Yang Peng's fleet, carrying twelve lucky ships surrendered by the Fujian government, crossed the East China Sea fully loaded with goods and entered Hsinchu Port.
Zheng Hui was very happy to see Yang Peng's large fleet arriving, and led all the officials in Hsinchu to the dock to greet Yang Peng. Yang Peng reported the success of the Xixia War to Zheng Hui. Zheng Hui is now the commander of the third rank of Jinyi Guards.
Qian was appointed as the "Marine Commander" and wore red official robes. Many of his subordinates also had official status. The guards commanded Qianshi, and a large number of thousands of households were all wearing official robes, either red or red.
Green, it looks like it’s all in one place.
The merchant ship of Fujian Counselor Liu Xianglong was fully loaded with Japanese specialties such as brass, terracotta objects, etc. It took several days to unload all the goods. The richness of the loot was an eye-opener for Zheng Hui and the people of Hsinchu. But what surprised Zheng Hui the most.
Of course it's still the ten armored ships.
Zheng Hui has seen ships that do not use paddle wheels. In the past few months, Yang Peng has also transformed five large pointed ships into propeller-type ships. These merchant ships have made several trips to Hsinchu, so officials in Hsinchu have seen propeller ships. But the hull
This was the first time Zheng Hui had seen the armored battleship outside.
The ironclad ship painted with gray tree paint was equipped with thirty-two heavy guns. It looked like a bunker on the sea. It exuded a murderous aura and made Zheng Hui feel excited. In this era, a five-hundred-ton ironclad ship was already considered a giant ship.
.With such a giant steel ship, it is not a problem to defeat Liu Xianglong.
In the past few months, Liu Xianglong's detective work on Hsinchu has become more intensive day by day, and it is obvious that he will attack Hsinchu soon. Liu Xianglong claimed to have 100,000 sailors, which made Zheng Hui very worried. Hsinchu is Yang Peng's hard work, and even more so Zheng Hui.
Zheng Hui has been working hard on construction in Hsinchu these years and finally built Hsinchu. How could he be willing to hand over Hsinchu to Liu Xianglong?
If Prince Yan's army came, he would no longer be afraid of Liu Xianglong. As soon as Yang Peng saw Zheng Hui, he asked: "Zheng Hui, is Liu Xianglong in Beigang or in Jinjiang?" Liu Xianglong's lair is in Jinjiang, Fujian. In addition, Liu Xianglong has a nest in Ryukyu.
The port is called Beigang, and Liu Xianglong sometimes goes to Beigang.
Zheng Hui was stunned and said: "My lord, Zheng Hui doesn't know. My subordinates are only busy raising the walls of Hsinchu City these days, but they didn't think of spying on Liu Xianglong." Yang Peng smiled, secretly thinking that he has a lot of advantages.
The shortcoming is that Zheng Hui is not good at military espionage activities. Zheng Hui bowed his hand to Yang Peng and said: "Why don't Prince Yan go to Hsinchu to rest for a few days. I built a palace for Prince Yan in Hsinchu City. Although Hsinchu is in ruins and is in need of reconstruction, it is crudely built.
But you can also let King Yan come in and rest for a while."
Yang Peng nodded, then mounted his horse and headed towards the center of Hsinchu City with his entourage. After leaving the harbor of Hsinchu Port, there was thousands of miles of fertile fields. At this time, the early rice had already grown. Along the way, he only saw green rice fields on both sides of the official road. Those rice fields
The stalks sway from side to side with the spring wind, and look like undulating waves from a distance, which is very beautiful. There are many scarecrows built on the ridges of the rice fields to repel birds, and rice farmers in twos and threes are working in the fields with their trousers rolled up, and they look completely comfortable and intoxicating.
pastoral scenery.
Far away on the road, from time to time you can see farmhouse villages with smoke rising from their cooking stoves. Those villages are often built on higher ground, with cement brick houses and tall chimneys. Because Taiwan is so vast and sparsely populated, farmers’ houses are all built high.
It is very large, with a spacious yard, and there are often five or six houses in the yard.
Looking from a distance, the farmers' yards look nothing like small farmers' houses, but rather like the houses of small landowners in Cangzhou. Yang Peng asked: "How many people are there in Hsinchu now?" Zheng Hui replied: "There are 150,000 land-owning farmers now.
The people have been divided into fields and houses. There are also 50,000 land reclamation farmers who have just arrived on the island, and they are arranged in the 'land reclamation camp'."
