Palace of Heavenly Purity.
As expected, Pan Jixun's expression turned cold, and he asked, "What advice do you have, Grand Marshal?"
"I'm not that smart, but I'm not as extreme as you." Zhu Heng said calmly, "Neither Zhao Bu Tang nor Weng Zhong Cheng said anything. We only want to restore the canal, not repair the river works, right?"
"The only way to restore the canal is to 'divert water from the south bank and build embankments on the north bank'. The result is that the more water is diverted, the more damage will be done to the Huanghuai water system, and upstream floods will not be able to be discharged in time, causing the embankments to overflow and burst continuously!" Pan Jixun refused to give in, just like he did three years ago.
"That's just your stubbornness." Zhu Heng snorted and said, "While protecting the Grand Canal, it doesn't affect the construction of a new canal!"
As he spoke, Zhu Butang bowed deeply to Emperor Longqing and announced his countermeasures: "I request that the Yanhe River be opened to allow the canal to flow directly from Pizhou into the Yellow River. This will avoid the dangers of the Qingou and Zhuohe Rivers in Xuzhou, as well as the Xuhong and Luliang floods! Although it will take several years of effort, there is no need to stop transporting grain, and after the project is completed, there will be no worries about the interruption of grain transport!"
Longqing was stunned when he heard this. He thought, wasn't it about controlling water and protecting the canal? Why are they opening a new river?
Then he blurted out, "How much does this cost?"
"This..." Zhu Heng said with a guilty conscience: "It's expensive, but it's a long-term plan that can solve the problem once and for all."
"I asked you how much it cost?" Longqing frowned. Usually when a minister answered like this, it must be an unacceptable number.
"It will probably cost more than two million taels of silver..." Zhu Heng replied in a low voice.
"Uh..." Emperor Longqing rolled his eyes. How much silver do I have in my treasury? If I were so rich, why haven't I collected a complete set of Jin Ping Mei talisman porcelain yet?
"Zhu Butang, are you going to tame the river? Which river are you tame?!" Pan Jixun couldn't help but explode on the spot: "You are going to open a new river and ignore the Yellow River!"
Zhu Heng's thoughts were seen through, and his old face turned red. He argued: "I am in charge of the Ministry of Works, and I should consider the whole country, not just the Yellow River."
"The Yellow River flood area covering a thousand miles is just left there and ignored? Millions of people are displaced and seeing that the court has abandoned them, will there be civil unrest?!" Pan Jixun retorted angrily. He had to admit that after a year in Kunshan, his fighting ability had improved.
Hearing this, Hum Hum felt that Pan Pan's words made sense, so he pretended not to hear Zhu Heng's words and turned to ask Pan Jixun, "Mr. Pan, what are you going to do?"
"Please step aside. In my humble opinion, the only feasible way to manage the river is to restore the Yellow River to its original course so that it no longer invades the Huai River." Pan Jixun answered loudly, "In this way, the Yellow River and the Huai River will each follow their own course, and the water will flow smoothly. The Grand Canal will naturally not be disturbed, and the water transport will be safe!"
"Humph! What do you think you have in mind? It turns out to be the same old idea!" Zhu Heng sneered and retorted, "The idea of ​​restoring the original course is pure wishful thinking. The Yellow River has been diverted for hundreds of years. Can human power restore the original course?"
"I told you three years ago. Dredging a river of hundreds of miles with human labor is no different from moving mountains! Moreover, if the dredged mud and sand are placed on both sides, it will inevitably cause landslides!" Zhu Butang mocked Pan Jixun expressionlessly, "Moreover, the river is full of mud below one foot, and it will sink as soon as you dig it. There is no place to stand. No matter how many civilians you have, they are not enough for you to fill it up. Pan Zhongcheng was speechless after being refuted by me at that time. Have you forgotten it after three years?"
"That was because I didn't have a solution at that time. Now I have!" Pan Jixun said loudly in response: "I found that to restore the Yellow River's original course, we should not rely on artificial dredging of the river, but should adopt the correct method of 'building high embankments, raising water levels, and increasing water flow'!"
The emperor and his ministers were all cheered up when they heard the words, and they all listened attentively to Pan Jixun's stunning move after three years of silence.
"In the past, the biggest problem of the Yellow River was siltation, which could not be dredged manually, causing the riverbed to fill up and the river water to overflow everywhere! So why can't we use the Yellow River's powerful ability to carry silt to dredge the river and wash away the silt?" Pan Jixun became more and more excited as he spoke, and excitedly told the emperor and his ministers in the Golden Palace about the new method he had thought of:
"As long as we can keep the main stream of the Yellow River in the channel and let it concentrate its power, the riverbed will be deepened over time, and the water of the Yellow River will stabilize and no longer overflow everywhere!"
After saying this, he held his head high and declared loudly: "I call this method the 'Water Binding and Sand Flushing Method'!"
However, the emperor and his ministers in the hall looked at each other in bewilderment.
Longqing wanted to praise him, but he didn't know how to start. There was no way, Panpan was too professional, and Hengheng couldn't understand.
"What does Minister Zhu think of this method?" Prime Minister Li, who had remained silent, finally asked.
"What a wild idea, so stupid!" Zhu Heng didn't really understand it, but his physiological aversion to Pan Jixun made him instinctively oppose it.
"The Yellow River contains seven liters of mud for every dou of water. Using this mud soup to flush out the silt is like drinking brine to quench thirst or using an oil pan to put out a fire. Just think about it and you will know that it will only have the opposite effect."
