New Shun 1730

Dengzhou is not far from Haizhou, and the young people on the boat did not suffer much from the bumps. Before they could vomit yellow bile, the boat arrived at the destination.

The place where they moored was very close to a town called Xugou.

The Lianyungang of later generations has not yet appeared.

There is Liandao in front, which serves as a natural breakwater. There is Yuntai Mountain behind, which was connected to the mainland only fifty years ago. The commanding heights can completely control the port behind Liandao breakwater, but the strategic location is very ordinary. Although it has the body of a military port, it does not have the life of a military port.

However, with Liandao and Yuntai Mountain, the name of Lianyungang can be determined.

When they arrived at Xugou, the leader led these young people to a place in Xugou to rest. It was originally a Catholic church.

At that time, Catholicism spread too fast, especially in Jiangsu and other places, which were the center. Even a small place like Xugou had such a church.

However, after the ban on religion, this place has been confiscated as official property. Now it has been sold out and has become a shop for resting.

Those decorations that did not conform to the prohibition of religion had long been removed or smashed, and the remaining area was now covered with wooden boards and wheat straw, becoming a very standard bottom-level resting car shop.

The general customers of this bottom-level car shop are pot and basin menders, monkey beggars, and peddlers.

The salt industry reform in Haizhou has just begun, and the coal transportation in Xuzhou is still in preparation, including the port of Lianyungang, which is still under construction.

Those who really travel around the world should know that the main customers of this kind of car shop in the past were either those who sold private salt by sea or those who dealt in smuggled goods.

The conditions were very simple, but these students were not from good families. If their families had 20 acres of land, they would not leave their hometowns and run to northern Jiangsu for a few silver coins.

There was a pile of wheat straw, shouting and squeezing each other, and a group of people were almost squeezed on the simple beds.

The leader said that they would go to Haizhou early tomorrow morning to participate in something like a "clerk training class".

As soon as the group of young people unfolded their luggage, the shop owner smiled and said, "Everyone, let's squeeze in a little more. There are too many people these days, and there is nowhere else to go. Another boat has arrived. It's not easy to go out. Let's squeeze in a little more and make some space."

"I'll get some more wheat straw. If it doesn't work, we'll sleep on the ground. It's not easy. Please forgive me, please forgive me."

Perhaps these young people are used to being obedient because they went to school. After all, when they were young, it was related to whether they could eat the free steamed buns at noon. They didn't say anything else. They just complained that "if you squeeze in, you have to squeeze in sesame oil", and then they made room for them.

Soon, a few more people came in from outside.

Some of them looked like the kind of wanderers. Most of the wanderers who could appear in such a place at this time were private salt dealers.

Now the details of Huaibei salt reform are to "turn tycoons into businessmen".

In short, those who have already made the first pot of gold can also enter the salt selling industry in the future.

As for how the first pot of gold came from, whether they were private salt dealers before, they will not be punished.

Yesterday, he was still an unforgivable private salt dealer.

After this month, he will become a legal salt dealer.

In addition to these merchants who are obviously "former" private salt dealers, there is also a young man dressed as a scholar, who is not very old, about 20 years old.

He wears a blue shirt, a square scarf on his head, a saddle bag on his back, and a flintlock pistol hanging on his waist.

Several young people who are studying practical science who are chatting inside, when they see this scholar-like person, they only glance at him and don't look at him anymore.

The two sides are completely different.

Just like when they were in Dengzhou Prefecture, these students complained that even if they went to the Academy of Sciences, they couldn't get the status of a scholar.

And these people did not go home to work directly after the age of fourteen, but continued to go to school.

In terms of ability, they still think they have some.

Although they are "left over", their gold content is not low, and they think they are not much worse than a scholar.

Dashun Academy of Sciences uses Leibniz's conception of the Academy of Sciences, and in terms of talent training, it is the Petersburg model: academicians who are engaged in mathematics, especially foreign academicians, take a few disciples. The disciples are also lecturers for new students of the Academy of Sciences.

In fact, they can't take many people, and those who can enter the Academy of Sciences are really rare.

