Chapter 284 Red Gum Grass

Before the salt lake was mined, the Harland Territory had to spend a lot of gold coins every year to buy salt from the Duke of Jonathan.

With the mining of the salt lake mine, salt is now self-sufficient, which can be regarded as saving money for the territory. As for selling salt to the outside, it is still very difficult for the Harland Territory.

Because there are many great nobles of Nolan standing inside the salt trade in each province.

Richard will not easily offend the big figures in the capital for some economic interests. In the past, the Harland family was very uncomfortable because of the salt trade. At that time, the Harland family had just started, and the barefoot were not afraid of the shoes. In order to protect their own interests, they were forced to compete with Jerram and others.

If it were not for the Duke of Brena's fake death, he wanted to lure the legendary magician Elena of the Novenas family to take action, which led to King Charles' misjudgment and the change of the political situation in Nolan, the Harland family must be having a hard time now.

If King Charles is in power and Prince Felix is ​​in charge, and keeps pulling the leg and playing dirty in the capital of Nolan, Richard's years of business may be ruined, and the Harland family may lose its territory.

These people are not good enough, but they are more than capable of doing bad things.

Although Richard looks down on such people in his heart and does not like to contact the nobles of the capital, he will not tear his face with these people and go to the opposite side on the surface.

After suffering several losses, Richard has learned his lesson and will not easily touch the interests of the nobles of the capital and clash with them.

As the construction of the North Boundary Fort began, the garrison of Salt Lake County basically left Salt Lake Fort and moved to the north.

Salt Lake County is the focus of the defense of the Harland territory. The sixth and seventh battalions are stationed in the territory, and the number of regular troops exceeds 3,000. In addition, the training of auxiliary soldiers has been strengthened this year. It is expected that the winter training will be three months to train 800 reserve personnel. Together with some second-line armed personnel to maintain public order, the defense force of Salt Lake County exceeds 4,000.

Beijie Fort is located in the middle of the valley. Military camps have been built on the ridges on both sides. Heavy catapults are installed in the military camps, and a large number of alchemical bombs are stored. There are 3,000 defenders. Even if half of the orc army attacks, they will inevitably be beaten to a pulp. The terrain here is more dangerous than Fort William.

If the orcs are smart, they will not attack such a strong stronghold with dangerous terrain and strict defense.

Richard has been wandering around Salt Lake County for seven or eight days and has a good understanding of the situation below. He said to Bernard with a serious face: "Your county has a heavy construction task, and the material support is not sufficient. Life will be a bit harder in the next two years. Now the climate has turned cold and it will snow soon. You have to focus on the construction of the contract slaves' sheds to prevent people from freezing to death in winter. As a senior civil servant of the territory, you must know that population is the most important resource of the territory. When you govern the country on a daily basis, you must have good thoughts in your heart."

Bernard did not dare to neglect what Richard personally told him. The next day, he mobilized some manpower and material resources, stopped some official projects, and started to build the camp shed.

Although the wooden house is not very warm and has poor fire resistance. However, it is easy to obtain materials, quick to build, and much better than tents in terms of warmth. In addition, there are coal stoves in the Harland Territory for heating, and few ordinary people have frozen to death in winter.

In the more than ten years since the establishment of the Harland Territory, the living standards have greatly improved. Today's contract servants basically will not suffer from cold and hunger. Entering the Harland Territory is like entering heaven on earth for them.

Richard has brought some changes to this world after traveling for twenty years.

After a tour of the territory, it was already September. This year, the northern border area had early snowfall, and the first snow had fallen in the Harland Territory on the third day of September.

Fortunately, the first snow was not heavy, and the temperature rose a little on the fifth day of September, which did not cause too much difficulty to the Harland Territory.

Richard is a person who can't sit still. After returning to Fort William, he began to enter various research institutes to inquire about the development of various studies.

The Optical Research Institute has produced a microscope with a magnification of more than 300 times. With the magician's visual magnification spell, it has shown great power in research.

In recent years, the Optical Research Institute has used the method of manual grinding to produce dozens of microscopes. Through accumulating and summarizing experience, the grinding skills of the lens grinders have become better and better, and almost every formal magician has bought one.

