Transmigrated into a female county magistrate during a famine, leading her country to prosperity

Chapter 397: Quicklime Meets Water to Perform a Miracle

Grinding limestone is a strenuous job that requires the limestone placed in a mortar to be pounded repeatedly with a stone pestle until the limestone is powdered.

The stone mortar that Wu Lizheng brought was quite large and could hold all the calcined limestone at once, but Shen Zheng still asked Niu Chu and the other man to chisel it into powder in two batches.

Everyone knows that you can't digest too much.

The river breeze was cool in the early morning. There were no buildings around the cloth shop to block the wind, so Shen Zheng hugged her arms tightly.

The stone pestle was raised and lowered, and the fist-sized limestone was gradually broken into powder.

Yu Shizhang watched Niu Chu's movements and asked Shen Zheng sideways, "The one that is chiseled into powder is quicklime powder?"

Shen Zheng nodded, estimating in his mind the time required to produce the powder this time, and making plans for calcining large quantities of limestone in the future.

"Now it is quicklime powder. After adding water and mixing, it becomes slaked lime. Slaked lime is needed for paving the floor."

Yu Shizhang absorbed the new knowledge, "What is the ground called when it is paved with a mixture of slaked lime, loess, and fine sand?"

Shen Zheng watched Niu Chu's movements without blinking, and replied, "It's called Sanhe soil. This kind of ground cannot be used just by laying it down. It needs to be pounded and compacted in layers. Just like what I told you yesterday, the better it is pounded, the longer it will last in the future."

She gave an analogy: "Who knows, in the future, even if the officials are gone, this land may still be there."

Yu Shizhang glared at her and said, "What are you talking about so early in the morning?"

He paused again, looking at the loess and fine sand placed beside him, and then at the river not far away, "Isn't that land afraid of water? What if it rains heavily? Will it be washed away?"

"No." Shen Zheng shook her head firmly. "The mixture of lime and loess has good water absorption. Coupled with the fine sand by the river, ordinary rainwater will not cause any damage to the Sanhe soil ground unless the ground is soaked in water for a long time. For example, if it rains heavily for several days in a row, they will absorb the rainwater they can absorb, and the rainwater that cannot be absorbed will penetrate into the ground or flow to the side."

She pointed to the top of her head and said, "Whenever the sun comes out after the rain, the cement will dry in just one day."

Yu Shizhang nodded, but he looked at things very comprehensively, "Then what is there to be afraid of in this land?"

He still had some doubts that the ground made with these things could be without any drawbacks.

Shen Zheng lowered his head and thought for a while. If there are disadvantages to rammed earth, they do exist, but these disadvantages can be ignored in today's Great Zhou.

She gave Yu Shizhang another analogy: "The disadvantage is... not being 'solid' should be counted, right? For example, when it rains, if there are three or four loaded carriages pressing on it at the same time, the ground will sink and the soil may shift."

Yu Shizhang suddenly didn't know what to say.

Is this also a disadvantage?

He looked complicated, "No more?"

Shen Zheng thought about it carefully for a while, and suddenly said "Oh", "The mixing ratio of these three raw materials is also very important, especially the loess."

She didn't mind the dirt at all and grabbed a handful of sticky yellow soil and rubbed it in her hands.

"If too much loess is added, the ground will become slippery when it comes into contact with water, and walking on it may cause slipping. If there is less loess, the ground will not be sticky enough and may crack."

Yu Shizhang had a complicated expression on his face and thought for a while, "Then what is the ratio of these three ingredients?"

Shen Zheng squatted down, put the yellow soil in his hand back, and grabbed a handful of river sand to look at it carefully.

When Wu Lizheng ordered people to dig river sand, he chose the river sand that had been dried on the surface. This kind of river sand is grain by grain and contains very little soil.

She spread the river sand in her palm and blew lightly. Grains of sand floated down like a light sand rain.

In Shen Zheng's eyes, this river sand is a very standard fine sand. And to prepare mortar with fine sand, you only need to use the standard proportion.

She said, "One part lime powder, two parts loess, and four parts fine sand. Mix them and add a little water. Then you can spread it on the ground and start patting and compacting it."

After hearing this, Yu Shizhang couldn't wait any longer and urged Niu Chu, "Hurry up."

He couldn't wait to see what the finished "cement" would look like.

The ground paved with a small amount of lime mixed with soil and sand was comparable to stone! Yu Shizhang had a premonition that he might witness the birth of history again.

More and more villagers gathered on the dam.

It's the slack season during the farming season recently, and they don't have much to do, so they are all waiting for the results of the recruitment process at the cloth mill.

Now that they saw Shen Zheng and his group tinkering with something by the dam, how could they sit still? Word spread quickly, and the gathered villagers gradually blocked out the river wind from all around them.

At sunrise in the early morning, the lime powder in the mortar became even more dazzling under the sunlight.

Shen Zheng's voice fell into the mortar along with the last blow of the stone pestle.

"That's enough, Niu Chu."

When the stone pestle was lifted up, lime powder was still falling down. Niu Chu hit the stone pestle against the wall of the mortar twice, and the lime powder on it was shaken off.

Shen Zheng squatted down, scooped up some lime powder with the stone spoon that had been prepared long ago, and said:

"Everyone remember, calcined limestone is called quicklime. Try not to touch it with your hands, especially if your hands are wet or sweaty. Don't touch it at all."

As soon as she finished speaking, the sweat on Niu Chu's face ran down his cheeks, stayed on his chin for a moment, and then dripped into the stone spoon with a "plop", making a small hole in the lime powder in the spoon.

Shen Zheng:......

Yu Shizhang and everyone:?!

Niu Chu:!!!

Niu Chu's eyes widened instantly, and he became at a loss. He hurriedly stepped forward to take the stone spoon from Shen Zheng's hand.

"Please forgive me, sir! I didn't mean to do that. I will go find some stones right away and grind them into powder!"

Shen Zheng didn't expect such a coincidence and was immediately at a loss whether to laugh or cry.

She comforted Niu Chu: "It's okay, I will add some water later for everyone to see, and I don't have to use my hands."

Under Niu Chu's self-blaming gaze, she raised the stone spoon to everyone's chest and called everyone around her over.

"Niu Chu just happened to help us do a verification, everyone just watch."

In the eyes of the crowd, a faint wisp of white smoke, which was invisible even without careful observation, slowly rose from the lime powder into the air until it dissipated.

The people surrounding were so shocked that they stood still, as if they had seen some supernatural scene.

Yu Shizhang rubbed his eyes and asked Liang Fu beside him: "Did you see it?"

Liang Fu opened his mouth wide and nodded stupidly, "I must have seen it."

This answer obviously did not suit Yu Shizhang's taste. He muttered "my eyes are blurry" and turned to ask Shen Xingjian beside him: "What about you?"

Shen Xingjian didn't even look at him, but nodded and said, "I saw it. Lime powder smokes when it comes into contact with water."

"Amazing!" Yu Shizhang slapped his thigh, "It's simply too amazing! I didn't feel anything when I just listened to Shen Zheng's description, but now I see that when this lime powder meets water, it 'burns'!"