Yang Peng nodded and continued walking to Hsinchu City. The official roads in Hsinchu were well built, smooth and solid. What surprised Yang Peng was that almost all the farmers on the road were wearing silk clothes. It seemed that farmers in Hsinchu had to wear satin clothes when they went out.
It looked respectable. From time to time, Yang Peng saw a carriage pulled by four horses, with more than a dozen people sitting behind the carriage, all of whom seemed to be going into the city.
Where did these carriages come from? From farmers? Yang Peng was very curious. Han Jinxin and others had never seen such a carriage before, and they were all surprised. Halfway through, Yang Peng couldn't help but stop a carriage and ask.
Seeing the official with many personal guards stopping the carriage, the people in the car knew that they were meeting a high official, so they quickly got out of the car to answer. Yang Peng randomly picked a middle-aged man holding a dry cigarette stick and asked: "Man
,Whose carriage is this? What are you doing in the city?"
The man put the cigarette rod into the pipe and answered with cupped hands: "Going back to the official, this carriage is a transportation carriage between Dingwu Town and Hsinchu City. It is run by the Zhang family. There are four round trips every day, and the price is ten coppers."
You can get on the bus and ride into the city. Nowadays, people in Dingwu Town take this bus when entering the city."
It turned out to be a privately operated public carriage, and the toll was ten copper coins. Unexpectedly, the people in Hsinchu were already so wealthy that they would be willing to take ten copper coins for a ride. Ten copper coins was enough for a meal of white rice. If I were in Shandong, I would probably have to take a stick.
Even the peasants who beat the peasants would not be willing to ride in this carriage.
When the man said this, he forgot Yang Peng's second question and stood there with his hands down. Han Jinxin smiled and said: "Man, the prince asked you why you came to the city?" Others around the man heard the word prince.
, was startled, and immediately knelt on the ground and kowtowed. The man did not notice the meaning of these two words, and replied carelessly: "Master, I went to the city to buy goods for my wife and sons.
I heard that King Yan's merchant fleet had arrived, so I went into the city to see if there were any fresh goods to buy, and also to watch a play. The play "The Great War of Xixia" in Cuiyu Pavilion has been on for half a year, but I haven't seen it yet.
You must squeeze in and take a look this time.”
Yang Peng asked curiously: "How much does it cost to watch a play?" The man replied: "It costs twelve cents to watch a play. But this is for standing room viewing, and there are only 200 seats. If the standing tickets are sold out,
I can only buy a tea seat in the front row, which costs 40 cents per person."
The man thought for a while and said: "This time I am spending forty cents. I want to see this big show, otherwise, will my trip to the city be in vain?" Yang Peng thought for a while and asked: "You are so lavish.
Don’t you need money to raise children?” The man smiled and said: “The official is joking, what kind of money is this money? I have had a son and a daughter in the past three years, and haven’t I made them fat and healthy? I am going to the city this time.
I want to buy wooden horses and rubber ball toys for my eldest son. Now my husband and I share the prince’s forty acres of paddy fields, and our annual income is about one hundred taels of silver..."
As he was talking, the man suddenly remembered that Han Jinxin had just mentioned the word prince. When he reacted, he finally realized that the official in front of him was the prince Yang Peng. He was so frightened that he knelt on the ground with a plop.
"Your Majesty, I have seen your Majesty." The farmer didn't know whether he was excited or nervous. He knelt on the ground and his voice changed. He shouted at the top of his voice: "Your Majesty, I hope you can come to Hsinchu and live a good life."
Mr. Lai Guo. I remember that in Baodi County, Cangzhou, my wife and I had not enough to eat all year round. We only had one set of cotton-padded jackets in winter and almost froze to death. At that time, we finally gave birth to a daughter, but she also fell ill from hunger and died...
"
Yang Peng continued to move forward with his guards and entered Hsinchu City from the west gate. According to Yang Peng's order, Hsinchu City was built in imitation of Tianjing New City. After more than three years of development, Hsinchu City is now quite large. The city
The scale is similar to that of Tianjing New City before expansion, and the number of streets is the same as that of Tianjing New City.
This small town is now a commercial center for 200,000 people. All goods shipped from the mainland are distributed here, so the wholesale business in the city is very prosperous. Zheng Hui built a large commodity wholesale market in the west of the city, and the goods shipped by Lu Hu
They are sold here to local retailers, who then sell the goods to villages and towns.
Yang Peng's decision changed the fate of hundreds of thousands of people. The new farmers here in Hsinchu are very wealthy and have amazing spending power, so logistics in Hsinchu city is very active. Taiwan's commodity supply currently mainly relies on Yang Peng's fleet. Gao
Ligong organized the purchase of goods in Tianjing New City, and then Lu Hu shipped the goods to Taiwan. Gao Ligong was also a talented person, and the goods he purchased were often urgently needed in Taiwan. Therefore, the goods shipped to Taiwan sold well.
