Thanks to the hard work of everyone in Qiwei Escort Bureau. [Full text reading] Sugar workers such as sugar cooks and other sugar cooks from various sugar houses have been recruited. Although it is a bit late to recruit people now, the best masters have been invited away, and the remaining ones are old and young. , the technology is not very good, at any rate, all the sugar shops have caught up with the crushing season. Wen Tong notified the five sugar mills under his name that any sugarcane from outside the village that is willing to process it will only charge 30% of the sugar produced as a processing fee, in order to attract small sugarcane farmers who do not have sugar mills to process it and earn more. of brown sugar. At the same time, he asked various sugar shops to open their doors to purchase various sugar products, including brown sugar, sugar bricks, and sugar rice left over from processing. They were also welcome and purchased together.
"Tell them, we want sugarcane bagasse too!" Wen Tong shouted excitedly to Wenxiu and Wenqing, who were acting as envoys. Because these two brothers were fluent in writing and Mandarin, they became Wen Tong's secretary and envoys, and were in Leizhou every two days. Running around the country delivering various orders, my face became quite tanned. Wen Tong wrote to the stewards of Tangliao and Zhuangzi whom he had just recruited every day to issue various instructions, and also asked these people to report to him regularly. For the convenience of conveying information conveniently. Liao Dahua specially bought several sedan chairs and kept a group of sedan bearers on standby to pick them up.
As for day laborers in the sugar cane fields, Wen Tong soon realized that he could not recruit enough people from the local area. The price of day laborers during the sugarcane harvest season skyrocketed, and because they started late, almost all the idle labor in the countryside was recruited by other sugarcane farmers and sugarcane farms. Wen Tong had no choice but to wait for Guangzhou to send labor.
Guangzhou was preparing to send the first batch of 200 people, but originally he wanted more. However, the dilapidated houses in various Zhuangzi and Tangliao houses cannot accommodate so many people. Most of the existing houses need to be repaired, and supporting kitchens and toilets must be built. Food and drinking water need to be prepared, and even pots for cooking for these people need to be purchased. In the 17th century, it was very difficult to arrange food and accommodation for so many people, and everything had to be done personally.
Fortunately, the Qiwei Escort Bureau was here to take care of things, including purchasing food, hiring craftsmen to repair the house, and negotiating with the government. Liao Dahua took care of the arrangements, which was of great help.
In Guangzhou, Zhang Xin asked Sun Changlai to organize the first batch of immigrants to Xuzhou. Because he knew from Xu Wen's letters that the conditions in Leizhou were poor and that people not only had to harvest sugar cane but also had to do a lot of chores after arriving, so Sun Chang selected the first batch of immigrants who were all young and middle-aged and free of diseases. Moreover, he only selects those who have a family and a family, and never singles. Zhang Xin was puzzled and asked him why.
"I heard that the environment in Leizhou is very difficult. If people with no worries go there, they will all escape if they make a mistake. Then won't all the hard work and money spent these days have been wasted? If you have a family and a family, Just be safer." Sun Chang reported back.
"You are really thoughtful." Zhang Xin was impressed by how thoughtful the housekeeper, who was born as a domestic slave, could be.
"It's not a villain who thinks carefully. In the past, when I was in Mr. Gao's house, even though I was a small servant, I also saw a lot of things like employing and recruiting people for the Gao family, and I am familiar with all the disadvantages involved."
Sun Changyou invited Guo Yi to go to the Governor's Yamen to pay a visit to Zanhua Lu Yizhong. I spent one hundred taels of silver to buy a famous post from him. Although hundreds of young and middle-aged immigrants can go to Leizhou by boat, they have to cross the city and countryside after landing, and the officials in various places they pass will inquire. It's much easier to deal with it if you have a piece of film in your hand. Here, the first batch of immigrants were organized in a militarized manner of squads, platoons, and companies, with leaders at each level. Everyone brings their own bedding, tableware and five days' worth of spare dry food.
The route is to take a boat from Guangzhou, disembark at Haian in Leizhou, and then walk to Xuwen. After arriving in Xuwen, they were assigned to nine sugar cane farms based on their circumstances.
