The wind blows from the South Sea

Chapter 51 Planning the Port (Please recommend, support, and vote for me.)

After the meeting, Feng Guohui led his people back to Jinyulou's home base and arranged several affairs, including the recruitment of 500 new workers, leaving it to Zheng Xiucai.

Back to the courtyard

The maids Hanmo, Wenjun, Xueer, and Xiaotuanzi all came out to greet her. Among the lush greenery, there was a bright and moving new face.

Her maiden name is Zheng, and she is called Zheng Xiang'er. She is fifteen years old.

This woman was a top beauty discovered among the female relatives of the inner house after the Tianjia Town was conquered.

It is said that he was kidnapped by Tian Qiwu, the second master of the Tian family, while he was going to the market. Even though his face was painted with turmeric, it could not conceal his handsome appearance.

Feng Guohui was greatly surprised when he saw this girl, because she was thin in stature, but her breasts were very big, and her appearance was very similar to Da Mingming, who was popular among Chinese people in her previous life.

After washing her face, she is even more beautiful with smooth skin and tender skin.

No wonder Tian Qiwu recognized him at a glance even though he was wearing a coarse cloth coat and his face was smeared with turmeric.

Fortunately, just after they were kidnapped, Nanyang Company's revenge army came and finally took advantage of Feng Guohui.

Among the women who took in Feng Guohui's house, Zheng Xiang'er and Zuma were the most stunning in appearance. They were equally good-looking, and he liked both of them anyway.

Adults don’t make a choice and just take it all.

One is placed in the house in Surabaya City, and the other is placed in the manor in the eastern suburbs of Yanwang City. The distribution is just right, and it is beautiful...

He loves to be clean now, and asks his maid to put hot water in his bath every day. After bathing, he looks refreshed.

The same thing happened after returning today. Under the service of the maid, Feng Guohui took a refreshing bath.

This splashing of water lasted for a short while, torturing Zheng Xiang'er and Xiao Tuanzi until their faces were like red clouds and their whole bodies were soft.

Xue'er hid away, snickering secretly.

After Feng Guohui left with satisfaction, the two women scrubbed themselves with hot water in the tub, put on a new set of clothes, and then asked the maid to clean up the mess.

Now in the back house

The three daughters Zheng Xiang'er, Xiao Tuanzi and Xue'er who Feng Guohui took over were only responsible for serving the master. They were each accompanied by two maids.

Aunt Zheng, the cook, also has three more menial maids, who are responsible for helping in the kitchen, sweeping the courtyard, holding curtains and watching the door, lighting the fire and doing laundry and other menial tasks.

Slowly, the courtyard became crowded.

In the study

Feng Guohui, who was serious at the moment, was writing and drawing on the paper with a brush in his hand. What he was sketching at the moment was the infrastructure blueprint of the new port.

Since he did not have suitable talents, Feng Guohui could only plan it himself and leave it to his subordinates to implement it.

The port is located on the southwest side of the Surabaya Strait on the northeast coast of Java Island, facing Madura Island across the strait. It has a long history of more than 800 years.

In Feng Guohui’s plan

Surabaya Port, a tropical fjord-shaped port, will build a stone breakwater of about a thousand meters to the northwest along the Qiao family's ore wharf.

Two wooden trestles were built deep into the bay, ranging from 120 meters to 150 meters respectively.

The average water depth in the bay is 10.5 meters, which can allow large ships of more than 2 tons to enter and exit freely. It can meet the long-term maritime trade needs in the future and is comparable to the Batavia Port.

Currently, the first phase of the project is being planned. More than 1,000 indigenous workers will be invested in the early stage. During the climax of construction, the number of workers will reach more than 2,000.

The entire construction period will take more than a year, and it has basically reached the standard that can be put into use.

in planning

The projects that use the most labor force should be the construction of thousands of meters of coastal breakwaters, the No. 1 and No. 2 trestles, the leveling and consolidation of the wharf yard, and the construction of wharf warehouses.

There are no difficulties in project implementation.

This is a tropical fjord seaport. Construction can be carried out 12 months a year except during the frequent typhoon season.

The main reason is the continuous investment of labor and materials. In this era, construction projects are carried on people's shoulders. The tools required are nothing more than hammers, iron drills and ropes, as well as grain, rice and other materials to supply the construction site, which need to be fully prepared.

In terms of labor force, Feng Guohui has notified Wu Siwen, who is based in Yanwang City, to forcibly recruit the strong labor force of the Yusuf tribe to serve for one year.

After one year of hard labor, the amount can be increased or decreased depending on the progress of the project.

These forcibly requisitioned native laborers will be escorted back by the southbound mule and horse caravans when they return.

Specifically, more than 1,000 indigenous laborers, ranging from two to three hundred people per week, will arrive at the seaside construction site within a month to begin preliminary project preparations.

In addition, Nanyang Company, under Feng Guohui's arrangement, will order 200 large hammers, 500 small hammers, 1000 long iron drills, 1000 short iron drills, 20 long saw blades, and 100 single carpenter hammers from the British Short saws, 100 axes, some ropes and four steam engines and other supplies.

At the same time, through the Hu family's channels, a larger batch of supplies such as cement and nails was placed.

Transactions related to land ownership in the bay are also in full swing.

This is a large transaction worth 1.15 silver coins. Although it is a deserted and undeveloped bay land, the transaction value is still very high due to its unique attributes.

The money paid by Nanyang Company can be said to be a preferential price, which includes about 2.5 kilometers of bay line extending northwest from Qiaojia Ore Terminal.

