If you take a plane from Kaifeng to Beijing in later generations, it will only take two hours to fly. If you change to a slower high-speed rail, it will only take about four hours. It may take more than ten hours to drive by yourself. Even if you take the slowest bus, it will only take a day at most.

But now Li Jie and his team have been walking for ten days, but now they have only been halfway. It is mainly because they spent three days when crossing the Yellow River before, because there is only one pontoon bridge on the Yellow River, and the load capacity of this pontoon bridge is limited. Zhu Biao and his team have many cars and horses, so they can only line up to cross the bridge little by little. Some too heavy cars cannot get on the pontoon bridge, so they can only transport it one by one by one.

In fact, this is already good. The floating bridge on the Yellow River can only be passed through spring, summer, autumn, and when the autumn and winter are intersected, the floating bridge will have to be demolished. When the river water is completely frozen, people on both sides can walk on the ice surface. When the ice melts in spring, the Yellow River will once again isolate traffic and can only be built after the ice is finished. Therefore, the Yellow River has two periods of time every year that is completely unpassable.

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After crossing the Yellow River, even if you leave Henan, this is different from Henan in later generations. Henan in later generations also has a northern Henan area, mostly located on the north side of the Yellow River, such as Xinxiang, Puyang and other cities. However, during the Ming Dynasty, these areas did not belong to Henan. In fact, even in later generations, the customs and even accents of these areas were more similar to Hebei.

However, although there was Henan, there was still a plain in front of him, and it was connected with the plains of Henan. Even if there was a natural barrier like the Yellow River, it could not stop the exchanges between the people on both sides of the Taiwan Strait. Therefore, the situation on the north bank of the Yellow River is very similar to that of Henan, and you can even see a hundred new immigrants who have migrated from Shanxi.

It is worth mentioning that although Li Jie and the others have reached the north bank of the Yellow River, this place does not belong to Hebei, because during the Ming Dynasty, there was no Hebei among the fifteen provincial administrative regions established by the official level. Hebei is more of a geographical concept, not an officially divided area.

Most of the Hebei Province in later generations are now included in the Beiping Province. Later, Lao Zhu abolished the title of the province, so it should be called the Beiping Chengxuan General Envoy. After Zhu Di ascended the throne, he changed the capital to Beizhili, which was named together with Nanzhili, where Nanjing is located. In addition, the thirteen General Envoys, which is the so-called Two Capitals and Thirteen Divisions of the Ming Dynasty.

The further north, Li Jie found that the more people the villages and counties they passed by became more prosperous, and some places were even more lively than Henan. In theory, the climate in Henan was warmer and recovered faster. In comparison, Hebei should be worse, but the situation seen was completely different.

Zhu Biao was also very surprised by this situation. He immediately sent someone to conduct a careful investigation and combined with the local government's report, and then he gradually understood the reason.

It turns out that compared to Henan, Hebei has an advantage, that is, Beiping Prefecture, which is the original Yuan Dadu. As the capital of the Yuan Dynasty, the Mongols also invested heavily in the city. Later, when they were defeated, Yuan Huizong was only concerned about escaping, which led to the fact that when Xu Da's army reached Dadu, the entire capital was unguarded, so most of them were almost not damaged.

When Yuan Dadu was at its peak, the population of the city was nearly one million, and even historical books have clear records that the people migrated from outside alone had a total of 400,000 or 500,000 people.

Although the population of most people decreased a lot at the end of the Yuan Dynasty, there were still hundreds of thousands of people. However, after Xu Da captured the place, he felt that the population in the city was too large and the food supply was not enough, so he ordered the people in the city to go out to farm.

Later, the Ming Dynasty attacked the remnants of the Mongol Yuan several times and also robbed many people who were plundered by the Mongol Yuan, many of which were also placed in the territory of Peking Prefecture. For example, in the fourth year of Hongwu, Xu Da moved 32,000 desert residents to Peiping Prefecture. These populations overflowed, resulting in a large increase in the surrounding Hejian Prefecture, Zhending Prefecture and other places.

This situation was quickly confirmed because the closer Li Jie and the others got to Peiping Prefecture, they found that the denser the population was around. Of course, this was also related to the fact that Peiping Prefecture was a major military center in the north of the Ming Dynasty. Just for food transportation, a lot of manpower and material resources were needed. After the canal was re-drawn, the front line of the canal flourished again, and many people relied on the canal to make a living.

On that evening, Li Jie and his team came to the junction of Zhending Prefecture and Beiping Prefecture. Further ahead was Beiping Prefecture. Originally, their team could have rushed to the county town in front to rest, but because there were too many people sent by Zhu Biao to investigate the situation, these people came back late, so they did not move forward, but camped in the wild for rest.