As for entering the military academy, there is a "good family" problem involved. They also study practical science there, and the court must set admission quotas according to the split identities. There are only a few people in the population base of good families? If the admission quota is not controlled, in a few years, all officers will be low-level practical people.

Of course, the reason is very high-sounding, saying that good family children have higher quality, can ride horses and shoot guns, and have a stronger physique. These low-level tenants are definitely incomparable, so more places for good family children are also for the country.

The top two places are limited, and the rest are them.

Now the company is just established, and the reclamation of northern Jiangsu is still in the trial stage, and the company can't accept many people. These people were recruited in advance, and they studied agronomy, surveying, simple water conservancy and other subjects.

I heard that the reclamation company might recruit more people in a while.

But eating is important. My parents, brothers and sisters are eagerly looking forward to making money quickly to make the family a little easier. How can I just sit there and wait?

Although the court gave them two taels of silver, they also provided food and other things, and maybe they would give them acres of land in the future, which was better than waiting at home.

They believed that they should be considered scholars, but the court did not recognize them as scholars at all.

Therefore, this group of people really didn't like scholars.

In short, I can't write poems, but you can't farm either. Why are we not considered scholars and you are? You can recite the Thirteen Classics, and I can solve equations. Rites, music, archery, charioteering, calligraphy, and mathematics are all six arts. Why are you considered serious knowledge and we are just witch doctors?

Just like the frequent fights between Wude Palace and the Imperial College in the capital, after the rise of folk practical studies, although the two sides could not fight because of their different status levels - Wude Palace and the Imperial College, the status levels are the same, and the status levels of practical studies college students and scholars are far different - but they could not fight, and they really disliked each other.

The newly-educated young people who were chatting and gossiping didn't care about the people who came, just as if they didn't exist at all, and continued to chat there.

The scholar probably knew what these people were doing. He frowned and looked at the messy wheat straw, sniffed the unique smell of the big bunk bed mixed with the smell of farts and feet in the air, and was a little uncomfortable, but still lay down in the corner.

Several "former" private salt dealers on the side were very familiar with the rules of this kind of shop. They took a few coins, bought firewood, borrowed the shop owner's pot, went to heat up the food they brought with them, and bought a few pieces of dry food from the shop.

At this time, the meal prepared by the shop owner was ready. The newly-educated young people who were chatting and gossiping there took three or four mixed noodles, and one of them ate with two cut old pickled radishes with relish.

While eating, his mouth didn't stop.

They were eating mixed noodles, but the content of the chat was a bit like lying in Longzhong and dominating the world.

A young man skillfully held the mixed noodle dumplings in one hand, four dumplings and a pickle, and he only needed three fingers of one hand to hold it steady.

You can tell at a glance that if you are not a poor person who has eaten mixed noodle dumplings for more than ten years, you really can't taste this level.

Holding the dumplings in one hand, the other hand was not idle, shaking a large piece of paper full of words, saying: "Those who do business on the canal are stupid if they don't go to the seaside at this time. Huai'an is so far away from the seaside. If they don't go to the seaside now, they will be in a hurry in the future."

The businessman lay there, just listening to a story. It can't be said that what the other side said was not Mandarin, but it was habitually mixed with some dialects, but you can still understand it if you listen hard. Because whether it is the navy, the marines, or some practical studies, many people are from this side, and many go to the south.

After listening to the general idea, it seems that those who do business on the canal are stupid if they don't sell their property and go to the seaside to change their careers at this time.

Now the imperial court has abolished the canal transport. Although it did not say that the canal cannot be used, how many years can the canal last without the imperial court's repairs?

Without the canal, Huai'an and other places can't support the top ten cities in the country at this time. It will decline sooner or later. It is smart to sell the industry and run away to the seaside to find opportunities while it has not collapsed directly.

After hearing this, the merchant lying there listening to the story couldn't help but look a few more times. Seeing that the young people who were talking were wearing patched clothes, he thought that the young people nowadays are really amazing. When I was this age, I didn't think about such a big thing.

Just looking at the clothes of those young people and the way they eat, I know that they must be from poor families.

