Chastity Layman

Since the Zhenguan period of the Tang Dynasty, the world has been stable and the people's lives have become better and better, so the demand for iron pots has naturally increased greatly.

Compared with clay pots, iron pots are of course of great superiority. People who have money in their hands want to change to iron pots.

In the same way, Hu merchants also saw the excellent quality of Guangguo, especially compared to the West, let alone, the products are better and cheaper, and the profit of selling Guangguo is not worse than selling spices. Who doesn't want to sell?

All the pot factories in Foshan are surrounded by Datang and Huren traders every day, shouting for orders, cash, or even extra money.

As for the iron pot factories, they sent people to various raw material factories such as iron frying factories to grab goods every day, and at the same time they went everywhere to recruit people. If they couldn't recruit skilled workers, they recruited apprentices.

It is said that the business of Guangzhou Yaxing is booming now, and they have received many commissions from Foshan, and they have gone to Chang'an, Luoyang and other places to dig out those skilled blacksmiths.

The wages offered are quite astonishing, and all the blacksmiths in Chang'an are tempted.

Foshan has a large number of new workers joining every day. At the beginning of the year, there were only less than 20,000 industrial workers. Now, it has increased to 30,000. It is still difficult to recruit people. Otherwise, there may be more than 50,000 people up.

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Now it's the Qin family's orders, and they have to queue up. The Qin family's sugar industry needs to order a large number of super-large iron pots, but each iron factory can only take the orders to queue up, and they are out of stock.

"Is there no one in Foshan to cause trouble?" Qin Lang asked the county magistrate of Foshan.

This county magistrate is an official transferred from Chang'an. He is a decent son of a noble family. He was born in a famous family. He passed the imperial examination and was admitted to the secretary province. , but it was planned hard by his family for him. This is because Qin Lang was the chief examiner of the imperial examination before, and his family was also married to Boling Cui, so the relationship can be regarded as connected with Qin Lang.

At the beginning, the family sought the post of Foshan county magistrate for him, and it was precisely because they saw the difference in this Foshan county. Who established it in Foshan County? Qin Lang, why set up a county? Foshan smelting.

As for Foshan Iron Industry, it was jointly established by local tyrants in the south of the Five Ridges and noble nobles in the Central Plains. It was led by Qin Lang, so of course there is something wrong with talking about it.

Facts have also proved that Foshan Iron Industry has only been two years old, and its scale and rate of return have already made everyone involved laugh from ear to ear, and the achievements of the Foshan county magistrate are naturally very conspicuous.

With such a strong background, although Foshan Iron Industry is now envied, who would dare to cause trouble?

Qin Lang, the prime minister of the current dynasty, took the lead, and the prime ministers Changsun Wuji, Qin Qiong, Fang Xuanling, Ma Zhou, Gao Shilian, and even the Du family, who had two husbands, also participated in the shares. Which family, such as the Pei family, the Cui family, etc., has no share.

Not to mention, there are also Donggong, Taijigong, and Daminggong grandsons and grandsons, each of whom has a share of dry stock. The capital is not invested, but dividends can be distributed every year.

With this background, who has the guts to seek trouble?

Even if Prime Minister Wei Zheng didn't take a stake or participate, he would never get involved here. Hou Junji was jealous for not being able to get involved, but he didn't dare to confront so many people.

Not to mention, the Foshan iron smelting industry designed by Qin Lang was intensified, and he specially reserved a share for the Guangzhou government and the Shibo Department. Now there is an official background, and it is a government-owned shareholding cooperation transaction.

It is precisely because of this that Foshan Township has been able to expand so rapidly in the past two years, because the Guangzhou government fully supports it, asks for land to give land, and even sends troops to garrison and patrol to ensure law and order.

As for the big and powerful families, who has the best hands and eyes, craftsmen, materials, transportation, etc., each of them contributed their efforts, not to mention, the first batch of orders actually came from various internal shareholders.

Without such a strong background, how could this Foshan become the iron smelting center in the south of the Tang Dynasty all of a sudden? In this way, Hou Junji would often take eye drops in the court hall, telling the emperor that iron is the country's strategy. Materials, now that Lingnan has such a big iron smelting town, there are hidden dangers.

It is also said that Foshan processed a large amount of precious iron materials into various iron wares such as iron pots and pots, and then sold them to Hu merchants and shipped them overseas. This is the loss of precious iron materials in the Tang Dynasty. It even suggested that Foshan should not be allowed to make ironware at all, and only iron materials should be smelted, and then the iron materials should be transported to Luoyang, Chang'an, and a special iron warehouse should be set up for storage.

Of course, such a proposal was not adopted by the emperor, not only because Foshan Tiezhen involved too many people's interests, but also because Qin Lang gave the emperor a memorandum, which explained with very detailed diagrams and data, the benefits and benefits of Foshan Tiezhen. cons.

The establishment of Foshan Iron Town did not actually lead to the loss of national strategic material iron and the reduction of reserves. On the contrary, it greatly promoted the mining and smelting of iron ore, the production and sales of iron tools, and trained a large number of skilled iron smelters. Reserve a large number of excellent craftsmen for the country.

Not to mention, at the same time that Foshan ironware is exported, there is still a large amount of domestic sales. The newly built iron mines in the upper reaches of Foshan Iron Industry also hand over iron materials to the imperial court in proportion to the imperial court's mining law. In the iron warehouse of the transshipment department.

The result was the rise of Foshan iron smelting town. The country did not need to spend money, and a large number of skilled iron smelting craftsmen were added. At the same time, the demand for iron materials increased, which promoted the prospecting and mining of iron ore, increased mining income, and increased reserves in the imperial iron warehouse.

No one was at a disadvantage, and even Foshan Town increased its tax payment by one million guan a year. The Guangzhou government and the Shibo Division also have a share, and they can also share a lot of profits.

