The Most Romantic of the Three Kingdoms Chapter 203

The so-called "the number of people in ancient times is the wealth of the country", the number of household registration is directly related to the wealth and poverty of the ancient country, and it is also directly related to whether Xuzhou can force the army to eat enough. matter very seriously.

After discussing with Xun Yu and deciding on several ways to increase the hukou, Xun Zhen read the books about Tianmu.

The people are the foundation of the country, and the fields are the foundation of the people.

Without sufficient fields and grain yields, the people would not be able to be prosperous, and secondly, they would not be able to support soldiers.

Since this dynasty, the total number of cultivated fields has been around seven million hectares in most periods, sometimes more, sometimes less. Xuzhou is not a top-ranked state in the world, and cannot be compared with the mainland. However, compared with the previous Han Dynasty, agriculture has made great progress and progress. In Taiping, there are hundreds of thousands of hectares of fertile fields in the state. If there is less, there will be less fields to be cultivated.

Due to the widespread use of iron farm implements, cattle farming, etc., as well as the popularization of the substitute field method and the implementation of the district field method, the amount of grain produced per mu of the Han family has been greatly improved compared with the pre-Qin period. The grain yields four stones, and the middle field also has three stones.

Xun Zhen read the books, and the state government calculated that Xuzhou's total grain output last year was less than 200 million shi, and the Han system's land tax was 30 yuan. , which is much less than usual.

Because the prefect of the prefecture only had the power to supervise the chief officials of the state, the county, and the county, but not the military and political power, the grain, money and other taxes received by the county did not need to be deported to the state, and the same was true of the original Xuzhou. It was not until Tao Qian took charge of Xuzhou that he had to fight against the Yellow Turbans in the early stage and needed money and grain to build up the army, so the state government gradually controlled the grain and money income of some counties in the state, but during Tao Qian's period, he did not It can take all the money and grain of the county and the state in the state, but there are still some counties that are out of control and not under control.

For example, when Xun Zhen was the prefect of Guangling, Tao Qian asked Guangling for food and money many times. For example, in the country of Langya, the grain and money are all harvested into the Taishan army barracks, and the state capital cannot get it. Why did Yinde attack the soldiers of Mount Tai? One of the main reasons is that he is a dignified prime minister, but he has no control over the money, grain and wealth of the county. Tao Qian sent Zhe Rong to Xiapi to be the prime minister of the state, and asked him to supervise the three counties of Xiapi, Guangling, and Pengcheng.

Of course, compared with Tao Qian's time, the situation in the prefecture is much better now: at least there is no problem with the receipt of money and grain in the three counties of Donghai, Xiapi and Guangling. Ba was transferred from Langya, used Xun Cheng to enter the town of Langya, and then appointed Chen Deng as the Prime Minister of Langya, although the daily supply and demand of Taishan soldiers were still from Langya, the prefecture did not accept half a grain of grain or a penny. Not anymore. As for Pengcheng, Xun Zhen has already completed the deployment in the military, which has suppressed and deterred Pengcheng. Next, he will start to attack Pengcheng in the aspect of money and grain collection.

In short, for the moment alone, more than three-fifths of the state's four million stone and field taxes last year could be captured by the state government, but not all of these three-fifths of the land tax could be collected. State got it.

First, counties should keep some of them for themselves.

One is to pay monthly stipends to county officials.

The county officials are all provided by the county magistrates themselves, so the monthly salary is not paid by the state, but from the county, and the same is true for the county. This is also one of the reasons why people at that time "respected the county as the country", the establishment of the county was established by the county, and the distribution of salaries was also performed by the county.

The monthly salary of officials in the former Han Dynasty was mainly based on money. Before the Ming Emperor, the influence of war and chaos had not disappeared due to the initial establishment of the country. Grain was expensive and money was cheap. The monthly salary of officials was mainly based on grain. Give money, half of it is for grain, such as Baishili, who gets 800 yuan per month, four stone and eight buckets of rice. This "four stone and eight buckets" is not coarse grain, but the refined grain after shelling and peeling, that is, a Hundred-stone officials need to give monthly salary of more than fifty-seven shi each year, usually a county temple, from Gong Cao, chief clerk to the lowest-level secretary, including township-level officials, there are as many as nearly 800 people, such as Luoyang There are a total of 796 officials in the county establishment, and there are at least one or two hundred people. Not all of them are a hundred stone or more, but the total monthly salary is not small.

The monthly salary is a part of the expenditure, and the other is the "lunar eclipse", that is, the officials with the "rank" or above in the county temple can eat for free in the county kitchen of the county temple. "Having rank" means having a certain rank, and the appointment must go through at least the prefecture and have a seal. When Xun Zhen was a Qiang husband in Xixiang earlier, what he did was "a rank husband", which was higher than that of Xiaoxiang who did not call him "a rank", but only called him "a rank husband".