It also includes land development and attachments within 3 kilometers of the bay line. The so-called attachments are hills and forests, etc., and the definition is very clear.

Have to admit

The Dutch were extremely lazy in the construction of colonial infrastructure and were almost unwilling to spend an extra guilder. However, the regulations on regulating transactions are very strict and there are few loopholes to exploit. It is commendable that the Dutch are impeccable in abiding by transaction rules and respecting the sanctity of personal property.

For example, when the Dutch intervened in the property affairs of the Huang family, they did not allow the Nanyang Company or any other force to occupy the Huang family's mansion, plantations, shops and other properties.

Only those holding land or house deeds can dispose of relevant property.

at this point

The Dutch showed the traditional stubbornness and inflexibility of the German people, and they were very accepting of death. Even if the Huang family's mansion was left empty, they would not allow others to get involved.

Feng Guohui could only laugh and laugh, but there was nothing he could do.

The situation of the Huang family is different from that of the Yusuf family in Yanwang City and the Nyonya Tian family. They fled with valuables and land deeds to avoid being pursued by the Nanyang Company.

The latter two were exterminated by force. Without any preparation, all the property deeds and valuables fell into Feng Guohui's hands and became his property.

The Dutch colonists no matter what method you use to trade, they will only approve it after seeing the property deed. This is how they accept death.

Otherwise, Feng Guohui would have moved into the Huang family's big house and enjoyed it long ago, instead of still being crowded in that small side yard.

To be honest, the gamblers are noisier at night and the place is smaller.

on the dock project

Masonry breakwaters can be built using a combination of primitive and modern methods. The method passed down from ancient times is to use glutinous rice water with eggs, mixed with shell powder, stone powder, volcanic ash and lime to make a slurry. The formula is close to Roman ash.

The Qiao family's ore dock was built in this way. It is durable and can withstand hundreds of years of attack by the sun, moon, wind and frost, and still stands strong.

This kind of adhesive is mainly used to make joints in rocks. Bamboo strips can be used to tie boxes and cages, to make large stone masonry, and to make joints in Roman gray to form a solid stone breakwater.

The so-called iron that lasts for a hundred years is bamboo that lasts for a thousand years.

Using tied bamboo nets and bamboo cages as the bones of Roman Gray, they can play a role similar to reinforced concrete, strengthening its sturdiness.

The disadvantage of Roman ash is that it takes a long time to solidify. Due to the strong sunshine conditions in the Surabaya port, it also takes one and a half months to reach the highest intensity.

Therefore, Feng Guohui plans to mix a certain proportion of imported cement into Roman gray to reduce construction costs.

The market price of cement shipped to Surabaya City is 21 silver coins per thousand pounds, and a ton costs almost 44 silver coins. The price is extremely expensive, which makes him feel heartache.

If you can save some, just save some.

at this seaside

Over time, countless discarded shells piled up like a hill beside the fishing village.

After these shells are burned at high temperature, they are crushed into powder with a stone roller, which is a very good base material for Roman ash.

There is also volcanic ash everywhere. It can be transported directly here without any trouble at all. It just requires a little labor.

Feng Guohui had considered all the issues involved in building the wharf quite thoroughly and felt that there was no problem.

In this era, there was no large-scale use of explosives to extract rocks from mountains. The common methods were the fire candle method or the iron wedge method.

The former uses the principle of thermal expansion and contraction to burn rock in a large area and then pour water on it to cause it to wrinkle and crack. It is suitable for large-scale excavation of rocks.

Iron wedges are as simple as nailing a row of iron wedges into the rock to cause the stress to change and crack. It can be mixed with the fire candle method.

These are low-cost construction methods, and the only disadvantage is that they are expensive.

Feng Guohui didn't care about this. He was now a standard large landowner and plantation owner, with about 20,000 to 30,000 people working directly for him. Will there still be a shortage of manpower?

Now the main thing is to look for some experienced craftsmen. There is definitely no chance for the local indigenous people. We can only look for them from the Chinese population who immigrated to Surabaya.

This matter has been explained, and there will be no shortage of old craftsmen and carpenters.

With these experienced craftsmen taking the lead, most engineering problems can be solved on-site without having to do everything personally, which is much less troublesome.

Before I knew it, it was time to turn on the lamp.

Zheng Xiang'er brought two lighted foreign lamps. The wicks were turned long and bright, bringing bright light to the room.

I brewed another cup of fragrant tea and placed it in a convenient place for Feng Guohui.

Take advantage of this moment

Zheng Xiang'er's beautiful big eyes suddenly looked at the drawings spread out on the table. Her eyes were full of confusion. She didn't know what the master was doing drawing these things.

She couldn't read a single word, so these drawings were like heavenly books to her.

suddenly

Zheng Xiang'er's fair little hand was tightly grasped by the big hand, which scared her so much that she subconsciously shrank her hand, softly yelled "Hmm..." and lowered her head in fear.

Feng Guohui looked at her pretty face with interest, leaned forward and said, "What did you see, Xiang'er?"

"Sir, I can't understand these paintings. Sister Xueer said that dinner is ready, and she would like to invite you to dinner. And...sir, I'm scared."

"What are you afraid of?" Feng Guohui leaned closer, and the hot breath from his mouth sprayed onto the girl's cheek.

This stopped Zheng Xiang'er from asking. She lowered her head as if she were a deer under the claws of a wild beast, fearing that if she gave the wrong answer, she would be eaten alive immediately.

Her ears turned red visibly.

Pity her, a young girl who has never seen much of the world, how can she withstand Feng Guohui's teasing?

(End of this chapter)