solve. Chief officials, unless there is something particularly important, generally will not go to Gao Yuan, because even if you go, their king may take you back in a few words. As long as it is within the scope of your responsibilities, you will You have to try your best to do it well, and don't expect the king to stand up and support you. If you go to the king every day to complain, you will only leave an impression on the king that your actual work ability is limited.
There is only one month left before the opening of the annual Grand Council. All the councilors are extremely busy, and legislators from various states are beginning to come to Beijing one after another, and more eyes are staring at the ministries and government offices. , the chief officials of each department do not dare to neglect. If these big congressmen catch the mistake, next year's department budget will definitely be reduced, and many planned things will not be carried out smoothly.
This year is a year of earth-shaking changes in the Kingdom of Han. The first is the official implementation of the Patent Law. All inventors will gain huge benefits due to the promulgation of the Patent Law. This has also made the newly established patent offices in various places the busiest departments. , more and more people are pouring into the patent office, hoping to register a patent for something they invented. Many things are ridiculous, but you still have to handle it for him, but Wu Kai was a shrewd businessman after all, and He has been in charge of the party for many years and has rich experience. After a short period of confusion, he boldly ordered that when the inventor registers his patent, in addition to submitting necessary materials, he must also pay a registration fee. The registration fee for each patent is as high as Fifty taels of silver.
This threshold suddenly stops many people, unless the inventor has full confidence that his invention can be actually used and can produce higher benefits than fifty taels of silver. Of course, if you are rich and willing to be a fool, Datou, the Patent Office will not stop you. I will register it for you with fifty taels of silver. As for whether it will make you rich in the future, it is up to you.
In this way, the Patent Office changed from a pure service department to a revenue-generating department, which actually made Wang Wudi of the Ministry of Finance smile crookedly. He hurriedly sent people to each state to review the income of each patent office every quarter. See if they line their own pockets, but it also adds a lot of income to the national treasury.
The second thing that shocked the whole country was Gao Yuan's public auction of various mineral deposits in the three counties of Liaodong. As long as you are a Han citizen, you are eligible to participate in the auction. Of course, you have to pay a sum of money in advance to fully prove your strength and obtain the mining rights. Mine rights, no matter which dynasty or generation they belong to, are a hugely profitable business. There is no shortage of rich people in the Han Kingdom. Through the land reform in recent years, the original big landowners have accumulated a lot of money in their hands, especially the new ones. The big landowners of the original Qi area that returned to the Han Kingdom and the original Wei area had a large amount of cash due to the land reform, but the original business system of the Han Dynasty had made it difficult for them to get involved again, even if they did. Even harvesting was not satisfactory. Gao Yuan's new opening undoubtedly allowed them to see the opportunity to increase their wealth on a large scale. Naturally, they flocked to the three counties of Liaodong to participate in this feast. The scale of this feast was so large that Gao Yuan, the instigator, had not expected it. He had to sigh that the people were really rich now. Such a project that required an investment of at least 100,000 taels of silver in order to benefit from it was also very competitive. Headache and bleeding.
But it's a sigh of relief. As for how busy he is with the work below, Gao Yuan is too lazy to care. He just wants to see the final results. Anyway, judging from the situation reported by the Supervisory Council, Sun Xiao of the Liaodong Protectorate is very busy. There were three heads of government, and the Grand Council and the Supervisory Yuan also sent many people there to ensure that this tender was open, fair, and fair.
Gao Yuan needs to raise enough money in the three counties of Liaodong to ensure the connection of Guoquan's east-west artery, and he also needs a large number of people to flow into the three counties of Liaodong to enrich the population there. The three counties of Liaodong are all good places, how can they be allowed to become What about the land of barbarians that people in the Central Plains talk about? When all this hot money pours into the three counties of Liaodong, earth-shaking changes will inevitably occur there in a short period of time.
At this year's Great Assembly, Gao Yuan is preparing to once again throw out a bill that will shock the world, that is, the inviolable property rights law of private property. If this law is passed by the Great Assembly, even the country will not be able to engulf individual private property at will. , this will be another far-reaching bill and will surely become a milestone in the laws of the Han Kingdom. (To be continued...)