New Han Dynasty 1834

Chapter 12 Cabinet Council Procedures and Metallurgical Experiments

Liu Yulong returned to his usual residence, the West Palace, and after a simple dinner, went to his study.

He sat down behind his desk, picked up his pen, and began to write.

Liu Yulong plans to record as much of his knowledge of natural sciences and sociology as possible, both now and in the future, so as not to forget it over time.

This content will also form the basis for my own textbooks, which I will later pass on to the scholars and craftsmen of the Institute of Natural History, depending on the circumstances.

Every half hour or so, Liu Yulong would stand up to stretch his body and organize his thoughts before sitting back down to continue writing.

Liu Yulong continued writing until after 9 p.m. before putting down his pen and going to bed.

The next morning at six o'clock, Liu Yulong got up, washed up, ate breakfast, and then went to the main hall of the West Palace to begin handling important military and political affairs.

All the orders that Liu Yulong gave to the Governor's Office, the Military Advisor's Office, and the nobles yesterday morning were drafted into official military edicts by the Military Command yesterday afternoon and sent to the West Palace, where Liu Yulong usually works.

Liu Yulong reviewed the contents and wording of the military order and edict, confirming that his will had not been distorted. He then had the eunuch beside him affix his seal on the spot and issue it to the various governor's offices, military councils, and nobles for execution.

The officials of the Military Command were only responsible for drafting military orders, while the transmission of military orders was handled by captains specially selected from the Imperial Guards.

Then he went to the cabinet office to deal with the routine administrative tasks that had accumulated over the past few days in a daze.

The official system of the new Han Dynasty established by Liu Desheng largely referenced and drew upon the official system of the Ming Dynasty.

Most of the institutions have names that are the same as or similar to those of the Ming Dynasty, but have been adjusted according to actual needs and modern management experience.

Liu Desheng transferred the Hanlin Academy to the jurisdiction of the Institute of Natural Sciences, and the Grand Secretaries of the Ming and Qing Dynasties became official positions of the Institute of Natural Sciences.

The Grand Secretariat of the Han Dynasty did not have Grand Secretaries, only Grand Secretaries and Secretaries' Attendants.

The cabinet offices were moved to the southern end of the West Palace, which was basically the location of the Qing Dynasty's Grand Council, but the area occupied was four times larger than the cramped Grand Council.

The cabinet procedures drafted by Liu Desheng were also significantly different from those of the Ming Dynasty.

By the time the cabinet system of the Ming Dynasty was basically mature, the emperor no longer directly participated in cabinet meetings.

The cabinet would handle the memorials themselves, discuss the solutions internally, and then submit the prepared petitions to the emperor, who would then issue his own instructions.

The Grand Secretaries of the Cabinet are the leaders of the bureaucratic group, and the content of their draft proposals is actually a consensus among the bureaucratic collective.

If the emperors of the Ming Dynasty were lazy, they could easily become stamping machines.

Liu Desheng requested that the Emperor of the Great Han Dynasty go to the Grand Secretariat to sit in court, where the Grand Secretariat secretary would give an oral summary of the important memorials, and verbally explain the analysis, interpretation and handling suggestions for the memorials.

The emperor would consult the suggestions and make decisions on matters reported in the memorials.

The cabinet secretaries recorded the emperor's decisions on the spot, affixed them to the memorials in the form of edicts, and handed them to the emperor for on-site review.

After the emperor confirmed that there was nothing wrong, he approved it in red on the spot and then handed it over to the Office of Transmission for distribution.

The cabinet secretary's advice was not written down; the emperor had to hear it in person.

As clerks, secretaries were only responsible for recording the emperor's decisions.

The final decision on all major matters had to be made personally by the emperor.

The memorials and imperial edicts did not contain the handwriting of the cabinet secretaries; they only contained requests from officials handling specific matters and the emperor's decisions.

The one-way verbal communication between the cabinet secretary and the emperor can be considered non-existent in the political process.

This would further safeguard the emperor's authority and prevent the cabinet secretary from rapidly expanding his power like the Grand Secretary of the Ming Dynasty.

However, this also requires the emperor to handle government affairs as if he were going to work. If the emperor is lazy, the power of his secretaries will naturally increase.

Liu Desheng abolished the early morning court sessions of the Ming Dynasty, so that the emperor and officials no longer needed to get up before dawn to attend court.

Instead, on the mornings of the 1st, 5th, 10th, 15th, 20th, and 25th of each month, the emperor would summon ministers, governors, military advisors, secretaries, and grand secretaries to the Wenhua Hall or Wuying Hall to discuss recent important matters. This was considered a regular imperial conference.

At the same time, a grand court assembly was held in the Fengtian Hall on the last day of each month to receive the homage of officials of the fifth rank and above in the capital.

Liu Yulong used to often go to work with his grandfather and father, so he knew how they used to work and generally knew how to handle different situations.

Even if you're unsure how to handle something, you can directly ask the cabinet secretaries, who are all the emperor's advisors.

Over the next few days, Liu Yulong went to the cabinet every day to handle government affairs and gradually deal with the matters that had accumulated during the period of national mourning.

The military and the Academy of Sciences were busy with their own tasks according to Liu Yulong's arrangements.

The deployment and operation of the army takes months, while the simple experiments at the Institute of Physics quickly begin to produce results.

For technologies like vulcanized rubber and alkaline converter steelmaking, finding the optimal formula may require a lot of time and trial and error, but whether the direction and approach are correct can be basically confirmed with just one or two experiments.

