After entering December, Zhao Mingchuan, who had fallen into an inexplicable depression due to a dangerous experience of "escaping from the tiger's mouth", finally recovered and cheered up. After the affairs of the preliminary working group of the Oriental Industrial Company were basically normalized, they took a boat to Qiongshan County, Qiongzhou Prefecture, to meet with Liu Yaoyu, who had been waiting for a long time, and Zhao Youheng, the prefect of Qiongzhou.

A batch of gorgeous goods as a gift has become a powerful proof of Zhao Mingchuan's personal sincerity to the Qiongzhou Mansion, and even Zhao Youheng, the brother-in-law of Liu Yaoyu's "no desire and no desire", was stunned for several minutes before he blushed and beckoned the guests to take their seats.

Regarding the incident that happened at the mouth of the Pearl River in Guangzhou last month, Zhao Youheng also received relevant news, and he secretly sneered at Wang Zunde's stubbornness like "cleanliness". But after all, this is a matter of dignity in the Ming Dynasty, if it weren't for the Fujian Governor Xiong Wencan who stood up and protected the face of the two places at the most critical time, I'm afraid that he, Zhao Youheng, would not dare to meet with Zhao Mingchuan if he was killed.

It is said that Xiong Wencan only mentioned in the recital of the emperor that "Wang Zunde, the governor of Liangguang, worked hard, the civil and military forces of Liangguang worked together, and Jin Penghai waterproofed the resolute response". Chen Qian, the commander-in-chief of the Guangdong army, and the commander of the Guangzhou Bei Japanese envoys, also joined forces to report the withdrawal of the Chinese and American fleets from the war as a "great victory" without mentioning the heavy losses of the Humen fortress. Zhao Youheng was not easy to speak even if he was full of doubts, and Zhao Mingchuan was very cautious to avoid the possibility of turning the topic from a possible lead. The meeting between the two was decent, polite and polite than the actual purpose of the relationship.

However, there is one thing that makes Zhao Mingchuan and Liu Yaoyu feel excited, that is, Zhao Youheng acquiesced to the business cooperation between Liu Yaoyu and Zhao Mingchuan in the name of "Nanhai Firm", and was willing to give help to Qiongzhou within the scope of his ability.

In fact, this is not Zhao Youheng's crooked idea of eating a mouthful, he is frustrated in officialdom, he doesn't have much intention to "shine" in Qiongzhou, it can be regarded as a monk for a day and a clock for a day. And it's such a poor and white Qiongzhou Mansion, no matter how much you toss, it's just a bird, it's better to let Liu Yaoyu, who "doesn't hit the south wall and doesn't look back", try it, as for the "Qiongya Development" vaguely proposed by Zhao Mingchuan. At most, he used it as an excuse for the other party to hope that some deserted borderlands could be created in the local circle.

……

On Tuesday, December 10, 1630, the seventh day of the winter month of the third year of Chongzhen in the Ming Empire.

In Ding'an County, which is only sixty or seventy miles south of Qiongshan County, Liu Yaoyu and Zhao Mingchuan sat side by side on straw mats, looking at a large area of overgrown wasteland across the Xiantun River in the southwestern suburbs of the county, and they were all sighing pity.

A few years ago, in order to suppress the Shengli rebellion on Qiongya Island, the Miao soldiers transferred from Guangxi turned Ding'an County upside down, and now the population of the county is only in the early 10,000s, which can be called a piece of red land. In the early years, tens of thousands of acres of farmland on the other side of the Xiantun River were abandoned, but now they have been abandoned into untended shrubs and weeds. The original landowners did not know whether to live or die.

“…… There is the help of the Huamei Pearl City Government, and the Oriental Industrial Company of Sicheng Brother monopolizes the supply and transportation of Huamei seafood. Liu Yaoyu now holds gorgeous seafood worth more than 100,000 taels of silver, and his speech is a little light.

"China and the United States are now shipping tight, tens of thousands of miles by sea, crises are lurking, and it is not easy for commercial goods to be lost once a year. What's more, most of them are arrogant and flashy. Plundering wealth is like hemp, killing chickens and taking eggs, which is not beneficial to people's livelihood. In many years, it won't be so much of a huge profit. Zhao Mingchuan saw that the other party was a little carried away, and couldn't help but remind secretly. If Brother Yi Ping only looked at the profits of selling seafood for one year, he would have been able to prosper in these years, but what was the significance of the country and the people? ”

"Brother is ashamed ......" Liu Yaoyu's face turned red, knowing that he was still stuck in the position of the South China Sea firm, calculating the gains and losses. So he quickly hugged his hands and apologized.

