The Imperial Age with the Resurgence of Han Style

Chapter 232 Differentiation
June 6, Changxing Island, Sindu (now St. John's, Newfoundland).

It is also speechless to say that during the more than 100 years that the Kingdom of England controlled Newfoundland, their government never encouraged its people to immigrate to the island. For a long time, the English used Newfoundland as a seasonal fishing ground. When the fishing fleet leaves in the fall, a large number of sailors who have been contracted to work for two or three summers are left on Newfoundland for the winter, not only to take care of the catch, but also to process and store the summer catch.

In the small town of St. John's, the largest settlement on the island, when the Qi Kingdom took over, there were only about 500 permanent residents, including about 60 to 70 women and nearly 100 children.

There are several shops in the town, which are the most important activity center here, but there are also cattle and sheep between the houses and behind the jungle, indicating that it is still an inconspicuous small fishing village.

It can be seen that although England competed with France for Newfoundland very early on, it never wanted to seriously manage the place until it completely controlled it.

However, after the Qi people arrived, they showed a completely different attitude. They attached great importance to the construction of Newfoundland and wanted to turn it into a real colonial territory rather than a pure fishing ground.

By the way, the Qi people not only changed the name of Newfoundland to Changxing Island, but also changed St. John's to an oriental name, called Xindu, and appointed a formal governor to replace the previous model of management by the captains of fishing boats. .

In the highlands on the north side of Xindu, a bastion covering an area of ​​about ten acres is under construction. Huge logs are driven into the ground, and stones are built into solid walls. There are warehouses, military camps, Official buildings and residential buildings are slowly taking shape. More than two hundred hired young men and teenagers, under the guidance of professional craftsmen, are working hard day and night without fear of hard work.

If we put aside the past, this season was the busy period for processing and salting cod, and there would never have been so many "idle" laborers coming here to build cities and buildings.

Gein, the reward offered by the people of Qi is really hard to refuse.

They need to build themselves a residence that can withstand the severe cold before the temperature drops in autumn and winter. They also need to clear some fields and plant a small amount of potatoes to slightly replenish the island's food reserves.

But it was last September that really sparked His Highness King Chen's endless ambition and determination to make great achievements in the vassal territory. At this time, a Qi merchant ship from the Mediterranean arrived at Port Royal unexpectedly.

Yes, Newfoundland has never been self-sufficient in food. Except for a small amount of supplies shipped from the New France Territory, most of the required supplies have to be imported from New England.

"Since ancient times, colonial development has been extremely difficult, and it takes one or two generations to make contributions." Xiao Lizhi said: "In the past, our country of Qi was based on Hanzhou, and it took twenty years to gain a firm foothold and be barely self-sufficient. Now, King Chen established the vassal state and founded the state of Chenzhou. Even with local support, we can protect ourselves within ten years. This is a tribute to our greed. In time, when the state of Chen becomes more powerful, we can use the merit of founding the state to assist and protect it. , enjoy a hundred years of wealth.”

"The land allocated to these immigrants is not ready-made farmland, but forest land that must be cleared first. It may take them a lifetime to clear all the land that belongs to them and then build a perfect residence." Xiao Lizhi, the Right Chief of the Chen Palace and the Governor of Changxing Island, stood on a hill, looking at a woodland planned as an agricultural planting area, and sighed slightly, "However, after a generation of hard work, a small family farm can also The scale has been basically formed, which should surely ensure that this family can live a more relaxed and comfortable life in the future.”

In view of this, they could only tie their fate firmly to King Jia, and followed Qi Weijun, who was named King Chen, to Chenzhou to join the vassal state.

"Yes, one hundred acres of cultivated land, a small pasture, a barn, a stable, a slightly larger house, a road in front of the door, neighbors who have known each other for many years, and plenty of food every day , it’s very desirable to have clothes to change throughout the seasons!” Xindu Civil Affairs Officer Zuo Zhichao nodded and agreed: “However, it will take at least twenty or thirty years to achieve the above development goals. I’ll wait for that. Either it’s a fashionable year, or it’s buried in the ground.”

In addition to bringing a large amount of daily necessities, this merchant ship also brought a lot of news from the mainland and Europe to Prince Chen's Mansion. One of them is that Emperor Yonglong, who had just succeeded to the throne, sent a diplomatic note to all countries in the world, inviting royal family members and government representatives from various countries to attend the enthronement ceremony of our Daqi Emperor in June next year (1730).

Adult laborers are paid 8 shillings a day, and teenagers can earn 4-5 shillings a day. For the residents of the island who have never seen a lot of money, this is simply "crazy".

Of course, building cities and houses for the people of Qi is also a hard job. Carrying baggage on your shoulders, sweating all day long, and even risking work-related injuries.

