"There is no way to the secluded door, and there is shade in the pine bed. The autumn mountains are wide and wide, and the cold water is deep in the clouds. The barren grass is a monk, and the slanting sun passes through the guest heart. Wandering from under the stars and moon, the pillow stone makes a long groan. ”

On August 2, 1686, Li Nanxian, who had just returned to Wuchang from Hankou Town, Jiangbei, splashed ink in his study and wrote the above poem. This poem is about the Huilong Temple in Hankou, the Saikou Temple, the legend is that the Jiajing Emperor of the former Ming Dynasty set off from Zhongxiang to Beijing when the emperor passed by, the imperial gift changed its name, and it can be regarded as some history.

It's just that the life of Huilong Temple is not very good, in the early years when the world was peaceful, Hankou had not yet developed, Hankou was a tidal flat and reed wetland, the people were scarce, and the life of the monks of Huilong Temple was also extremely hard. As can be seen from the verses, the temple is located in the woods deep in the tidal flats, very remote and desolate, without even a door, and full of pine trees and grass. Later, after Hankou slowly rose up, the world was not very peaceful, as a famous commercial port, Hankou was repeatedly attacked by war, and the losses were quite large, and the life of the monks was even more bitter.

Waiting for the current situation of confrontation between Shun and Qinghubei, Hankou in Jiangbei has changed hands several times, and although it is currently controlled by Shunguo, it has become a military fortress as a barrier to Wuchang City. At this time, there were soldiers, masters, muskets, and cannons in Hankou Town, but there were no merchants, craftsmen, money houses, and all kinds of shops, and the money that had been flowing had disappeared, and the goods accumulated in the mountains were also scattered to Wuchang, Baling and other places, and Hankou Town fell almost at an alarming speed.

Li Nan first went to the territory of the Qing Dynasty some time ago to inspect the territory. Although this person is a Shunguo nationality, and his family house is located in present-day Chibi City, Puqi County, Wuchang Prefecture, but he went to the Qing State as a comprador on the east coast, and obtained the permission of the Qing government, so the road was unimpeded, not only the local officials of the Qing State often invited and visited, and even he and his entourage could live in the post house, and this treatment was indeed no one.

Li Nanxian mainly inspected Anlu, that is, the three prefectures of Chengtianfu, De'an, and Xiangyang in the Ming Dynasty, to learn about the local customs and products, and to see if there was any possibility of further trade. You must know that now the relationship between the Qing State and the east coast has been greatly eased, and the three pioneer teams of the South, Denglai, and Manchurian and Mongolian have signed peace agreements with them one after another, and then opened their respective borders to carry out mutually beneficial trade.

Generally speaking, this trade was mainly concentrated in the south, that is, the people on the east coast of Ningshao traded with the Qing merchants in the neighboring provinces of Hangzhou, Songjiang, and Jiaxing. In the Denglai area, because the western half of Laizhou Prefecture is mainly planted with grain, vegetables, and fruits, and the specialty commodities are relatively limited, at best, Dengzhou Prefecture has some seafood, building materials and other commodities that can be dumped in Qingguo because of cost factors. The rest are mainly entrepot trade, that is, the Nanyang specialties, Heishui specialties, and Korean and Japanese specialties are resold to the past, but the scale is not very large, far from reaching the scale of the Ningbo area in the south.

As a result, the East Coasters intended to trade elsewhere to compensate for the lack of Denlai. No, after negotiations between the two sides, the Qing State agreed to open some additional ports along the Yangtze River and open them to various countries, including the east bank, in order to increase fiscal revenue.

Although Hubei has experienced many wars, after all, the foundation is there, so in terms of trade specialty goods, there are still quite a few things. For example, Shatou City, a treaty port determined by the Qing Dynasty, is located in Jingzhou City, that is, east of Jiangling County, and is a natural harbor suitable for large ships to dock, so it was jointly identified by the two sides as one of the ports of the mutual market.

Li Nanxian saw a large number of rice, Sichuan salt, wood, dried fruits, medicinal herbs, and various other handicrafts in the market of Shatou Town. This made him very surprised, because Shashi is located in the wrong place of the Qing and Shun forces, and the Jiangling County next door has changed hands three times for decades, the most recent is more than ten years ago when the Qing army sent troops to capture the capital county of Jingzhou Prefecture, and then set up warships here and destroyed them, and added forts as a military town in the west of Gongwei Anlu Mansion.

