Chapter 977 Changhua Insights
After Van Diemen took over the post of Governor of the East India Company in Batavia, the number of banquets he held and attended far exceeded those in the early years when he led his fleet to travel between colonial points in the Java Sea and Banda Sea. time, but it is definitely not as frequent as attending banquets during this visit to Hainan Island. The dense banquet arranged by the Haihan people was already too much for him to bear. So when Qiao Zhiya, who was meeting for the first time, mentioned the reception banquet, the expression on his face was inevitably a bit strange.
After listening to Ning Qi's explanation, Qiao Zhiya was able to guess at least 70%. She smiled and said, "Don't worry, sir. Our reception banquet here doesn't have as many rules as in Sanya. You can just drink as you like. The Yacheng you went to earlier, Sanya is a place where wine is produced. How can we show off our local characteristics if we don’t drink you up?”
Van Diemen could only express his helplessness about this "local characteristic". Although he personally liked drinking, he really couldn't stand Haihan's wine-table culture. He fainted at two and a half meals out of three. It would be fine if he had nothing to do, but this inspection was of great significance to the East India Company, and Van Diemen did not want to waste this precious time in a daze. He could only keep the loss he suffered this time silently in his heart, and when he had the opportunity to deal with the Haihan people next time, he would also bring a group of men who could drink to fight, so that these Easterners could see the Nordic people's drinking capacity.
Qiao Zhiya kept his word. As expected, no one attacked Van Diemen at the reception banquet, and the toasts were all ordered to the last minute. Unlike the banquet table in Sanya where there is a rule of "three circles on the left and three circles on the right". After completing these six rounds of toasting, you have to return six rounds of toasts. Most people can no longer hold on during the toasting stage.
Without the frequent toasting offensive, Van Diemen was finally able to taste Haihan delicacies in peace. He had to admit that even using the same ingredients and spices, Haihan's cooking method was indeed much better than that of the Batavia cooks, and the method seemed to be different from the Han cuisine, but based on Van Diemen's experience I don’t know enough about the art of eating to go into all the details, but I just think the method is more refined. Although he didn’t know the Chinese saying that one never gets tired of fine food and fine food, Van Diemen thought about it carefully and felt that this was consistent with the Haihan people’s style of material enjoyment.
Fan Diemen also noticed a detail during the dinner. Qiao Zhiya, a local official, was responsible for much more official duties than the two places he had inspected previously. People kept coming to ask for instructions and report on work during the dinner, so Qiao Zhiya had to leave the table frequently. Deal with the problem. This level of busyness could only be achieved by several senior officials in the Haihan Executive Committee when they were in Sanya before.
"He is responsible for the local administration and production alone, so he will be very busy." Ning Qi explained for Qiao Zhiya who left the meeting again: "Presumably Mr. Van Diemen was in this state when he was in Batavia, right? ”
Van Diemen smiled deeply and said: "It is true. This visit to your country for inspection can be regarded as the longest period of time that I have been away from official duties since I took office."
When Van Diemen took office, he encountered the Malata Blue Army attacking Batavia. He finally managed to survive until the end of the war, and continued to face the heavy post-war reconstruction project. During this period, the Haihan people also took advantage of the opportunity to move in and deepen their tentacles. In the South China Sea, the scope of activities of the East India Company was gradually suppressed. It can be said that there was no easy day during his tenure. Although he came to Hainan Island with a mission this time, it was a rare treat for him to be able to break away from his original work environment for a while. Although Van Diemen had all kinds of worries before coming here, it turned out that the Haihan people acted in a decent manner, and the inspection itinerary they arranged was much better than he expected. For example, Van Diemen didn't think about Changhua, which produces steel. I would like to be allowed to visit here.
The next morning, Qiao Zhiya took Ning Qi and Fan Diemen to visit the local smelting workshop as scheduled. Not surprisingly, Van Diemen saw a steam engine here again. The blowers used in the furnaces here are driven by steam engines. The kinetic energy output by a steam engine can drive the blowers of several blast furnaces at the same time, and the efficiency is far higher. Beyond human power. The only materials needed for a steam engine are cheap coal and fresh water.
