Rise of the 1630s South America

Chapter 1945 Overseas Interests ([-])

April 1686, 4, Port Harge, light rain.

In a primary school in the suburbs, a group of students are having physical education class.There are not many students, there are only a dozen or so, and the age is generally 10-12 years old. This club is working hard on long jump and other subjects aimed at improving physical fitness.

Strictly speaking, this basic education institution called Haji Primary School is the first (and perhaps the only) modern complete elementary school in the entire Black Sea region, which is completely different from the Mongolian children's education institutions spontaneously established by the people in Ottoman and other countries.Haji Primary School currently has more than ten teaching staff and nearly a hundred students.There are five grades in the school, from the first grade to the fifth grade. There is only one class in each grade. There are more than ten students in each class. Most of them are the children of the East Coast nationals who live in Haji Port. At the same time, there are some admiration (or curiosity) The school education system on the east coast, the children of the aristocratic age of the Crimean Khanate who came to study specially.

The textbooks and teaching aids used by Haji Wan Elementary School are all shipped from the local area, and most of the teachers are hired from the local area with high salaries, which is not easy.However, in order not to be blamed by the people on the east coast of Haji Port, which has a growing population, the state-owned South China Sea Transportation Company, which is in charge of operating the entire port city, can only make Haji Commercial Station take out a fixed percentage of profits every year to support Haji The construction and daily maintenance of the Jilin Primary School.

Speaking of this, I have to mention that with the continuous expansion of Black Sea trade and the continuous warming of the special relationship between the East Bank and the Crimean Khanate, the area of ​​Haji Port currently controlled by the East Coast people is also increasing. It is large, almost over 500 square kilometers, and there are two to three thousand merchants living on the east coast, as well as a larger number of Tatars, Poles, and Ukrainians.

Haji Port has developed from a barren land to today, and it can no longer be referred to as a port or a commercial station.Obviously, it is now a city, a special city with government agencies, commercial agencies, religious agencies, schools, hospitals, workshops and military camps, and its status must be clarified.

For this reason, a few months ago, under the instruction of Gao Wengang, the special envoy of the East Coast to Europe, Malati, the ambassador to Istanbul, personally negotiated with the Great Khan of the Crimean Khanate on the status of Haji Port. clear.The Great Khan of Crimea is also very talkative—nonsense, the situation is tense now, so it’s hard to talk—before they only verbally agreed to lease these wastelands to the people on the east bank, but the specific boundaries are somewhat vague, and the deadline is from I haven't talked about it, it seems very informal.Therefore, after serious consideration, he also agreed to sign a formal agreement in black and white to lease Haji Port and some surrounding land to the East Coast Republic in exchange for some other benefits.

Malati was very interested in these, and immediately sent the Clippers to Cadiz to report to Gao Wengang, and Gao Wengang immediately gave Malati greater autonomy, instructing him to seize the opportunity to compete with Grail Khan. Negotiations will clarify the status of Port Haji.In this way, with the intention of both parties, the lease of Haji Port was quickly negotiated: the East Coast Republic of China leased the city for 5000 years at a price of 100 yuan per year, but the rent needs to be paid in one lump sum, which can be used in various Offset of similar materials.The area of ​​the leased land has expanded compared to the past, including the entire city of Sevastopol and some sparsely populated mountainous areas on the southern coast of the peninsula. The total area exceeds 1800 square kilometers, which is much larger than the area of ​​Hong Kong, which is quite good.

At present, the lease agreement of Haji Port has been sent to the mainland for approval by the government, so it is not a big problem.Although the government is now heavily in debt due to investment in the military, it is still very cost-effective to spend 50 yuan to obtain a reasonable and legal naval and army military base in the Black Sea. Delivery in Crimea.

The bulk of the materials delivered (that is, the rental fee) is undoubtedly military materials!In view of the fact that the most powerful force of the Crimeans is their cavalry, so the "lease fee" provided by the people on the east coast accounts for more than half of the cavalry equipment, including high-quality sabers, light cavalry breastplates, carburized cavalry spearheads, etc. Tens of thousands of pieces.In addition, there are some saddles, spurs, horseshoes, military water bottles, and leather armor. Because of mass production, the cost is very low. Although the Tatars can produce them themselves, they still order a considerable amount and hoard them. , because God knows how long the war with the Russians will be.

