A Man of Science and Engineering in Troubled Times Wandering in the Late Qing Dynasty

Chapter 417
Jiang Menglin and Zhou Yichun are about the same age, both in their twenties, very young.

Jiang Menglin is a student of Shanghai Public School; Zhou Yichun is a graduate of Shanghai St. John's University, and Zhou Yichun has been a teacher at St. John's University for three years.

St. John's University is currently No.1 in Shanghai University, and being able to stay in the school as a teacher is enough to show that Zhou Yichun is not small.

According to history, Zhou Yichun will study in the United States at his own expense in two years. If he can afford to study in the United States at his own expense these days, his family must be in a very good position.

And it was Zhou Yichun who began to attach great importance to sports when he was the president of Tsinghua University, which gave Tsinghua a century-old tradition of valuing sports.

Li Yu signed the qualification certificate for them, and a week later they could go to the capital to go through the formalities of studying in the United States at the Traveling Beauty Office.

But in fact, the most powerful boycott of American goods is the Shanghai area.

Jiang Menglin took the certificate and said, "I'd like to see if the Americans are really as powerful as they say they have surpassed the UK."

Zhou Yichun was also full of confidence: "The Chinese Exclusion Act, huh! Americans really don't know that water can carry a boat or capsize a boat. They are talking about the common people. They dare to treat the Chinese with this bill that specifically excludes laborers."

The two are worthy of being the principals of Qingbei in the future. Their thinking is very clear, and they have seen the core through the phenomenon.

Of course Cai Yuanpei understands these problems, and said to several people: "If you should boycott, you still have to boycott, but you still have to study, one size for one size, no delay! You should not have too much psychological burden when you go to study in the United States."

Zhou Yichun and Jiang Menglin said, "Students understand."

Cai Yuanpei asked Li Yu again: "Brother Shucai, you have spent the longest time in the United States, what do you think?"

Li Yu said: "I agree with Brother Heqing (Cai Yuanpei's word) that boycotting is for national awakening, and learning is for national self-improvement. Both are right. Moreover, we need to learn from Western industrial systems too much. At present, the best is the Americans."

Zhou Yichun asked: "Mr. Emperor, shouldn't the country with the strongest industry be England?"

Li Yu shook his head: "The United States has a large population, and now it has made a fortune for so many years, and it has already surpassed the United Kingdom, and their potential has not been fully released. In the future, the industrial output value will be greater than the combined total of Germany and the United Kingdom." Be big."

Jiang Menglin said: "It seems that our choice to study in the United States is very correct."

"That's right!" Li Yu said affirmatively, "Although I don't understand politics, in terms of industry, the United States is the most we should learn from, because only the United States has a vast environment similar to ours. As for Japan, England, etc., although are also strong, but they are both too reliant on international trade, and many industrial policies are formulated with very different priorities."

Cai Yuanpei said to several students: "After you go to the United States, don't confine yourself to your own majors. You should broaden your horizons like the Shucai brothers and learn as much as possible. It would be even better if you learned how to build warships. "

Li Yu said with a smile: "That's not necessary. There were so many warships in Beiyang back then, but not all of them sank to the bottom of the sea. The navy really spent too much money. Besides, they couldn't learn the most advanced warship technology. They could only be iron-clad warships in the past. This year The British have just launched a dreadnought, and all warships of the old era will be eliminated, including Japan and Russia, which fought fiercely in the Japanese Sea last year."

Cai Yuanpei was shocked when he heard this: "I was lucky enough to see a warship at the port. Such a huge ship, can I say no?"

Li Yu said: "The navy is a super gold-selling cave, and once there is a generation difference, it is almost like a big fish eating a small fish, and there is almost no resistance."

Cai Yuanpei sighed: "The world is developing so fast, we should put more emphasis on learning! It seems that when you go to the United States, you should study more pedagogy, so as to train more talents in various subjects."

Zhou Yichun said, "I would like to follow the principal's instructions."

Jiang Menglin also went on to say: "I am also aspiring to this. Education is the way to make two, two, three, and three things in one life."

Of course, after the two went to study in the United States, what they paid most attention to was indeed pedagogy.

After the students left, Cai Yuanpei left Li Yu to ask about the situation in the capital.

"I heard that the Manchu Qing court sent the royal family and important ministers abroad to investigate the constitutional government. Does Shucai think it is possible to implement it after returning to China?"

Li Yu knew that Cai Yuanpei had joined the Tongmenghui and belonged to Mr. Sun Yat-sen's revolutionary faction, so he replied, "So what about constitutionalism? The basis of constitutionalism is to limit imperial power. Brother Heqing, do you think it is possible for the royal family to decentralize power?"