When I was young, I also walked the streets and sold private salt on my shoulders and carrying a pole. How could he not know what knowledge the children of poor families could have?

However, these people were different. It seemed that they were not wearing patched clothes, but official uniforms with patches; it seemed that they were not living in the lowest carriage inn, but in the mansion where ordinary people came and went.

This merchant really thought that these poor young people had some knowledge, because he was originally a private salt dealer, and later he saved some capital and bought a shop by the canal.

However, with the rise of sea transportation and the final order of the court to abolish the canal transport, the two sides of the canal inevitably declined.

Many shops would rather complain that business was getting worse day by day, but they didn't want to leave and find other ways to make a living.

This merchant was different. He made a great effort and gritted his teeth. He thought that the two sides of the canal would decline completely sooner or later, so he sold all his properties and found another way to make a living.

This time when he came to Haizhou, it was best to take advantage of this opportunity to "turn from a smuggler to a businessman" and go back to his old business of selling salt.

But as a smuggler, he also knew that the court was reforming the salt policy and changing the salt bill to a ticket, and small capital could enter the market with a few hundred taels of silver.

I am afraid that the business of selling salt, which was profitable before, may not be so easy to do, and the profit is not so big.

After all, it is a professional match, so it is just a bottom line. I have never done those strange new industries before, and I will go to Songjiang Prefecture in a few days to take a look.

The businessman really didn't expect that a group of poor children wearing patched clothes and living in straw shops could have such knowledge.

Out of curiosity, he pricked up his ears to listen to what else these people could say.

The young people discussed the situation after the canal was abolished for a while, and then talked about Haizhou.

One of them talked about the future of Haizhou, and said as if pointing out the mountains and rivers: "I think Haizhou will be a good place in the future. The newspaper said before that southern Jiangsu lacks coal and firewood. If the road is built as mentioned above, how can it not prosper by transporting coal from here to the south?"

"The book says that steam engines are popular all over the world. The matter is explained so clearly. As for the merchants along the canal, they should think about opening coal mines and building roads."

"We should build a road for transporting coal here and collect freight. How can we not make money?"

"It's just that I don't have money. If I had money, I would have to buy a large piece of land at the port. In the future, even if we build warehouses, pile coal, and build warehouses, we can make money back."

"In the future, Haizhou will definitely not be famous for salt, but for the coal needed by southern Jiangsu."

At this point, the merchant who was eavesdropping was already a little confused.

He had never read the books of these students, so how could he know what a steam engine was, what the concept of a future steam car was, what a railway was, and so on.

Of course, these young people had never seen it either.

But these young people had never really been to Africa, but they knew that the people there were all black; these young people had never really felt gravity, but they firmly believed that gravity caused them to fall to the ground even if they jumped up.

They believed in many of the contents of the books without a doubt.

Just like every normal person in the future who had never been to space but firmly believed that the earth was round, not flat.

The businessman had originally wanted to hear what they had to say, but now he was hearing things that he didn't understand at all, so he lost the interest when he heard them say that the two sides of the canal would be finished sooner or later.

In addition, he heard that those young people were actually talking nonsense about building warehouses near the port, which made him feel even more ridiculous.

How much money can you make from selling coal in Haizhou?

Who can make more money from mining and selling coal than selling salt? Isn't this nonsense?

I thought I had some knowledge, but it turned out to be just like this.

The merchant just thought it was funny, thinking that even if you know these strange steam engines, what's the use? You still wear patched clothes and can't even be a scholar?

Although I don't know these things thousands of miles away, when I arrive in Haizhou tomorrow, I will be a legitimate salt merchant who sells salt with tickets. In the future, even if coal really becomes popular, it will not be your turn to open a mine, but ours.

You continue to chew on your nest, talking nonsense about this thing will be popular in the world and coal mines will be prosperous. Even if it is ten thousand years, as long as people still eat salt, Haizhou will be famous all over the world because of salt, not coal.

The merchant didn't listen to a group of idiots chatting nonsense, but the scholar-like man in the corner was interested in what these people said and took the initiative to talk to them.