Amidst the excitement, the first day of April finally arrived.

 The holding of the Great Court Meeting was changed from Fengtian Hall to Huangji Hall.

According to the meeting agenda set by Feng Ziying, a ceremony was held first to establish the basic structure of the cabinet and the eight-ministerial prosecutor's office, but then important officials were asked to go overland to Zunhua to visit the Gyeonggi Coal, Iron and Military Industrial Complex, Lulong-Yuguan Ma It takes about four to five days to pull the railway and Yuguan Port, and then take a sea ship from Yuguan Port via Dagu to Tongzhou to return to the capital city.

This arrangement also caused some controversy, but it won unanimous approval within the cabinet. If many people are not allowed to see the changes brought about by the heavy chemical industry in Northland in recent years, it will be difficult to deeply touch them, especially They are many scholars and officials who have been serving as officials in the interior and south.

There are currently only four cabinet ministers in the cabinet. Except for Feng Ziying as the chief assistant, there are only three assistants: Xu Guangqi, Cui Jingrong, and Chai Ke.

Feng Ziying once considered letting Sun Chengzong join the cabinet, but if there were three northern scholars, it would probably cause a lot of criticism. In addition, Sun Chengzong himself preferred to serve as the Minister of War, so the matter was shelved for the time being.

No one has ever experienced such a large court meeting. However, according to Feng Ziying, such a large court meeting may not happen often. Its name should be more appropriately called the Congress. As for the time of the convening, it may be three Once every five years, it will determine the key strategies for the government's governance in the next few years.

A total of more than 120 officials and representatives participated in the visit to the Zunhua Gyeonggi Coal, Iron and Military Industrial Complex. As long as the body can bear it, everyone needs to take a look. Of course, there are indeed many people Not very interested, but since you are going to attend this meeting, you must abide by the meeting rules.

However, these people soon realized that they were wrong because of their contempt. Whether it was coal and iron ore mining, ore dressing and transportation, or blast furnace smelting, they all saw this iron smelting workshop known as the number one in the Zhou Dynasty and even in East Asia. The high efficiency brought by the large-scale assembly line production.

In addition to large-scale and efficient iron smelting workshops, officials and representatives also visited iron factories and military factories. Iron factories only produce civilian iron tools, such as shovels, shovels, hoes, iron pots, firewood (kitchen) knives and other tools. All kinds of iron parts used in shipbuilding and carriages and carts were produced on assembly lines in this type of workshop. The lathes that had begun to be used in large quantities also allowed officials and representatives to see the progress and progress of the Zhou Dynasty in iron-making technology. breakthrough.

As for the military factories, not to mention the assembly line production of various types of firecrackers, especially heavy-duty firecrackers and self-generated firecrackers, no confidentiality measures were adopted, which also allowed officials and representatives to see the confidence of the Zhou Dynasty's military industry.

As for the cement plant, it has aroused the interest of many people. Everyone knows that this industry is currently the most prosperous, and the main production area is in the north. Through sea transportation and canals, it is continuously transported to the south of the Yangtze River, becoming many people in the south of the Yangtze River. It is an indispensable item for wealthy people to build their mansions and castles.

 The horse-drawn train from Lulong to Yuguan became the most curious thing for officials and representatives.

Officials and representatives are asking questions about the capacity and speed of horse-drawn trains and how to miss trains. The cost of building the rails also makes officials and representatives speechless.

However, considering that there are iron smelting workshops in Lulong and Luanzhou, steel production is increasing every year, and if you want to transport it out, it is undoubtedly the most cost-effective to ship it southward through Yuguan Port. So after such calculation, everyone feels that this It’s worth investing a lot of money in advance.

From Lulong to Yuguan, the speeding train can transport hundreds of people in just three hours. This speed and efficiency are simply unbelievable.

At Yuguan Port, everyone can’t believe that ten years ago it was just a small fishing port with only a few fishing boats. Now it has become a bustling commercial port with more than thirty ships entering and leaving the port every day. The corridor is still the eastern Mongolian grassland, or the Jingdong region. It has become a huge material distribution center, radiating to the entire Jingdong, Liaoning and Simondong regions.

Feng Ziying did not go on this trip. For him, these specimens are all familiar to him. He has also ridden the horse-drawn train from Lulong to Yuguan three times and put forward many suggestions for improvement.

Although it will take an extra five or six days, Feng Ziying thinks it is worth it.

Especially officials, gentry and even industry organization representatives from inland areas such as Henan, Shaanxi, Huguang, Sichuan, Yunnan, Guizhou and Guangxi do not understand the rapid development of the outside world. It can be said that the understanding between the two sides is twenty or thirty years apart. It is also normal for some squires to have never left their provinces or even their prefectures in their entire lives. Having such an opportunity allows them to feel the changes in the world around them, and the intuitive impact on them is far greater than ordinary verbal preaching.

