I have a cornucopia

Chapter 240 Ming-style Capitalism
Non-staff members are prohibited from entering...

However, Yang Feng soon realized that he was out of date.

This closed management model has long been used in many fishing ports. The fishing tyrants or emerging capitalists who control the fishing industry along the coast react faster than people like him who only come back a few days a year.

Besides, it's not just the oarsmen. In an era of complete free development, or the barbaric growth of capitalists, cruelty and blood are everywhere. It is inevitable that supervisors use whips, it is inevitable that coolies struggle in the dark, and it is inevitable that child labor...

Their parents don't think there's anything wrong with this either.

After all, in their view, as long as you can work, you should work.

Although five years old is a bit exaggerated, twelve or thirteen years old is already a strong laborer and can go to dig coal.

This cruel new era is impacting the old moral concepts. Although the landlords used to treat their tenants in the same way, at least they still talked about courtesy, righteousness, integrity and shame. In the relatively closed rural society, it is difficult to cause a large-scale impact. But in the emerging factories and mines, the supervisors holding whips, the coolies working hard and sweating, and the child laborers dragging heavy coal trucks are impacting the cognition of everyone who sees them.
After all, such large-scale and concentrated display of suffering can only be found in the legends of tyrants like Emperor Yang of Sui.

Therefore, the Shandong Tongshan Association has issued an order, first of all, it is strictly forbidden to kidnap innocent people to make them ship slaves and miners. It is needless to say what it means since it has been specifically prohibited.

Second, child labor is strictly prohibited.

The boy is ten years old and the girl is twelve.

Because these old-fashioned people still want to pay attention to education.

In fact, elders and local celebrities from all over the country are running various schools, including private schools, community schools, charity schools and so on, with various names of schools.

It can only be said that the thoughts of the gentry have not kept up with the development of the times...

They are still stuck in the era of repairing bridges and roads, and doing good deeds. Although this description is actually just bragging, the traditional Confucian gentry do like to run schools when they have spare money. This not only allows them to gain the vanity in their cognition, but also allows them to cultivate the next generation who are influenced by their own ideas. Their legs are indeed running into capitalism, but their minds are still the traditional Confucian gentry formed over decades.

Setting up schools, providing porridge and medicine, and repairing bridges and roads are still their main ways to satisfy their inner needs.

In this case, child labor becomes something they dislike, after all, in their rigid minds, these children should be studying.

Third, strengthen folk moral norms. Women cannot go to places that are not suitable for them. Factory owners must also be clean and not let workers be naked. They even made a code that lists in detail the necessary moral principles that factory owners and workers should abide by. The elders are quite proud of this, as if they are speaking for saints, just like the ashes man made rules for landlords and tenants, explaining the relationship between factory owners and workers in a common normative way, what the former should do, what the latter should do, and not abusing workers.

Of course, workers cannot be disloyal to factory owners.

This is especially important.

According to their explanation, factory owners provide workers with food and clothing, just like their parents. Workers treat factory owners like sons treat their fathers, so they must be obedient and loyal like loyal dogs. However, factory owners must also care for workers and not let them suffer from hunger and cold. Only when factory owners care for workers and workers are loyal to factory owners can there be a good society.

Of course, the key is not to disobey or cause trouble.

In short, they try very hard to find explanations for those new things that conform to their moral standards in this fast-paced era. Although this explanation is not pleasing to both sides, both factory owners and workers sneer at it. After all, the former thinks that I just need to pay wages, and the rest is none of my business, while the latter thinks that I am not without parents. The factory owner pays me and I work for him, so I treat them as my parents...

Am I cheap?

Jiaozhou.

Tower Pier Port.

"A bunch of old people who know nothing but want to dictate everything. They also don't allow the curfew to be abolished, saying that abolishing the curfew will give thieves an opportunity to take advantage.

Still a thief?
What thief?
There are escorts on duty in the city every night. What thief can withstand the muskets?

If the curfew is lifted and some lanterns are put up to light up, shops can still do business. It would be best if the city gates are not closed so that people outside can come into the city at night to do business and stay in hotels when they come back late. The daily trading volume can not only double, but it can increase by 30% to 40%. It is obviously a good thing that can make more money, but it cannot be implemented because these old people don't allow it. They won't listen when we talk to them.

What else can you say that the laws of our ancestors cannot be changed? "

Kuang Lanzhao, a knight of the Order of Confucius and Mencius and a member of the local powerful Kuang family, said angrily.

According to history, he should have become a Jinshi of the Qing Dynasty next year, but now he is a student and a knight of Confucius and Mencius, and he is not very interested in the imperial examination.