With so many benefits, no matter how much Hou Junji said, he couldn't change the emperor's mind.

Wherever the interests come, gold and stone are opened.

From the emperor to the family of important ministers, to local powerful merchants, and even the common people, craftsmen and workers in Guangzhou, they are very happy to see this new iron town.

Not only the 30,000 workers in various iron factories in Foshan have benefited, but also countless people in the upstream and downstream industries are now relying on Foshan for food. Those who sell pot, those merchants, and even the farmers around Guangzhou, now many of them grow and sell vegetables for Foshan, and their income has greatly increased.

Nowadays, there is a mining boom in many mountains in the south of the Lingnan Mountains. Those savages who have mines in the tribal territories have transformed themselves into mine owners in the east of the mine, or partnered with the Han people to open mines, or sold mines directly, or opened mines by themselves. , anyway, make a lot of money.

And due to mining in various places, roads and bridges have been built one after another. When the mining team arrives, a large number of miners are recruited, and small mining villages have sprung up one after another.

I deliberately went around Foshan and found that it is really prosperous here. There is a smell of coal everywhere, and there is even a layer of fog in the sky.

A gust of wind from the industrial age rushed towards his face, making Qin Lang feel a little dazed.

He even saw a blast furnace.

He once proposed the idea of ​​blast furnace iron smelting to blacksmiths, processing coal into coke, using coke and blast furnace to smelt iron ore, which will greatly improve the efficiency of iron smelting.

It's just that he only knows such a general process, and the specific process is not very clear. He proposed this concept, and then set up a big reward, and this matter was put on hold.

Unexpectedly, a blast furnace actually appeared in Foshan.

Qin Lang asked.

The county magistrate recruited a master blacksmith, who told Qin Lang that this is called the shaft furnace ironmaking method, using coke extracted from coal, and adding some materials to smelt iron ore into molten iron.

This is the result of the wisdom and experience of countless blacksmiths, and after countless explorations and failures, it was finally made.

"The molten iron smelted in this shaft furnace is of average quality and cannot reach the level of the traditional methods of the master craftsmen. It is not suitable for the production of swords and armor, but if it is only for the production of pots, pots and agricultural tools, it is still completely acceptable. The biggest advantage of the shaft furnace is its high efficiency and fast speed."

The old master told Qin Lang that in fact, not only the iron smelting in the shaft furnace still has some quality problems, but also the iron smelting with charcoal has some quality problems. Generally speaking, charcoal is not as refined as charcoal iron smelting.

Qin Lang just smiled, he vaguely remembered that it was because the coal contained sulfur or something else, which would affect the quality of iron.

But the blast furnace can not only smelt iron, but also make steel. When iron is smelted into steel, the quality of steel is far superior to that of iron. Even if steel knives and swords cannot reach the level of hand-casting by masters, with its efficiency and production capacity , that's totally doable.

Charcoal iron smelting is only suitable for small workshops. For a large-scale iron smelting center such as Foshan Tiezhen, how many trees on the mountain have to be cut down with charcoal? How much will it cost to transport? However, coal transported by sea from Wu'an Prefecture does not have these problems.

Only coal smelting iron can maintain the scale of Foshan Iron Town, and help him expand even further and go further.

Qin Lang liked the fog over the Foshan Iron Works, the road paved with black cinders, and even the pungent smell in the air.

"What a delicious smell!" Qin Lang was intoxicated!

The county magistrate of Foshan also had the same reaction. He felt that the smell was not pungent at all, and even mellow like fine wine.

Because this represents that countless iron factories are producing at full capacity, the smell of coal and the sound of clanging are all attractive.

"Wei Gong, the Weapons Supervisor recently came to investigate and said that he was going to set up a bureau workshop in Foshan to make weapons such as swords and arrows. The officials did not dare to agree, so please let us know."

"It's a good thing. It is estimated that the weapon inspector also saw that there are abundant iron materials here, and there are also a large number of mature and excellent craftsmen. They can come if they want. Let's make plans for him."

The county magistrate was a little hesitant, "When the weapon supervisor comes to set up a bureau and build a workshop, he will definitely need to recruit a large number of craftsmen and even a large amount of iron materials. Will this affect us?"

"Everything is done according to the rules. The Weapons Supervision has its own manufacturing bureaus and its own craftsmen. Of course they are welcome to come, but the craftsmen in our iron factory can't just ask for it. They can recruit, but they can't force it. The same is true for iron materials. , The transshipment department has iron warehouses, where there are special iron materials collected by the national iron department, of course, they can also buy iron materials in the market, and everything will be done according to market rules.”

"Wei Gong, I'm afraid they won't be so disciplined?"

"What are you afraid of? Could it be that they came from Chang'an, and they can break the rules when they arrive in Foshan? If that's the case, then the truth will be your decision. How did they come here, let them go back!"

The county magistrate of Foshan breathed a sigh of relief. With the support of Qin Lang, the procuratorate of the nine prefectures in Lingnan, he no longer has to be afraid of the weapon supervision.

The Weapons Supervision was originally called the Military Weapons Supervision, and its superintendent was nothing more than an eighth-rank official, who was in charge of military weapons manufacturing. But later the Military Weapons Supervisor was merged into the Shaofu Supervisor and changed to Jianufang, and then the Firearms Workshop was added.

The Shaofu Supervisor is the Tang court that manages all kinds of craftsmanship, handicraft casting and coinage. The new weapon casting is just a new business. Although its chief is one of the nine ministers, he actually manages His affairs are complicated, he has little power, and he is only a fourth-rank official.

To set up a military weapon foundry in Guangzhou in the south of the Lingnan, of course, it must follow Qin Lang's rules, there is no doubt about it.