The reason why Zhu Biao was so interested in Zhending was mainly because Zhending Prefecture belonged to the main transportation route between Beiping Prefecture and Shanxi. The entire Zhending Prefecture was under the jurisdiction of five prefectures and eleven counties. The area controlled by the control was larger than the Hejian Prefecture that had passed before. Moreover, the imperial court also stationed heavy troops here, mainly to protect the safety of Beiping Prefecture.

It was already late, and Li Jie and Zhu Biao were sorting out the information collected today in the tent. The sources of this information were very diverse. Some were seen by people sent out to investigate and recorded it and gave it to Zhu Biao, some were asked for official information from the local government, and some were collected from the local Jinyiwei.

Because the sources of intelligence are too complicated, and some of them are even contradictory, someone needs to sort out these intelligences and find out truly useful information.

"It's really a headache. Who would have thought that there would be so much information to be sorted out in the entire mansion alone!" Zhu Biao kneaded his forehead and said with a little tiredness on his face. In fact, this information had been screened by the officials he brought, and now he was in front of him with certain value of information.

"The more local, the more complicated the affairs are, but these information is also very useful. At least we know that the situation in Zhending Prefecture is stronger than that in Hejian Prefecture in the south. I think it would be better to come to Peking Prefecture!" Li Jie also said tiredly at this time. It was also an extremely tiring task to organize this information after rushing a day.

"Uncle has eaten, let's put these things on!" At this moment, Princess Pucheng walked in with a tray and smiled, saying that, and came to Zhu Biao and Li Jie, and then put the food on the tray on the table.

During this period, Princess Pucheng has been taking care of Zhu Biao's diet and daily life personally. It can be said that she is more concerned than her own daughter. This also made Zhu Biao love her more, and she has long regarded her as her biological daughter during her conversation.

"Why are you cooking in person again in Pucheng? You are tired after leaving for a day. Just leave these things to others!" Zhu Biao immediately said when he saw the food brought by Princess Pucheng.

"It's okay, I've been in the car for a day and I just feel bored. I can cook and move. And I know your taste better than others!" Princess Pucheng said, bringing the food to the table very quickly and setting dishes for him and Li Jie.

"Have the princess eaten?" Li Jie also asked politely. He did not communicate much with Princess Pucheng along the way. The main reason was that neither of them wanted to let outsiders see any secrets between them, so only when Zhu Biao was present, Li Jie and her would politely chat with her.

"I have eaten it. Brother-in-law, please eat it quickly, it will be cold later!" Princess Pucheng finally reminded again.

Zhu Biao and Li Jie were indeed hungry, so they didn't hesitate anymore. They immediately picked up the dishes and swept away the food. It has to be said that Princess Pucheng's cooking skills are really good. Zhu Biao ate the food she cooked almost every day along the way, and she became a little fatter. This made Li Jie a little worried that Zhu Biao's weight loss results would rebound.

Li Jie and the other two had dinner, but Princess Pucheng did not leave, but helped them organize the messy documents on the table, and Zhu Biao did not stop it. After all, many of these information were made public and not confidential.

However, Zhu Biao and Li Jie soon discovered that Princess Pucheng did not just put the documents neatly, but separated them according to the categories they had sorted out before. This surprised Zhu Biao and asked in surprise: "Can you understand these in Pucheng?"

"Of course I can understand it, it's just that it's separated according to population, taxation, grain and other categories. When I helped my father manage the Qin Palace, I had dealt with a lot of similar things." Princess Pucheng explained with a smile.

"That's great. Come and help us later. Li Jie and I are very tired these days!" Zhu Biao said happily when he heard this. Although he brought a lot of officials, he was worried about handing over this information to others. He only trusted Li Jie before, and now it's good to have an extra niece to help.

"Okay, as long as the uncle doesn't scold me for interfering in politics!" Princess Pucheng smiled when she heard this. Lao Zhu was very alert to women and eunuchs, and had already set rules that strictly prohibit women and eunuchs from interfering in politics.

"Haha~, this is what government affairs are. It's just that I'll sort out some local situations and report them to my father in the future." Zhu Biao laughed and said when he heard this. As the prince, he could still distinguish between this matter.

However, Li Jie next to him frowned slightly. Although he sympathized with Princess Pucheng, he was still a little wary of this shrewd little woman. He had already been puzzled by the other party's attempt to follow them to Peking Mansion. Now Princess Pucheng actually helped them sort out the information. Although this is not a government affairs, he still opened a hole. God knows whether she will participate in more affairs in the future?

Princess Pucheng seemed to notice Li Jie's suspicious gaze. At this time, she suddenly looked up and looked at him, then showed a meaningful smile to Li Jie. Now Li Jie was also stern and the suspicion in her eyes became deeper.
Chapter completed!