Every five days has a rest day. Except for the rest day, the work and rest of the county officials are mostly in the county temple. Down, there is a lot of food.

The monthly salary and the lunar eclipse are all expenses for the officials, and secondly, there are the expenses for postage.

The cost of postal transportation is very large. If the postal transmission building is damaged, it needs to be repaired. This is about money, let alone food. The postage requires different standards of food supply according to the grade of the other party. The low-level officials are given three liters of rice for each meal. The high-level officials not only provide rice, but also meat and even wine. In addition, they also need to supply horse food, which is usually At the same time, corn is not only used to supply food for the horses that travel to and from officials, but also many horses that are self-supported by postage. It is three stones each of millet and shu.

The food and ingredients supplied to officials and horses are also refined grains.

In addition to monthly stipends and postage expenses, there are also expenses for relief and pensions.

When Xun Zhen and Xun Yu were discussing ways to increase their hukou just now, one of them was to allow the refugees to return to their hometowns, and the counties and counties could borrow crops and food. The "seeds" and "food" were both produced by the counties. The purpose of "loaning crops and food" is to resettle the refugees. In addition, there is also relief. If the refugees pass through the county, or the people in the county are short of food, the county and temple will provide food relief. To make trouble.

In terms of pensions, it is mainly aimed at the elderly, weak and widows. Xun Zhen taught that the county should honor the elderly according to the "monthly decree", and asked the elderly over 70 in the county to also give rice and meat wine. from the county.

In addition to monthly stipends, postage expenses, relief, and pensions, when there is a major project in the county that requires corvée labor, no money is given, and meals are always taken care of, which is also a food expense.

There are all kinds of things, and a county's annual expenditure on food is not a small number.

Secondly, just like the county, the county should keep a portion of its grain when it goes to the county.

When the world is in peace, the food expenditures in the county are similar to those in the county, except that there is no cost for postage, mainly monthly salary, lunar eclipse, etc. Compared with the amount of county officials in a county, the amount of county officials is also similar. Large counties have more than a thousand officers, and small counties have hundreds of officers. In times of war, the county will have to spend a lot more than the county, and that is military spending. After Le Jin officially took office in Xiapi, Xun Zhen authorized him to form a county soldier, and the daily needs of this county soldier were paid from the money and grain income of Xiapi county.

Excluding all the expenses of the county, and excluding the part of the county that is reserved for emergency use, the state government can now obtain a total of more than one million stone of coarse grains next year.

This number is very small.

The expenditures of the state capital are mainly in two parts. First, like the county, it pays the monthly salaries and eclipses of the state officials. Second, although there are no expenses such as postage and relief, there are military expenditures.

A foot soldier needs about two shi of grain per month, 24 shi in a year, or 20 shi in less, and 10,000 people need more than 200,000 shi of grain a year. Xun Zhen lived frugally when he was in Guangling. Use, in the case of vigorously colonizing the fields, a total of more than 20,000 soldiers were raised. After Xuzhou was conquered, Tao Qian's Danyang soldiers, Xuzhou soldiers and Zherong's Xiapi soldiers** estimated that there were thousands of soldiers. At present, there are more than 30,000 soldiers. , One year needs more than 600,000 stone of military ration. This is only the consumption of the infantry, and the horses of the cavalry. One horse needs a month, if there is enough forage, it needs five stones of Chujing, and nearly one stone of grain. If no forage is used and all grain is used, the food for one month will be used as a soldier for a year. After receiving Tao Qian's cavalry troops After the war horse, Xun Zhen now has more than 3,000 cavalry, more than 1,000 spare war horses, and needs more than 80,000 stone a year.

With the combination of foot and cavalry, Xun Zhen's current military expenditure for a year is only about 700,000 shi.

The monthly salaries and eclipse expenses of state officials are not counted. The military salaries of lieutenant generals, colonels, and military officials are more than 2,000 shi, that is, above the captain. The total annual military stipend of military officials above the senior level is very large.

In addition to these, Xunzhen has already distributed the eliminated prisoners of Xuzhou soldiers to Jiang Qin and Zaozhi to expand the scale of the farmland. Because Le Jin and others have just arrived in office, he was busy with statistics in this county. Hukou, farmland and other data, the fields required for the farms have not been handed over to Jiang Qin and Zaozhi, so these prisoners who are about to be transferred to the farms, Xun Zhen still has to keep them, and even after they are transferred to the farms, the beginning There would be no harvest either, Xun Zhen still had to support them, and also had to give them grain and seeds.

More than a million stone grains are really not enough.

