Qi Dajiang held up a monocular and carefully observed the island in front of him.

The island is located in a huge bay. It is almost twenty miles away from the nearby land. Whether you are replenishing supplies nearby or defending and attacking on the island, it is a good distance. Of course, the premise is that you must have

Armed ships are near the island to prevent foreign enemies from landing on the island.

"There shouldn't be many people on the island. Get ready to land and go up and have a look." Qi Dajiang put down the monocular and said to Hu Pingjiang.

"Okay, I'll take ten people to the island first to see if the island can accommodate a thousand people." After Hu Pingjiang finished speaking, he called the ten brothers and prepared to land in a small boat.

This island located in the bay was Phu Quoc Island, the largest island in Vietnam in later generations.

It is 11 kilometers from Bokor on the south coast of Cambodia to the north and 69 kilometers from the west coast of southern Vietnam to the east. It is about 48 kilometers long from north to south, and 27 kilometers at its widest point from east to west, covering an area of ​​596 square kilometers.

Geographically, the eastern half of the island drops from an altitude of 600 meters in the north to 366 meters in the south. The western half and southern end are low-lying, and part of the island is covered with forest.

The island produces coal jade, anthracite, pepper, cocoa, coffee, betel nut and coconut, and the surrounding fishery is developed. It has a tropical monsoon climate with a dry winter of 2 to 3 months.

Cao Xiong's fleet stayed at Phu Quoc Island for one night. At dawn the next day, the newly purchased Galen ship "Xinghan" commanded by Qi Dajiang was left to explore the situation on Phu Quoc Island. Cao Xiong took other ships along the occupied Phu Quoc Island.

City, the coastline of Annan, and sailed straight to Daming.

Qi Dajiang's mission is to explore whether this island can accommodate thousands of people. If it is feasible, set up a simple camp and purchase food and daily necessities from the nearby Champa City to make preliminary preparations for the Ming immigrants who will be transferred here.

According to the plan agreed upon on the way, after Cao Xiong's fleet arrived in Guangzhou, the "Pioneer" and "Xingye" (the newly purchased Galen ship) searched for craftsmen, artists, young and strong people in Guangzhou, Foshan, and Oyster Mirror (Macau).

, as well as various scientific books published by Ming Dynasty requested by Qitian.

Once the ship is loaded with people, it immediately sails to Phu Quoc Island, unloads the people and supplies, and then turns back to Daming.

Other ships, led by Luo Rucheng, passed through northern Guangdong, Fujian, Jiangsu and Zhejiang and other places within Zheng Zhilong's sphere of influence, heading to Haizhou (Lianyungang) to transfer the hungry people of Huaibei who had gathered in large numbers to wait.

They will return three times to transport as many hungry people as possible to Guangzhou, and then the "Kaifeng", "Xinghan" and "Xingye" will be responsible for the relay transfer. The entire large-scale relay transfer will last until the beginning of May.

Then they all returned to Batavia one after another.

A rough calculation shows that with three months of non-stop transshipment, it is estimated that 4,000 to 5,000 people could be transported to Phu Quoc Island for temporary stay.

At that time, Cao Xiong will return to Hanzhou with the "Pioneer" and "Xinghan". After a short stay, he will rush to Batavia with more than 200 armed personnel trained in advance by Jianye City, and together with the Dutch,

Attack the Kingdom of Aceh.

"We have captured just these people. If we want to capture more people, we may have to go deeper into the island!" Hu Pingjiang pointed at the forty or fifty short, black and thin natives squatting on the ground and said with a wry smile.

.

"Are you honest and obedient?" Qi Dajiang shook his head, feeling that there were still too few people caught.

"After firing a few shots, they all fell to the ground." Hu Pingjiang smiled, "They saw that we were Ming people, so they were more honest and cooperative... but they couldn't speak Chinese!"

"Okay!" Qi Dajiang said: "Give them tools and go chop down trees! Just like when you first arrived in Hanzhou, build wooden houses and build camps... Tomorrow, you will take some people to the island.

, try to catch as many people as possible to work. I will go to Chenla to buy some food and store it here."

"Brother Qi, if we occupy this island, no one will come to ask for it from us, right?"

"The small countries in this area are constantly fighting, and I guess they can't spare the energy to take care of this small island." Qi Dajiang once heard the fourth child say that the small countries in this area are in chaos. The largest Annan is divided into three parts, and they are still fighting each other.

Go. The weird one is the southern part of Annam (Nguyen family)

) and suppressed Champa to fight, making Champa see that it could no longer hold on (in 1697, Champa was destroyed by the Annan Nguyen clan). Nearby Chenla (now Cambodia) saw that something was wrong, and secretly wanted to support Champa against southern Annam.

power, but does not contribute any effort of his own.

As for this small island, it is estimated that all parties have not yet taken the time to come and take a look.

"That's good!" Hu Pingjiang said: "It would be great if we could always occupy this island. It takes about ten days to get here from Daming, just enough to rest. At the same time, let the immigrants get some air and catch their breath. I guess.

