In the past, Roque always heard people use "a mine at home" to describe people as wealthy, but Roque couldn't understand what it was like to have a mine at home.

Now Roque finally realized.

In the first week of the resumption of operations, the mine made a profit of more than £5,000, and this is on the premise that Roque has significantly increased the treatment of miners, and if other gold mines treat miners by the same standard, the mine's profits will be further increased.

In fact, improving the treatment of workers will not increase much expenditure, because camps, equipment, tools, clothing, etc. are all one-time expenditures, so the cost of this part is negligible, so the largest expenditure is the cost of food.

The Matilda gold mine does not have more than 1,000 people, including managers and security personnel, and in Johannesburg, if it were replaced by other gold mines of the same size, the daily expenditure on food would probably not exceed 50 pounds.

That is, about one shilling per person.

But at the Matilda gold mines, the expenditure on food was around £100 a day, which means that the average person spent about two shillings.

It sounds like the bar has doubled, but how much is the daily increase in support?

It's just £50.

It may not be enough for those extravagant mine owners to pay for a day's cigars.

But the benefits of £50 are immeasurable.

For example, when standards are raised, workers work harder, units are more efficient, and the mine spends less on management.

At the same time, there is also a sense of identification with the mine, which is important, why is there a shortage of miners in Johannesburg?

Because of the harsh working conditions and the harsh treatment of the mine owners, the mine was unable to retain miners, whether Boers or Zulus, who usually left Johannesburg to try their luck elsewhere after their contract ended, rather than staying in the mine to start their next contract.

This is the real reason why there is a shortage of miners in Johannesburg.

Relatively speaking, in fact, the Boers are better, those Zulu talents are really "naïve", through the Zulus under Christian, Roque's original impression of the Zulus has changed, but after communicating with Christian, Roque knew that those Zulus are indeed mud and can't support the wall.

Admittedly, there are some Zulus who are indeed down-to-earth and capable, but most Zulus are lazy, and most Zulus will be lazy at work without overseers, and Christian has to worry about the loss of workers after every paycheck.

Most Zulus have no concept of saving, they spend as much as they have and never save up.

Some workers get paid and then disappear for no reason until they spend all of their paychecks, then come back to the next job and repeat the same process.

So Roque doesn't like Zulus very much now, even the little blacks in the Johannesburg Police Department, and Christian is telling the truth, some Zulu police officers will disappear after receiving their salaries, and come back when their salaries are spent, hoping to continue to be police officers.

For such a guy, Roque will never re-admit, after knowing that most of Xiao Hei is this kind of virtue, Roque warns Yaya and asks him to remind all Zulu police officers that if they dare to disappear, then Roque will sell them to the mine to mine.

In contrast, Chinese miners are certainly hard-working.

According to Sam, he has managed workers of many races, and the Chinese miners are the most self-controlled, hard-working, best-managed, and most frugal group Sam has ever seen.

After an initial discomfort, it didn't take long for the Chinese miners to get on track.

In fact, it is really simple to change a person's habits, after a Chinese miner who urinated in the open was whipped in public, all Chinese miners remembered to go to the bathroom.

After a Chinese miner spilled urine outside the pool and was whipped in public, all the Chinese miners remembered that urinating was a small step forward.

After a Chinese miner showed up in the cafeteria in disheveled clothes, then whipped in public, and then starved again, all the Chinese miners remembered that they had to take a shower after work and that their clothes had to be changed for the day.

Yes, the punishment of Matilda Gold Mine is simple and crude, it is to whip, lash, lash -

And it was a public whipping.

You must know that Chinese people are very face-saving, and it is undoubtedly a very shameful thing to be whipped in public, so it only took a week for all the Chinese miners to meet the hygiene standards required by Roque, and this adaptability made Sam simply dumbfounded.

Sam had worked in the mines for many years and knew what the vast majority of miners looked like, and under normal circumstances, miners were disheveled, rude, and filthy, almost no different from those homeless people in the city.

In fact, when Sam arrived at the Matilda Gold Mine, in Sam's opinion, the Chinese miners in the Matilda Gold Mine were no different from the other miners in Sam's impression.