"Hey, don't hide it from Brother Yiping, it was also Master Huamei who taught me this way. Only then did he say 'borrowing flowers to offer Buddha'. Seeing that the other party actually showed a trace of respect for himself, Zhao Mingchuan waved his hand embarrassedly. But since the topic has already touched on a larger aspect, Zhao Mingchuan also put on an unusually serious expression: "I look at the beautiful places to govern the people and prosper the industry, all of them are drawn in the overall situation, and they are all small, and they are focused on in detail, step by step!" This parent official of Qiongzhou, since he is a native of Zhao Youheng, the governance of the state is his duty. With the thrust of the government, it is naturally a natural official affair to connect the gentry and promote the people's industry. The South China Sea business will guide it again, communicate with the outside world, and the people's power will be used by me! We should let go of the situation of one business in the South China Sea, and ponder carefully, what are the advantages and disadvantages of this Qiongya land, and what are the advantages and disadvantages of the near and far, and what are the auxiliary forces! If the three are connected, everything will be done. Qiongzhou Xing, Daming Xing, and Nanhai merchants are also Xing, so why worry about the can't recover? ”

Liu Yaoyu listened and listened, and in the end he couldn't help but stand up, eager to return to Qiongshan County immediately and have a long talk with his brother-in-law all night.

"Brother Yiping, don't rush yet. What we are doing today is to prove what Lord Zhao will see in the future, otherwise I am afraid that I will be regarded as boastful talk. Zhao Mingchuan smiled slightly, pressed Liu Yaoyu's shoulder, and looked calm, "What do you say about the Ming Dynasty now, the benefits of people's livelihood, and the inexhaustible ones?" ”

"Since ancient times, what people's livelihood needs is long-term profit, oil, salt, iron, tea, wine, and silk. However, the officials and camps of all dynasties have arbitrarily decided that there are more than nine points, which are regarded as the important interests of the country. Under the huge profits, it is inevitable that there will be people who take risks and are banned by private traffickers, and the past dynasties have also repeatedly banned them, and at the beginning of our dynasty, it was also the same. Since the beginning of Longqing, the silver is getting worse, in order to boost the state, the imperial court opened the sea to ban, lenient the civil industry, the official and private divisions, the wealthy businessmen and giants are all into it, and the imperial court only raises taxes from it. Nowadays, the construction of goods in the south of the Yangtze River is far better than that of previous dynasties, and the people nourish hundreds of millions of people, and the people's needs are more prosperous. Only then can there be the grand scene of mulberry hemp all over the Jiangnan Lake, household weaving, and private porcelain kilns in Fujian, Zhejiang and Guangdong. Our firms transshipment goods are sold for thousands of miles, which is also to take the long-term profits of their people's circulation. ”

After all, Liu Yaoyu is a scholarly family, and he is from a big family, so he naturally knows all about this, and he can say it in one breath without any stagnation.

"What if we can have better salt, better oil, better iron, better silk, and prosper the local livelihood of Qiongya?" Zhao Mingchuan saw that the other party was getting better, and began to strike while the iron was hot.

"Then Qiongzhou must be another Jiangnan in the future!" Liu Yaoyu's eyes gradually lit up, as if he had seen some scene, and he suddenly hit the straw mat with a punch, "Brother Sicheng, if you want to do such a big thing." And how do you get started? ”

"Mr. Frey is a beautiful and handsome man, and he is well-versed in geography, and he has come to visit Joan this time to explore the 'treasure' of the earth." Zhao Mingchuan smiled mysteriously, stretched out his hand and wrote a few words in the soil in front of the straw mat.

"Fine-grade copper and iron veins? Is this true?! Liu Yaoyu was stunned for a moment, a little unbelieving his ears, "This Qiongzhou has been open for thousands of years, and I have never known that there are such mines, could it be that tens of thousands of miles away from China and the United States, that is, the underground treasure of Qiongzhou?" ”

"Brother Yiping. The essence of gorgeous seafood is praised by the world, but still have doubts about the science of gorgeous craftsmanship? Moreover, you should know who this gorgeous ancestor is, and he may not be unfamiliar with Qiongzhou......" Zhao Mingchuan smiled and turned his head to the deep mountains and high mountains in the south, and he was also a little uneasy in his heart, because he didn't dare to guarantee that Frey would really be able to find copper and iron veins in Hainan this time.

……

According to the instructions of the headquarters of the domestic group, or simply under the guidance of the people who have long been familiar with it, Oriental Industrial Company has long set the tone for cooperating with Qiongzhou Nanhai firm to carry out the first phase of development on Hainan Island.

First class big thing. It was Frey's pre-prospecting work. With the cooperation of the Qiongzhou government, it is necessary to find out the situation in the area of the Shilu iron and copper mines in Hainan at the end of the Ming Dynasty within a few years, especially the relationship between the local indigenous people and the Li. It laid the foundation for large-scale encirclement and monopoly development in the future.

