I

Twenty years ago, Song Yingxing and his brother Song Yingsheng took part in the provincial examination, one ranked third in the province, and the other ranked sixth in the province.

The third and sixth place in Jiangxi Provincial Examination!

It's a pity that neither brother has passed the Jinshi examination until now.

Three years ago, Song Yingshengquan was elected as the magistrate of Tongxiang County. To put it bluntly, it is the relationship between the Ministry of Civil Affairs and the appointment of candidates to fill in the vacancies. Money must have been spent, otherwise the number would not have been picked. Fei Yinghuan also did this when he was the county magistrate.

The family spent a lot of money to buy an official for his brother, but they really had no money to buy Song Yingxing a county magistrate, so they delayed for two years to help Song Yingxing buy an edict.

Jiaoyu is barely an official, the principal of a county public school.

Song Yingxing is now in his forties and came to Fenyi County to teach. This should have been the most important stage of his life. All his works were completed in these few years.

Unexpectedly, when he met Zhao Han, he was arrested by a group of rebels as soon as he started writing "Tiangong Kaiwu".

"Search the county school and find all this person's belongings," Zhao Han glanced at Song Yingxing, "especially manuscripts and the like!"

Half an hour later, the soldiers carried the box to the county government office.

Zhao Han knelt down and looked through it slowly. There were Song Yingxing's travel notes, as well as countless technical information notes, including agricultural machinery, ceramics, bricks, metallurgy, gunpowder, textiles, mining, meteorology and so on.

"Tiangong Kaiwu" has begun to be written, but it only contains the content of planting crops.

Zhao Han picked up the few pages of the manuscript, but they were about planting rice, and they included many pictures and texts of farm tools.

After a rough reading, Zhao Han commented: "That's ridiculous. Rice cultivation can be divided into early rice and late rice. You only recorded the early rice. Late rice can be sown with banana. You did not collect all the information."

"Um?"

Song Yingxing originally seemed to be generous in his sacrifice, but until his manuscripts and materials were found, he became a little scared, fearing that the rebels would burn his manuscripts.

Unexpectedly, the rebels actually discussed rice planting techniques with him. Song Yingxing frowned and said, "Is there really a way to plant late rice?"

"Where are you from?" Zhao Han asked.

Song Yingxing replied: "Fengxin County, Nanchang Prefecture."

"As far as I know, there are already farmers planting late rice in northeastern Jiangxi, and late rice has also begun to be planted in southern Jiangxi." Zhao Han said clearly and clearly. In fact, the information came from the grain merchant.

Song Yingxing ignored the opponent's status as a rebel and asked curiously: "Can you grow late rice with only japonica rice seeds?"

"No," Zhao Han corrected, "I asked people to try planting late rice in Luling County, but the harvest was not very good. Careful calculations indicate that it should be due to insufficient heat. If crops want to grow well, it is nothing more than water and heat. The more the crops grow, the better. The farther south you go, the hotter it gets throughout the year, and I heard that in some places in Guangdong, you can grow two or three crops of rice a year."

"Two to three seasons?" Song Yingxing was shocked.

Zhao Han said with a smile: "For many things, you not only need to know what they are, but also why they are so. For example, if you want to harvest more crops of this kind of rice, you must go to the south. It is known that the reason is the heat of the sun."

Song Yingxing said: "If I have the opportunity, I will go to Guangdong to see it."

Zhao Han knelt down and continued to search, and actually found the information for making weapons. There were crossbows, arrows, gunpowder, guns, etc., but unfortunately no trebuchet was found.

"Why is there no catapult?" Zhao Han asked.

Song Yingxing replied: "I haven't seen it before. Even the warships of the Ming Navy use either artillery or crossbows. Who would use catapults?"

Well, the catapult has been eliminated.

It was almost meal time, Zhao Han took Song Yingxing to eat, and asked him to guard the information in the box.

Song Yingxing followed in a daze, thinking only of the wooden box. Even if Zhao Han lets him go, this guy will not leave. The box contains twenty years of hard work that he has collected.

There is wine and meat.

Today the entire army has meat to eat. After all, they have been marching hard for many days and must replenish their bodies.

There is no need to rob, take the county magistrate's money and go to the butchers in the city to buy it. The butchers dare not not sell it.

"Bring the wine, I want to entertain Mr. Song." Zhao Han shouted.

Mr. Song didn't speak. He just sat down and looked at Zhao Han, wanting to get back his manuscripts and materials.

Zhao Han smiled and said, "Mr. Song, let's eat."

Song Yingxing said: "I had a long-term follower who got separated while running for his life."

Zhao Han immediately ordered his men: "Post notices throughout the city, saying that Mr. Song is my guest, and ask Mr. Song's entourage to come to the county office as soon as possible."

"This... this is impossible." Song Yingxing stood up in shock. Once the notice was posted, wouldn't it mean that he had become a thief?

"It makes, it makes." Zhao Han laughed.

Song Yingxing had no choice but to sit down angrily.

Soon, the fine wine hidden by the magistrate was served to the dinner table.

Zhao Han personally poured wine for Song Yingxing and asked, "Sir, do you know the principle of leverage?"

Song Yingxing did not accept the wine glass from Zhao Han, but picked up chopsticks to eat. He was really hungry. He chewed the food and said, "I haven't heard of it."

Zhao Han turned a wine glass upside down, put his fingers on the table as a fulcrum, and used chopsticks to pry up the wine glass: "This is the principle of leverage. From my fingers to the wine glass, the distance between the chopsticks is the resistance arm. From my fingers to my hair The place of force is the power arm.”

Song Yingxing immediately said with disdain: "It's such a mess, this is the principle of the specimen!"

"Specimen?" Zhao Han didn't understand.