Sulfur, rubber, dolomite, and pyrolusite (manganese ore) are all readily available materials. The Chemical Industry Department and the Metallurgical Department also have specialized testing equipment, blast furnaces, converters, refractory bricks, blowers, and other equipment.

After the Han Dynasty acquired hot air blowers, pig iron became extremely cheap. Therefore, the Metallurgical Bureau specially produced a batch of steel-making furnaces, or converters, to repeatedly test the effects of different smelting formulas.

On the same day that Liu Yulong went to the Cabinet to begin handling government affairs, the Chemical Industry Department basically confirmed the properties of vulcanized rubber through experiments. Just as Liu Yulong had said, it would no longer become sticky and deformed due to exposure to the sun.

The craftsmen who participated in the experiment were amazed; the biggest problem with natural rubber had been solved just like that!

Its application scope suddenly became extremely wide, and the large number of rubber trees that Emperor Taizu Gao had arranged to be planted also found a use.

The Metallurgical Department was a little slower, mainly because they were putting a new converter into operation.

On the first day, dolomite was used to make the refractory furnace lining, and ferromanganese alloy was calcined in a blast furnace as a deoxidizer.

After the material had barely dried, the technical verification began on the afternoon of the third day.

Improving steelmaking technology is a project that Liu Yulong pays special attention to and values, as it will provide basic raw materials for other machines.

Grand Secretary Zheng Fuguang, along with the Director of the Metallurgical Bureau, personally directed and supervised this technical verification.

Dolomite furnace lining is a consumable material, so you can lay more without significantly affecting the results.

Ferromanganese alloy is a deoxidizer. If too little is added, it will leave a small number of air bubbles. If too much is added, it will form high-manganese steel.

Therefore, the properties of the steel itself can be basically determined with just one furnace.

After the first batch of steel was smelted, it was poured into a sand mold to solidify and form a steel ingot. The blacksmith standing nearby would then immediately pick up a piece and hammer it while it was still red-hot to check its properties.

Zheng Fuguang and officials from the Metallurgical Bureau stood guard nearby. Some stared intently at the steel ingot in the blacksmith's hands, while others watched the blacksmith's expressions and movements.

The burly blacksmith in his thirties tapped and inspected for a while, then his eyes widened and he gasped in shock:

"These steel ingots, cast directly, are practically pure, high-quality steel!"

Upon hearing this, Zheng Fuguang, who was standing nearby, immediately shouted out:

"Say it again!"

The blacksmith was startled; he had never seen the Grand Secretary so excited before. After a moment of hesitation, he quickly replied:

"So that Mr. Zheng may know, I believe this steel can already be considered a high-quality steel billet, comparable to European-style crucible steel."

"As long as the forging and shaping are done normally, a high-quality weapon can be obtained after quenching, especially pure refined steel with a uniform shape throughout."

"On the market, an ordinary steel knife would cost several strings of cash, but this knife, forged entirely from fine steel, would cost at least ten strings of cash. If it were crafted and decorated by a skilled artisan, it could easily sell for tens or even hundreds of strings of cash..."

When the blacksmith mentioned the price, he instinctively became conflicted and glanced back at the sand mold on the ground not far away.

There lay a large number of steel ingots, each of which could be forged into several fine steel weapons.

Crucially, there are also blast furnaces and converters nearby; this setup can produce dozens of stones of this "refined steel" per day.

"But... with this material, the daily production is estimated to be enough to produce thousands of them."

"Based on market prices, it would have to sell for tens of thousands of strings of cash, equivalent to tens of thousands of taels of silver in the past. Something doesn't seem right..."

The blacksmith was so confused that he was completely bewildered. He felt that it was all very unreal and began to wonder if he was still half asleep.

All the officials, scholars, and craftsmen below Zheng Fuguang were also taken aback as they listened to the blacksmith's ramblings.

Everyone was stunned for a while, and after slowly coming to their senses, they began to excitedly mutter:

"What the Emperor said is indeed true!"

"Using dolomite furnace lining and clay, it really is possible to directly cast high-quality steel!"

"Will any amount of pig iron be directly converted into a certain amount of refined steel in the future?"

"Wouldn't that mean the entire army could be fully armored from now on!"

"Cannons can now be forged from high-quality steel!"

"This is...cast steel! Steel can be cast now!"

"Now it's time to report the good news to the Emperor!"

"The Emperor must have known this would happen all along, right? It's just that we had our doubts before..."

"No one is more wise than the current emperor!"

The crowd gasped in surprise. Some people thought about whether to report to Liu Yulong, and their words became instinctively respectful to the emperor.

A few days ago, when Liu Yulong was arranging the experiment, many scholars and craftsmen couldn't help but ask him what the principle was.

The underlying reason, besides genuine curiosity, is also a subtle form of questioning and distrust.

They didn't believe that the problem of the steel's hardness and brittleness could be easily solved, and more importantly, they didn't think that the eighteen-year-old emperor understood metallurgical technology.

At the same time, facing the supreme Emperor of the Han Dynasty, they dared not directly question or slander him, so they could only seek his advice.

Now that they have personally confirmed that what the emperor said is true, their initial doubts have naturally turned into respect.

After regaining his composure, Zheng Fuguang surveyed the scene, pondered for a moment, and then made the following arrangements:

"Don't rush to report now, but you don't need to wait too long."

"Tomorrow is the court assembly of officials held every five days, and I will report the experimental results to the Emperor."

"Everyone, continue the experiment. First, we need to confirm that this batch of steel was not an accident, and that we can continue to cast similar high-quality steel."

"At the same time, we have roughly determined the appropriate ratio of soil additives."