Although the price of the microscope is very high, the internal price is more than 80 gold coins, which can't stop the enthusiasm of the wealthy magicians. Even if the salary of a newly-made magician is not high, it takes two years of saving money without eating or drinking to buy a microscope.

Because microscopes have a strong effect on magicians and scientists to understand the world and summarize laws, the intelligence department of Harland Territory has also set restrictions and prohibited the sale of high-power microscopes to the outside world.

Every high-power microscope manufactured by the Optical Research Institute must be numbered and often faces spot checks by the intelligence department. After the mirror surface is worn, it must be destroyed by special personnel.

Through high-power microscopes, magicians in Harland Territory have discovered hundreds of bacteria and viruses, which has promoted the great development of biology. In recent years, doctors in Harland Territory have written hundreds of papers on bacteria and viruses.

Although the Optical Research Institute has developed rapidly, there have been no major discoveries in recent years. ˜”*°•.˜˜.•°*”˜After listening to the report, Richard came out of the Optical Research Institute and saw that it was still early, so he quickly entered the nearby Botanical Research Institute.

As soon as he entered the door, Richard said to Cartman, the director of the Botanical Research Institute: "Some time ago, I heard that you had a major discovery?"

Cartman was born in a very ordinary family. He was the child of a serf. He entered Harland in 3255, and it has only been eleven years since then. Relying on his elder brother who died in the army, Cartman became a freeman in 3257. With the support of his relatives, he went to Riverbank Elementary School and was one of the first students of Riverbank Elementary School.

Compared with students of the same period, Cartman was already seventeen years old when he went to school, almost an adult. He cherished the opportunity to study and change his destiny. He was very hardworking when he was in school. In just one year, he taught himself five years of elementary school courses and graduated from Riverbank Elementary School at the age of eighteen.

After graduation, Cartman joined the newly prepared Botanical Research Institute and began to collect plant specimens outside and compile plant series.

In order to collect rare plants, Cartman even went deep into the Eagle Mountains and entered the territory of the Orc Empire twice, making outstanding contributions to the development of the Botanical Research Institute.

After the death of the first director of the Botanical Research Institute, Richard overruled all opposition and promoted Cartman, who was only twenty-one years old, to take over as director.

Sure enough, in just a few years, Cartman lived up to expectations. This year, he personally led a team to investigate and discovered a very important economic plant. If this plant is successfully planted in large quantities, it will greatly promote the industry of Harland Territory.

"You are right, dear Earl. We have indeed discovered a special plant, red gum grass, in the western part of the Eagle Mountains. After our research, the gum content of this plant exceeds 25%, and the extracted red gum should be able to meet the requirements of the Lord."

About ten years ago, when Harland Territory had just stabilized, Richard started the preliminary research of the steam engine.

In the past ten years, he has been investing money in this project.

At the beginning, there were only two or three students in the steam engine research team, and the research process almost entirely relied on Richard's guidance.

Because of unqualified craftsmanship, the casting of the steam engine cylinder was stuck for two years.

With the development of the steel industry in Harland Territory, the steam engine research team has successively overcome difficulties such as manufacturing cylinders, grinding and polishing, and gear alloys.

Two years ago, a prototype was manufactured, but the sealing problem could not be solved, and the steam engine could not run for too long.

In the past three years, Richard has been offering a huge reward, hoping to find something like natural rubber, but unfortunately, nothing has been found.

If nothing is found for a long time, Richard is even prepared to send people to the south of the Dawn Continent to look for it, and arrange some members of the Harland family to develop in the southwestern magic countries to see if they can find the rubber tree of the other world.

After three years of offering a huge reward without any progress, Richard had already given up hope, but he didn't expect to find something this fall.

The natural red rubber extracted from the red rubber grass, the red rubber product made after vulcanization, has better performance than vulcanized rubber. Not only does it have very high elasticity, but it also has strong mechanical strength, wear resistance and corrosion resistance, and is a very good sealing material.

Solving the sealing problem, it is not far from manufacturing a qualified steam engine.