The wholesale market in Hsinchu is called "Yanwang Market". Yang Peng took a look at the wholesale market and found that all the goods shipped last month had been sold out. There was no one in the market at this time. Everyone was standing at the door of the market.
Retailers eager to purchase goods, wearing clean and decent clothes, all crowded at the entrance of the wholesale market, anxiously waiting for new goods to be shipped from the dock.
Zheng Hui said: "Your Majesty, in the first half of the year we mainly used freighters to transport land reclamation farmers and land reclamation materials, so the transportation of consumer goods was relatively tight. When goods are shipped to Hsinchu City, it often takes less than three days for them to be sold out. Every time the ship ships
When a team brings goods into the port, it is a big event for merchants."
Yang Peng stood at the door of the wholesale market and watched for a while. Not long after, a carriage loaded with fine cloth drove into the wholesale market. The merchants were like civet cats seeing river fish, waving their silver and surrounding them. On the carriage
The two children sitting there were very busy, scrambling to keep accounts and collect money among the money pushed in by the merchants.
Before the carriage entered the textile area of the wholesale market, the fine cloth on the carriage was sold out. Not long after, another cart of fine iron drove over, and another group of businessmen rushed to buy it. The scene was like the Spring Festival travel period in later generations.
Buying a train ticket. Yang Peng smiled, left the wholesale market, and went shopping in other places in the city.
After walking around the city, Yang Peng discovered that there are not only wholesale businesses in Hsinchu, but also a very developed retail industry. There are six streets in the city, three vertical and three horizontal. Among them, the street named Phoenix Street by Yang Peng is full of ornately decorated streets.
Large stores. These stores are often two stories high and the storefront is two or three rooms wide.
There are a dazzling array of products on the store shelves: silks, porcelain, mirrors, tea, famous wines, tobacco, etc., all of which are high-end consumer goods that wealthy Hsinchu farmers can afford. People come and go on Fenghuang Street, and well-dressed farmers are everywhere.
Going in and out of the store, carrying large and small bags in hand.
Han Jinxin said: "Although there are retail stores in various towns and villages, the varieties are limited. To buy high-end goods, farmers would rather spend dozens of extra pennies on transportation to go to the city to buy them, because there are more varieties to choose from."
Yang Peng nodded and walked to the north of the city. Zhenbei Street in the north of the city was also named by Yang Peng. Now it is full of more than a dozen theaters and teahouses, and every house is overcrowded. From time to time, loud cheers can be heard in the crowded theater.
Obviously, the wealthy farmers have a great demand for opera entertainment. Someone in the teahouse is reading a newspaper, reading the "Dali Temple Announcement" that came with the fleet. Although the arrival papers were more than ten days ago, but
The people in the teahouse still listened with great interest.
However, Yang Peng walked around and found no brothel. Yang Peng thought for a while and realized that this was because when he recruited farmers to open up wasteland, he mostly recruited young couples, so there were no women to come out to work as sex workers, so the brothel could not open.
stand up.
Han Jinxin and others followed Yang Peng, observing the prosperity of Hsinchu City all the way, and praised: "Hsinchu City has been so prosperous in just four years, which is really good. It would be a pity if it was snatched away by Liu Xianglong.
Yang Peng said with a smile: "Not only can Liu Xianglong not be able to rob us, we will also rob Liu Xianglong's. After two days of repairs in Hsinchu, we will go and capture Liu Xianglong's Beigang."
Two days later, Yang Peng's huge fleet sailed out of Hsinchu Port and attacked Liu Xianglong's Beigang. Beigang was developed by the great merchant Wang Hu in Taiwan in his early years, also known as Bengang. It is located in the western and central part of Taiwan Island, on the right bank of the lower reaches of Beigang Creek. Today
This port is Yang's stronghold on Taiwan Island. Beigang is four hundred miles away from Hsinchu. Yang Peng's fleet set out at night and sailed all night, arriving at Beigang in the early morning of April 15th.
There were three Fu Ships moored in Beigang Port, which were probably the merchant ships used by Liu Xianglong to communicate with the mainland. Yang Peng used a telescope to observe the port and found that there were not many defense facilities in the port. Only a few recesses were built along the small river near the port.
There were more than a dozen red cannons mounted on the fort on the ground.
