Rise of the 1630s South America

Chapter 842 Construction of Ancillary Lands ([-])

"The most romantic thing I can think of is to build a great city of our own on such a deserted Gobi desert; to extend the railway representing the most advanced technology of our country to the Pacific coast, which makes my country's great east. Shore’s will can be extended far away, so that the Executive Committee can join the sea..." Captain Ventura stuffed the "South Railway Weekly" in his hand into a drawer, then straightened his clothes, walked out of the captain's cabin, and walked along the pedals. Jumped onto the pier of Xingnan Port.

There are not many people on the pier, just sparse.It seems that the nearby farmers who usually do odd jobs here (as dock laborers) have gone home and are busy, which makes the unloading efficiency on the dock suddenly worse.In fact, it is almost the same. Today is November 1650, 11. The southern Patagonia region ushered in the most important day of the year: spring sowing. This undoubtedly caused a large number of migrant workers to return to the countryside, and the pier was suddenly empty. up.

I would like to add one more thing here. Today, the number of settled residents in Xingnan Port has officially reached more than 6700, most of whom are farmers, scattered in more than a dozen newly built villages on both sides of the nearby Xingnan River.With the continuous construction of flood irrigation reservoirs, more and more land has been improved on both sides of the river, and the area of ​​arable land has even exceeded [-] mu, and two-thirds of it have been planted at the work meeting at the beginning of this year Deep-rooted crops such as sorghum and corn, among which sorghum, which is cold-resistant, resistant to barrenness, and has a fairly good yield, is the main sowing variety.

With the whistle of "Woo", the "Sequoia" (formerly the Danish merchant ship "Green Oak", photographed by Captain Ventura at 4900 yuan) just dragged Captain Ventura's "Sequoia" into the port for anchoring. The steam tugboat untied the cable, and after collecting a small tugboat fee, turned around and left the dock berth.It is towed by a steam tugboat to enter the port and dock. In the east coast of China, only Xingnan Port has this kind of service. Of course, this is the only one in the world.This kind of service that greatly reduces the difficulty of sailboats entering the port is still very popular among captains, especially those large clipper cargo ships that specialize in the New China route, and the flute-shaped transport ships of the South China Sea Transportation Company. When the wind direction and ocean current are unfavorable It is very troublesome to enter and leave the port. Now that there is a small steam tugboat, it is much more convenient, and the charges are also very low, which makes everyone very satisfied.

After the steam tugboat left, two more small boats approached, a steam water supply boat and a disinfection boat.In addition to carrying a large amount of fresh water on the water supply boat, there are also some vegetables and fresh meat for sale. This service is also very considerate for ships who are eager to return and do not want to stay in the port.As for the disinfection ship, since the newly arrived "Sequoia" is full of all kinds of goods, they need to undergo a simple disinfection procedure before entering the port to prevent germs from being brought into Xingnan Port and causing diseases spread.

It can be said that Xingnan Port at this time is the most advanced in the East Coast Republic of China in terms of hardware and software management, and many technologies are even pioneered.However, some other domestic ports are temporarily unable to carry out large-scale modernization due to reasons such as early construction or lack of funds. Therefore, Xingnan Port is destined to dominate the country—or even the world—for many years up.

Captain Ventura came to Xingnan Port for the first time.After resigning from the inland waterway transportation company as the captain of the small steamer "Yiyun-007", Captain Ventura hastily joined the South Atlantic liner, which is jointly owned by several businessmen, the Ministry of Communications, the Southern Railway Company and the East Coast Company. The company is responsible for the fixed route passenger and cargo transportation between Dongfang Port-Yancheng Port-Xingnan Port: one ship is dispatched on the 1st and 15th of each month, and Captain Ventura departs from Dongfang Port on the 1st of this month of.

“小麦94.19吨、大豆40.62吨、玉米27.1吨、花生9.9吨；煤球1.38万个、焦炭0.8吨、红砖4.1万块、涂料染料0.19吨、钢条20吨；盐1.9吨、豆饼18.8吨、豆油0.67吨、鱼干18.2吨、精制面粉39吨；家具152件、蜡和蜡烛0.17吨、纸张0.47吨、各类纺织品0.6万匹……”曾经在罗洽海关任职、现已加入南铁公司的习维奥（西尔维奥）正在仔细核对着该船所载货物的数目，他的助手则在身后用算盘快速计算着文图拉船长这艘船上货物所需缴纳的入港关税。

These goods were undoubtedly transshipped to the Pacific Ocean via Xingnan Port, and they were basically orders from the Peruvian businessmen on the banks of the Maolin River.Nowadays, more and more Peruvian merchants have set up business stations in that extremely remote place, and the types of goods on the order list provided to the east coast are also increasing, and the number has become extremely trivial.And every new order for goods means that the Spanish viceroyalty of Peru has lost another handicraft industry, or the smuggling ships from Europe have sold less goods-of course, this is not absolute, because the Peruvian market has never Saturated, this market has been full of hunger for various commodities under the strong suppression of the peninsula people, so that the number of smuggling ships is increasing day by day, but it still cannot satisfy the appetite of this huge market.