After all, there is no need for imperial examinations now. What's more, he had participated in the Northern Expedition last time and was a student of the Imperial Academy in Nanjing. It would be easy for him to become an official, but being an official to serve the local gentry and begging for leftovers in other people's territories was no match for being a powerful person in his hometown.

The Kuang family also came from a military background and changed their status to that of scholars.

My ancestor was a captain of Jiaozhou Guard.

Now it is an important commercial city. Tabutou Port is not inferior to Andongwei and Dengzhou in Shandong. It is also a fishing and aquatic product processing center, but it is not in Jiaozhou City, but in Lingshanwei and Fushanqiansuo. After all, it is easier to go to sea, but the product transportation must go through Jiaozhou. Guhe River and Jiaolai River are two water transport lines, which can allow goods to go deep inland. In addition, Jiaolai River is being dredged, and some sluices are also being repaired. Although the watershed is still inaccessible, small boats are sufficient for local transportation.

This river actually has limited value. It is unrealistic to rely on it to connect the north and the south. After all, maritime transportation is already very prosperous.

The Ming Dynasty attempted dredging several times but ultimately gave up.

But it is completely sufficient to serve as an extension of Jiaozhou's water transportation to the inland.

Under such circumstances, the prosperity of industry and commerce naturally made the curfew somewhat inappropriate, but the Shandong Tongshan Association still insisted that the curfew could not be lifted.

The Jiaozhou Hometown Association also does not support it.

After all, once the curfew is lifted, it is easy to cause trouble. There are many refugees in Jiaozhou now. Once the curfew is lifted, or even the city gates are opened to allow entry at night, who knows if bandits will sneak in? Even if the force of the Confucius and Mencius Knights is enough to suppress the unruly people and eliminate the bandits, why not take precautions before it happens? Obviously, a curfew can completely solve the problem, and there has always been a curfew in the past. Why do we have to lift it for the sake of commercial interests? It is enough for business to do business during the day, why do we have to drag it until night?
Can't we wait outside the city?
Besides, it is not impossible to trade outside the city, and there are checkpoints outside the city.

In the Ming Dynasty, people already had means to deal with curfews. The areas outside the cities were extremely prosperous, and there were also some towns independent of the prefectures and counties. Since these towns were not considered cities, they also had no curfew.

But this made the younger generation, who were completely excited by the business, dissatisfied, especially those Confucian knights.

They had long disliked those old people, but they had to put up with it, after all, these old people were basically the elders or even their fathers and ancestors of their families.

“These things still need to be discussed with them slowly, and we can’t be too impatient. After all, they will understand sooner or later.

Besides, even if we can’t cancel the curfew, we can postpone it, even two updates would be fine.”

Yang Feng said.

Indeed, sooner or later, they will understand. Now it is just that time is short and the gentry have not yet kept up with the pace of the times.

But they will eventually understand and become capitalists who are only interested in profit. Then their old moral concepts will collapse in the impact of gold and silver, and will be replaced by new capitalist moral concepts. Now they think that child labor is immoral and that children under ten need to go to school. But when they become real capitalists, they will be surprised to find that eight-year-old children are the most cost-effective, just like the British capitalists. One eight-year-old child is indeed not comparable to an adult, but what about two, three, or four? In the British child labor era, the wages of eight-year-old children were only one-eighth of that of an adult. Can eight children not be as good as one adult?

Everything just takes time.

"He's covered in blood and filth from head to toe!"

Prince Yang sighed in a low voice.

At this moment, dozens of warships were approaching on the sea in front of him...

"I greet the king!"

Lin Qingye, the general of Dongjiang Town in the Ming Dynasty, and a group of generals knelt down excitedly in front of Prince Yang.

Yang Feng hurried forward to help him up, and then helped the generals up one by one, and then returned to Lin Qingye.

"General Lin, I was ordered to be the governor of the coastal area and manage Korea, but I have only taken care of your affairs until now. I am really ashamed!"

He put on an expression like Deputy Commander Tang, took Lin Qingye's arm, patted his shoulder, and spoke as if he was speaking from the heart.

He finally thought about North Korea.

Of course, North Korea is not important, what is important is Japan.

At the current speed at which the Ming gentry are rushing into capitalism, they will soon have to face another new rebellion. The peasants' rebellion has been temporarily suppressed, and the workers' rebellion should take over. This is inevitable. The people on this land are not short of the spirit of resistance, especially since they have not been continuously enslaved by the Qing Dynasty. In fact, the Ming Dynasty has already had many workers' rebellions. In addition to the Suzhou uprising, which was manipulated by the gentry, there were a lot of uprisings caused by mining and tax supervisors during the Wanli period.

