Xinshun 1730

Chapter 1167 Preparation for War ([-])

When the two people took the carriage and came to this town, which is pronounced locally as Ratnapura, translated as Gem City, or Treasure Island, the first thing that caught the eye was the bustling streets and shops.

Some soldiers were patrolling the streets, and some beautifully dressed women knew what they were doing without asking.

The road on the street is very special, flashing a different kind of blue, with the color of the sea faintly under the sun, which is indescribably brilliant.

The driver who kindly picked them up looked at the strange eyes of the two men staring at the road, and said with a smile: "This gem city was rebuilt later. At the beginning, houses were built with coconut wood. These stones were not worth much at that time. The dull color, a bit like moldy coconut meat, is the slag left over from the gem mines.”

"As a result, there was a fire later, and these wooden houses were burned down. Guess what?"

It's like the kind of old man that is common in Dashun villages or cities. After a little bit of speculation and earning enough expectations, he said: "As a result, after those wooden houses burned down, they were hot on the ground for a long time. These originally The white-gray paving stones turned blue like sapphires."

"However, it's not a real gem after all, and it's still worthless. But if the road is paved, it looks good. After paving, it's blue and looks like broken glass all over the floor."

In this era, the broken glass all over the floor may be one of the most beautiful scenery in the eyes of many people or imaginable.

However, this kind of scene with a little bit of colorful stone paving is indeed shocking enough.

In fact, this kind of broken thing is called milk stone in later generations, and ruby ​​and sapphire are both aluminum oxide, but the appearance is ugly, covered with a layer of titanium dioxide, ugly.With the advancement of technology in later generations, controlling the temperature and firing it all have the potential to be made of sapphire.

Now, even if it is a beautiful legend that Dashun occupies the gem mining industry in Ceylon, it is worthless.

After the fire, the houses here also chose masonry structure, forming a street of shops facing the street.

While introducing the wonderful scenery here, the coachman said something to the special practitioner who was posing next to him. This is a mining area, so naturally it is not like the atmosphere of Yangzhou City, it is very vulgar.

When they arrived at a shop, the coachman stopped the carriage, and the two people in the cart went to buy cigarettes, only to notice that there were bags of flour on the cart, and there was a steamed stuffed bun shop next to it. They like the taste of big oil and big meat.

The coachman took the cigarette and said again: "Many of the miners here are from the northern part of Jiangsu and Dengzhou Prefecture. They are not used to rice, and flour is expensive here, so they have to be transported from outside. Anyway Yes, these people are rich, and they are not hungry when they are full. When they are paid, they either go to find women, or gamble, eat, and drink."

"Why don't you say that these people are difficult to serve. They are Tamil people, as long as they give them some rice and curry onions, they are willing to work."

"However, there are imperial supervisors here, who are only allowed to use us Tang people. The investigation is much stricter than that of the plantation. If the working groups do not report the knowledge, they will be imprisoned, and they are required to be paid on time every month. Hey... "

Although the coachman was just a coachman, for some reason, he sympathized with those who run the mines, and felt that the imperial court was a bit harsh on them.

I don't know how these news, or this idea, came out.

In short, it is unlikely that he figured it out by himself.

These words really surprised Zhao Liben, and he thought that this is really strange, it's not like he hasn't worked in mines before...

"Brother, are you serious? Didn't this trick us into working in the mine?"

With a deep fear of the gold, silver and gemstone mines, Zhao Liben asked subconsciously, thinking that he had said the same thing when he was tricked into being a slave at the Black Gold Mine in Huanglongfu.

The coachman said with a hey, "Brother, what do you say? The mine is profitable, but the risk is also high. If you don't pay attention, the mine cave will collapse. It rains a lot here. How many months will there be no deaths? This It’s a place where life is exchanged for money, come if you want, and leave if you don’t want to.”

"To be honest, it's very easy to make a living on this island nowadays. You can rub cinnamon, or fish for clams, but you can't go to the plantation. You can't climb trees to pick coconuts, but you can't pick coffee. Right? But knowing that this mine is risky, there are still many people scrambling to come. The mine doesn't recruit many people, so you still need me to lie to you?"