Cai Yuanpei said: "The Manchu and Qing Dynasties have always put the most emphasis on defending against the Han. The contradiction has not completely dissipated after 200 years. I don't think they will delegate power."

"So," Li Yu said naturally, "there is no foundation for constitutionalism, do you think it will succeed?"

Cai Yuanpei smiled and said, "Brother Shucai, you have always said that you don't understand politics. If I ask you to say that you understand politics better than anyone else."

Li Yu just saw it with the eyes of a future person, and said: "It's just a deduction of the status quo."

Cai Yuanpei said: "Shu Cai can't continue to elaborate."

So Li Yu asked: "Brother Heqing, what do you think of the industry in the Qing Dynasty?"

"Bad, and very bad!" Cai Yuanpei said.

"Last year, the imperial court abolished the imperial examinations, and hundreds of thousands of scholars had no way out; when the school is built in the future, even if there are hundreds of thousands of graduates, if there is no supporting industry and commerce, they will have no way out. At that time..."

Cai Yuanpei was taken aback for a moment, and then said: "At that time, the imperial court will lose the support of the gentry class and the new learning group at the same time!"

Li Yu just nodded.

Cai Yuanpei felt that his palms were sweating: "Brother Shucai's words awakened the dreamer, I will send electricity to my colleagues in Japan today!"

Li Yu said: "In any case, the imperial court is already facing a road with no future in sight. The arrival of foreigners only exacerbates the situation."

China's national conditions are too special, and the relatively simple line of constitutionalism cannot be suitable. This has been proved by history with blood.

The current situation is: the Qing Dynasty will perish if it does not reform, and it will perish quickly if it reforms.

It's a dead end.

If any Aixinjueluo wants to save the Qing Dynasty, at least it must be before the Opium War.

But at that time, it was still the "prosperous age of Kangxi and Qianlong" that many people dreamed of. How could there be any sense of crisis?

Cai Yuanpei sighed: "For decades, the foreigner's despotic power has been exerted on the people, and the double fear from the foreigner and the imperial court has dominated the world for too long. To be honest, the world has been suffering for a long time, but at the same time, the foreigners have been suffering for a long time. This kind of pain Be with me all the time, and sometimes it’s hard to sleep.”

Li Yu naturally understood this emotion, not to mention Cai Yuanpei, even those princes and nobles would not dare to speak loudly when they saw foreigners.

"Brother Heqing, I know that your emotions all come from the depressed emotions of the poor and weak in the country, but we are just the beginning, as long as we go step by step, there will be a way."

Cai Yuanpei picked up the wine on the table and filled it up for Li Yu and himself: "Brother Shucai, I often see a kind of indescribable self-confidence and a sense of maturity that I don't know how to describe from you. Why, after these two years of contact, I firmly believe in your judgment."

Li Yu said with emotion: "Brother Heqing, don't look at the strong guns of foreigners, the principle behind this is actually not elusive. As long as we follow the correct route, sooner or later we will impress foreigners."

"Like you? Become a foreign academician of the Royal Society of England?" Cai Yuanpei said.

Li Yu said: "Not only that, but I am just one of thousands of people."

Cai Yuanpei was considered an old Jianghu who had experienced many things, and sighed: "The world is not so simple. I went to Qingdao a few months ago and saw the construction of the German concession. It is not much different from the Shanghai concession. It is different from other Comparing national areas is really hard to see directly. This gap is visible to the naked eye, and you have been to so many countries, it is impossible not to understand what I am saying.”

Cai Yuanpei and Li Yu lightly clinked their glasses, and drank them all in one gulp.

Li Yu couldn't be more clear about what Cai Yuanpei said, especially the story of Qingdao, that "story" that has been widely circulated.

The most familiar concessions to future generations are the Shanghai and Tianjin concessions. A few people may also know the Hankou Concession, Xiamen Concession, and Guangzhou Concession, but many people have forgotten that there is also a German concession in Qingdao.

Later, the Qingdao Concession became known to the world because of a lie made up by some well-known people, that is, the very famous and widely circulated lie about Qingdao sewers.

In 1897, Germany forcibly leased Qingdao, and it was taken away by the Japanese in World War I for a total of 17 years.

Many of you must have heard this story:
The meticulous German stayed in Qingdao for 17 years. He did not build villas or buildings, but repaired the sewers.

Therefore, Qingdao has never been flooded for a hundred years!
Especially in the rainy season, Beijing, the capital city of "water flooding the golden mountains", and Shanghai, the magic capital known as Asia's most prosperous, are all ashamed in front of the Qingdao sewer made in Germany.