"The minister is right." Weng Dali, who rarely stood on the same side as Zhu Heng, echoed, "The Yellow River has been a problem for thousands of years. If there is such a simple way to solve the problem, why didn't our ancestors find it? Could it be that they were waiting for Pan Zhongcheng to come down from heaven to save the people and make great contributions?"
"Puchi..." All the ministers in the hall had undergone special training and generally would not laugh unless they could not help themselves.
Hearing those sneers, Pan Jixun was so angry that he almost died.
His face flushed red as he glared at Zhu Heng and Weng Dali, shouting like he was going to eat them: "How do you know it won't work if you haven't tried it?"
"Have you tried it?" Zhu Heng asked coldly.
"Uh..." Pan Jixun lost his temper and whispered, "I have witnessed it in the Yellow River and have also conducted experiments in Jiangnan."
"I asked you if you have tried it on the Yellow River?" Zhu Heng asked.
"No chance yet." Pan Jixun shook his head dejectedly.
"What a waste of time." Zhu Heng snorted contemptuously, unwilling to argue with him any further.
"This method sounds pretty good." Long Qing was very sympathetic and couldn't bear to see Pan Jixun embarrassed, so he asked with a smile: "How much do you want? If it's not too much, you can try it first."
"Your Majesty," Pan Jixun said helplessly, "We can try, but we have to build high river embankments and dams, and then open the river embankments during the flood season, so that we can see the magic of water conservancy and sand flushing..."
Before he could finish his words, there was a loud bang and the Qianqing Palace was in an uproar.
"Your Majesty, please punish this thief who speaks nonsense and harms the country!"
Several officials jumped up and fired at Pan Jixun. "It's too late to repair the dike, but he wants to break it, and he wants to break it during the flood season! Is he going to flood the entire Ming Dynasty?!"
"It's really outrageous! How foolish!" Chen Yiqin, Ma Sen and others also shook their heads. What happened to the Ming officialdom recently? Why do some crazy people keep appearing?
Such crazy remarks are not something a normal official would say, let alone a former prime minister of the river department who is a third-rank official.
"..." Long Qing was also a little unhappy. He thought to himself, I helped you out, but you used me to make fun of me.
Thus, under the collective attack of the crowd, Pan Zhongcheng, who had traveled all the way from Jiangnan to offer advice, had his enthusiasm extinguished. He retreated with a frustrated look.
However, with his intervention, the ministers no longer had the energy to continue arguing.
The final result of the discussion was to follow the suggestion of the Canal Transport Office, seize the time to plug the breach, dredge the silt, and restore the water supply of the canal as soon as possible to solve the urgent problem.
At the same time, the Minister of Works Zhu Heng was sent together with the Governor of Grand Canal Zhao Kongzhao and the Minister of Rivers Weng Dali to conduct an actual survey in the lower reaches of the Yellow River and Huai River to see whether the next step should be to open the Yi River or dredge the estuary, and to decide after the investigation was thorough.
"Resign..."
Amid the respectful farewell of the ministers, Teng Xiang supported the exhausted Emperor Longqing back to the East Warm Pavilion.
Li Chunfang also led the ministers out of the Qianqing Palace one after another.
Pan Jixun fell dejectedly to the end of the team. No one spoke to him, and no one waited for him.
Although he had served his 27th month of military service, he was reinstated by the court on personal merit. However, he was not assigned any task in either river management or river survey.
This was nothing less than a serious humiliation, and in the eyes of others, it was a sign of bad luck for him. Of course, no one wanted to stay around him.
When he was about to leave Qianqing Gate, Pan Jixun looked back at the magnificent Qianqing Palace, and his face suddenly felt a little cold.
He couldn't help but laugh at himself. How could this old man be so fragile that he actually shed tears out of grievance?
I looked at the sky and realized, oh, it was raining.
Looking at the sky covered with leaden clouds and the countless raindrops falling, Pan Jixun sighed. This year was destined to be a flood year, whether in the north or the south. Otherwise, he would not have to risk being accused of being greedy for fame and return as soon as he was called.
Isn't it just to save time and reduce the harm caused by the Yellow River?
The funny thing is that after rushing back, I have to stand aside.
Alas, it was a wrong payment after all.
~~
The rain is getting heavier.
When Pan Jixun came out of the palace in the rain, he saw his son holding an umbrella and looking out the gate of Donghua.
Seeing that his father was soaked, Pan Dafu hurried over and helped Old Pan into the carriage parked outside the palace gate.
As soon as Pan Jixun got on the bus, he found that there was another person sitting inside.
Mr. Zhao, dressed in brocade clothes and wearing a net scarf on his head, was holding a copy of "The Great Learning" and was leaning against the wall of the carriage leisurely waiting for him.
"Are you here to see a drowned rat?" Pan Jixun vented his anger on Zhao Hao.
"I've never seen a Zhongcheng in such a miserable state." Zhao Hao laughed, pulled out a dry cotton towel from under his buttocks, handed it to him and said, "It's warm."
"Are you relieved to see me like this?" Pan Jixun snorted, took the cotton towel and wiped his face, then took off his soaked official hat and threw it into the carriage, continuing to wipe his head and said, "That's good now. I don't have to share your Jiangnan Group's cement production capacity, and you don't have to worry about the canal's restoration. I'll take a break for two days and then go back to Suzhou to continue working for you."
"Really? So good?" Zhao Hao took out a small sandalwood box from his arms, opened it and handed it to Lao Pan.
"That's better." Old Pan's expression eased a little, and he picked up a small white stone from the box. He looked at it with some displeasure and said, "Why are you trying to fool me with limestone again? This thing doesn't taste good."
ps. Second update, I will try to write one more. This way I can have a good rest tomorrow.
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