There were hundreds of sailors in the port. When these sailors saw Yang Peng's huge fleet approaching the border, they hurried to the dock. Yang Peng looked carefully and found that one-third of the Liu family's private soldiers were equipped with crossbows, and the others
Then use a spear.
The artillerymen in the port fort first opened fire on Yang Peng's fleet. However, the distance was more than two miles, and the Liu family's thirteen cannons lacked accuracy, and none of their shots hit the target.
Yang Peng ordered ten merchant ships and ten ironclad ships to semicircularly surround Beigang and defeat the fort. Soon twenty ships were in position, and 240 cannons were aimed at the fort in Beigang. The gunners fired the ignition.
Rope, bombs flew towards the fort in the port like raindrops, exploding loudly inside and outside the fort. The Liu family fort was designed to be recessed into the ground, so it was difficult for the bombs to hit the target, but once they fell in, it would be a massacre. 2
About a dozen of the one hundred and forty artillery shells exploded inside the fort, blowing the Liu family's private soldiers operating the artillery into a bloody mess.
After just one round of firing, the Liu family's gunners couldn't stand it anymore. Half of the gunners were killed, and the remaining half were splashed with the blood and broken flesh of the dead and injured. They also lost their fighting spirit and fled the fort in a panic.
Yang Peng asked the cannons to change their targets and start bombing the more than 600 Liu family private soldiers guarding the dock. However, the scene of more than 200 cannons bombing the fort just now scared these 600 private soldiers. If more than 200 cannons were exposed,
Six hundred soldiers were shooting at the port. How bloody must that scene be? Before Yang Peng's cannon could fire, the six hundred private soldiers were defeated with a roar. The soldiers threw away their weapons and fled in panic into the countryside outside the port.
Yang Peng smiled, waved and said: "The ship has docked, and Beigang is ours too!" The fleet entered the Beigang pier, and Yang Peng found that the port town was not big. There were dozens of houses on the pier, and dozens of cargo holds.
, storing supplies shipped by Liu Jiafu's ship from the mainland, as well as rice to be sold to the mainland. There was quite a lot of rice. Yang Peng's sailors made a rough count and found that there were more than 100,000 kilograms of rice stored in more than a dozen granaries.
paddy.
These more than 100,000 shi of grain were probably the farmers' annual land tax or land rent in Beigang, and were worth more than 400,000 taels of silver. At this time, they all became Yang Peng's possessions. The Liu family believed that they controlled the southeast sea and were not afraid of being robbed by others.
He even wanted to snatch Yang Peng's Hsinchu, but he didn't expect that Yang Peng would dare to snatch his Beigang.
There is a gorgeous five-entry courtyard to the north of the pier, which is the "palace" where Liu Xianglong lived in Beigang. At this time, seeing Yang Peng attacking, all the Liu family members in the courtyard fled, and they didn't know where they fled. Yang
Peng's soldiers searched the hospital for a while and found only more than 20,000 taels of silver in one warehouse. It seems that Liu Xianglong did not have the habit of storing large amounts of money in Beigang.
Three miles east of the pier is a town. There are about a thousand traders and craftsmen living in the town. At this time, when they saw someone attacking the pier, the people in the town hid in their homes, and the roads in the town were deserted.
Yang Peng rode into the countryside again and found that the countryside in Beigang was in tatters. The people were hiding in mud houses with thatched roofs. Occasionally, there were uninformed farmers working in the fields, and they were all sallow and thin.
Yang Peng was ready to take over Beigang and manage the place well. Naturally, he could not let the people be afraid of him. Yang Peng asked soldiers in groups of ten to go deep into towns and villages to promote his policies:
"The King of Yan is fighting against injustice. He only punishes the culprits and does not harm the people. People should not panic!" "The King of Yan has occupied the entire Hong Kong, and the order of the towns has been restored. The people can go out to business with confidence, and the soldiers will not commit any crimes."
The soldiers shouted along the street for half an hour, and the people of Beigang gradually stopped panicking. Yang Peng found ten prestigious village elders and used a wine shop in the town to entertain them, trying to understand the basic situation of the entire Beigang.
"Fellow fellow villagers, I am Yang Peng, King of Yan! From now on, Beigang will be under the jurisdiction of the prince." The officials in Beigang who were loyal to Liu Xianglong had already fled, and the people who remained in the town had nothing to do with the Liu family.
When these village elders heard Yang Peng's words, they wanted to leave their seats and kneel down, but Yang Peng raised his hand to stop them.
"Excuse me, I want to know how many people and fields there are in Beigang. How did the Liu family collect taxes in the past?" The village elders looked at each other, and an old man with a gray beard stood up and replied: "My lord, I'm sorry.