It was a little strange to him that such a town, which was on the front line and facing great military pressure, could it be that the economic activity here was so active that he was not afraid of war. However, regardless of whether Shatou City is really not afraid of war or whether it is not afraid of war, in short, after the East and Qing Dynasty determined that it is a mutual market port, the threat of war here will indeed be greatly reduced. Aren't you afraid that you will injure the expatriates on the East Coast and cause diplomatic disputes? He can't afford it!

Therefore, the Qing State identified Shatou City as a mutual market port, which is actually quite ghostly, strictly speaking, there is a hint of kidnapping people from the east coast as shields. However, the conditions of Shatou City itself are indeed good, and the people on the east coast don't care much about this aspect, and everything is still business.

As a comprador on the East Coast, Li Nanxian is naturally not unlearned. In fact, before going to Shatou City and Anlu, Xiangyang, and De'an Prefectures for inspection, he focused on consulting relevant ancient books and materials, and learned that Shatou City has been an important commercial town since ancient times, and Shashi was located in the outer harbor and market of Yingdu of Chu State; In the poems of the Tang Dynasty, there is a song of "Jiangguan Liansha City, Taki's boat is moored on the waterfront"; In the Song Dynasty, Shashi became a famous town in Sanchu, "connecting the northern and southern provinces, and there were thousands of Jiake sailing, reflecting the evening lanterns in the distance, shining as often as day"; At the end of the Ming Dynasty, the sand market once reached its peak, "the sand city was extremely prosperous at the end of the Ming Dynasty, there were ninety-nine lanes, each line occupied an alley, the boats and vehicles were divergent, and the prosperous Jiayu was in the interior, that is, the current Beijing division and Gusu were not as good as also." ”

From the above descriptions, it can be seen that Shashi has indeed been a very prosperous trade port since ancient times, so even if it suffered a large-scale military disaster during the Ming and Qing dynasties, and later the war between Shun and Qing made it worse for many years, but in the end, the foundation is still there, and there is still a little bit of vitality, so it is not surprising that Li Nan found that the commercial trade here is still a bit of climate when he went to investigate before.

After Li Nanxian's inspection in Shashi, he immediately sent a report to Madang Fortress by clipper ship, and handed it over to the navy stationed there on the east coast to take back to Ningbo. In his report, he praised the port conditions in Shashi, saying that this place, which is located at the top of the Jingjiang River and Dongting Lake, and which controls the choke point of the water network transportation in the Jianghan Plain, must be "brought under control as soon as possible." If possible, a small river fleet should be set up here and secluded into a demilitarized zone, so that it can sit back and enjoy the profits of trade, and it is a safe business to make a profit without losing money.

This report has not yet been delivered to Yin County and handed over to Liu Houfei and Captain Liu for review. However, it is foreseeable that Liu Houfei should be very interested in this, because after the opening of Shashi, the people of the East Coast can purchase large quantities of goods there, and at the same time dump the competitive industrial products produced by the four feudatories in the Far East to make huge profits. At the same time, it seems that Li Nanxian himself can also profit from it, not by buying goods, but by forming a shipping brand.

In fact, Li Nanxian has been negotiating with Shunguo businessmen and gentry in the two lakes for the past year to see if he can set up a shipping brand specializing in the route from Wuchang to Yilingzhou, and now he basically has some eyebrows: Li Nanxian himself invested 200,000 taels of silver, accounting for 40 shares, some businessmen in Wuchang and Yuezhou jointly contributed 50,000 taels and some of the ships are all Chinese-style sailing ships, with a small tonnage, accounting for 30 shares, and some generals in the former battalion of Dashun also have some shares as an official umbrella. Jointly set up Dafayong shipping brand, specializing in river transportation between Wuchang and Yiling.

Li Nan first lived in Ningbo for many years as a comprador and even the importance of shipping. Even for people like them, controlling the shipping business is just as important as controlling the source of the goods. Imagine that if Li Mouren controlled the industrial output of the Yangloudong area, and then the shipping company he ran controlled the route from Hankou to Songjiang, then he was not alone in this tea business? When it came to that part, the tea farmers and tea merchants in Yangloudong could only let him slaughter, and the merchants at home and abroad in Songjiang, Ningbo and other places could only pinch their noses and purchase the tea he shipped at a high price.