In addition to these supplies, it is the turn to get infantry equipment - don't look at the fact that Glei Khan has paid more and more attention to the infantry of the new army in recent years, but in the final analysis, the most important force in this country is the Tatars, who come and go like the wind, are sturdy and light Cavalry, at least at this stage, is right-these equipment are mainly spare barrels, barrels, tents, engineering shovels, bayonets, military boots, medicines and other things, mainly for the [-] new troops.

According to the payment plan agreed upon by the two parties, the equipment of the [-] new troops was unloaded at Murato Port (that is, Kherson in later generations, a port city emerging from the Black Sea trade) and handed over to the Khan's trusted officers to receive it. Distributed to the combat readiness warehouse of the new army.As for the cavalry equipment, it is temporarily stored in the warehouse in Port Haji, and is temporarily kept by the people on the east coast.Once needed in the future, Gelai Dahan only needs to send someone to pay by check until all the supplies are collected.

It can be seen from this that the relationship between the Crimean Khanate and the East Coast Republic is too close, so close that the Ottoman Empire may not communicate with it so much. I don’t know if Istanbul will be "jealous".But no matter what, the purpose of the East Bank and Ottoman is always the same, that is, to increase the strength of the Crimean Khanate as much as possible, and to do everything possible to curb the Russians' ambitions for Ukraine.

"It's been a few years since the establishment of Haji County, right?" Wu Yifei, the Commander of Haji Police, who was sitting on the second floor of the teahouse, said to himself.Holding the teacup, he looked with interest at the students who were taking physical education not far ahead. Because of their good nutrition, those students, regardless of gender, were very strong, and it was gratifying to watch.

As for the teahouse he is currently in, it is called Wancun Teahouse, and the proprietor is a descendant of Lu Liuliang, a famous scholar in the Ming Dynasty.The backbone of the Lu family is currently assisting the King of Lu in Taizhou, but there are also some branch families who are not very optimistic about the King of Lu, and have traveled across the ocean to the east coast to seek a living.And this descendant of the Lu family who opened a teahouse in Haji Port in front of me is quite amazing. It can only be attributed to his love of traveling and experiencing different cultures.

There is a pair of carved couplets hanging in front of Wancun Teahouse, which is exactly the couplet that caused literary inquisition in the history of the Qing Dynasty.But in Haji, a place where the birds don’t shit, let alone this couplet, so what if you hang up poems scolding the eighteen generations of Aixinjueluo’s ancestors, who cares about you!

Of course, the Lu family didn't just open teahouses in Haji Port. In fact, although their family only had a dozen or so people here, they also hired people to run some commodity trading businesses. Compulsory education for school-age children's traditional Chinese culture is also awesome.

Wu Yifei once sent a license to this school, knowing that there are probably less than twenty students here, and the teaching content is not much different from that of ancient China. It is always enlightenment books such as "Three Character Classics" and "Thousand Character Classics". People were amazed when they saw it.If you also consider that most of the students who come to study are the sons of "deer-headed rats" who are greedy for cheap (no tuition fees) and become regular non-citizens, then Wu Yifei feels even more ridiculous.

However, this Lu’s Elementary School is also objectively helping the government to carry out the assimilation work, and the students taught are at least able to read and write, right?That's fine, at least you can do a lot of work, and it's also creditable.Besides, the population of Haji Port is increasing, reaching almost [-] to [-] people, and their lives are stable. In the future, there will only be more and more school-age children entering school every year, but there are only three primary schools (that is, the government-run Haji Wan Primary School, and the two primary schools funded by the Taoist Federation) are definitely not enough. Now that the Lu family is willing to undertake certain social obligations, it is naturally a dream for the government.

"Commander, I'm afraid Hajijian County has to be moved back. The local gangsters now have empty pockets, and they have to send people to send money when the county is established. It's okay to say that this group is just some cadres. , there is no shortage of anything these days, but there is no shortage of people who are willing to be officials, but it is difficult to distribute money. Haji Port has a large area and a large population. Once a county is established, it is bound to increase by a large amount every year. I am afraid that many people are not willing to use a large sum of money to improve various infrastructures, and they will do everything possible to delay it.” A subordinate carefully lit a cigarette for Wu Yifei, and then said: “Instead of relying on the State Development Bureau Help the guys who fall into the eyes of money, we might as well count on those old-fashioned people, they are rich, and they are more interested in spreading the faith, the construction of Haji still depends on them."