The Qiwei Escort Bureau has also made sufficient preparations at various branches and counters along the way in Leizhou, delivering roll-on orders in sections and doing all-in-one relays. As soon as the immigration team enters, there will be people to greet them and act as guides, and rest points will be set up along the way to provide boiled water. Steamed bun. Some places were too desolate and there were no rest stops, so the cooking team would make fires to boil water and eat dry food. Don’t drink raw water on the road. Accommodation is arranged every night, and we will never stay alone. During this kind of transfer, the immigrants can eat well, rest well, and will not get lost. They were escorted by bodyguards, who had government documents in their hands, and the immigrants had whistle sticks and swords for protection. In Leizhou, a land that is not peaceful, no one dares to mess with him. It took less than two days to reach Xuwen, and he was in good physical condition. No one was sick or injured on the way. After arriving, you can get back to work immediately after taking a short rest.
Wen Tong said that the more than 200 immigrants were dispersed and sent to various sugar cane farms in shifts. Although they lived in temporarily repaired thatched huts, fortunately the weather in Leizhou was warm and they would not suffer from the cold. As soon as the immigrants arrived, they devoted themselves to agricultural production by harvesting sugar cane. According to Wen Tong's instructions, enough rice, vegetables and meat were purchased from nearby villages to ensure that the immigrants could get sufficient food during the busy farming period. Harvesting sugar cane is very labor-intensive. If they are not allowed to eat well, some people will soon be unable to hold on and flee.
The first batch of immigrants settled down and after working for half a month, they found that people's hearts were relatively stable. Guangzhou began to send out the second batch of immigrants, including the wives, children and family members of the first batch of immigrants. The purpose of sending women was mainly to meet the logistical needs of these immigrants, to help with cooking, sewing and mending clothes.
In the end, a total of about 400 people were transported from Guangzhou, including men, women and children. Wen Tong, Chang Shide and Liao Dahua dispersed them to various sugar cane farms and used them as long-term workers - in fact, their status was contractual slave. Everyone owed Zi Enterprise fifty taels of silver in the contract, so they had to use labor to pay off this debt. Guo Yi believes that this model can somewhat curb the tendency of some refugees to escape when they are full.
The situation of the refugee recruitment policy was quite good at the beginning, especially when the turnover of transportation to Lingao was relatively fast. The half-starved refugees were happy to go to a new place where they could find work and food. But when the transfer rate began to slow down, more and more people were accumulated in the refugee camps in Guangzhou. After eating a few good meals and regaining their composure, they heard that they would be immigrated to Qiongzhou. Many people who are nostalgic for their hometown are thinking of running away - they came to Guangzhou not to starve to death, but now that they have eaten enough, they see that spring is coming again. Then some people slipped away one after another. Guangzhou Station was completely helpless at first - there were not enough manpower to take care of these people, but the matter could not be delayed, otherwise it would soon become a trend. Guo Yi and others came to a conclusion: Just giving carrots is not enough - there must be a big stick to match.
In order to minimize the number of sheltered refugees from escaping, in addition to increasing various brainwashing measures and advocating for a better life prospect after going to Qiongzhou, Guo Yi finally asked the executive committee to implement the indentured servitude system.
All refugees who are taken in must sign a contract and pay for their food, clothing, housing and medical services in the refugee camp by taking out a loan. For this reason, they must serve Zi Enterprises for at least seven years, and they can take back their body contracts after the expiration of the term.
According to the contract, their meals were provided free of charge during this period and their wages were paid. There is no need to pay additional redemption fees after maturity.
With this contract, Guo Yi can legally use the power of the government to control them in Guangzhou. Let the common people who are particularly afraid of the government dare not escape at will. Especially after he used Liang Cunhou's film to report the crime to the Nanhai County Yamen and arrested more than a dozen refugees who had escaped. After each of them was beaten to 40 to 80 times with a cane in the Yamen, the phenomenon of fleeing was brought under control. It has completely eliminated many people's idea of returning to their hometown if they find an opportunity. Others gradually began to doubt the meaning of returning to their hometowns to live a life of eating rice, growing land and paying rent. If they wanted to work on the land, working for a boss like Dongzhu Guo was not the point. Even better, at least he has enough food to eat and new clothes to wear.
After struggling for almost a month, Chuanchuan Group's sugar industry in Haikang and Xuwen counties finally got back on track. Although there were some troubles during the period due to the poor workmanship of the sugar cooks and a large amount of sugar was scrapped, the overall operation was still very stable, and brown sugar was continuously produced. According to Wen Tong's instructions, all the brown sugar, sugar rice and sugarcane bagasse produced in the sugar factory were transported to the central sugar cane farm in Xuwen - Liao Dahua followed his instructions. We managed to buy some land and expand the boundaries of the sugar cane farm to the river. If we can't get the power of steam or diesel engines, we will prepare to use hydraulic machines for crushing production.