The period from 1631 to 1640 was the first decade of the Oriental Union's exclusive operation of the Far East route and the Pearl Island. This stage. It will mainly solve the raw material and market problems of the economic industry of Pearl Island, and realize the self-hematopoietic function of OUCC Group in the Far East.

With the back-of-the-scenes financial support of Dongfang Industrial Company, Nanhai Firm will join forces with some local gentry to occupy wasteland and barren beaches in Qiongzhou on a large scale. First of all. It is the area of Yazhou, where the temperature and precipitation are most suitable for growing cotton, where cotton will be grown on a large scale, and the cotton seed comes from the island cotton off the coast of South America. Compared with the native cotton varieties of Hainan Island, this island cotton is much higher-quality.

According to the current meaning of Zhao Youheng, the prefect of Qiongzhou, the kind of ownerless wasteland is as much as you want. But Zhao Mingchuan, who has already experienced a "Guangzhou crisis", finally began to be flexible in his brain. In order to prevent the local gentry in Yazhou from being embarrassed in the future, he and Liu Yaoyu still united several large landlords in Yazhou, and offered a "sky-high price" of three dollars of silver per mu of wasteland, and even followed the instructions of the country to give the Yazhou government a "farm cadre stock". In the first phase, more than 20,000 acres were encircled, so that those Yazhou governors, Tongzhi, and general judges, who were once so poor that they had to wear their official robes for several years, and now have privately divided thousands of taels of silver, woke up with laughter from sleep.

Next, Zhao Mingchuan and Liu Yaoyu also plan to continue to carry out large-scale agricultural promotion in the thirteen counties of the three prefectures of Qiongzhou, and introduce various subtropical agricultural and sideline products from Huamei on a large scale, especially rubber trees, coconut palms, cotton and sugar cane, which will provide important industrial and agricultural raw materials for Pearl Island. Similar industrial promotion work will also be carried out at the same time on Dayuan Island, and the business representative is a number of people led by Qian Laosan.

In addition, Oriental Industrial Company will also rely on Chinese maritime merchants and European colonizers from all over the world to carry out large-scale raw material import trade for India, Daming, Japan, Korean Peninsula, Luzon, Java, Indochina Peninsula and Malay Peninsula, especially important industrial raw materials such as medicinal materials, natural resin, copper ore, coal mine, tin ore and saltpeter. It is believed that the scale of procurement on Pearl Island will definitely attract local authorities to make corresponding industrial adjustments, rather than just staring at luxury goods and spices.

At the same time, Dongfang Industrial Co., Ltd. will cooperate with relevant domestic enterprises to build a number of light industries such as salt making, sugar refining, oil extraction, food processing, cement building materials, textiles, etc., with Pearl Island as the production base, so as to make Pearl Island a beautiful commodity production area in the Far East. At that time, not only the Ming Dynasty, but also India, Indochina Peninsula, Southeast Asia, North Korea, and Japan will be included in this labor, raw material supply and market circle.

Starting from the later stage of the first ten-year plan, some low-tech industries on Pearl Island will gradually be transferred to Hainan Island and Dayuan Island, so as to realize the development of modern light industry in Hainan Island and Dayuan. In this process, a large number of Guangxi officials, enlightened gentry and businessmen, including Zhao Youheng, will be tied up to prepare for the transformation and cultivation of the emerging capital force in the south of the Ming Dynasty. Finally, combined with the Ming Dynasty agent plan, the military, political and economic influence of China and the United States in the entire Far East was completed, thus changing the history of the East. This was Yan Xiaosong's most ambitious plan at the beginning, but at present, it is only an inevitable step for the Oriental Union Group to seek the long-term interests of the Far East.

Of course, none of these steps can be put in place smoothly, because the Oriental Union Group, as the largest back-office capital operator, must first consider its own interests, that is, it must achieve profits in the East that are not lower than those of the Atlantic and European trade circles.

……

Just when Zhao Mingchuan and Liu Yaoyu were still running around in the thirteen counties of Qiongzhou's three prefectures with Zhao Youheng's "Shangfang Sword", escorted by a bodyguard team composed of several retired soldiers of the army special combat team, and with the help of guides and interpreters sent by the Qiongzhou government, the young scholar Frey had already gone deep into the hinterland of Hainan Island with a map and a document that had been written long ago, and was carrying out an arduous field investigation.

At the end of December, Zhao Mingchuan, who had been running for nearly a month, sent back the first "Qiongzhou Development Preparation Report" to the domestic group headquarters, and the headquarters of the Oriental Union Group held a grand celebration banquet.

At the same time, Xiong Wencan, the governor of Fujian in the Ming Dynasty, finally received the holy decree of Emperor Chongzhen, and will be transferred to the post of governor of Liangguang in the Ming Dynasty after the beginning of spring next year to deal with the affairs of the southern coast, and has since embarked on the highest point of his life. (To be continued......)