Wu Yifei and several of his subordinates are Buddhist believers, so their reverence for the Taoist Association is not as strong as that of ordinary people.However, they also admit that Taoism’s status as a state religion on the east coast is as stable as Mount Tai, and the amount of government funding and private donations it receives every year is horrifying. Therefore, it can spread its beliefs everywhere, even in the remote islands of Diu, Djibouti and Port Haji. No exception.

The Crimean Khanate is very friendly to the east bank, and gives many privileges to the people of the east bank.For example, people on the east coast need to spend a lot of energy to negotiate the right to freedom of religion when negotiating with Spain and the Kingdom of Portugal. It wasn't easy to do - the Crimeans graciously agreed with little thought.The reason for this is probably related to the fact that the country's own beliefs are not very strong. Although the descendants of these nomadic peoples have now naturalized the Green Church, there are a lot of things that violate the precepts such as drinking alcohol openly, and they rarely participate in them. Religious activities, how pious can you expect them to be?

In today's Haji Port, there are really too many Taoist temples, as many as seven or eight.The number of believers is even greater. Every year during the Sanqing Christmas period, the cigarettes lit by the incense burners at the entrances of the Taoist temples can make people feel as if a fire is erupting.People who believe in Taoism, besides the nationals on the east coast, there are also many Polish and Ukrainian slaves who escaped, and even many Tatars grazing in the countryside have believed in Taoism and become believers of Tianzun, although this has aroused the attention of the Green Sect. Some grievances from the mullahs.

All in all, the status of Taoism in Port Haji is very high now, and the finances of various Taoist temples are also very ample, so they naturally undertake considerable social obligations, such as donating to schools, building hospitals, disaster relief, and persuading people to be kind etc. In short, it is an important stabilizer of society and is very popular with local officials.

"Hey, that's the reason. The construction of Haji County may have to be delayed for a few years. The root cause is that there is no money." Wu Yifei took two puffs of cigarettes and said with a smile: "By the way, old man, our security team now belongs to Portugal. The leader over there, Commander Mao Jun wrote to me a while ago to ask me if the Russians have shown signs of a war recently, how do you think I should reply to him?"

"The news that the Russians are going to start a war is probably known to everyone, right? What else is there to say, let's just tell Commander Mao that this war is inevitable. If we don't fight this year, we have to fight next year. The Russians think It’s almost crazy to get a port in a warm water zone. Now the mouth of the Dnieper River is in the hands of the Crimean Khanate, and the mouth of the Don River is in the hands of the Ottoman army. They tried their best to eat Eastern Ukraine, but they didn’t even have an inch There is no coastline, so how can they be willing? This battle is almost inevitable, and the current behavior of the Russians also shows that they are preparing for war. What else is there to say? Hurry up and send troops to protect our country's overseas interests. .”

In fact, it was just like what Wu Yifei and Wu Yifei were talking about at the moment.The Russians are now desperately trying to get access to the Black Sea, but the first thing they have to face is the alliance between the Crimean Khanate and the Ottoman Empire.The Russians now occupy half of Ukraine, but all of them are inland areas. The coastal areas are either controlled by the Crimean Khanate or controlled by the Ottoman Empire garrisons, such as the Azov Fortress at the mouth of the Don River.As for the Caucasus region, I'm sorry, the locals have basically surrendered to the Ottoman Empire, belonging to its outer territories and servant forces.If you want to obtain a coastline in the Caucasus, you also have to ask the Ottomans whether to agree.

In short, if the Russians want to make breakthroughs in the Black Sea and the Sea of ​​Azov in the south, they cannot bypass the Ottoman Empire, just as they cannot bypass Sweden if they want to gain access to the sea in the west.So you can see how the Russian Empire was ecstatic when the Ottoman Empire fell into a bitter battle with the Austrians, and began to prepare for going south to drink horses in the Black Sea.And this is exactly what Wu Yifei and others are worried about. Once the Russian army goes south in a large scale, how will the interests of the people on the east bank be guaranteed.

"I can only take one step at a time." Wu Yifei sighed after hearing this, and said, "I see what Commander Mao meant, he wanted to transfer the Portuguese garrison to the east, but I don't know if Special Envoy Gao Wengang agreed or not. "

(End of this chapter)