But the miners who have adapted to the rules of the Matilda gold mine have obviously improved a lot, and perhaps their behavior is still rude, but they are neatly dressed, clean, and there is no unbearable smell on their bodies, and if you have to compare, Sam is surprised to find that even many of the freedmen in Britain are not as hygienic as the Chinese miners who work in the Matilda gold mines.

This was a surprising find.

What is even more surprising is that Roque did not stop educating these miners, who had to go down to work during the day and at night, the night school teachers hired by Roque would train these miners in English.

This is also a mandatory requirement for Roque, every person per day, must learn three English words, otherwise the food supply for the next day will be halved.

At the Matilda gold mine, the miners are now provided with three meals, including eggs, milk, bread, vegetables, as well as chicken thighs and beef.

Halving the supply?

That would be worse than killing the miners.

So just a week later, there were already Chinese miners saying hello to Sam in English.

Weekends are payday.

This is definitely a novel experience for Chinese miners.

Because no matter how long they have been in Johannesburg, they have never been paid before.

So when Hoover took them away from the De Beers Unified Mining Company, the vast majority of them were penniless.

Sadly, they collect the world's most precious metals, but they are almost the poorest people in the world.

The Matilda gold mines paid the Chinese miners three shillings a day, a little less than the Boers and a little higher than the Zulu during the Transvaal period, so that after a week's work, each worker received a pound sterling, plus a shilling's salary.

Even if a few of the workers did not go down because they were sick, they received half of their salary, which was one shilling plus six pence a day.

This is because Matilda Gold Mine stipulates that miners are entitled to sick leave, during which the mine halves their salary.

The shilling, in fact, is a silver coin that is slightly smaller than the ocean, and one ocean is roughly equivalent to two shillings.

In other words, these Chinese miners have a salary of forty-five oceans per month.

What is the concept of the forty-five oceans?

In this era, if a girl from a poor family in the Qing Kingdom went to work as a servant in a rich man's house, in addition to food and accommodation, she could get a salary of about ten taels of silver a year.

Ten taels of silver, about twenty pieces of ocean.

The soldiers of the Qing Dynasty, the monthly salary of silver is one tael and five dollars, and three buckets of rice are given, and the sum of silver and rice is less than 30 taels, even if it is calculated at 30 taels, it is only 60 oceans.

Being a soldier is a profession that puts your head on your belt.

So when they got their salaries, the joy of the Chinese miners can be imagined.

It was the first money they had ever received since they arrived in Johannesburg, and it was a joy to know that one shilling was about half an ocean.

In fact, the joy did not last long.

When the De Beers Unified Mining Company hired these Chinese miners, it was also talking about what salaries were paid on time, what extra meals must be made every other day, what fixed paid annual leave, etc., and in the end, none of them were cashed in.

In fact, the Chinese miners did not have much demand for extra meals and vacations, and salary was the most important concern of the Chinese miners, but the De Beers Unified Mining Company really broke its promise, there was no extra meals, no vacations, and even the most basic salary, which was really unacceptable.

At the Matilda Gold Mine, the Chinese miners finally received the legendary "weekly salary".

This was supposed to be a good thing, but some thoughtful miners found out in less than half a day that a good thing can turn into a bad thing.

Johannesburg is not a Qing country after all, and the salary cannot be delivered to the family in time, and the salary that I finally got is no more than three ways at present, either to send the money to the family, or to deposit the money in the bank, or to carry the money with me.

Either way, it's not the best way to do it.

Such a little money, if it is sent back to the Qing Kingdom-

I guess this money is not enough for postage.

If you deposit it in the bank—

Let's not talk about whether the bank of foreign devils can be trusted, it is estimated that the bank will not look down on this money, I heard that I want to open an account in the bank, not to mention no interest, what account opening fee to pay, not counted, not counted-

It seems to be the most secure to carry with you -

That's even worse, what if you lose it? What should I do if I get stolen? When you go to the shower, do you want to hang money around your neck?

It's better now, if in a few months, the salary will be saved more, and it will be hung around the neck, and people will not be exhausted to death!

If you don't get tired to death, you have to be crushed to death!

At this point, the miners realized that when the mine did not pay them in the past, the miners were very troubled.

Now that the mine is paid, the miners seem to be more troubled.

It's a blissful annoyance.