Even 100 years later, when some joint parts of the sewers in the former German Concession area needed to be replaced, the Chinese searched for the parts but they were missing.Finally, there was an email from Germany, explaining to the Chinese a small warehouse for spare parts.

After the Chinese technicians opened it, the parts in the small warehouse were still as new after a hundred years!
For a while, public opinion was in an uproar. This is simply the supreme display of the legendary German rigorous spirit!

The Sino-German sewer duel has risen to the comparison of national spirits.

Ever since, the German sewer not only washed away China's self-esteem, but also washed away the IQ of the Chinese people!

Yes, it washed away the IQ of countless Chinese people!
why?
Because this historical story is all fabricated by the public intellectuals!

Everything is nothing but a lie to bury China and glorify the West.

The Germans planned for a rainy day and set up a "small warehouse for storing spare parts" plot, which is purely a historical rumor.

And the well-known people lamented that "China's technology is [-] years behind, and its industrial spirit is [-] years behind," which is the crime of those with ulterior motives.

It is true that in order to compete with Britain and France, Germany spent all its money and tried to build Qingdao into a "model colony".

After all, Germany started late and wanted to impact Britain's status as an empire on which the sun never sets, so the world was desperately looking for remaining colonies.

Qingdao is an unimaginably good place. It is backed by the hinterland of the North China Plain. If there is a railway connection, it is not weaker than Guangzhou.

As a result, a group of top German urban planning experts and architectural designers were sent to Qingdao to lead Chinese workers to build housing and drainage systems and other infrastructure in Qingdao City.

Naturally, this includes sewer works.

Looking at it today, this project does have some remarkable points - the total length of the completed pipeline is [-] kilometers, and the wide part can even run a car.

However, the "public knowledge" who is good at making history only appeared on the "historical manhole cover", but deliberately did not open the "manhole cover".

If anyone tells you that the colonists are trying to make the colony more prosperous, then he is not stupid, he must be bad!
The German sewer project in Qingdao was not prepared for the Chinese at all.

During the colonial period, Qingdao was divided into the Western District and the Chinese District. The Germans lived in the Western District, while the Chinese lived in the Chinese District such as Dabao Island.

Modern facilities such as sewers are only distributed in the western districts, and the Chinese districts cannot enjoy them at all.

German naval construction consultant Bockman even said: "The sewer project prevents the dirty water used by Chinese residents from flowing through the places where Europeans live. This dirty water will cause great harm."

The sewer is indeed an important part of the city's municipal engineering, and it can be called the city's kidney.

But the modernized Qingdao of the later generations is a super metropolis with a population of nearly ten million. It has undergone several rounds of expansion. The pipes left over from the German sewers are only 2.6 kilometers away. Qingdao City's drainage task, right?
The fundamental reason why Qingdao is not prone to water accumulation is its special terrain: high in the northwest, low in the southeast, and facing the sea on three sides.

Accumulated water can be quickly discharged into the sea, and it is difficult to form waterlogging.In the credit book, you can write about the terrain and the sea, but you can't write about Germany.

What's more, the current Qingdao sewer is made in China.

Cai Yuanpei's vision was relatively broad during the period of the Republic of China. He later studied in Germany and had a deep understanding of Germany.

Cai Yuanpei said: "I know Brother Shucai is an academician of the Prussian Academy of Sciences, but Europe is still the world's leader in culture and other aspects, and even the United States you mentioned is just a barbaric land in the eyes of Germans. "

What Cai Yuanpei said was actually the reality. At least until the end of World War I, Europe still did not think highly of the United States.

Even though the economy, military, and technology of the United States all surpassed Europe at that time, the pride in the bones of Europeans could not be changed.

Li Yu doesn't hate this kind of pride, because China also has...

Cultural self-confidence is actually rooted in the bones, but it lacks a release medium.

No matter how much Li Yu didn't understand political economics, his worldview for a person a hundred years later was far better than anyone at this time. The two of them started chatting while drinking until late at night.

Cai Yuanpei burped deeply, "Brother Shucai, I rarely drink so much, and there are even fewer people who can make me drink willingly. You are one of the rare ones."

Li Yu was also a little dizzy.Let me go, why do these big shots in the Republic of China drink so much?Unscientific!
Li Yu replied: "Brother Heqing, the future is long, what is this little wine, drizzle!"

Cai Yuanpei laughed loudly: "Boy, I'll bring a drinkable drink some other day, and I'm sure you'll drink until you lose consciousness!"

Li Yu also laughed and said, "My little brother has long been too drunk."

(End of this chapter)