There was naturally nothing to say at the mourning ceremony, and Gong Yan looked red with his eyes and didn't seem to have any interest in chatting, so Deng Ming just gave a few simple words of persuasion and left with others. The carnival in the city could not be suspended because of the death of one person. Deng Ming would definitely not order the whole city to mourn Hui Shiyang, so all he could do was to restrain his behavior and not organize carnival activities between the institute and the Chengdu government as planned.

In the following days, Deng Ming met with some Senate and Imperial members in private. Although Deng Ming had never interfered with the actions of the House, he was always observing which members were activists. After returning to Chengdu this time, he met with these people separately, hoping that they would support their actions. Deng Ming did not need to talk too much about the senators. These senators were appointed by Deng Ming, and there were also leaders: Liu Yao was the head of Chengdu, and Yang Youcai was just a matter of all the senators in Xuzhou. This time, Deng Ming asked him to return to Chengdu because he needed to exert influence in the Senate in Xuzhou.

However, the Imperial Congressmen are very different. Many of them are the products of behind-the-scenes transactions in the Senate, but Deng Ming has always pretended not to know this and claimed that they were representatives of the same scholars. Some of them have indeed become Imperial Congressmen because of their prestige among the same scholars. Deng Ming also showed special respect for these people. When they met with them, they not only kept them for dinner, asked them about their work and public opinion, but also seriously explained their strategic ideas to them.

These members of the parliament are a bridge between the ruling class and ordinary citizens. If it were not for the performance of the Imperial Parliament, Deng Ming would not even notice the emergence of extended emotions, would not know how the people's hearts were ups and downs, nor would he realize the need to hold this triumphal carnival. The last war gained hundreds of thousands of people, which undoubtedly would have long-term benefits for western Sichuan production, but this long-term benefit cannot be revealed in the short term.

In a conversation with these parliamentarians, Deng Ming said that the large-scale attack on western Sichuan for population purposes has come to an end for the time being, and all subsequent wars will revolve around how to expand and ensure trade, or obtain more funds for western Sichuan. Deng Ming explained to these parliamentarians that war is not a model. If the government and the military aim for short-term interests, the war does not require large-scale mobilization and will not seriously affect the production in western Sichuan. Such small-scale wars will help western Sichuan to gain benefits from the increased population more quickly. Deng Ming assured these parliamentarians that all the attacks launched next will not be a loss-making transaction, and will increase the income of the government and the people. It will not be until the empire feels that the hunger for manpower exceeds the desire for funds again that the government in western Sichuan will change its policy again.

Communication and transportation technology are now very primitive. Without a parliament, Deng Ming's channels for understanding people's sentiments were no more than Shunzhi, and the speed would not be faster. Similarly, without this institution, the people would not have an intuitive understanding of Deng Ming's ideas. The governments in western Sichuan were the same as the Qing court: they hoped that the scholars of the scholars understood Deng Ming, and they would tell them what kind of person Deng Ming was. Now Deng Ming hoped that through this channel, the scholars of the scholars in western Sichuan understood that the strategy of the government was to serve them.

, they will give priority to meeting their most urgent needs. Even if Sichuan already has a population of more than one million, it is still extremely weak compared to the entire Qing court controlled area, so the level of support from the people is very important. But on the other hand, before the advent of radio, telephone and railways, the huge territory was extremely limited in improving the national strength of the autocratic country. Although the population in western Sichuan was only one-tenth of that of the Qing court, as long as the people did not care about war, it is actually hard to say who is stronger and who is weak.

After trying hard to introduce his strategic ideas to the representatives of the same scholar, Deng Ming discussed specific war strategies with the government and the military.

"The material we need to import the least at present is grain," Liu Jinge reiterated this point at an internal meeting of the Western Sichuan Group. Although there was a large influx of population, as well as the production cuts brought about by the last large-scale mobilization and the consumption of supporting the Kuidong Army in launching the Chongqing Campaign, the grain reserves in western Sichuan are still above the security line, and the output is still more than twice the consumption: "The excess grain was sold to Kunming, or used to raise pigs."

Myanmar's spoils and compensation were shared with Kunming and Jianchang, but Kunming has a huge demand for food. Almost all gold is used by Kunming to buy grain and other materials. If the journey was not too bad, Deng Ming would like to sell more cloth and pig iron to Li Dingguo. Jianchang also bought a lot of goods, salt, cloth, sugar, silk from western Sichuan. From daily necessities to luxury goods, Jianchang could hardly produce it by itself, and a small amount could not be self-sufficient. After sending troops to Myanmar to make a fortune, Jianchang's demand for meat and other luxury goods also suddenly rose. Myanmar's gold was constantly flowing into Chengdu from Jianchang and Kunming; as for jade, ivory, gems, Kunming might still be able to smuggle to Guizhou, while Jianchang had no sales target. Except for the generals who saved it themselves, they would not compete with Deng Ming for business.