Even many officials in the DPRK and China have only a partial understanding of many changes. Only when they see and experience them with their own eyes can they realize the huge gap in their knowledge.

 Board the ship at Yuguan Port, take a sea-going ship to Tongzhou via Dagu, and then return to Beijing from Tongzhou.

 “How do these people feel?” Feng Ziying asked.

As the officials and representatives returned to Beijing, He Fengsheng, who had followed these people for a long time, also returned, and he could be regarded as one of Feng Ziying's "insiders."

 He Fengsheng participated in this imperial meeting as the magistrate of Xuzhou in the Southern Zhili Province.

“I have to say, Ziying, your skills are quite impressive.” He Fengsheng praised him with excitement on his face.

"The blast furnace of the iron smelting workshop was so shocking to people. Watching the molten iron flowing out turning into fine steel, watching the firecrackers being forged, and the rails, everyone's eyes were opened. I can't believe that rails are used to pave roads, and the land is covered for hundreds of miles. I am counting on my fingers how much kilograms such a long rail will be, and if it is distributed to the people in the area, how much can each person get? Is it cost-effective? A good deal,…”

 Feng Ziying laughed. This was definitely a shocking move in this era.

Anyone who sees it can't help but reflect, is it possible that the Zhou Dynasty has become so prosperous that it can even lay iron materials that were difficult for ordinary people to hold on the ground for use as roads? You know In this era, many families cannot even own a kitchen knife or a pot, but here, hundreds of miles of railway track weighs ten pounds per foot!

It can be said that in the face of this "unparalleled wonder", no one can resist the visual impact, especially when sitting on this horse-drawn train and running for hundreds of miles to the destination, without feeling any bumps at all, and feeling relaxed and happy. After completing the journey, the impact is even greater when we think about the mobilization of the army, the transportation of massive supplies, and the connection between land and sea.

"I also guessed that the biggest impact would be on the railway tracks. In the future, from Zunhua to Lulong and from Tongzhou to Lulong, these railway tracks will be used to connect. In this way, the entire Gyeonggi coal-iron military-industrial complex will be connected with the two major coal and iron military-industrial complexes around Gyeonggi. The terminals can be completely connected. Whether it is materials arriving from Yuguan or Tongzhou terminal, or various products produced by the Gyeonggi coal, iron and military industrial complex, they can be transported at any time at Yuguan and Tongzhou terminals. Loading and boarding ships, which will greatly improve commercial operations in the entire Gyeonggi region,…”

Feng Ziying is also very interested. This is what he needs. Only by letting the officials and gentry in the inland areas feel the tremendous changes brought about by the rapid development of industry and commerce in a region, as well as the huge business opportunities and wealth gains opportunities contained here, Only these people will shake their original inherent thinking and seriously think about whether and how to change.

Feng Ziying does not expect that everyone can change their ways and join this era of change just because of this visit, but it will definitely have a considerable effect, and this kind of change is often realized gradually by gathering sand into towers and armies into feathers. From quantitative change to qualitative change, and I still have plenty of time to promote this change process.

"Ziying, let alone them, even I have heard all this from you a long time ago, and it's just as touching. I talked about it with some colleagues and many gentry, and we all found it incredible. But after careful consideration, I felt that It is indeed possible to do this. In the long run, it is indeed cost-effective. Of course, this situation cannot be universal. Only regions like Gyeonggi, where the volume of goods entering and exiting is huge, and the production capacity of iron materials happens to be huge, can they dare to use it. This kind of railway track may not be feasible in other places..."

He Fengsheng is still very keenly aware of this point.

"Well, being aware of this is considered thoughtful, but as the production of iron materials continues to increase, and many areas within our country are becoming more and more busy in transporting goods, there will always be more and more road sections that require this kind of high efficiency. Large-volume transportation methods can solve the needs of bottleneck areas. For example, you can go from Xuzhou to Yangzhou by water, but what about Jinan to Dongchangfu, or Jinan to Dengzhou? What about Foshan to Guangzhou? "

Feng Ziying nodded, "The liberation and development of productivity will inevitably make many goods that were originally very expensive become increasingly popular or cheap. I believe that with the popularization of blast furnace technology, more and more steel workshops will They are constantly being built in various places, and the output will become larger and larger. You can go to the Ministry of Industry to check that the current national steel output is three times that of the fourth year of Wantong, and ten times that of the twelfth year of Yonglong. , one hundred and twenty times that of the first year of Yonglong. The huge changes in this process are unimaginable for ordinary people, but as a first-level official, you should understand the impact this change will have on society..."

He Fengsheng was convinced.

Before he went to visit, Feng Ziying had a special talk with him, Wu Di and others to let them feel the changes that may be brought about by the development of industry and commerce. At the same time, he should also use this visit and the conversations with officials and gentry from all parties in the past few days. , bringing these thinking concepts to other people, touching them, and making them reflect, this is what Feng Ziying wants to achieve. (End of chapter)