Fortunately, in the past few years when Tao Qian was the prefect of the prefecture, he had been extortionate and reckless, hoarding a lot of grain in the prefecture warehouse, Zherong was also as fierce as a tiger, and there was also a lot of grain storage in the Xiapi County warehouse. , there is no fear of food shortages in the short term.

However, it is not enough to only look at the short-term and not the long-term.

After reading the general book, and reading the separate books of fields and acres of each county and country, Xun Zhen said: "Although Pengcheng is narrow, there are tens of thousands of acres of land. Wen Ruo, I want to order Xue Pengcheng to immediately release 300,000 shi of grain and send it to him. State capital, do you think you will ask him for too much?"

Xun Yu couldn't help laughing and said: "Although Pengcheng has tens of thousands of hectares of land, there are not so many currently used for farming. Xue Pengcheng raised more than 10,000 soldiers at most, and there are still thousands of them today, with an annual need of 200,000 shi The county officials and military officials receive a lot of monthly salaries each year, and they have deported a lot to the state government before, so I don't think there will be much leftover food in his county warehouse.”

"Then two hundred thousand stones."

"200,000 stone, he should be able to take it out." Xun Yu paused, then said, "Your Majesty, asking Pengcheng for grain is only a matter of urgency. The most urgent task is to cultivate more fertile fields and harvest them."

Those who have good fields are also on the fields. Now that the labor force is insufficient, it is necessary to work **** the advantages and disadvantages of the fields. The upper field of 100,000 mu can receive 100,000 more stone grains than the middle field of 100,000 acres, and the yield of 100,000 hectares can be increased by millions of stone grains.

"What's the best way to do it, sir?"

"Xuzhou Duoshuipi, in the first year of Zhanghe, Ma Bowei revived the lake and irrigated more than 20,000 hectares of fields. In the first year of Han'an, Zhang Wenji opened ditches to divert water, so that the fields were irrigated and the rice was abundant. When I was in Guangling, I had seen the ruins on the spot, and the benefits of digging and irrigation benefited today. From the humble point of view, the state government can send officials to inspect the state, depending on the suitability of the soil and fields, and follow the actions of the former sages. Good land."

Ma Bowei is the grandson of Ma Yuan, and he is of the same clan as the great Confucian scholar Ma Rong. Zhang Wenji is a descendant of Zhang Liang. 's performance.

Xun Zhen said in his heart: "Building water conservancy is a major event for the benefit of the country and the people. If I have this policy, I will follow it." When he was in Guangling, he thought about building water conservancy, but the main goal at that time was to win Xuzhou. Therefore, this matter has not been put into practice. Now that Xuzhou has entered the hands, we can allocate energy and people's strength to carry out water conservancy construction.

Xun Zhen pondered and said: "If you want to do something, you must first have someone. Can someone recommend you enough to take on this responsibility?"

Building water conservancy is a professional job, and people who don't know how to do it can't do it well, so if you want to do it well, you must first find a suitable professional.

Xun Yu said: "I tried to discuss water affairs with Du Ye, and I benefited a lot. Yu thought that Du Ye could be appointed."

Superintendent Pu Hu, he and Yao Sheng are half fellows. His ancestral home is Julu, but he was born in Wu County. His grandfather was a magistrate in Wu County. It was at that time that his grandfather died of illness and took office. He returned to his hometown from his father. Com and Chang, Shizhouzhong, the provincial governor recommended him, worshipped him as a man, and went to fill the Zhongqiu county magistrate. When he was serving as the Zhongqiu county magistrate, Xun Zhen went to Zhao State to serve as a lieutenant, and the two met because of this. In the middle of Chuping, he and Handan Rong went to Yingchuan to cast Xunzhen, and after fighting against Dong, he followed Xunzhen to Guangling. Because he was familiar with smelting matters, Xunzhen appointed him as the superintendent of the army, and he was now in charge of the army. The smelting of weapons.

Xun Zhen smiled and said, "It fits his words."

Puhu has the word Guanshui, and the name has water, and the word has water, and it is "guanshui". It is mainly used for water conservancy, at least the name is very suitable.

Xun Yu also laughed.

Xun Zhen continued, "It's just that military affairs are related to military equipment. This is a top priority. If he is assigned to build water conservancy projects, who can temporarily lead the work?"

"Wei Guang, the commander of Zhaoxin, has been the deputy of the Duye for a long time. I asked the Duye and said that he is quite skilled in smelting and can take him on his behalf."

"Okay, then let the shogunate pass the order, and ask Guan Shui to listen to your dispatch, so that the public servant will temporarily lead the smelting."

The construction of water conservancy projects is a long-term project, and it takes only one year to see results. Xun Yu still has two ideas for agricultural affairs, and now he will tell Xun Zhen separately.

Chapter end