Dominate the Country

Time flies, years pass, and a year is very short.

The 27th year of Chengtian came to [1801]. From spring to summer, continuous heavy rain fell in both the north and the south.

The water of the Yongding River outside Yanjing City surged, and the rolling water flow was parallel to the river bank. The Haihe and Luanhe River basins broke out with a major flood. The people in Yanjing and Tianjin were separated and suffered a disaster that could be said to be "unprecedented". After holding on for five days and nights, the Yongding River embankment finally broke due to excessive pressure, causing the seven prefectures and fifty-eight counties in northern Hebei, including Tianjin Prefecture and Yongping Prefecture, to be affected. Daxing, Wanping, Changping, Miyun and other cities near Yanjing were crowded with refugees.

The areas near the Yongding River breach and Shijingshan, Wanping, Daxing, Changxindian, Liangxiang and other places in Yanjing where the flood flowed, all became severely affected areas. At that time, Wen'an County was low-lying, and the water depth ranged from more than two meters. Not only was the county town flooded, but more than 300 villages outside the city were also submerged by the flood. More than a thousand people died, and the homes of more than 50,000 people were submerged by the flood. Moreover, the accumulated water could not be drained, and it was impossible to completely dry up in a short period of time.

"Your Majesty, the water in Wen'an County is too deep. It may take two or three years for farming to be possible after the disaster." The disaster in Bazhou, Zhuozhou and other places in the whole northern Hebei was also relatively serious. Xu Yongmin, the governor of northern Hebei, could not help but sweat on his forehead when he reported back.

The flood in northern Hebei made Chen Ming unable to sit still. He traveled light and traveled a hundred miles in one night on the canal ship to the north and went directly to Baoding.

Just half a month ago, Xu Yongmin wrote in his memorial to Chen Ming: "In Tongzhou, except for 70% of the land affected by water, 30% of the land was harvested, and the autumn harvest was about 6%." According to the list, the flooded and autumn harvest of the counties under the jurisdiction of Yongping Prefecture, Daming Prefecture, Hejian Prefecture, Tianjin Prefecture, Zhengding Prefecture, Shunde Prefecture, Guangping Prefecture, Baoding Prefecture, Yihua Prefecture, and Chengde Prefecture, including Yanjing Prefecture, were counted, and a very terrible conclusion was reached: the farmland in the middle and lower reaches of the Yongding River basin was generally flooded, and about two-thirds of the counties had more than 50% of their area flooded. The flood disaster caused by the failure of the accumulated water to recede and dry up in time caused the farmland in most counties to reduce production or even lose its harvest. About half of the counties had a grain harvest of less than 50%, among which Wen'an County was the most severely affected, with no harvest at all. The flood caused hundreds of rivers, bridges, dams, and moorings in Jibei Province to be damaged and collapsed by floods. Thousands of villages were engulfed by the floods, and no less than 10,000 people were killed. The flood disaster also affected crop production, and a large area of ​​farmland production reduction became certain.

——Yanjing Prefecture is the northern capital, no longer under the jurisdiction of the Jibei Provincial Government.

How can Chen Ming sit still?

It was as if there was a fire burning under his buttocks, and he ran to Baoding Prefecture in a flash. Although he always felt that disaster relief and rescue work was troublesome, he really needed to be there. This flood covered most of Jibei, and the number of people affected by the disaster was as high as 5 million. There were also floods in Jiangsu and Zhejiang in the south, and the number of people affected was also three or four million, but the disaster situation in Jiangsu and Zhejiang was far less serious than that in Jibei.

Chen Ming sent the attendants around him to the prefectures and counties to investigate the details, which was not the same as the people of the Supervisory Council. The attendants are the attendants, and the Supervisory Council is the Supervisory Council.

The latter was a small imperial envoy sent by the court, and the former was a "spy" sent by the emperor personally.

Their first task was to carefully investigate the flood situation and report the disaster truthfully and in detail. After that, Chen Ming held local officials who delayed reporting the disaster accountable, and even dismissed them from their posts.

In addition to reporting the flood situation in northern Hebei, when investigating the disaster situation in various counties and prefectures during this disaster relief, Chen Han still insisted on using villages as the basic disaster investigation unit, assessing the severity of the disaster according to the severity of the land, reporting the disaster situation, and emphasizing the accuracy of the disaster assessment.

For the victims, ensure their clothing, food, and shelter to keep them alive.

Floods occur in summer, and there is no need to wear clothes to keep warm. Therefore, the focus of disaster relief at this stage can be placed on food and shelter, that is, building houses for resettlement and cooking relief. Floods are not like droughts. Although the previous drought in Huanghuai was very severe, the houses of the victims were intact. Unlike the current floods, a large number of homeless refugees were directly created. Therefore, after the flood, the government must provide shelter for the victims by building shacks and tents, and cooperate with some non-governmental organizations, such as charitable foundations, to accommodate the victims so that they will not be displaced.

If the disaster lasts for a long time, "the famine is extreme, and rice cannot be provided, so we should try to provide porridge." Because the disaster came suddenly, the hungry people could not eat enough, and cooking relief could save money and food and save people more than directly providing relief, so the government first set up a rice factory to provide porridge. These measures are introduced in the "Handbook of Disaster Prevention" issued by the court before.

In today's imperial examinations and civil service examinations, this "Handbook of Disaster Prevention" is also one of the knowledge points involved.

But it is easy to say, but when the disaster really comes, it is not so easy to do.

