Rise of the 1630s South America

Chapter 386 Lake West ([-])

With the existing road, the distance of only a few kilometers does not seem too far away. Shao Yuanyi and Petrov soon arrived at the 8th production team at the foot of the mountain.The place is about ten kilometers north of West Lake Fort, backed by a hill and surrounded by large forests.People on the east coast have built a number of miniature reservoirs here, collecting water from some local creeks and swamps to irrigate newly opened farmland.

However, as Petrov said, the people from the east coast were not the first to settle here.Due to the superior natural conditions here, Guarani people may have settled here thousands of years before the people from the east coast came here.Here they carry out primitive slash-and-burn farming and thrive.

But all this came to an abrupt end when the East Coasters arrived here.The technicians of the Ministry of Agriculture took a fancy to the rich water resources and fertile farmland here, so they didn't care whether there were any settlers here, and they listed this area as the key reclamation area of ​​the West Lake Fort Agricultural Area with a big stroke, and arranged The 8th to 10th production teams were selected to cultivate here.

After the technicians from the Ministry of Agriculture returned, a large number of Ming, French, and Italians flocked into this fertile land. They felled trees, hunted animals, filled swamps, and built reservoirs, without any regard for the interests of the aborigines here. with feelings.Therefore, these aborigines were naturally angry. With the help of Spanish missionaries, they took up arms to fight against the East Coasters and successfully killed dozens of East Coast pioneers.

However, their resistance was naturally regarded as a serious provocation. The two army companies urgently dispatched from Zhenhai County and Pingan County split up from the north and the south to suppress them. All the rebellious Guaraní villages on the land.Even if they did not participate in the attack on the Guarani villages of the East Coast people, the East Coast people forcibly expelled or exiled them. Naturally, those who were expelled were driven into the mountains, while those who were exiled were exiled to Australia.

After the battle on the surface, the Guaraní people who retreated to the mountains were unwilling to fail, and they started a guerrilla war with the people on the east bank that has continued to this day.From time to time, they rushed down from the hills and mountains to the plains, and then attacked the villages of the people on the east coast, destroying their crops and plundering their livestock.Naturally, the people on the east coast will not be afraid of their attacks. Although these Guarani people have the help of Spanish missionaries, their weapons are still quite simple. Most of them use spears, bows and arrows, and there are few arquebuses. .And every adult man on the east bank must receive regular military training and join the local militia organization. The Minister of Armed Forces of West Lake Fort gave each of them a flintlock rifle, and even each production team was equipped with a 4-pound gun. Small cannon, the firepower can be described as powerful.

In addition, the people on the east bank also divide and woo those Guarani tribes, using the contradictions and even hatred among their different tribes to achieve their own goals.With the help of the Leading Party, the East Bank mobilized three army companies and the same number of militiamen at one time to carry out a large-scale bloody cleansing of the hideouts of these hostile Guarani tribes in the mountains.Under this continuous attack, the resistance of the Guarani people became weaker and weaker. Many tribes could not bear such a cruel and bloody war, and instead migrated westward to the depths of the hills.And those who stayed and persisted in fighting were naturally not as powerful as before. Now they can only do some attacks in twos and threes, and in many cases their own losses are often much greater than those on the east coast.

According to the records of the Spanish missionaries who personally participated in this incident, the people on the east bank killed and injured more than 500 Guarani settlers in total for two years, and the Guarani people who died indirectly because of them Also more than 1000 people.In addition, they exiled more than [-] peaceful Guaraní villagers, a significant number of whom are believed to have died on the way, and less than half managed to reach their place of exile.The main reason for such a tragedy is that these Guarani people are farming and settled tribes. Unlike the Indians on the North American continent who live by hunting and have no clear concept of territory, they grow corn, cassava, and raise livestock. There is a clear concept of territory, and the will to defend their territory is extremely firm, which broke out fierce and irreconcilable conflicts with outsiders on the east coast who wanted to seize their land.

Today, in March 1644, the conflict between the two sides is actually not so severe. The Guarani people have been dying in the two-year-long battle, and the backup is not available. Now they can only do some harassment. nature of the attack.And the people on the east bank finally solved the long sword hanging above their heads for two years, and finally they can farm and live with peace of mind.

What Shao Yuanyi and Petrov saw at this time was a stable rural pastoral scenery. The large-scale war was a thing of the past, and everyone continued to live.Therefore, in addition to arranging some armed militiamen to guard the entrance of the village as usual, most people are harvesting crops in the fields.