A few fewer people will die on the road!"

"It's good to occupy it! But how can we have extra ships to park here to look after it." Qi Dajiang said with some regret: "Without the warships to look after it, the enemy will not be able to attack easily."

"Then build a city on the island." Hu Pingjiang said: "Bring some cement from Hanzhou, build a small fortress, and station a few hundred people. As long as there is no shortage of food and dig a few wells, the general enemy will definitely

Unbreakable!"

"We still have too few people!" Qi Dajiang sighed, "This place is too far from Hanzhou. If we are really going to be besieged by the enemy, we may not know for several months."

At dawn the next day, Qi Dajiang left thirty people with Hu Pingjiang to supervise the captured natives on the island to cut down trees and build camps. Then he drove the "Xinghan" to the nearest port of Chenla.

Glong Gap (now Kep, Cambodia) is about 20 kilometers away from Phu Quoc Island. It is one of the most important rice distribution centers in Chenla and an important grain trading port. The main merchants are Ming merchants from Guangzhou and Badawi

Asian East India Company.

"Are you just going to buy two thousand shi of rice?" the hired dentist and interpreter asked Qi Dajiang curiously.

Generally, for merchants from all over the world who come to Chenla, food accounts for at most a small half of their space, and other precious goods such as agarwood, yellow wax, cardamom, purple stems, gale oil, rhinoceros horns, ivory and other precious goods account for the majority of their space.

If these rare and exotic objects are shipped to Ming Dynasty or Batavia, the profit will be three to five times.

Therefore, the hired man was very surprised when he saw that Qi Dajiang and others only bought grain after disembarking from the ship. This was not the behavior that normal merchants should do at all. Food is really worthless in Chenla. Even if

Going to the north of the Ming Dynasty where food was scarce, the profit was not even doubled after excluding the expenses. In Chenla, food was generally used as ballast on cargo ships.

Qi Dajiang looked a little embarrassed. I only know what is missing, so I buy it. Buying low, selling high, and trading goods are really not what I am good at. It wouldn't be like this if shopkeeper Zhou or his assistant were around.

.

"This is my first time here, but I will visit frequently in the future." Qi Dajiang couldn't help but think of what his fourth brother said, professional things should be left to professional people.

"Please help me choose some goods that are in high demand in Guangzhou. Once the deal is completed, I will give you one hundred taels of silver!" Since we are going to pick up immigrants in Guangzhou, we can't just go there empty-handed.

"Also, after you help me purchase food and other supplies, go to the city to contact the merchants. In half a month, two large ships will arrive from Guangzhou. I will also entrust all transactions to you, and the remuneration will be paid separately."

After Su Cha heard this, he couldn't help but be overjoyed. This was a wealthy businessman who didn't know what he was doing. He could earn a hundred taels of silver just by helping contact merchants and introducing material purchases. Moreover, there were two big ships behind him, so wouldn't he be the one behind them?

I can earn at least three hundred taels of silver. Oh, not counting the commissions from merchants in the city. It’s my turn to get rich!

Although, in the past hundred years, the Ming Dynasty has been slightly less powerful in Southeast Asia, it is also a existence that many small countries admire and look up to. Therefore, the Ming Dynasty merchants are also quite powerful here, and they are the targets of many small countries' merchants.

"I can't bear to deal with these entertainments. You handle everything for me... But at the latest, the day after tomorrow, I have to load all the goods on the ship! If you are late for one day, I will deduct ten taels from you.

Silver." When Qi Dajiang heard Sucha said that many merchants in the city were coming to see him, trying to sell all kinds of goods they held, he immediately became timid. I don't know how to talk about business, so I might as well entrust this Yaman to handle it.

Although he is a business layman, he also knows that as long as the unique treasures from various places are transported to the Ming Dynasty or Batavia, it will definitely make money. It is just a matter of making more or less. In this case, if I entrust others to buy it, it will be a scam for me.

A little, but at least I can make some money and buy more food for the immigrants.

As Lao Si said, for Hanzhou, trade is incidental at present, accumulating population and developing strength are the most important things.

When Qi Dajiang brought back a boatload of grain and Chenla products and returned to Phu Quoc Island, he saw that the camp on the island was roughly built, and it already had some appearance. A row of wooden houses was also built, and more than a dozen logs were laid around the camp.

There were only a few wooden piles, and the number of native people working there increased to more than 100.

"The day before yesterday, more than a dozen fishing boats came ashore, and I caught them all. Don't tell me, these natives are much better than the savages in Hanzhou. After teaching them a few times, I will know how to work.

If people drag all those fishing boats ashore, they won't be able to escape," Hu Pingjiang said with a smile.

"Then I will stay here for a few more days and help you build the camp before going to Guangzhou." Qi Dajiang was still a little worried if he really wanted to leave more than thirty people like Hu Pingjiang here without any obstruction.
Chapter completed!