Van Diemen also noticed that the iron and steelmaking furnaces used by Haihan were different in appearance from those he had seen and known, but Qiao Zhiya's explanation did not involve the relevant design principles and usage methods, and he My understanding of smelting is only superficial, so I can only take a few more glances, keep the appearance in mind, and plan to draw it later and hand it over to professional technicians to figure out the mystery.
Van Diemen thought that since this stove was of a style he had never seen before, given Haihan's consistent style, it must be the most advanced technology, and imitating it might have the same effect. However, his idea was too simple. Haihan's design of the smelting furnace took into account its own technological conditions. There were supporting solutions in terms of furnace materials, fuel, smelting process and temperature control. It was not just By imitating the appearance of the furnace, the entire smelting method can be copied. The steam-powered blower used to raise the furnace temperature cannot be made elsewhere.
However, Van Diemen is right about one thing. Haihan’s technology in smelting is indeed unparalleled in the world. However, due to current conditions, it is impossible to build oxygen converters, electric arc furnaces, electroslag furnaces, etc. High-end equipment can only be constructed according to local conditions for blast furnace ironmaking and open-hearth steelmaking. Of course, even if the principles are the same, the technological advancement of the iron and steelmaking furnaces built and designed by Haihan far exceeds the level of its contemporaries, and it does have relatively large advantages in terms of production efficiency and product quality. In addition, Shanghai Han manages and arranges production in the smelting workshop according to the modern industrial model, so the operation of the entire smelting system is closer to the state of the industrial age, rather than the common workshop-style operation model of this era.
"Most of the coke used in our smelting furnace here comes from Black Earth Port. After the coal excavated there is prepared, the finished coke is directly transported here for use." Qiao Zhiya explained to Van Diemen: "From In terms of steel production capacity, our smelting workshop here has exceeded that of Ming, Fu and Guang provinces combined.”
Van Diemen couldn't help but feel a little moved when he heard this number. He had collected some intelligence about the Ming Dynasty in his early years, and this information about steel production was naturally also an extremely important part.
During the Ming Dynasty, iron ore was discovered and mined in as many as 232 states and counties across the country, including 28 in Fujian, 23 in Guangdong, and two in Guangxi. These three places combined have 50 iron ore deposits. As many as three places. As for private smelting workshops, there are many. For example, the iron smelting plant in Nanhai County, Guangdong has reached a labor scale of 3,000 people during the Chongzhen period. According to statistics from the Jiajing period, the annual pig iron output of government-run smelters and private workshops nationwide has exceeded 10,000 tons, far exceeding the production levels of European countries during the same period. Among this number, the production capacity of Fuzhou and Guangzhou That's almost half. The production capacity of Haihan's smelting plant in Changhua is equivalent to that of the two major iron-producing provinces of Ming Dynasty combined, which shows its high production efficiency.
However, what Van Diemen didn't know was that the Haihan smelting base could start so quickly because it actually relied on the many craftsmen trained by various official and private smelting institutions in the Ming Dynasty. The private iron smelting industry in Guangdong is particularly developed. For iron mines in places such as Shaozhou and Huizhou, during the autumn harvest every year, people gather in groups and cross the border in groups to open mines and build furnaces on their own to make profits from iron. Of course, in addition to this kind of "wild" operation, there are also more legal smelting workshops and mines that have obtained official licenses and paid taxes on time. For example, the scale of the iron casting factory in Foshan, Guangdong is quite large. There are thousands of employees in the iron frying industry alone, and they are subdivided into stokers, casters, fitters, hammerers, etc., and there is a relatively detailed division of labor. However, these craftsmen are still limited by the conditions of the times. They basically obey the arrangements of the guilds and are not free wage laborers of a capitalist nature.
In the early years, Haihan introduced a large number of refugees from Guangdong caused by wars and famines. Among them were many craftsmen engaged in this industry. Later, most of them were concentrated in Changhua to work. Through the connections of these people, the civil affairs department gradually recruited many craftsmen in the smelting industry from the Ming Dynasty.