Zhao Liben thought about it, and it seemed to be reasonable. After apologizing, the driver smiled and said, "Actually, ordinary people really can't do this."

"Walking forward, you will find the mining area. The surrounding area is surrounded by logs, just to prevent people from carrying things away without permission."

"When you get off work... you have to come out naked. Not only are you naked, but you also have to open your mouth to have a look, just like checking an animal."

"In the end, I had to lie down on the ground, push up my buttocks, and pass them one by one, lest someone would come out with them. I did this last time. My legs were broken and I was hung up and beaten."

"But I heard that someone brought it out. I don't know why they brought it. They said they bought a boat and went to business. I don't know if it's true or not."

Zhao Liben sounded true, and felt a lot more relaxed. He smiled and said, "That's true. But there are always rumors of one kind or another in mines, but few of them are true."

"To be honest, brother, I'm here to find someone. My younger brother seems to be working here. Where can I find him? Brother, can you show me the way?"

The coachman hummed and said, "Actually, I knew you were looking for someone at a glance. The gentleman next to him probably came from Dengzhou Prefecture with his attire and accent, right? This attire is not from the army, but from the army." There are inspections and unannounced visits.”

"Go inside, you can't enter the mining area. Walk forward, there is a building, the company's office. If you are looking for someone, go there."

Zhao Liben thanked him repeatedly, feeling happy in his heart, thinking that although his younger brother had the courage to go to Ceylon alone, he might not have the courage to hide the gems.

As long as he was lucky and didn't die of illness or the mine tunnel collapsed to death due to rain, he might really have a chance to see his brother.

Quan Zheshen was not as elated as Zhao Liben.

Although the blue milk stone pavement on the ground, the shops on both sides are everywhere, and the street is full of vitality, it is even more human than Seoul.

However, there is a sense of disintegration of rites and music, the death of the world, old people's hearts, moral depravity, and profit-seeking, permeating the streets and alleys.

Out of my status as a Confucian scholar, I naturally don't like this kind of vibrant feeling very much.

But he just sniffled, and followed Zhao Liben to the building in front.

After turning around the street and walking for a further distance, I came to the place the coachman said.

A very interesting building, found the main entrance, opened the door and entered, there were two people sitting inside, when they saw the two people came in, they waved their hands and said: "No jobs are being recruited recently."

Zhao Liben quickly stated his purpose of coming, and after giving his name, he handed over a dollar, and the person sitting there skillfully took out a set of rosters.

Put the work group roster aside first, take out a set of rosters by surname next to it, and look for them there.

Quan Zhe, with his hands behind his back, looked at some things posted on the wall that made him very uncomfortable.

One is the time sheet and the other is the clear payroll.

The miners will have three days off every month, and they will have holidays on the first, fifteenth and thirtieth of the new year.

There are also fixed times for going to and from work on weekdays.

The ore excavated by the work team, as well as piece-rate wages, are given a commission.

The rest are some rules that need to be followed.

Seeing this, Quan Zhe was dizzy for a while, he really had never seen such a situation.

After all, in North Korea, he was either a slave or a slave, and he really didn't adapt to the strange working system here.

But it looks like...it seems that life here is really good.

Quan Zhe thought in his heart and soul, could it be that the people who mine here all have the style of ancient gentlemen?
The Kingdom of Heaven is really different.

However, in fact, what he thought was very wrong.

A gentleman with hanging hair.

Dashun's capitalists are certainly not made of special materials.

This is purely forced.

Of course, in addition to being forced, Dashun's technological progress has led to Dashun's excess profits in the gem industry, which is also part of the reason.

In fact, if you start the "Dashun Franchise Ceylon Company", you don't have to think about it, you can know that capital will not choose Chinese as labor, but will choose Tamil, which has cheaper freight and less resistance to the caste system. people.

The distance from Tamil to Ceylon is not as far from Nanjing to Shanghai.

