Rise of the 1630s South America

Chapter 562 New Colonization ([-])

On February 1647, 2, the former Spanish Montevideo outpost.

A group of bright-faced common people wearing uniform denim overalls and short hair are brandishing hammers to break stones at a quarry by the sea.After the large stones are blasted by black powder, they need to be broken by manpower before they can be used to pave the road.As for the steam breaker, I'm sorry, Montevideo keeps everything simple, and it hasn't been able to install such advanced equipment here.

Most of these Ming people had already shaved their hair in Heishui and Dabo, and there was nothing they could do about it. They had three meals a day with their hair shaved: two dry and one thin, and occasionally some dried fish mixed with minced meat.Those who don't shave their hair can only do one job, one thin and two meals, and the work is even more difficult. Many people can't hold on, so they shave their hair short one after another.Nowadays, it is not uncommon to see unshaved hair in that place, and we country people are not so particular about it. The world is probably the biggest belly.

Oh, by the way, Montevideo was named by the Spaniards, and now it has been renamed Qingdao.The name Qingdao is still a bit unfamiliar to the Ming people from Jiaozhou, Shandong. Hmm, it seems to be the name of a small fishing village?I don't know what the old men think, but they actually named this harbor after a small fishing village.Although some of them are fishermen from around Qingdao, it is a bit weird to name them like that.But in fact, this is nothing. The current Qingdao Port on the east coast only has a few hundred fishermen who are poor. Isn't it just a small fishing village.

They arrived at Dongfang Port by boat from Xinhua Port in early December.After passing the initial quarantine period, they walked all the way here - a beautiful bay - under the leadership of some doll officials who are said to be from the Bingtuanbao.The bay has fresh air, open terrain, and calm water waves. After careful measurement by naval survey ships, most of the bay is a deep-water anchorage of sandy texture, with a water depth of 12-8 meters, which is very suitable for use as a large commercial port.

However, it is precisely because the port here is wide and the water is deep, it is not suitable as a military port, so the main base of the navy is still located in Zhenhai port.In fact, there are indeed no places on both sides of the Rio de la Plata that are suitable for military ports, and these places, which are the first priority of the Gein military port, cannot meet the safety.If the navy really wants to pick a military port, it might as well go to the Uruguay River, but it's close to the Spanish sphere of influence, so it's not suitable at the moment, so the navy can only place its old nest in the north.Anyway, the ports, waterways, lighthouses, and shipbuilding industries have grown to a large scale, and it deserves its name as the home port of the Navy's First Fleet.

In today’s Qingdao, apart from the more than 600 immigrants from Gelatin State, Gaomi and other places, there are more than 700 peninsula people from Bilbao and Santander—these people were the original colonies of the Kingdom of Spain here. of settlers.After the initial period of panic, these people have basically stabilized their emotions.The dozens of gauchos who originally harmed them are said to have been dispatched by the east coast people to places such as Mar del Plata and Puerto Blanca in the south to harm the residents there.

The military discipline of the 6th Company of the East Coast Army, which has been stationed here recently, is indeed very good. Apart from training and quarreling all day long, they have not done anything to bully them, the peninsula people, in the rest of the time.If you really want to talk about it carefully, in fact, these east coast people have brought some benefits to the local Spanish residents.For example, at the beginning of this month, the wheat fields reclaimed by more than 700 local Spanish residents came to the harvest season. These people from the east coast bought most of the wheat from them at a very reasonable price, and then shipped a lot of cotton cloth, salt, and salted fish. , bacon, leather goods, agricultural tools, beer, wine and other commodities, selling these consumer goods at a price that seems extremely cheap to the Spaniards (in fact, it is the domestic price on the East Coast), has actually made the local Spanish residents get rid of the long-term However, the living conditions have been improved to a certain extent.

This is what Qingdao Port looks like today.There are more than 700 local peninsula residents who farm land, herd sheep, do some farm work, and are sometimes expropriated to repair houses and city walls.The original Montevideo outpost was regarded as a relatively important stronghold set up by the Spaniards on the east coast, so a beautiful two-story stone building was built locally—a typical Baroque style.This solid two-story building was originally a residence for Spanish officers and a warehouse, but now it has become the headquarters of the 6th Company of the Army. It is said that it will become the seat of the Qingdao Township Government in the future.

