Guide to traveling through the Northern Song Dynasty

It is said that Australians are descendants of British criminals, but this is not necessarily true.

Historically, before gold was discovered in Melbourne, there were only more than 10,000 descendants of British convicts here. In just three years, more than 100,000 gold diggers arrived, most of whom were American civilians.

The Chinese are also one of the main groups of gold diggers.

There is no mention of those Chinese workers who were not registered, only those who were allowed to go overseas by the Qing government. The first batch came with 1,586 people, and the second batch soared to more than 10,000 people, including 20 children and 1 woman.

There were so many gold prospectors arriving by boat in a short period of time that the Port of Melbourne could not accommodate so many ships. They can only stop at the banks of the Yala River, live in temporary shacks on the river banks, and then hike to the mining area in batches.

There are more than 300 Chinese workers starting from the river bank every day.

Since the Chinese were the last to arrive and there were too many at once, they were naturally squeezed out by white miners from various countries.

In addition, the gold mining methods at that time were very primitive and there was no professional machinery at all. However, the Chinese made all kinds of machinery themselves, and even made wooden water pumps by logging nearby trees. Their gold mining efficiency was the highest among all gold diggers, which increasingly aroused the jealousy and resentment of the white people.

But the Chinese basically come together with fellow villagers, and they are very united by joining the mutual aid association. They go out to hunt for gold in groups of a hundred, while white people always come in groups of three or five. Can three or five white people beat a hundred Chinese?

What to do if you can't beat the Chinese?

Then the government will come forward and formulate a bill specifically to suppress Chinese workers, and continue to increase taxes, increase taxes, and increase taxes on Chinese miners. In the end, nearly 10,000 Chinese workers were forced to jointly protest. After a while, some results were obtained, that is, the Chinese resident tax of 6 pounds was reduced to 4 pounds. The Chinese workers continued to protest, and three years later it was reduced to £2.

Although official official taxes and fees have dropped, exorbitant taxes and miscellaneous taxes on the Chinese have increased. The entry tax for gold diggers from other countries was cancelled, but the entry tax for Chinese people continued to be collected privately. Newly arrived Chinese workers had to go all the way around to land, and had to trek for a month to reach the mining area.

The Chinese workers made money, not only opened various shops, but also raised funds to build various temples.

Unfortunately, the temple was quickly burned down, and white miners rushed into the Chinese community with muskets, destroying, looting, and burning. Similar conflicts lasted for ten years, eventually ending with reduced gold production and most Chinese returning home with their money.

This is not the largest gold mine in Australia, so why did it cause such a sensation?

You must know that the Chinese who come to Melbourne to dig for gold are not piggies. Especially the second batch of Chinese workers who came by boat. They were the compatriots recruited by the first batch of Chinese workers who wrote letters.

First, the natural environment is suitable for human survival; second, the local population is sparse.

Melbourne has both of these factors, so gold diggers who come from thousands of miles away are able to survive and take their income home.

When all the gold was mined in Melbourne, those Chinese who chose to stay even changed careers and became Australian farmers. To be precise, they stopped mining gold and switched to farming a long time ago, making money by selling agricultural products to gold diggers.

This is one of the most suitable areas for farming in Australia.

A Fujian sailor stood on the river bank, grabbed the soil and rubbed it around, and said to Wang Chongdu: "The soil here is very fertile and can be used to grow food."

Wang Chongdu nodded and smiled: "If there is gold and you can farm, it is very likely to create a gold rush. The gold rush in Taiwan has cooled down. It is difficult for individual investors to find the remaining gold. Big merchants are required. Organize the digging of deep mine tunnels.”

Gao Wenbao calculated the time and said: "From Guangzhou to here, starting in winter, with a smooth journey, it will take about fifty days to arrive. We can also resupply in Java Island on the way, and there will not be many storms. It is safer than going to India."

"What about the local indigenous people?" Li Bin licked his lips.

Li Zuqia said: "It's best not to start a conflict first. If you find a mining area, buy it and give the natives some rare goods. If they really don't want to sell it, you can only occupy it by force."

Wang Chongdu said: "First get a few pieces of nugget gold back and promote it in Fujian and Guangdong provinces. Just transport a few hundred people in the first batch. Farm the land and pan for gold at the same time. When ships are sent to deliver supplies the next year, let the first batch come over." We write letters to gold diggers to send gold home, and invite friends to attract more people to come to gold mining. We only collect gold mining taxes and protection fees to protect gold diggers from being harmed by the natives.”

"What should I do if the imperial court pursues me if I collect gold mining tax privately?" Li Zuqia asked.

Wang Chongdu said: "The court will not care about this small quarrel. At least until there are nearly ten thousand gold diggers here, the court will send tax collectors, or even set up a governor-general here. At that time, we will hand it over. It’s not too late. Of course, I will inform your Majesty in advance.”

Sooner or later, gold diggers and indigenous people will clash, especially when the number of people increases, and the two sides will inevitably compete for limited land resources.

Do dwarf black people count as human beings?

At least those dwarf black people in Southeast Asia are not counted. Whether it is Arabian maritime merchants, Indian maritime merchants, or Southeast Asian and Chinese maritime merchants, they do not regard the dwarf black people in Southeast Asia as human beings.

Whenever they have free time, they will catch dwarf black people as slaves, and the countries in Southeast Asia are the most enthusiastic about this.

In another time and space, the South Sea dwarf black people spread all over the islands. They were captured and only a few groups survived to modern society. Their numbers are so rare that they are almost as rare as giant pandas.