I'm rude on a desert island. As far as I know, Beigang has more than 4,000 households and 32,000 people. I don't know how much land there is specifically, but the former Liu family's housekeeper once invited us to drink and said
"After talking about the two thousand hectares of fields in Beigang, I think there are two thousand hectares of fields."
Although the old man spoke Mandarin, his Fujian accent was very strong. It took Yang Peng a lot of effort to understand and nodded.
"How does the Liu family collect taxes and land rent?" The old man said: "These fields owned by the people of Beigang were cultivated voluntarily by Wang Hu, the 'Toyo Shipowner'. They are private fields of the people, so there is no land rent.
But when the Liu family comes, they will charge us 60% of the land tax, and the people will have to pay six dou to the Liu family for every stone of grain they receive, so the people are very poor."
It turns out that the Liu family set the land tax at such a high level. Although it is a land tax, it is actually no different from land rent. "My prince also collects 60% of the land rent from the people in Hsinchu. The people are very rich. Why are the people in Beigang so poor when they pay 60% of the land tax?"
When the village elder heard Yang Peng's question, he hesitated and did not dare to speak. He was afraid that his behavior of crying about poverty would offend Yang Peng. A fat old man next to him stood up and said:
"Your Majesty Mingjian, the fields in Beigang are cultivated by the common people on the side of the valley. Irrigation and watering are all carried out by buckets of water on poles. The young couple can only cultivate twenty-five acres of land and they are half exhausted. Moreover,
Manpower is always insufficient to carry water for irrigation, and the harvested grain is limited. It is good to harvest two dan in a year. After removing the land tax, there are only a dozen dan left for personal use."
"You can only harvest so little food after a year of hard work. If you have to feed your whole family, how can the people of Beigang not be poor?" Yang Peng understood after hearing the old man's words. The main problem of Beigang is that there are no water conservancy facilities. Every common person can grow
There is little land and poor irrigation, resulting in low yields, so the people are poor. In comparison, Hsinchu's productivity per man is twice that of Beigang because of its water conservancy facilities.
Yang Peng nodded and said confidently: "Don't worry, fellow villagers, since Beigang is now in the hands of my prince, I will definitely make the people rich in the future. Not to mention that eating and clothing will not be a problem in the future, I will also let the people live in
Go to a brick house, wear silk clothes, and eat meat!"
When the village elders in Beigang heard this, they all knelt on the ground and kowtowed vigorously to Yang Peng. Although they may not believe Yang Peng's words in their hearts, these village elders had expressions of sincere submission on their faces.
Leaving 500 soldiers to maintain order in Beigang, Yang Peng sailed the fleet to the open sea outside Beigang. The advantage of Yang Peng's fleet lies in its maneuverability and firepower. Only in the vast open sea can the fleet be free. If the ship docks
Being surrounded by Liu Xianglong's army in the port, the situation is not good. The water channel in the port is narrow and the ship cannot maneuver quickly. In the end, it will definitely be surrounded by Liu family's pirates. By then, thousands of people will climb the side of the ironclad ship with swords in their mouths.
, no matter how big the cannon is, it’s useless.
Attacking enemy ports is not what Yang Peng's steamships are best at. There are many reefs near the mainland, and an ironclad ship with a deep draft can easily run aground if it maneuvers at high speed in the shallow sea near the land. But if it does not maneuver at high speed, it can easily be outnumbered several times.
Surrounded by his Liu clan pirates.
So Yang Peng sailed the fleet to the open sea outside Beigang and patrolled at high speed. On the one hand, it could plunder the Liu family's merchant fleet returning from Japan, and on the other hand, it could intercept the Liu family's navy trying to regain Beigang.
Beigang can bring hundreds of thousands of taels of income to the Liu family a year, but Liu Xianglong would not be able to swallow this breath no matter what. Yang Peng's fleet patrolled the waters off Beigang for five days, and indeed encountered Liu Xianglong's huge fleet. Yang Peng was
While pondering the map on the poop, he suddenly heard a loud call from the lookout. Yang Peng looked up and found that countless spots suddenly appeared on the distant sea horizon. The spots grew larger and larger, and finally they formed a line on the horizon.
Line. The straight line becomes thicker and thicker, covering the entire end of the sea from south to north.
Under the bright sunshine of early summer in April, those spots gradually revealed their true colors - the sails of a sailing ship. The Liu family's fleet seemed to have covered the entire sea surface. There were no one knows how many warships there were, arrogantly moving towards fifty-three ships.
Steamships are coming.
What happened after all? Let’s look at the breakdown next time.