The distance from Chinese hired workers to Ceylon is equivalent to that from Shanghai to Almaty.

The cost of transporting a Chinese is more than 20 times the cost of transporting a Tamil.

Moreover, what happened in Nanyang back then, the Batavia Wushan Party, also left a deep impression on the emerging class in Dashun: when the Chinese are in a hurry, they are easy to resist, and they are far less tame than people under the caste system.

If capital is not constrained, which one will it choose?
From the perspective of pure profit, it can be said that government-supervised business operations are definitely not as profitable as those with no government supervision and completely free capital... or "efficiency".

To a certain extent, Liu Yu's many changes are similar to [objectively] completing a historically progressive cause, purely relying on the special circumstances of Dashun to complete a historical and productive progress.

Liu Yu often stands on the side of capital, suppressing small farmers, suppressing uprisings, and sometimes escorting capitalists in the court, but if Liu Yu really stands with them, that is definitely not the case.

In fact, the logic of Liu Yu's work is actually very simple:
Guaranteeing the profit of capital investment is higher than buying land in Dashun and collecting rents, and it is higher than the trust bonus brought by historical traditions to the land.

It is a basic law that capital pursues profit, just like water flowing downhill.

Land mergers including Dashun are actually in line with the law of profit-seeking under private ownership of land.

Some people have long said that the family has a lot of money. If you lose money today and burn it tomorrow, it is far inferior to the land. After the war, the Zhang family is still the Zhang family, and the Li family is still the Li family. The rate of return on rent collection is not high. Low, and there are plenty of safe-haven investment properties.

With the private ownership of land and the permission of land trading, capital will naturally go to land and lending.The invisible hand.

Therefore, Liu Yu appreciates the "reflection" of "Westerners used gunpowder to conquer the world, and Chinese used gunpowder to make firecrackers" - the reflection is wrong, which clearly reflects the spirit of market economy and profit orientation that the Chinese people have had for a long time.

Galileo’s mechanical research funded by the Venetian Ordnance Bureau, and Lavoisier’s chemical research by the director of the Gunpowder Bureau are clearly the “evil path” under the state’s control and government guidance against the market economy.

Liu Yu didn't think about relying on ideas, but just changed this rule, imagining that capitalists who belong to a nation will definitely give up profits for the rise of the nation and the world of great struggle.

He's just taking advantage of this pattern.

Water flowing from A to B is not a law; A is higher than B, and water flows from high to low, which is the law.

That's easy.

B can be raised a little higher.

For example, in the Songsu area, he carried out a comprehensive inventory of land acres, standard [-]th tax, raised land prices, lowered the income from buying land and collecting rents, and converted money rents to lower grain prices to force tenants to quit their tenancies and flee.

You can also dig another C, which is deeper than B.

For example, the large-scale development of Kanto and Nanyang; overseas trade and so on.

In northern Jiangsu, he brutally suppressed the salt households, in order to make the profit of investing in the land reclamation in northern Jiangsu higher than the profit of buying land in Songsu and collecting rent.

Since the salt households of small producers are against it, they should be suppressed.

The gold mine plan for emigrating to Shibian proposed by him in Mohe, Heihe and other places is another way of thinking, that is, from the very beginning, the Dongyang Trading Company had to undertake military obligations and train sailors’ obligations—even if it assumed the additional expenses of various obligations , the rate of return on profit is still higher than that of buying land and collecting rent. If you are not willing, some people are willing to do it.

The pure pursuit of profit and rate of return is a situation that can only appear after the bourgeoisie seizes power, becomes the ruling class, and enacts laws that conform to its class interests.

But Dashun's bourgeoisie is still far from becoming the ruling class.

When Dashun's handicraft industry and industrial base have huge advantages over the rest of the world, efficiency or profit is not the first priority.

As long as it is higher than buying land in Dashun and collecting rents, the more efficient profit return, in his eyes, or from the perspective of an abstract nation rather than commercial capital, is meaningless redundant profit.