Chen Ming is planning to start with South Africa.

Since the start of the Suez Canal project, the British attitude towards South Africa has suddenly softened. But the British are still unwilling to give up Cape Town, an important port on the East-West trade line. After all, the Suez Canal has not yet been completed, and the British are worse off with just one rabbit in hand than with a thousand sheep in sight.

And with the opening of the Second Coalition War, the British had actually occupied Cape Town, but they had not completely driven out the Dutch. And just as Chen Ming had predicted before, the British occupied the Western Cape. From the perspective of future market value, the more important Eastern Cape was still a wilderness.

The local Boers also resisted. Except for the port city of Cape Town, the rest of the vast Cape colonies were still controlled by the Boers - the Huxe River Valley and the Bullid River Valley.

There was no way, because the Dutch had become a vassal state of the French. The British took advantage of this opportunity to plunder and devour the Dutch colonies around the world.

On the issue of the Cape Colony, China and Britain had been secretly communicating for more than a year. But just when the matter was finalized, Chen Han could boldly attack the Cape - the reason was the complete defeat of the Austrians in the northern Italian battlefield. This not only made Austria completely lose the crown of the Holy Roman Empire, but also made London see the omen of the collapse of the Second Coalition.

Without Austria, Russia has chosen to retreat. Does the newly established United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland have to fight Napoleon to the death? ——On January 1, 1801 in the Western calendar, England, Scotland, Wales and Ireland merged to form the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland.

Haha, Chen Ming just wants to laugh.

The British will not go to the battlefield and fight the French to the death unless they have to.

The war in Europe is coming to an end. The British do not want to fight the French on land, so they can only cease fire. Because the British have no thugs.

Supporting the European boss to suppress the European boss and maintain their dominant position in Europe is a national policy that the British will not waver.

In this way, the interests of the Netherlands are guaranteed. Is this small country a vassal state of the French? When signing the agreement, the French will definitely not give up the interests of the Netherlands, or even the interests of Germany and Italy.

The British will probably return the control of Cape Town to the Dutch next year. In this case, they are of course happy to invite the wolf into the house. Moreover, in the agreement secretly made between them, China also has to give up some of the interests of the Cape Colony to the British.

Chen Han's actions in the Caribbean and South America still need the cooperation of the British. The Cape Town area is Chen Ming's benefit fee to feed London.

But now a heavy rain and a severe flood have made Chen Ming's mind unable to focus on the war.

Fortunately, in late July, after the weather cleared for a period of time, the water level of the river channel dropped, and the flooded river bank began to dry up. The engineering team organized by the government started the corresponding repair project one after another.

Take the Yongding River project as an example. Before the project started on July 23, the Ministry of Construction had already made an estimate. A total of four overflowing stone embankments, four cement bodies, and fifteen earth embankments were built and repaired, totaling 3,747 feet and 5 feet, and more than 15,000 feet of silt were excavated, which is about 100 miles.

However, this heavy rain flooded the farmland in northern Hebei, leaving a large number of disaster victims without land to cultivate and grain to harvest, and there was a long-term food supply problem.

Therefore, external migration is really inevitable.

This is completely different from the drought in Huanghuai. When Huanghuai was hit by the disaster, the people still had stored grain, savings, houses, and utensils, but what about now? How many families have lost everything in a flood?

All the food and belongings were lost. There was no time to withdraw even the savings. Many families can be said to have nothing.

After the people's sentiment was slightly appeased, the areas that were severely affected, in addition to external migration, took the opportunity to guide the labor force to transfer to factories. The rest were to adopt two methods: work-for-relief and relief money and grain.

"Your Majesty, this flood in northern Hebei has destroyed many water conservancy facilities in the province. The dredging and repair of Yongding River and Haihe River alone will require tens of thousands of laborers." The officials in northern Hebei headed by Xu Yongmin were of course unwilling to let the people move away.

And they knew the family background of the current court very well. Although the flood in northern Hebei was "earth-shattering", as long as the court was willing to pay, it could be "restored" to northern Hebei. But if all the people affected by the disaster in northern Hebei were to migrate, it would not be fun.

Without people, there would be no labor force, and without labor force, there would be no productivity, so how could northern Hebei develop?

Therefore, Xu Yongmin put forward conditions and complained to Chen Ming. He expressed one meaning, that the post-disaster reconstruction of northern Hebei requires a lot of labor, and these disaster victims are the best and most needed objects of exploitation.

Chen Ming turned a deaf ear to it, and he didn't listen.

Several sons are migrating to America nervously, and it is impossible for them to go alone. Not only must there be a large amount of materials, but also the people. Without the people, no matter how good the land is, it will not grow food, right?

Chen Ming was worried about where to find hundreds of thousands of people for his sons before. Now there is such a good opportunity, if he lets it go in vain, he would be a big idiot.

"Your Majesty, Your Majesty, Your Majesty..."

Xu Yongmin didn't dare to reach out and grab Chen Ming's clothes, he could only shout "affectionately", shouting affectionately, the painful expression on his face was like a lover who was separated from each other forever.

The emperor was not kind, not kind. He was determined to "rob" Jibei's "wealth" to help his son's "poverty".

What should Jibei do?

If a million people were immigrated at once, Jibei's taxes could be reduced by a level.

Xu Yongmin really wanted to shout out: "Your Majesty, you can't do this..."

Xu Yongmin, who joined Chen Han in the early years of [Xiangnan], is now suffering as if he had eaten Coptis chinensis.