But in order to earn good rewards, a little hard work is nothing. As a poor person, don’t you only have a handful of strength left?
A dozen days ago, a Qi merchant ship arrived at Xindu Port. In addition to bringing a large amount of food and daily necessities to this town, it also brought more than 60 Qi immigrants, including no women and children. , all young and strong men.

After His Highness King Chen heard the news, he locked himself in the palace and closed the door for a long time.

Obviously, this young emperor wants to use this method to not only show off the great strength of our Da Qi Empire, but also to demonstrate his power and reputation, thereby further consolidating his position as emperor.

The governor of Newfoundland very generously distributed large tracts of land in the north to these immigrants free of charge. It seems that each settler was assigned more than 30 acres (1 acre = 6.07 acres) of land. Some scholars with higher status, Craftsmen and soldiers will receive more additional land on this basis.

Fortunately, after the persuasion of the two elders, Shi Hao Zongzhang and Prince Chen's father-in-law Xiong Weicong, Prince Chen gradually recovered from the blow of demotion, cheered up a little, and began to pay attention to various affairs in Chenzhou.

These former officials and subordinates of Prince Jia's palace had lost all political prospects in the country when Emperor Jia's dream was completely shattered. They may even be liquidated after the new emperor takes the throne.

Haha, the nature of a young man is to be pushy!

After two days of short rest, these people did not participate in building the city. Instead, they built transitional collective wooden houses on the west side of the bastion.

And the remuneration given by the people of Qi is 50% higher than that of England!
In the past, processing salted cod for those fishing boats only cost 3-4 shillings a day, and the working hours were more than thirteen or four hours. Prolonged exposure to salt can cause dryness, itching, and peeling of the hands. In severe cases, it may even lead to skin inflammation or ulcers, which is really not a good idea.

You know, even in a big city like London, the average worker's daily wage is only 4-5 shillings at most, and no more than ten pounds a month (1 pound = 20 shillings = 240 pence).

When King Chen first arrived in the feudal territory, he was depressed for a time. For almost half a year, he spent all day hiding in the slightly crude palace, drinking and going crazy. He was resentful of Emperor Taiping's ruthlessness and jealous of the emperor's grandson's promotion. He was filled with hatred and lamented his miserable fate. He paid almost no attention to or dealt with the local affairs in Chenzhou.

Just when many officials in the royal palace thought that his fragile psychology had been hit again, he would be in a state of collapse from now on. But he never expected that after two days of "retreat", King Chen would burst out with raging fighting spirit. He called everyone together and announced that he would use Qingguo as an example to build Chenzhou into a powerful vassal in the northeast of Yinzhou (North America). . The people present in the palace will also enjoy the wealth and honor with King Chen and his family, and they will live together with the country.

Subsequently, King Chen granted large tracts of land in the southwest and southeast of Qingchuan (today's Nova Scotia) to all the officials and servants who followed him. The land was connected by roads, ranging from hundreds of thousands of acres to more than a thousand acres.

In order to calm people's hearts and win over all the attached officials, scholars, and craftsmen, King Chen generously gave 100,000 yuan to everyone to help them settle down.

As a result, the morale of Prince Chen's Mansion was greatly shaken, and everyone felt a bit of heroic spirit to make contributions and create a century-old family. It was now.

King Chen sat in Qingchuan and summoned Qi's overseas troops to suppress the local forces in Arcadia. As the old man of the palace and the right chief minister, Xiao Lizhi was appointed as the governor of Changxing Island, presiding over all affairs here.

Xiao Lizhi came to Changxing Island with more than ten officials and subordinates. For more than half a year, there was not much action, and everything was as before. After a period of exploration and understanding, Qi State also had some understanding of this large island that thrived on cod.

Changxing Island covers an area of ​​about 100,000 square kilometers. It controls the mouth of the Gulf of St. Lawrence to the west, faces the French territory of Labrador Peninsula across the Strait of Belle Isle to the north, and is controlled by the French on Isle Royale (i.e. Bray) to the southwest. Cape Dun Island) and St. Jean Island (ie Prince Edward Island) are isolated from Qingchuan, and the French St. Pierre and Miquelon Islands are in the south and face to face with Changxing Island.

If we add the scattered French settlements on the west side of the island, it can be said that the north, west and south sides of the island are surrounded by the French.

In addition, there are one or two thousand English permanent residents and temporary fishermen in the eastern part of the island with Sindu as the core, and an unknown number of Indians and Inuit live in the central mountains.

And they, the Qi people who came to the island for the first time, were an absolute minority.

If you want to control the island, in addition to occupying the legal principles, you must naturally adopt a strategy of disintegration.

