Ryukyu is now the fief of Li Ke.

Under Li Kuan's encouragement, Li Ke vigorously promoted the cultivation of tobacco after he arrived in Ryukyu.

In the first year, since the tobacco planted mainly aimed at picking more seeds, and the tobacco leaves were still conducting experimental flue-cured tobacco, the sales pressure on tobacco leaves in Ryukyu was not very high.

It is basically digested after being pushed locally in Ryukyu.

However, this year's planting area has expanded by hundreds of times, and the situation is immediately different.

In the middle of the year, the tobacco leaves were basically picked, and by July and August, all of them were baked and entered the warehouse.

At this time, how to sell these tobacco leaves has become a big problem.

Li Ke, who has already put all the funds in the Wu Prince's Mansion on tobacco cultivation, would be really unlucky if the tobacco leaves cannot be sold this year.

So in desperation, there was no obvious progress until the end of September. Li Ke directly arranged for people to find a fleet and loaded all the tobacco leaves to Chang'an City.

There was no way, and at this time he could only pin his hopes on Li Kuan.

Li Kuan asked him to grow the tobacco, and now he has completed the task.

But how to sell it and how much it costs, Li Kuan needs to help.

"Prince, all the tobacco leaves sent by His Highness the King of Wu are now stored at the Weishui Wharf. What should I do now?"

The person arranged by Li Ke was contacting Wang Fugui.

Now that such a hot potato is in your hand, Wang Fugui is also very depressed.

In his opinion, these tobacco leaves, even those animals such as cattle, sheep, horses, etc. are not eaten.

What are you doing in your hands?

He naturally knew very well what the purpose of the people in the King of Wu’s Mansion did this.

But he really didn't dare to make the decision to pay, and he didn't know how to calculate the money of these tobacco leaves.

If he follows his inner thoughts, it would be expensive if he spends a penny or a pound.

"Is the tobacco planting area of ​​my fifth brother that large? Will there be sales issues so soon?"

At this time, Li Kuan also remembered the fact that he encouraged Li Ke to grow tobacco in Ryukyu.

As a place with not abundant resources and not superior geographical location for the Tang Dynasty, Li Ke must have a different approach to developing Ryukyu.

And this tobacco was the solution that Li Kuan had come up with.

Although smoking is harmful to health, it is reasonable to exist.

Besides, to some extent, tobacco tax is actually an alternative tax increase method.

Ordinary people cannot feel the secret of this tax increase.

Because no matter how much the tobacco is sold, they will only think that this thing is expensive and will not think that the court is levied on them.

After all, you must pay the taxes from the court, and there is no room for bargaining.

But if you want tobacco, you can choose not to buy it.

"Your Highness the Crown Prince, if Your Highness the King of Wu could think of a solution, he would definitely not have sent all the tobacco leaves to Chang'an City.

Now there are so many tobacco leaves, I don’t know how to deal with them.

This thing seems to be of no use.

I heard from the people of the King of Wu’s Mansion that this tobacco leaf is very irritating and can restore physical strength and refresh the spirit. Therefore, in Ryukyu, a small number of people bought it to chew and eat it.

But I tried it, and the taste is very poor, and it is not as refreshing as the refreshing effect of drinking a cup of strong tea."

Wang Fugui dislikes tobacco leaves in his words and outside.

There was no way. In order to confirm the usefulness of this thing, he personally took a piece of tobacco leaf and stuffed it into his mouth, and endured the discomfort and chewed it.

The tobacco leaves were very chewy and almost didn't chew his teeth.

"Tobacco leaves are used to chew and eat? What a joke."

Li Kuan looked at Wang Fugui speechlessly.

Only then did he realize that he told Li Ke to grow tobacco, but he did not tell him how to use the tobacco at that time.

I'm a little bit taken for granted.

"Then...what should this tobacco be used for?"

Wang Fugui was very familiar with Li Kuan. When he saw the expression on Li Kuan's face, he realized that tobacco should be really useful, but this use is definitely not for chewing.

