Autumn of the 17th year of Chongzhen

Chapter 1316 Development of Shipbuilding Industry

With the development of maritime trade, the shipbuilding industry in the Ming Dynasty also showed a trend of explosion. There were a large number of shipyards in Qiongzhou, Guangzhou, and Shanghai.

Trees from Yunnan and Guizhou are transported to the seaside through the Pearl River and Yangtze River systems to be used in the manufacture of seagoing ships, but Qiongzhou's shipyard is undoubtedly the largest shipbuilding workshop in terms of scale.

Qiongshan County is the seat of Qiongzhou Prefecture. It is located at the mouth of the lower reaches of the Nandu River, facing the Leizhou Peninsula in the north. It is the first stop from Guangdong to Qiongzhou Prefecture.

The shipyard of the Four Seas Company is just outside Qiongshan County, at the mouth of the Nandu River.

The reason for choosing this place is that after the trees are felled upstream, it can be floated down the river to reduce the transportation of manpower. Another reason is that it is close to the coast, and it is very convenient for new ships to go to sea or repair damaged ships.

Because of these conveniences, Qiongshan County has become the largest county in the Guangnan area for shipbuilding.

However, Qiongzhou Mansion is a lonely island after all. The population and supplies on the island are not as good as those on the mainland. The development of the shipyard is still greatly restricted. One of them is the number of craftsmen, which has never been able to expand.

Now Qiongshan County has a population of 30, of which 12% are engaged in agriculture and 2% are engaged in fishing. Among the remaining [-] people, about [-] are young and middle-aged people engaged in shipbuilding, logging and other industries.These people and their families totaled more than [-] people. Qiongzhou Island couldn't afford the annual consumption. Many materials had to be transported from Guangdong. The shortage of materials and population limited the development of Qiongzhou's shipbuilding industry.

This time Song Yingsheng led a team to Qiongshan County to inspect. In addition to seeing the captured Spanish warships, he mainly came to inspect Qiongzhou shipyards to see how they operate. The government-run shipyard meets the needs of the navy and the people.

After watching the dismantling of the two ships, Song Yingsheng was very satisfied, "The Dutch ship a few years ago made me a great progress towards becoming a navy ship. I hope we can also gain something this time."

Feng Yingchang nodded and said with a smile: "Sir Song, you can rest assured that compared with a few years ago, we have more shipbuilding craftsmen and richer experience. We will definitely be able to learn the essence of Xiyi shipbuilding."

"It's a pity that the files and materials of the Sanbao eunuch's voyage to the West are not left, otherwise we wouldn't have to fumble around like this when building a ship." Song Yingsheng looked at the big ship on the berth, sighed, then turned his head and said: "Go! Go and see the shipyard. other places."

During the 200 years after Zheng He's voyages, the shipbuilders of the Ming Dynasty experienced a huge dynasties, and most of their previous technology and experience were lost. 200 years ago, the Ming Dynasty was able to build a [-]-ton lucky ship, but now it is impossible. Yes, all technologies need new accumulation.

The next group of people came out of the dock, and there was a large timber field outside. Logs as thick as buckets were piled up like a mountain, covering an area of ​​more than [-] mu.

Song Yingsheng and others walked for about a quarter of an hour before passing through the stockyard and arriving at a shipyard by the river. Several stone walls built with bricks and stones stood tall. Feng Yingchang led Song Yingsheng up the stone wall and saw nearby stone walls. There are more than ten walls, each of which is a group of two, all parallel.

There is a distance of about ten feet between the two stone walls. The bottom of the stone wall is wide and the top is narrow and there are steps. There is a "U" line between the two stone walls. At the bottom is a canal connected to the Nandu River.

Song Yingsheng stood on the top of the wall, and hundreds of people stood on the bottom steps of the "U" shaped wall. They were chanting and pulling a damaged Western-style gunboat to the slipway between the two walls.

"Master Song, it's time to build ships and repair the berths of ships!"

Song Yingsheng is Song Yingxing's elder brother, the most proficient manufacturing talent in the Ming Dynasty. He just looked down and understood the function of these two stone walls. A Western-style gunboat can be placed between the two walls. The "U"-shaped wall has steps from the bottom to the top, which facilitates the repair and manufacture of ships by craftsmen.

He looked at the entire slipway, pointed to a few stone walls in the distance, and couldn't help asking, "Are all of them building Western-style sailboats?"

The distance between these walls is relatively narrow, and the stone walls are relatively high, while the Fuchuan has a relatively wider hull, no more decks, and the boat is shorter, so Song Yingxing knew at a glance that it was not for the benefit of the boat.

Feng Yingchang hurriedly replied: "Fuchuan is also built, but not here. This place mainly builds Western-style sailboats. The speed of Fuchuan is slow, and there are not many artillery equipment. It can sail in Nanyang. Once it passes Johor (Singapore), it enters the Tianzhu Sea. , When you meet a Xiyi warship, you can’t beat it, and you can’t run away, so it’s very dangerous, so the recent orders placed by the maritime merchants in Guangzhou are all Western-style fast boats.”

Song Yingsheng nodded, "Then Mr. Feng's shipyard built it? If you need anything, you can ask the court."

"How can it be built? If you place an order now, you will have to wait three years at the earliest to get the ship."