In other words, in fact, the East Coast-Peru smuggling trade has been flourishing for 16 months, and the market is still undersaturated.Commodities transported by the Spanish treasure fleet, foreign smuggling ships via the Caribbean Sea, and Manila galleons (mainly luxury goods, only one flight every two years, one or two ships of three to four hundred tons each time) , with a negligible impact), neither could satisfy the appetite of the standard colonial market, which imported almost everything.

What's more, the pirates posing as the main warships of the East Coast Navy are now searching and attacking smuggling ships from France in the Straits of Florida, off the coast of New Granada, and along the eastern coast of Mexico (in many cases, it will inevitably bring disasters to other countries. Merchant ships), the number of goods shipped from the Old World to Peru and Mexico has limited growth (maybe even showing a downward trend).

After the sweaty customs officers had calculated the duties to be paid, Captain Ventura went to pay the duties with a calm expression, and then received a stack of bills of lading.The goods on the bill of lading are scattered in various places on the wharf cargo yard. Captain Ventura and his crew go to various cargo yards to pick up the goods he needs, and then transport them to the trestle with a flat rail car at the dock. The steam booms are loaded into the cabin one by one.

这些货物同样五花八门，计有热带干果18.1吨、砂糖19.3吨、木材36.1吨、矿物20.6吨、肥料（鸟粪）25吨、棉花56吨、上等硫磺18吨、羊皮0.6万张、羊毛8.3吨、中国绸缎0.19万匹以及诸如金鸡纳树皮等零零碎碎的小玩意——全部是东岸本土各企业、商人订购的货物，当然都是来自秘鲁。

After seeing the names of these goods, Captain Ventura suddenly became overwhelmed: How many places will it take to get all these goods!In desperation, he could only pull his sailors out of the wharf tavern and the house of the Italian prostitute, and then drove them to run with him to various freight yards to collect the goods under their dissatisfied eyes.

In fact, it's no wonder that Captain Ventura lamented so much, because the cargo yard in Xingnan Port is too big today.I don’t know why the South Railway Company has gone crazy. Almost everything in Xingnan Port is built according to high standards, such as the anti-ice embankment—the total length is more than 1300 meters, which prevents ice floes from forming in the shallow water area of ​​the harbor in winter and flowing into the waterway and docks. In the near future, of course, some of these anti-ice embankments may be dismantled after the reclamation of these shallow water areas has progressed and the coastline has been adjusted to reduce drift ice.

Another example is land reclamation - some areas in the harbor are affected by the sediment carried by the Xingnan River into the sea, and the silt water is shallow. In addition, the direction of the channel is perpendicular to the direction of the strong wind in winter (not conducive to navigation), so the Southern Railway Company decided to turn these areas into Reclaim the sea to make land, and increase the area of ​​the storage yard by the way.Moreover, after the area of ​​the wharf cargo yard is expanded, it will be more convenient for the shunting of trains that go directly to the wharf in the future, which will undoubtedly greatly increase the ability of the wharf to import and export goods.

Some of the places Captain Ventura is going to now are the areas formed by land reclamation, with a total area of ​​nearly [-] square meters. The sand and soil taken from the nearby Gobi Desert are repeatedly compacted with roller rollers.The freight yard road formed by land reclamation is concave, with a drainage ditch in the middle and a cover on it.The drainage ditches are used for drainage of the wharf (sea water pours into the Xingnan River in winter, which can easily cause chain disasters). At the same time, in the event of a fire on the freight yard, it can quickly divert sea water to help put out the fire, which is very convenient—of course, the above design is in today’s Huaxia East. Each port of the Republic of China is also unique, which shows its advanced nature.

"I don't think the gang of the Southern Railway Company are really willing to spend money. They built such a jaw-dropping and magnificent port in the barren land of Southern Patagonia, and suddenly the mother of all the other ports in the country It’s no match.” Captain Ventura said in an admiring tone, but he kept slandering the extravagance and waste of the Southern Railway Company—reclamation?It will kill you if you build the yard smaller. Didn’t you see that more than half of the area is still empty? It caused me to run from east to west. Not only was I exhausted, but I even paid a lot of money for renting a flat-bed rail car. What a bad luck!

Of course he was just complaining.In fact, he knew in his heart that with the increasing scale of smuggling trade between the East Coast and Peru, and the deepening of immigration operations in the South Pacific, these freight yards would soon be filled with various goods and people.In the future, what will restrict the handling capacity of this modern port, Xingnan Port, may be the extremely scarce local labor resources. However, this cannot be changed overnight, and can only be improved as much as possible.

(End of this chapter)