First of all, it is necessary to use the power of the English on the island to eliminate French influence as much as possible. It is best to expel them all, so that these French people will not rely on the New France territory to exert various influences on Changxing Island and cause trouble. Rainy.

As for the English, who have the largest population on the island, it is not impossible to differentiate. At the very least, those permanent residents and the large number of migrant fishermen obviously have no way to stir food in one pot.

After the annual fishing season, thousands of European fishermen flock to nearby fishing grounds. After catching boatloads of cod, they will be brought to the island for salting and processing. All island residents become the owners of these fishing boats. Workers work with fishermen to process the harvested cod.

As the food and clothing parents of the permanent residents on the island, the attitude of the boat owners and fishermen towards them must not be warm and gentle.

In order to ensure that the cod caught ashore can be salted and processed in the shortest possible time so that shipowners can bring more cod back to Europe for sale, all employed local residents were forced to work for more than ten hours, scolding and beating them. , Withholding wages is a common thing.

There are even some bastard fishermen and sailors who, in order to vent their lustful desires, will violate the women on the island, whether they are adult women or young girls, and commit some beastly acts that are outrageous to both humans and gods.

You must know that the management authority of the island was previously granted by the English government to the captains of these fishing boats. Naturally, it condoned certain "excessive" behaviors of fishermen and sailors, and even did not pursue any investigation.

Well, residents have been suffering from foreign fishermen for a long time.

Even if they are all foreign fishermen, they are not monolithic. The English, French, Dutch, Danes, and Swedes come from different countries and regions, so naturally they are full of contradictions and have their own thoughts. Sometimes, they would get into fights with each other in order to compete for a certain operating area with rich cod resources.

Even if we are all English fishermen, we still have to distinguish who is from England and who is from the New England colonial territory.

There are endless cods in the sea, which are jumping silver and gold coins. You need to seize every minute and every second to catch as many as possible, so that you can gather these wealth into your arms.

The people of Qi want to collect fishery taxes, which sounds particularly uncomfortable. Cod, this is a gift from the ocean, why should I pay you an extra sum of money?

However, the fishery tax of five pounds to ten pounds per vessel in a fishing season is actually not high. A fishing boat loaded with cod can easily earn hundreds or even thousands of pounds by returning to the European continent.

If the people of Qi are offended because of not paying this small sum, I am afraid that the gain will outweigh the loss. Not to mention forcing people to send several warships to enforce violent law enforcement during the fishing season, the Qi people prohibit fishing boats from landing on Newfoundland to obtain water supplies and process cod, which is enough to make all fishing boats extremely uncomfortable.

After the Qi people promulgated the fishery tax order, while fishermen from Britain, France, Denmark and other countries were still hesitant, the Dutch fishermen, who knew the opportunity, took the lead in saying that they would abide by the Qi people's regulations and took the initiative to pay the tax to the newly established Fisheries Management Department and receive their catch. license.

Subsequently, fishermen from Sweden, Portugal and other countries also arrived at the port one after another, paid fees and received certificates in accordance with regulations.

When the English and French fishermen saw this, they couldn't help but cursed, accusing them of being cowards and cowards who were willing to submit to tyranny.

If you surrender to the people of Qi today and pay the fishery tax according to their regulations, there will be more tolls in the future. Do you have to choose to obey?

Do I need to pay for berthing in the port?
Will there be an additional tax for processing cod?
Will the prices of various daily necessities on the island increase?

Also, now that the fishing tax has begun, will the tax rate continue to rise in the future?
……

Not long after, the Qi people transferred an army of more than fifty people from Nova Scotia to the port and began to inspect any fishing boats berthed in the port.

What frightened the English fishermen even more was that these soldiers were all Irish!
They were not very friendly to the English.

Under this situation, some English fishermen were also discouraged. With various dissatisfaction, they lined up to go to the Fisheries Management Department to pay taxes and obtain fishing licenses.

What's even worse is that the people of Qi not only spent a high price to hire nearly half of the residents of the town to build forts and houses, which reduced the number of people handling cod, but they also pretended to be good people and suggested that all the people who came to the port to handle cod were fishing boats to increase worker wages to improve the living conditions of local residents.

Damn it, the people of Qi are so shameless. You don't pay for the cod processing fees, so you just want to raise workers' wages. You are taking the profits we deserve and selling them to local residents!

These permanent residents seemed to be really moved by the care of the new rulers. While responding to the call of the people of Qi to increase the wages for processing cod, they also took the initiative to register their details with the municipal management department and cooperate with the government's civil affairs statistics. work, and claim a piece of land of their own.

The Qi people were serious about colonizing Newfoundland.

(End of this chapter)