Song Yingsheng was a little surprised, "It will take so long? It seems that we need to step up and expand the scale."

Since the gap in shipbuilding is so large, it seems that the imperial court's plan to expand the shipyard and increase the number of shipyards can be implemented.

Feng Yingchang shook his head, "Master Song, just expanding the scale is not enough, the main reason is that some raw materials are not enough, such as the production of tung oil, so just expanding the scale of the shipyard is not very useful."

The transformation of the commercial society is the change of the social production mode, which tends to be more complex, more systematic and intimate collaboration.

Song Yingsheng understood as soon as he heard it. Taking simple weaving as an example, the traditional society is self-sufficient and can be completed by one person at home without cooperation with the society. However, workshop weaving in a commercial society requires collaboration. All kinds of people and industries have relationships.

First of all, there must be someone who grows cotton, and secondly, those who purchase raw materials need to know the price fluctuations of raw materials, where to get cheap raw materials, and reduce the cost of weaving.After the cloth is woven, it needs to be dyed, which requires the purchase of dyes. When it is finally sold, it is also necessary to grasp the taxation of various places, the climate of the sea, and other issues.

What can be done by one person in the past requires the fine division of labor and cooperation of countless people in the commercial society. Weaving a piece of cloth is enough, let alone building a ship.

This is an industry network problem, not a point problem.

The change in this is an upgrade of the whole society and the country. The country will become stronger, but the society will also become more complicated. The original way of treating headaches and feet is no longer applicable in this era. .

The bureaucracy of Ming Dynasty must also be upgraded, and Wang Yan's reform of the affairs officer and administrative officer is also to adapt to this change.

Song Yingsheng was silent for a while, then nodded slightly and said: "I understand a little bit. Can Mr. Feng organize a file for me. After I analyze it, I will report it to the court to solve the problem of insufficient tung oil."

Feng Yingchang naturally had no objection, and immediately nodded in response.

After inspecting the shipyard, Song Yingsheng rested in Qiongshan County for a few days, and after analyzing the entire shipbuilding industry based on the files provided by the Four Seas Company, he wrote a memorial and submitted it to the court.However, he did not end his trip here, but to complete the inspection of the entire industrial chain of the Qiongzhou Shipbuilding Workshop.

A few days later, still accompanied by Feng Yingchang, the group of them entered Qiongzhou Island along the Nandu River to inspect the forest farm of the Four Seas Company.

Along the way, Song Yingsheng could see that from time to time there were trees cut down from the upper reaches of the river, drifting downstream from the river, and many mountain peaks on both sides of the river were cut bare.

This scene made Song Yingsheng frowned. He looked around, but saw many people on the hillsides on both sides of the river, carrying a bamboo basket. He didn't know what they were doing, so he asked, "What are they doing?" ?”

"My lord, it's planting small trees." A leader of the nearby forest farm explained.

Song Yingsheng heard the words, took a closer look, and found that these felled hills were actually very organized, and seemed to delineate the area. On the west hillside, a small tree with a height of one person had grown. He couldn't help nodding, "Trees grow It’s not easy, it’s gone after felling, if you can think of planting new saplings, future generations will give you a good judgment.”

Trees are indeed not easy to grow. The forest farm can think of planting trees for the long-term plan, which is only one of the reasons. The other main reason comes from the conflict between Han Li and Han Miao on the island.

In Qiongzhou Prefecture, the Han people are mainly distributed in the coastal plain area near the sea in the north, while the Shao people live in the interior of the island.They believe in ghosts and gods, San is a kind of panpsychism, which can be regarded as a primitive religion.This kind of belief made them believe that all things have spirits, and felt that the felling of trees by the Han people would arouse the dissatisfaction of the mountain gods, so it caused many conflicts.

The new household registration system in the Ming Dynasty has been promoted for some time, but in the actual implementation process, the progress is still very slow.Some minority tribes live in the mountains, and the Ming Dynasty has not figured out how many people there are. Moreover, the living space of these minority tribes is squeezed step by step by the Han people, and they are finally forced to retreat into the mountains. The conflicts will not dissipate easily. It will take a long time to realize national unity and integration in China.

Replanting after felling is a kind of compromise, and the forest farm is mostly managed by the people. The company also took this opportunity to plant teak and camphor wood that are more suitable for shipbuilding, changing from a rough model to a fine and durable model.

The crowd continued to walk for a while, and there were fewer mountains to be felled, but a large number of figures could still be seen in the forest. Most of them were dressed as young people, and they climbed up the trunk with a hatchet and cut off some side branches.

Song Yingsheng knew at a glance that this was to make the trees grow upwards, so that larger and straighter trees could grow out.

This inspection made him gain a lot, and he had a general understanding of the current situation and process of the entire shipbuilding industry.

After ten years of development, Qiongzhou's shipbuilding industry has gradually standardized its processes and formed a huge industrial chain.

Most of the keels for shipbuilding are giant logs brought from Yunnan and Guizhou, and Qiongzhou provides general timber, tung oil is purchased from Guangxi and other provinces along the Yangtze River, iron nails are from smelting workshops in Guizhou, and canvas and ropes are from Jiangnan. Huge collaborative network.

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(End of this chapter)