The Dawn plane has a magic factor, and the magic crystal contains powerful energy. It is quite simple to make the magic crystal burn through special runes. The magic energy hot air balloon manufactured in the Harland territory can easily do this.

After the steam engine is successfully manufactured, Richard can further determine the technical route and manufacture a smaller magic energy steam engine, making the steam engine very convenient to use.

After the magic steam engine and the red glue were successfully manufactured, the power problem was solved. As long as a large amount of funds and personnel were invested to solve some mechanical transmission problems, it would not be difficult to manufacture steam trains, steam cars, and steam ships.

The emergence of trains and telegraphs was subversive to the development of a territory and a country. This meant that information and materials could be transmitted quickly, and the cost of ruling remote areas became lower, which added much more to the national strength than alchemical bombs.

"How much red glue did your laboratory extract?"

"Only less than six kilograms, half of which was vulcanized according to the Lord's suggestion. The performance of the vulcanized red glue was stable, and we made some red glue sealing rings."

Richard suppressed his excitement and said to Cartman: "Now you take these sealing rings and follow me to the Steam Engine Research Institute to see the sealing effect."

When everyone came out of the Botanical Research Institute, it was almost dusk. The Steam Engine Research Institute was about three kilometers away from the Botanical Research Institute. It was probably dark when they arrived at the Steam Engine Research Institute.

But Richard was anxious and couldn't wait until tomorrow.

The group came to the Steam Engine Research Institute with the red rubber seal ring. The sun had already set.

Under Richard's command, everyone installed the red rubber seal ring on the huge steam engine. As the wood was ignited, the water boiled in less than a moment. Driven by a large amount of hot steam, the steam engine began to work.

Richard had been guarding the steam engine for about four hours before a conduit part was burned out.

"Although the steam seal problem has been solved, the cylinder and piston are not smooth enough, and the vibration is too large. There is still room for improvement in the steam engine. In addition, the conduit, gear, piston, and bearing materials still need to increase their strength. You must cooperate with the Metallurgical Research Institute in this regard. If the funds are not enough, I will find a way.

Today's experiment is enough to show that the steam engine has strong practicality. I think it can be used to pump water in mines first, and it can also be used to pump water for irrigation in case of drought.

The Steam Engine Research Institute should divide some of its strength. The research institutes with high technical levels will continue to conduct research on steam engine improvement, and those with low technical levels will serve as steam engine maintenance personnel.

We must use the steam engine in production as soon as possible, and discover and improve problems during the production process.

The steam engine has a wide range of uses. It can not only pump water, but also grind flour, serve as the power of machine tools, and be used in the machinery manufacturing industry. In the future, it can also manufacture steam cars and steamships. Our invention will change the world.

I will let the painters of the territory paint and hang our portraits in the Harland family museum for future generations to visit. Medals will also be awarded to meritorious personnel and generous subsidies will be issued.

From today, you will become the heroes of the Harland territory, your names will be recorded in history books, and you will become great men admired by people. Let us cheer, history will remember this day. "

Richard's speech was very passionate, making the researchers present feel excited.

Even at midnight, Richard's orders continued. He first sent someone to wake up the sleeping painters of Harland Territory and ordered them to draw a huge portrait called "The Great Invention" to record this great moment. Every researcher who played an important role in the study of steam engines must show his face in the portrait.

This painting will be hung on the front of the Harland Territory Museum as soon as it enters the door.

Last winter, the Harland Territory Museum was completed. Because the city expanded rapidly, the museum was built outside the back city, not far from the Riverbank Primary School.

In order to build the museum, the Harland Territory also held a The demolition and removal of sixteen houses and courtyards was done to build this tall and majestic museum.

Because the history of Harland Territory is very short, the museum does not have many antiques and cultural relics for the time being, but the materials left during the construction of the territory are basically preserved in the museum.

The museum also collects some very meaningful items, such as the pots and pans used by Richard, Powell and others when building Fort William, and the straw mats and quilts used for sleeping. The letters and orders they wrote, the manuscript paper used for planning the city, the first bottle of distilled liquor produced in the territory, the first furnace of iron slag smelted by the steel department, the first scalpel made by doctors, etc. These useless things were collected and preserved by Richard and exhibited in the museum.