It is conceivable what the treasure hunting trio will do in Australia, and what the Ming Governor who comes later will do in Australia.

But it would certainly be much more merciful than the whites, who are a planned genocide.

Pure-blooded Australian aborigines, all dead!

The so-called Australian aborigines in the 21st century are not real aborigines at all, but mixed-race offspring born by white people's rape. Even the mixed-race offspring were forcibly driven to the "protected area" and gathered into tribes to become tourist resources.

According to the nature of the Chinese, killing and driving away are mostly the end of the matter. The aborigines were driven to barren areas, and as long as they did not cause trouble, the Ming officials were even happy to educate the foreign race.

In addition, with the increase in the number of Ming gold diggers, the primary enemy of the aborigines was actually foreign pathogens.

The local aborigines did not realize that a disaster was coming. After repeated body language communication, the chief sent people to take them to find gold.

After walking along the river for several days, they met another tribe on the way.

The communication process was quite peaceful. The two tribes were related by blood. In other words, several nearby tribes had formed an alliance and united to fight against the more distant tribal alliance.

Probably in the river 20 miles east of Ballarat in the future, the Ming expedition team discovered the first nugget gold.

The search continued along the river for several days, but the luck was bad and there was no harvest.

The prospector simply took out the wooden sieve for gold panning, and it only took half an hour to pan out the gold sand.

In fact, there was gold in the soil along the banks of the river.

The Chinese gold panners in another time and space were excluded from exploring new mines, so they specialized in secondary panning in the abandoned mines that the white people had mined. In addition, they cut wood and made machinery by themselves, so the gold mining efficiency can still catch up with the white people, which shows how rich the gold mines here are.

More than 100,000 people have been mining for more than ten years!

After selecting several places for gold panning along the river and tossing for two or three days, the prospector said to Wang Chongdu: "There are things here, and they are very abundant."

Wang Chongdu nodded and said: "The climate here is also good, and all the way is fertile land that can be cultivated. The place where we landed is a natural harbor, and it can be made into a harbor with some repairs. When the population increases in the future, it is better to build a shipyard at the harbor."

Everyone returned happily and had enthusiastic exchanges in the two tribes.

Wang Chongdu took out cloth and other items and exchanged them with the natives for a total of more than six kilograms of gold ornaments.

It was a bit difficult for the fleet to continue westward along the coast because the wind direction was particularly chaotic. Just now, it was blowing southwest wind, but it turned northwest wind in a blink of an eye, causing Wang Chongdu to directly order to return the original route.

Therefore, the treasure hunting trio did not go to the richest mineral areas in Australia.

In fact, it doesn’t matter whether to go or not. Most of them are uninhabited areas, and no matter how many minerals there are, they lack mining value for the time being.

They returned to the northern coast of Australia and found that they were still against the wind if they wanted to return to Java. So they stayed at the seaside for a while, catching various animals nearby every day, killing or injuring animals to eat, and raising intact ones to bring back to the country.

The fleet finally returned until the monsoon changed.

During the exploration of Australia, 46 people fell ill, and three of them died of illness.

Another person had his bones broken by flying stones from the natives.

Three people were bitten by poisonous creatures in Australia, two of them were poisoned to death on the spot, and one decisively cut off his bitten left hand to survive.

Li Zuqia also fell seriously ill and started to have a fever for no apparent reason. The doctor on board said that he had some kind of leprosy and isolated him in the cabin and sent him medicine and food every day. After he recovered from the illness, lime was sprinkled on his cabin and all the clothes he changed were boiled with water. The doctor said that this was to kill the leprosy.

The doctors on the ship have seen a lot of such situations. After all, they have been traveling to various islands in the South China Sea for many years, and there are even special cabins for storing medicines.

Only three crew members died of illness, but the natives who came into contact with them were miserable.

Although there have been outsiders landing in the past tens of thousands of years, the new pathogens that have existed for hundreds or thousands of years are still a deadly threat in Australia.

There were outbreaks of infectious diseases in two tribes. The natives lacked relevant immunity, and in a blink of an eye, more than half of the tribes were infected. Then, it spread to nearby tribes, and two or three thousand people died one after another.

There is really no way to do this.

Perhaps something happened to Zhu Guoxiang and Zhu Ming when they traveled through time. The corn and sweet potatoes they brought with them all mutated, but the modern germs on them did not bring the plague.

The fleet arrived at Java Island with favorable winds, where they repaired the damaged ships and bought some spices to set off.

Some goods were replenished along the way and all shipped to Guangzhou for sale.

In Guangzhou, Wang Chongdu asked the crew to go ashore in batches to have fun, and spread the news that they had found a gold mine in brothels and taverns.

He took out two more opals and put them up for auction at the Goods Exchange.

This kind of gem is so beautiful, and no one has ever seen it before.

The two opals were sold at a total price of 950 guan in Guangzhou. The first one was sold for only 300 guan, but the second one was in great demand because Wang Chongdu only released two.

Repair the ship, sell goods, advertise, buy goods, and set sail.

The goods purchased from Guangzhou were transported to Hangzhou by Wang Chongdu for sale, and three more opals were put up for auction.

It was still early for the southbound trade winds.

Wang Chongdu sent people to send the disabled crew members home, and also sent the ashes of the deceased crew members home, all with huge pensions.

He handed over all matters to Gao Wenbao and Li Bin, and took Li Zuqia to Beijing to meet the emperor.