Miners from the Xishan coal mine in Beijing have been walking around the capital for a long time. Although these were manipulated by the gentry, the resistance spirit of the people was also very important.

That's just because of taxes.

Given the current oppressive methods of the gentry, it would be incredible to say that there will be no resistance if the situation continues to develop.

The best way to solve this problem is to give the worst jobs to those who can exploit them to their heart's content without them having to worry about resistance.

Like all those capitalist powers did in the initial stages of bloody accumulation, they laid the foundation of their wealth on the corpses of foreigners.

Japanese slaves!
Although Yang Feng said that he was going to buy it from Zheng Zhilong, it costs money to buy it. Why did he have to go through a middleman? Why couldn't he just arrest him directly?

"Your Majesty, the Ming Dynasty is to my country like a dog to its master. When the master is prosperous, the dog is well-fed; when the master is poor, the dog is hungry. Fortune and misfortune go hand in hand, and poverty and humbleness depend on each other. If the Ming Dynasty cannot be strong, how can my country be rich? Now that the Ming Dynasty is in danger, my country should do its best to serve the Ming Dynasty. Only after the Ming Dynasty puts down the disaster and chaos, my country will be prosperous again."

Lin Qingye said quickly.

Although what he said is a bit shameful by modern standards, in this era, it is not shameful to call yourself a dog.

The term "hawk dog" is not necessarily a derogatory term, it means that the master is truly honored.

"Well said. This winter, I will march north to recapture the capital, and it's time to resolve your issues. We cannot let the Korean people wait for the royal army to come south for another year. Today, I, as the governor of coastal military affairs and the governor of Korea, will recommend the general to be the governor of Korea, and will move his Korean troops to Korea. I will also ask the regent to appoint the general as the general, and use Wu Zhikui, the general of Wusong Town, Zhang Mingzhen, the general of Zhejiang, and Huang Fei, the general of Liaodong, to escort the general to Jeolla, march north to Seoul, fight against the rebellion and rescue the king of Korea."

Yang Feng said.

Zhang Mingzhen has only appeared so far, mainly because he was a guerrilla in Taizhou before, belonging to the old official army system. When Zhang Guowei organized the Zhejiang New Army, he deliberately did not allow the old official army system to participate. After all, he also knew the various problems of the old official army system, so it would be better to directly establish a new one. However, as the Zhejiang New Army and Zhejiang Tuanlian went north to join the war along the Yangtze River, when Li Zicheng went south, these old generals were also reused, and Zhang Mingzhen was also promoted to the general of Zhejiang.

"The general will obey the order!"

Lin Qingye knelt down again in excitement.

Yang Feng solemnly asked for the Imperial Sword...

As the governor of North Korea, of course he must have the imperial sword.

Now the civil officials are governors, and the military officials are generals. They all command a certain area and are all granted the imperial sword.

"The general can execute first and report later, Korean civil and military officials!"

Yang Feng said.

"Humble and obey orders"

Lin Qingye raised his hands high and took it solemnly.

The generals behind him were also excited.

These are the loyal and righteous people he brought over from Korea through recruiting surrenders and rebellions along the coast in recent years.

In fact, with the cooperation of the Korean people, including Li Jong, they secretly condoned Lin Qingye. They were not blind to the current situation of the Qing Dynasty. They did not want to follow the Qing Dynasty in the first place. Although they did not dare to play two-timing in public, they dared to do so in secret. On the surface, they still paid tribute to the Qing Dynasty, but secretly condoned the local people and the people to interact with Lin Qingye, and even sent their own family members to Lin Qingye. When the time came, they transformed themselves into loyal ministers and righteous men.

I understand.

Therefore, Lin Qingye's landing will not encounter any real resistance.

As for whether he could attack Seoul directly to suppress the rebellion and eliminate the traitors, it all depended on the result of Yang Feng's Northern Expedition. If Yang Feng succeeded in beating Dorgon, then he would be successful.

Of course, this doesn't matter to Yang Feng.

What Yang Feng wanted was to gain control of an area in southern Korea, and then use this area as a base to trade slaves in Japan.

You can also capture slaves.

But there is no need to go through so much trouble. It's not like Japan is unwilling to sell. Japanese slaves are the most popular slaves in the Eastern Sea at that time. From the distant Malacca to Macau, they can be seen everywhere. This kind of business needs to be sustainable.

(End of this chapter)