Song Yingxing pointed casually: "The front part is the foundation, and the back part is the standard."

Well, since Mozi's time, the resistance arm of the lever is called "Ben", and the power arm of the lever is called "Biao".

Zhao Han said with a smile: "Mr. Song, I have made a discovery. The force on my hand multiplied by the length of the mark is equal to the weight multiplied by the length of the mark. I named it the lever principle."

Song Yingxing was immediately attracted by these words and wanted to go home immediately to verify.

He has already thought about the content of the verification test and can just use a large scale.

In fact, "Mozi" has revealed the principle of leverage and explained the issue of proportion, but the description is very rough and no clear formula has been formed.

The two stopped talking and each immersed himself in eating.

After filling his stomach, Zhao Han did not move around, but asked someone to carry the box.

Zhao Han carefully read the manuscript, suddenly laughed, and read an article aloud: "To rule the extremes, you want to control chaos, and if you want to rule the chaos, this is the number of multiplications and divisions in the world... The bandits in the northwest have spread to the Central Plains, and only the city walls are left. The number of villages, towns and cities that have been burned to the ground is unknown. Today, the people are killed by bandits and tomorrow by soldiers... At this time of political chaos, when it is extremely important to think about governance, things can still be done in the world, so don't be dejected by multiplying and dividing numbers. "

Song Yingxing sat on the bench, turned around and looked at the scenery outside the room, wondering what he was thinking in his mind.

Zhao Han smiled happily: "Mr. Song, your article seems to be self-motivated and wants to save the country. But except for the last sentence, the whole article is about changing dynasties."

"Nonsense," Song Yingxing denied. "In these troubled times, it is the time for our generation of scholars to rise up."

Zhao Han nodded and said: "It is time for scholars to rise up. I am also a scholar, so I will rise up and work hard to create a bright future!"

"You are rebelling!"

Song Yingxing suddenly came back to his senses and asked, "Who are you?"

"Have you heard of Luling Zhao Yan?" Zhao Han asked with a smile.

Song Yingxing was shocked: "You are actually the Zhao thief, why are you here in Fenyi?"

Zhao Han did not answer, but continued to read Song Yingxing's manuscript. He smiled even more happily when he saw "The Discussion of People's Finances".

Song Yingxing's "People's Finance Discussion", the content is roughly as follows -

The Ming Dynasty has fallen to this point, which is nothing more than "the people are poor and the wealth is exhausted".

Wealth does not only refer to money, but all department stores in the world are wealth. There was a lot of wealth in the Ming Dynasty, but it was gathered in the hands of a few people. The people were exploited to the point where they could no longer survive, so the court could not collect taxes. The worse the financial situation, the more tax collection has to be imposed, leading to a vicious cycle. Not only that, the thieves and bandits in the world couldn't survive, so they started to rebel one after another.

Song Yingxing directly used the word "exploitation" in his article.

There are also articles such as "Tuntian Yi", "Ji Ke Yi", "Military Pay", "Troop Training" and other articles, which all point directly to the core problems of the imperial court, but they do not provide the correct response measures.

In other words, no countermeasures can be given because the roots of Ming Dynasty are already rotten.

Zhao Han commented: "They are all good articles. You are a great talent, but it is a pity that Emperor Chongzhen cannot use them."

"It's because I didn't pass the Jinshi examination, otherwise I would have done something." Song Yingxing actually understood in his heart, but he had to be tough in front of the rebels.

Zhao Han asked: "How do you compare with Mr. Li Meng'an?"

Song Yingxing thought for a while and said, "Mr. Meng An, I am not as talented as I am in managing the world."

Zhao Han smiled and said: "This talented man who managed the world and helped the country was demoted by the emperor and returned to his hometown. Now he is working for me."

"You will use your wealth and life to force me!" Song Yingxing sneered.

Zhao Han shook his head and said: "From the beginning to the end, I have never forced Mr. Meng An. When he took refuge with me, no one in the clan was under my rule. He took the initiative to surrender to me after observing my governance. You have said too much, you I won’t believe it either, come back with me in a few days and have a look.”

After reading Song Yingxing's article, Zhao Han didn't want to talk about any more reasons, because the other party understood these reasons.

Between the lines, Zhao Han read nothing but despair, even the smell of a broken jar.

Song Yingxing was arranged to live in the county government office, and his slaves quickly came to meet him.

"How is it in the city?" Song Yingxing asked.

The slave replied: "These rebels are very good. They are not killing people or setting fires, but are maintaining law and order. Things inside and outside the county are better than before. Those who committed crimes are so scared that they are hiding."

Song Yingxing was stunned and suddenly didn't know what to say.

He was very clear about the current situation of the Ming Dynasty, and the "Discussions on the Destiny of the World" was written very strangely. The whole article implicitly expresses the view of the end of the dynasty. At the end, there is a sudden sentence saying that although we are in troubled times, scholars should not be depressed and should cheer up to save the situation.

It’s just self-deception.

What can Song Yingxing do?

Although he came from a wealthy family, even the money for his brother's official purchase was scrapped together. And his brother, who had only been a county magistrate for two years, brought back a lot of money to the family.

Song Yingxing was able to go to Fenyi County to teach, and the money he paid to buy an official position also included money embezzled by his brother!

He was in the middle of the situation, could see clearly, and could not act.

Alas, let's not talk about political affairs, let's just indulge in side streets.

The next morning, Song Yingxing took the initiative to visit Zhao Han and wanted to get a steelyard to verify the principle of leverage.

The guard guarding the county government office said: "Mr. Song will be waiting for a few days. The main town is not at the county government office at the moment."

Song Yingxing was shocked: "He sent troops to Yuanzhou Mansion?"