The Chief Secretary of Guangdong has relatively clear regulations on the operating structure of private iron ore mines. The owner of the mountain is the head of the furnace, and the head of the furnace is the general A. There is a small A for every ten people below, and personal information must be filled in and then submitted to the county. Only then can the government obtain a business license. Haihan directly obtained these lists through people in the government, then dug people according to the lists, and brought them to Changhua one by one for resettlement. This method of poaching was later even used in government-run ironworks, poaching all the craftsmen with high salaries.
At that time, the income of these craftsmen who served the government was about "ten stones and eight buckets of grain per year, two pounds of cloth for winter and summer clothes, and two pounds and eighty ounces of cotton." This kind of income can only be regarded as the lowest level in Haihan's salary that is linked to the labor class. It is a relatively basic level, and Haihan has always been very generous to craftsmen with professional skills. As long as the treatment of third-level workers is shown, it is enough to make most of the craftsmen's hearts flutter, and there are colleagues who invested in Haihan early to persuade them to be guarantees. , this poaching operation went very smoothly. The officials in charge of this field have long been fed by Haihan's sugar-coated bullets, and they have turned a blind eye to this kind of behavior. As long as they don't make the matter too big, it doesn't matter how many people Haihan poaches. negative impact.
Among the thousands of smelting employees currently working for Haihan in the Changhua area, at least four to five hundred craftsmen were poached from the Ming Dynasty. Most of these people are already serving as directors and foremen of various production links, and they have also trained more employees for Haihan. Recently, it has even begun to accept trainees from Annan to train workers for the iron smelting plant to be built in Annan through cooperation between the two parties within the year.
Fan Diemen can only observe the scale of the smelting industry in Changhua with envy and hatred. There is no such large-scale smelting plant in Batavia, and there are only more than thirty professional blacksmiths in the city. They can make things like farm tools, weapons and armor, but they want to carry out large-scale smelting operations like Haihan. It is indeed a bit difficult. Of course, the most fatal shortcoming is that there are no large-scale iron mines near Java Island. While Batavia was still worrying about the source of pig iron, Haihan's production capacity was already large enough to be used to lay long-distance rail transit lines. This really made Van Diemen feel a little worried.
Before Van Diemen came to Changhua, he had heard that there was the longest railway line on Hainan Island, and Van Diemen had briefly experienced the unique advantages of this railway line in transportation during his stay in Sanya. He could only express his sincere admiration for Haihan's invention, but this thing, like many Haihan characteristics, could not be copied to other places. Firstly, only Haihan could build steam locomotives. Secondly, The reason is that there are too many rails needed to lay the railway, which is several times more expensive than building an ordinary road. Others simply cannot afford to invest this money.
After visiting the smelting and production site in Changhua, Qiao Zhiya invited Fan Diemen to take the train from Changhua Port to the inland Shilu Mine. Van Diemen naturally agreed happily. In addition to taking the car, he also really wanted to see what the conditions were like in the mines mined by the Haihan people.
That afternoon, a group of people boarded a specially equipped VIP carriage at the port train station. The main feature of this carriage is the use of relatively sophisticated interior decoration, soft sofa seats and glass windows. Considering that the inside and outside of the carriage will be contaminated with a large amount of coal ash every time it is used, it is usually stored in a garage next to the port station. Even Qiao Zhiya rarely takes it out for use. Only on occasions like today can this luxurious car have a chance to see the light of day.
As the whistle blew, the train slowly left the station. The VIP carriage is hung at the end of the entire train to keep it as far away from the soot and water vapor as possible from the locomotive boiler. This train takes more than an hour, and will not stop during the journey unless it misses the train heading in the opposite direction.
Van Diemen also took a train once when he was in Sanya, but the trip between Sanya and Fort Victory was too short and it was not satisfying to take such a trip. This time he had the opportunity to take a train again in Changhua, which also made Van Diemen Extremely excited. From time to time, he looked through the window at the continuously reversing scene outside to judge the speed of the train.
"Mr. Van Diemen, what do you think of our train?" Qiao Zhiya couldn't help but ask him as he looked at him like a curious baby.
"Very impressive!" Van Diemen thought for a moment and then added: "It's just that the cost of building this kind of railway should be very high, and the construction will be more complicated. I'm afraid it will be difficult to promote it."
(End of chapter)