It's like the difference between Zhao Liben's experience in the black gold mine and the Heilongjiang immigration plan that Dashun is currently working on at the gold mine.

From a pure profit point of view, black gold mines, slavery, and a small number of guards have a higher return on capital.

From the perspective of national expansion of settlements, it is correct that the government supervises business operations, reduces the return on capital investment, and entrains military and civil obligations.

Although Liu Yu doesn't understand, the first income table for a long time is the Bangladesh agricultural tax, the second is the salt tax, the third is the opium monopoly tax, the fourth is the dumping of Indian cotton comprador profits to the country, and the fifth is contracting. How is the British East India Company, which was introduced in the country, understood as the benchmark of free trade, commercial spirit, and the great power of industry and commerce.

It even has nothing to do with the two mainstream economic ideas of this era, mercantilism and free trade.

A mercantilism that makes the country's precious metals outflow, dumping and suppressing the country's industry?
A typical free trade that relies on monopoly privileges and is attacked by free trade schools?

Although he didn't understand these things about debating scriptures and imprinting ideas, Liu Yu understood that what Dashun was most suitable to learn was not the Anglo-Dutch model, but the French and Spanish model.

Spain's colonial trade policy was wrong.

The reason for the mistake was not that the colonial policy itself was wrong, but that Spain was not Dashun and Ming Dynasty, and they didn't have a number of batches for their handicraft capabilities.

Spain's little handicraft industry ability is also worthy of banning foreign goods?Can you stand it?
France's colonial control policy was also wrong.

The reason for the error is not that the colonial control policy itself is wrong, but that France has a good geographical environment and has no approval for the living standards of its own population.

During the Chinese New Year, there is a chicken in each pot. The living standard of 2600 million people is not registered, and the 3 million mu of arable land and pasture land is also allocated to immigrants?Who would go but the Protestants hit by the Edict of Fontainebleau?
Learning from Yinghe, according to the evaluation of the time when a hundred schools of thought are contending, they are not even trying to find a sword, they are purely waiting for the rabbit.

The Anglo-Dutch model cannot save Dashun, and cannot even guide colonization and overseas trade.

Perhaps the Song Dynasty was the only opportunity for the Anglo-Dutch trade model. The Song Dynasty money spread all over the world shows that a large amount of tariffs in the Song Dynasty should be import taxes; and it is really difficult for Dashun to spend silver to buy things now. With an India that cannot sell products or even competes with the same quality, Dashun has only two options: "expand with all its strength and bypass India to grasp the Sino-European trade, destroy the Indian handicraft industry to expand the market" and "collect money by doing business with one mouth", and there is no intermediate state.

As far as the West and France are concerned, the wrong policy is exactly the right choice for Dashun.

According to Spain's colonial trade policy, Dashun can guarantee the population of the colonies, and half of the foreign goods will not be used, and even if you want to be a comprador, you will not be able to do so.

According to the distance between France's geographical location and North America, Dashun can guarantee that in the previous 100 years, at least one French population of 2600 million, or even more than one, will be reached in North America, even if it is the form of the Dudu Mansion plus the reform of the land return——Northeast Pacific Cold, Southeast Asia is too hot, and the temperate zone at the same latitude is too attractive.

Therefore, when the capital satirizes the control of the French royal power over capital, and when the capital satirizes the French king for being able to transfer the governor of the French East India Company all the time, Liu Yu works hard to learn French, prompting Dashun, the leader of the Anti-Christ League, and France, the eldest daughter of God, has reached a quasi-alliance and learned many policies of France.

Therefore, Du Feng in Ceylon, facing the situation of Duplex being transferred, will have an inexplicable sadness of hurting others.He also only needs a word from the court to get out, and he must get out.

Therefore, it is clear that the capital will prefer to choose Ceylon with Tamils. The number of Chinese is forced by Liu Yu to about 20, and it is still increasing.Moreover, organizations such as Dashun Ceylon Company and Chartered India Company have never appeared.

(End of this chapter)