What opened Shao Yuanyi's eyes was that a strange machine pulled by four horses appeared in the field.After seeing it, Petrov also said in a tone full of admiration: "This is a machine sent from Dafeng Fort a few days ago. It is really amazing. It can automatically harvest corn in the field, and the efficiency is better than 50 corns. The lad is even taller. It's unbelievable!"

In fact, the machine Petrov mentioned was the first-generation horse-drawn corn harvester produced by the Fengshou Agricultural Machinery Factory newly established in Dafengbao.This harvester was brainstormed by a few old people who traveled across the mile, and then designed by a new generation of young mechanical designers.These old people were born in the 20s. When they were young, they saw and even used and repaired agricultural machinery such as animal harvesters and threshers.After the large agricultural areas near West Lake Fort and Dafeng Fort raised the need for a high-efficiency crop harvesting machine, a group of bureaucrats from the Ministry of Agriculture dug out a design drawing from the file cabinet, that is, the drawing of the horse-drawn harvester. .

This drawing has been lying quietly in the filing cabinet for several years.In the past, first, there was a lack of demand in this area. Domestic agricultural production was relatively scattered, and farmers often harvested crops by themselves. Objectively, there was no motivation to develop new machines. Second, the technical content of this machine was not low. Many components Machines are needed for processing, because it is time-consuming, labor-intensive, expensive and lacks practical significance if it is made by hand alone.However, with the gradual development of the machining level of the East Coast Republic today, it is no longer a problem to process some agricultural machinery parts.

It just so happened that a large agricultural planting area was planned in the area west of Yazi Lake in China. This large-scale agricultural production method puts forward new requirements for high-efficiency harvesting machines.Therefore, Fengshou Agricultural Machinery Factory came into being under this background, and the first equipment they produced was the corn harvester in front of them, which was used to harvest early corn in the agricultural area of ​​Xihubao.At present, only one piece of this type of equipment has been produced, and it will be used for trial use in order to improve and finalize the production.

This equipment is mainly composed of cutter, grain divider, transmission device and conveying mechanism.Among them, the most important part cutter is a pair of reciprocating cutting knives, which is composed of a handle, a moving blade, and a knife head. The knife head is connected with a transmission mechanism for power transmission; The function is to separate the crops to be cut from the uncut crops; the conveying mechanism is a conveyor belt made of canvas or animal skin, and the conveyor belt is equipped with teeth to better transport the cut corn cobs to the rear In the material pocket; the conveying mechanism and the cutter head of the cutter are connected on the same transmission shaft, so that the corn can be conveyed while cutting.

In general, this machine still has a certain technical content.The strength or machining accuracy of the parts may not be very high, but the design idea is much better than the animal harvesters designed by the British and Americans in the early 19th century. After all, this is the harvester that was still used in rural areas after the liberation of China until the 60s. mechanical.After a certain modification, this harvesting machine can also harvest rice, wheat, pasture, etc. The principle is similar, and the modification is not too complicated.

If there is no problem with this equipment after trial in the West Lake Fort Reclamation Area, then Fengshou Agricultural Machinery Factory will finalize production, and then the Ministry of Agriculture will promote it throughout the country to improve production efficiency and liberate rural labor.And some people may say why not use steam power, but use this less efficient animal power as power?This is complicated to say, but in simple terms, there are three reasons. One is that the people on the east coast lack non-ferrous metals such as manganese and chromium, so the steel material is just like that, and the steam engine cannot be miniaturized; the second is that the steam engine is expensive. The cost is high; the third is that the steam harvester is too heavy, which is easy to cause damage to the farmland, and if the weight is to be reduced, the problem of metal materials must be involved.All in all, steam-powered harvesters are limited by materials and processing on the east coast today. Generally speaking, the cost performance is not high, the practicability is not strong, and it is not meaningful for production and promotion.

Shao Yuanyi and Petrov soon arrived at the production team headquarters here.The militiaman with a wounded left leg was lying inside. He was chatting with others at this time, and he seemed to be in good spirits.Shao Yuanyi loosened the splint and looked at it. The fractured part was a little purple and swollen, but the bone setting was done pretty well, and there was no need for re-bonding.So he quickly splinted the soldier's leg again and prescribed him some nutritious food.

On the other side, Petrov has already chatted with the captain of the production team and the militia commander. The content of their chat mainly refers to the land reclamation operation to the hilly area that will soon be carried out, and the Guarani people over there. Condition.

(End of this chapter)