Wen Tong planned to build a demonstration sugar cane plantation here and build a sugar refinery using new equipment. He named it the South China Demonstration Sugar Factory - this is to commemorate Xuwen's earliest modern sugar factory, the South China Factory. At the same time, the other four sugar factories were named after several shareholders of the factory who had made great contributions to China's sugar modernization industry: Guoxin Factory, Qichong Factory, Zhi'an Factory, and Qiwen Factory. These factories can only maintain the old production methods for the time being and wait until the demonstration sugar factory matures before making technical improvements.
Therefore, the South China Model Sugar Cane Farm became the place that received the most immigrants, with nearly 150 men, women, and children settling here. Chang Shide became the manager of civil affairs because he didn't know how to grow sugar cane. Zhuangzi after Zhuangzi registered their household registration according to the "Civil Affairs Management and Organization Manual" compiled by Wu De, established grassroots organizations, selected young and virtuous people from the immigrants to be village chiefs, and selected people who were witty and eloquent to serve as deputies. A militia team was established based on the principle that all people are soldiers - according to the local name, they are Xiangyong. They were equipped with swords, guns, bows and arrows brought from Lingao, and even matchlock guns. The militiamen used their free time to gradually practice under the guidance of the bodyguards - Wen Tong did not want them to be a musketeers, he just wanted them to be able to defend themselves when bandits invaded. Although Chang Shide and Wen Tong deeply doubted the loyalty of these militia teams. However, the security situation here did not allow them to think about it any more. The protection of nine properties in two counties by a few bodyguards really exceeded the strength of Qiwei Bodyguard Bureau in Leizhou.
"Even if it's not for us, we can only hope that it's for themselves." Chang Shide said, "At least they have food and clothing now, their whole family is reunited, and they should do their best to defend their homeland."
"Then they must regard this place as their home." Wen Tong was still relatively pessimistic.
"The two shopkeepers are worrying too much." Liao Dahua persuaded him, "Here is a good place with food and shelter, a warm climate, no frost or snow, and a good person like Mr. Australia, what else can these refugees expect? ?”
"I hope so." Wen Tong looked at the newly built thatched huts that resembled an African patchwork. "After this harvest season, all villages will be built with new houses. They will be built according to standard B-type residential buildings."
"The investment is too big -" Chang Shide had seen the B-type building built for Baitu Village in Bopu. It was simply a fortress-type building, and it seemed to be much larger than the A-type building like a tube building.
"The sugar factory will be our cash cow in the future. If we want to gain a firm foothold in Leizhou, we can't do anything without the ability to protect ourselves." Wen Tong said, next, he will start to improve the process and machinery - only in this way can his South China Sugar Factory lives up to its name.
Wen Tong now has two directions for improvement. One is to make white sugar. Wen Tong knows several techniques for making white sugar, but without equipment, he can only use the local method in "Tiangong Kaiwu" and use yellow mud as an adsorbent. Make sugar. The so-called yellow mud should be a porous material such as clay. If you look at it from this perspective, it does not necessarily have to be yellow mud. Things such as activated carbon and diatomaceous earth can act as adsorbents.
The second is to increase the production of jaggery. There are many areas that can be improved. The simplest way is to increase the juice yield. Wen Tong has roughly tested that the juice yield of sugarcane crushed three times with wooden rollers in the sugar cane is only 40%. The so-called bagasse also contains a large amount of sugarcane juice, which is a huge waste. The juice yield rate of modern sugar factories is at least 7o%.
After much consideration, I decided to start with sugar production - after all, this product has a high profit margin.
Wen Tong didn't try all kinds of messy adsorbents. They couldn't make activated carbon yet. As for diatomaceous earth, they had to be shipped from Lingao. It is not convenient. Although clays such as yellow mud are not everywhere, they are still easy to find locally. If it can't be made, I'll think of another way.
According to the description of the process in "Tiangong Kaiwu", Wen Tong first melted the brown sugar, then poured it into the tile with straw stuffed underneath, and then pulled out the thatch after the brown sugar completely solidified. Chang Shide asked someone to pick up a few loads of pure yellow mud from outside, pour it into a water tank, and stir it into yellow mud water. After letting it sit for a while, use a ladle to scoop up the solution from the upper layer of the yellow mud water, and pour it into the tiles one by one.
"This method is so weird." Chang Shide didn't believe it. Can white sugar be produced by pouring brown sugar into yellow mud water? It looks dirty enough. ! ~!