Of course, Li Nan was self-aware first, knowing that he could not control the lower route of the Yangtze River, which was the forbidden territory of the people on the east coast, and he would only mix it up when his brain was pumped. In fact, he was aiming at the inland shipping business of Wuchang, Hankou, Yiling, and some of the neighboring inland waterways, which had not yet been touched by the people on the east coast, and to put it bluntly, he was pouring goods back and forth between the two important trading towns of Wuchang and Shatou City in order to make a profit. The skin of the comprador on the east coast on his body can give him enough protection, and the local officials of both the Shun and Qing countries will not be too embarrassed by the fleet under his name, which lays a good foundation for profit.

Li Nan first planned to take the time to go to Ningbo once next month. While the delivery of a batch of tea leaves, visit some old friends and see if it is possible to purchase some ships from the East Coasters. He is aiming at the classic ships such as the 72-ton inland river steamer eliminated by the people on the east coast, and the Heishui Shipyard can assemble and manufacture it to see if it can be lucky enough to buy a few, so that it will be much more convenient to transport people and goods. And this, in fact, is also the official meaning of Shunguo, they also want to use Li Nan to test some people on the east coast first, to see if there is any possibility of lifting the ban on sensitive things such as ships. It doesn't seem very likely, but how do you know if you don't try it?

"The Yangtze River, the golden waterway also. The depth of the riverbed is sufficient, the water is abundant, there is no worry of freezing, it is connected to other water networks, and it is convenient for shipping; The two sides of the strait have a large population, developed agriculture, huge economic potential, many types of goods, and a magnificent amount of transportation. The history of trade is still long, there are many commercial channels, and production and sales are booming, even during the war years. After putting down the brush in his hand, Li Nan washed his hands in the copper basin first, then sat down in front of the coffee table, picked up a cup of fragrant tea, and after taking a leisurely sip, he said to himself: "Prince Li Siming, the son of Li Laiheng, Hubei Jiedu is eyeing me, and he actually wants to form a steamship fleet, can Dashun afford it?" What a mess! But then again, if there is such a fleet of steamers on the Yangtze River and the Hanshui River, then it will be very easy to communicate with the newly acquired land in Sichuan, and the transportation of troops, food, and weapons will also become very fast, and the speed of the circulation of goods in various places will also be greatly accelerated, and the benefits of this are really great. Seriously, compared to the more expensive things like railways, ships seem to be more important to today's Dashun Kingdom. Yangtze River, Hanshui, Xiangjiang River, Ganjiang River, look at how developed the water system, Shatou City, Wuchang, Liujiabi, Wujiaxue, Laohekou, Yiling Prefecture These important commercial towns, which one is not developed by relying on shipping? Where the two lakes and rivers crisscross the river, the steamship is more useful. ”

Thinking of this, it is easier for Li Nanxian to understand the behavior of Li Siming, the prince of Dashun, who has been trying to find a way to obtain the steam engine of the East Coast people all these years, this is all forced! If the people of the East Coast were willing to sell steamships to Dashun, why would they do this! Speaking of which, the Eastern Dynasty still doesn't treat Dashun as its own people, guards against everything, and wants to use them as gunmen to fight against the Manchus, if this Dashun has no ideas, it would be strange! Finally, everyone is still quite consistent on the surface now, don't mention a little bit of dirt, everything looks forward, the Manchu Qing is the big enemy.

"The formation of Daihatsu Shipping Company is going to be faster." After drinking the fragrant tea, Li Nanxian stroked the beard on his chin, thought about it and said: "The local wooden boats can be used, and those that are not usable are purchased from the people on the east coast." Well, it would be even more beautiful if you could hire some shipbuilding mechanics from the people on the east coast, but those people don't have them in Ningbo, mostly in Heishui and other places, if you want to find them, you need to make a few turns, and ask a lot of people. That's it, this matter is in the future, no matter how difficult it is, you have to invite, and if there are people in it who know a little about marine steam engines, it will make a lot of money. ”

Thinking of this, Li Nanxian was also a little excited. Although he was a comprador on the east coast, he was also patriotic and had a deep affection for his hometown, so he naturally hoped to see Dashun one day build a ship. In that case, the Yangtze River and the Han River will become a thoroughfare, the speed of the circulation of goods throughout the country will be greatly accelerated, and commerce will be unprecedentedly prosperous, which will undoubtedly greatly increase the strength and influence of their merchant group, and this is not exactly what Li Nanxian and others have been pursuing?