In addition to these peninsula people, more than 600 Ming immigrants basically came to work as a construction team.They expanded the urban area, built the city wall, leveled the wharf and freight yard, and built the road to dredge the port. In short, the workload is very large.It is said that the north will send another [-] Ming immigrants and [-] escaped English indentured slaves to build a railway station in the north of the harbor.Obviously, the master also plans to extend the railway line at the port of Rocha to this place in order to better communicate with the north and the south.

The weather today is not very good. It rained in the middle of the night last night. Although the rain stopped in the morning, the air is still very humid.Mr. Jimenez hated rainy weather very much, because his leg joints would always hurt a little at this time.But Montevideo is a rainy place. The Anda company commander from the East Coast said that the annual rainfall here exceeds 1100 millimeters. Mr. Jimenez doesn’t know exactly what this means, and he is not interested in knowing it. All he knew was that his legs were going to ache again.

In the past, when faced with such situations, he always seemed helpless and could only bear helplessly until the pain gradually eased, but now he didn't have to.He sighed, picked up a tablet from the vial on the table, and swallowed it with water.This is a famous trick created by people from the east coast. It is called "aspirin", and it has a certain effect on treating rheumatism and other diseases.The company commander Anda who was familiar with him before gave him a few pills as a reward for discussing Cuba's geography with him.After taking it, he felt that the effect was not bad, so this time he spent a sky-high price of two pesos per capsule to buy ten capsules at a time from the store set up by the people on the east coast.

Although the price of this drug is outrageous, the effect is really good.And I heard from the shop clerk that the current price is only a tentative price during the trial sale period. After the official large-scale sale starts, the price of the drug will be adjusted to a certain extent depending on the market situation. It is very likely that there will be a large increase at that time. rise.What a heretic who believes in the devil!A pill costs two pesos, why don't you go and rob it, after all, it's faster to get money!Mr. Jimenez muttered a few words, then carefully put away the remaining medicine, then sorted out the lesson plans on the table, and prepared to go outside to teach the students.

There were bursts of bugles and commands outside the window. It was the 6th Company of the East Coast Army conducting military training on the playground.Unlike the soldiers of the Spanish Army who gambled, slept and fought when they were free, the East Coast Army looked more like a real army.At this time, almost all the countries on the European continent were scumbags, swindlers, and beggars who came to serve as soldiers for a living, but the navy and army soldiers of the East Coast Republic were all nationals with official status and real estate, and their sense of honor far surpassed that of the Spanish army. Not to mention the frequency and hard work of training.The long-term victories against Spain have cultivated their high morale, and they have a psychological advantage in face-to-face battles, and it is easier for them to display their usual training level. It is no wonder that they will win many battles. Army of the world.

Originally, even though he was an enemy, Mr. Jimenez still had an admiring attitude towards the army on the east bank, but a bad news yesterday made his perception of these people the lowest: a young officer came to tell him yesterday, This is already the territory of the East Coast Republic of China. The Central Executive Committee has decided to set up a complete elementary school in Qingdao Port, and all school-age students must be forced to receive East Coast education.Yesterday, the principal and teacher of the elementary school arrived here by boat, and requisitioned Mr. Jimenez's church as the school building, and the school will officially start tomorrow.

The officer told Mr. Jimenez very clearly that today will be the last day for him to teach Spanish, and tomorrow there will be uniform Chinese teaching here. Anyone who tries to disobey this order will be fined, detained, imprisoned or even hanged. Waiting for punishment.As a learned scholar, Mr. Jimenez can choose to go to the capital on the east coast to study Chinese, and he can continue to come back to teach after he finishes his studies, and he will still be able to receive wages during the study period.Of course, if he is unwilling to learn Chinese, then he will lose the qualification to continue teaching these students.

After some consideration, Mr. Jimenez decided to accept the invitation and go to the capital of the East Coast people for further study.Of course, this is not to come back and continue to be a teacher. In fact, he has lost this interest.He did this just to master a language that he thought might be useful in the future, and in addition, he wanted to see more of the country on the east coast.He wanted to know what was driving the rapid development of this small young country with a population of only [-], so that they even dared to declare war on the great and glorious Kingdom of Spain. How reckless and rebellious was this!And there must be a deep-seated reason for this, and Jimenez decided to find out the reason.

Of course, before all this, he had to complete an important thing first.

"Children." Mr. Jimenez said in a slightly sad tone: "Today may be the last lesson I teach you beautiful Spanish."

(End of this chapter)