There are also some production consumed by Chongqing. In jewelry transactions, Chongqing earned a lot of processing fees and intermediate prices. The sales of those jewelry obtained from the mainland, and 60% of them belonged to Deng Ming. However, Chongqing's luxury goods are provided by western Sichuan. As Chongqing's generals become richer, their luxury is getting higher and higher. The scraps have been sold almost all the time, and the Qing army of Chongqing is paying the bill with the silver they earned. According to Xiong Lan's estimate, 50% or 60% of the profits obtained by Chongqing now have been transferred to western Sichuan. Various jewelry processing knives are favored by the Qing army of Chongqing in the past two months. Sichuan Governor Gao Mingzhan has spent a lot of money to order a batch of knives with diamond heads from western Sichuan.

"It's just that Xintian's cultivation is a bit troublesome."

Although there is no food problem for the time being, the land reclamation is coming to a halt, which has several reasons. First, according to the Imperial Parliament’s decree, the free land granting activity has been suspended, and any wasteland will be purchased from the government in the future; second, new immigrants do not have the ability to clear the land, they do not have complete citizenship, no savings, and no collateral to obtain loans; third, the wasteland around Chengdu has been almost fully developed.

With the continuous expansion of its strength, the Western Sichuan Group has begun to want to include Mianzhu, Jiangyou, and even Zitong and Jiange of Baoning Mansion in its own control to ensure the safety of northern Chengdu. However, the surrounding areas of Chengdu are much more prosperous than those areas. Tongxiucai who have the ability and money to open up land are unwilling to go. Now they would rather operate business in Chengdu and Xuzhou than stay away from the Yangtze River waterway to open up land.

Therefore, the government planned to resettle retired soldiers to those places, but it was also subject to fierce protests because the value of wasteland in those places was obviously not comparable to that of the land around Chengdu. Veterans gathered in front of the prefect's office, claiming that they could not accept the twenty acres of land there as compensation for service. There was no population in those places, and it was a problem for veterans to buy seeds and farm tools, and there was no protection from the garrison. They also had to bring their own weapons to guard against wild animals and the Qing army that might suddenly appear.

"There is no land around Chengdu to settle them." Liu Jinge was very enthusiastic about removing a group of people from Jiangyou. This is also the wish of the Chengdu parliament. As Chengdu becomes more and more prosperous, they pay more and more attention to safety; and Chengdu does not have to settle more agricultural populations, and the number of farmers is still decreasing now, because although the agricultural tax here is not high, the workmanship is obviously more than the income from farming. Many people even sold their land to live in the city.

"Yes." Deng Ming nodded. Chengdu was becoming more and more crowded. Due to its rapid prosperity, the normal population spread was stagnant. The trade profits of the entire Yangtze River poured into this place. The surrounding fellow scholars would rather continue to squeeze into the city than go to Jiangyou to deal with wasteland.

However, agriculture is the first edge of the BRICS, not to mention that immigration to Jiangyou has important military significance. When these immigration points are formed, the military power of the Western Sichuan Group will be easier to follow, and the cost of stationing can also be reduced a lot.

"We still have to let the veterans go first, but we really need to give them more compensation, otherwise they would rather give up the land they gave them than stay in Chengdu." Deng Ming thought for a while and said to the person attending the meeting: "How about two hundred acres? If they are willing to go to Mianzhu, they will give ten times the land. If they are willing to go to Jiangyou, they will give three hundred acres of land."

"Mianzhu is a little better. You can go back to Dufu to buy some goods after a few days. Jiangyou is too far away, and the water conservancy and land are completely abandoned."

"Then give it five hundred acres. If no one is willing to go there, you can give it more. If there is not enough arable land, give it to mountains, forests, lakes, twice or three times the land. I don't need them to reclaim it into arable land, and they don't need to pay land tax for the time being. As long as they are willing to settle there, the land will be their own.

Everyone and others discussed it, thinking that if this was the case, it would attract a group of veterans, but Xiong Lan had another question: "If there are not enough people willing to go, can we continue to increase the number of land grants?"

"Of course, there must be enough people willing to move." Deng Ming replied.

"Then there may be smart people who are not in a hurry to accept the conditions, but stay and watch." Xiong Lan immediately pointed out the loopholes in Deng Ming's policy: "After seeing the conditions given by the government get better and better, those who are waiting and watching are even more reluctant to leave. They all think that the conditions will be better in the future and want to wait for signing to receive better retirement compensation. The result is that we are constantly improving the conditions, but fewer and fewer people go there, but we are waiting here."
Chapter completed!