"Go!"

"smoke?"

"Yes, tobacco leaves are for smoking!"

After hearing what Li Kuan said, Wang Fugui showed a confused expression on his face.

Obviously, he did not understand what this "draw" is.

"Forget it, let's do it. I'll draw a pipe. You can find someone to make a few immediately. Then tomorrow I will tell you the correct way to use the tobacco leaves."

For this era, the kind of cigarettes familiar to later generations are obviously not made.

Not to mention anything else, a filter cannot be handled by this era.

If you use paper to roll cigarettes, although it is OK, Li Kuan personally thinks that the pipe is more suitable.

Although he doesn't smoke much, at least he is not addicted to smoking, he seems to be able to consider it if he occasionally holds a pipe and thinks about problems while taking a few sips.

However, if his dignified Prince of the Tang Dynasty takes the lead in smoking, will the history books become a stain?

After all, the idea that smoking is harmful to health will sooner or later be promoted.

...

"Li Zhong, I heard that after Ke'er went to Ryukyu, she had been growing something called tobacco. Now the scale of the planting has increased, but tobacco cannot be sold.

The people who went to Ryukyu with Ke'er suffered heavy losses. Is this the case?"

In addition to being able to obtain information from Li Zhong, Li Shimin naturally has other news channels.

If you don’t talk about anything else, the censor of the Censorate will not let himself be idle.

"Your Majesty, my subordinates have not fully understood this matter yet. However, His Highness of the King of Wu arranged for people to send a lot of tobacco leaves to Chang'an City, and now they are stored in the Weishui Wharf. This matter is true."

After hearing Li Shimin's words, Li Zhong suddenly felt a little bit overwhelmed.

Why do I always encounter such difficult problems?

No matter what the final result of this matter is, Li Zhong feels that he will be more troublesome.

"What exactly is this tobacco? Why did Kuan'er encourage Ke'er to plant it?"

Although he is old, Li Shimin is still very curious.

"According to the subordinates' understanding, tobacco, like corn and potatoes, was brought back from the Americas by the expedition team.

However, this kind of thing is not a crop, and there is no part of the body that can be eaten.

I heard that some people in Ryukyu have dried tobacco leaves and chewed them to refresh themselves, but not everyone likes them.”

Li Zhong told all the news he knew about tobacco.

"Then this matter is a bit strange. Kuan'er did it a little unconsidered."

Over the years, Li Kuan has been very reassuring in doing things.

Li Shimin has become accustomed to thinking that what Li Kuan does should be right.

However, when it comes to encouraging Li Ke to grow tobacco, Li Shimin felt that Li Kuan might not have done the right thing.

"It may be a bit too early to draw conclusions about this matter. Maybe His Royal Highness the Crown Prince can make full use of these tobacco leaves by then so that everyone can find completely different points of use."

At this time, Li Zhong could only say this to comfort Li Shimin.

As for whether this is possible, even he himself has no confidence.

"Since the tobacco leaves have been delivered to Chang'an City, please pay more attention to the trends of this matter and see how Kuan'er handled it in the end.

If he really made a wrong judgment at the beginning, see if the Ministry of Revenue arranged for people to transport some food to Ryukyu, so as not to eat food for the people.”

Li Shimin has now determined that Li Kuan is the crown prince of the Tang Dynasty, so even if he thinks he might have done something wrong, he will only find a way to help wipe his butt.

"I understand, and I will send additional personnel to watch the movements on the Weishui Wharf later."

...

"Civil He, I have fully confirmed this information. If you have any questions, you can continue to arrange someone to investigate.

The Censorate has now begun to impeach His Highness the King of Wu.

In fact, in my opinion, His Highness of the King of Wu was completely unfair. He only ordered that all the people of Ryukyu not stop rice, but instead planted tobacco.

With agriculture as the basis, agriculture is the foundation for our Tang Dynasty to settle down.

Although Ryukyu is alone overseas, even if something happens, it will not have much impact, but the nature of this matter is very bad."
To be continued...