1635 Han style rises again

Chapter 129 Luo Rucheng's Big Appetite

Just as Cao Xiong was excitedly accepting the two newly purchased Galen ships, a fleet of eight Ming-style fuchuan, haicang ships, and flying bird ships gradually headed for Java in the sea off Batavia. island coast.

Luo Rucheng stood on the boat ridge, looking at the boats behind him, he was a little excited, but also a little dazed.

Except for his "Tuochan No. 2" and Zhou Yingping's blessing boat, all other boats that followed were full of migrants.When they set off from Daming, a total of more than 100 people were shipped, but by this time, there were still more than [-] people left.And when they boarded the ship, they still chose young men and women as much as possible.

In fact, if possible, Luo Rucheng would like to put more people on board.When he followed Zhou Yingping to Xuzhou via the Grand Canal, he saw a shocking scene on the boat. Both sides of the canal were densely packed with refugees fleeing for refuge.

Most of the refugees near the canal live in the open air, stretching for more than ten miles, relying on the government's once a day porridge, barely hanging their lives.

In the entire refugee camp, dozens of corpses would be carried out one after another every morning.In Huaibei in November, the wind is as cold as a knife, and the temperature is as low as a few degrees.The refugees have no shelter at all, they can only hug each other to keep warm.

Many refugees will wander in the endless camp, and once they see someone dead, they will immediately strip off all his or her clothes and wrap around themselves.

Thousands of refugees endured the hunger and cold silently, hoping that the government would try their best to rescue them.

However, the states and counties near the canal are simply unable to rescue so many refugees.But they didn't dare to forcibly disperse and repatriate these refugees, so they could only send a large number of guard soldiers to divide tens of thousands of refugees into several pieces.

After spending half a month, Luo Rucheng entrusted Zhou Yingping with all the Boni treasures he was carrying, and got more than 4 taels of silver.

Then Zhou Yingping came forward and proposed to the government whether some refugees could be recruited to Nanyang for reclamation.

Local officials were overjoyed when they heard the news.Directly sent a thousand households with a hundred guards to lead Zhou Yingping and Luo Rucheng to the refugee camp.

Luo Rucheng and a few old brothers carried out a few baskets of steamed buns, and just yelled, "Go to Nanyang to cultivate and take care of the food!"

In an instant, thousands of refugees poured in, dragging their weak bodies, squeezing forward desperately, with hoarse mouths, expressing their willingness to go to Nanyang.

More than 100 guard soldiers, holding sticks and scabbards, drove away all the refugees who crowded forward to keep them in order.

Luo Rucheng looked at the many refugees who were full of expectations, and his heart was ruthless. He stood on a high place and said loudly: "Craftsmen, entertainers, and scholars are preferred,... as long as they are young and strong!"

The guard Qianhu standing next to him looked at Luo Rucheng strangely.There is nothing wrong with gathering refugees and selecting young and strong.What's the matter, you give priority to recruiting craftsmen and artists, as well as scholars.What is this for? Going to Nanyang to rebel and build a nation?If it weren't for seeing that you have no prohibited words and deeds, and you have a big local businessman as a guarantee, you might have taken you, accused of mobilizing a crowd for rebellion, and beheaded.

According to the carrying capacity of the two ships they returned, Luo Ru originally only wanted to select 300 people to board the ship.But countless hungry people kept begging and crying, only willing to eat to survive.

Looking at Luo Rucheng, he was anxious, unable to bear it, and even more helpless.Zhou Yingping sighed, if one person can live, let him live.

He took Luo Rucheng to the canal wharf, found all the large ships that could go to Nanyang, negotiated with him, and sent the refugees selected near the canal to Batavia for 20 taels of silver each.Before boarding the ship, pay three points of fixed silver, and after arriving at the destination, the final fee will be calculated based on the living population.Immediately, six ships were called to go to Nanyang.

Three days later, with the enthusiastic help of local officials, Luo Rucheng and his team of eight ships only loaded part of the porcelain and silk, and all the places on the ships that could hold people were filled with hungry people.

Exit Xuzhou, take the Grand Canal, pass through Yangzhou, enter the Yangtze River, pass the estuary, and drive straight south along the coastline.

For more than [-] days, they only stopped in Guangzhou and Champa for supplies, and then drove all the way to Batavia.

Luo Rucheng was very worried that Cao Xiong's fleet sailed directly to Daming because they couldn't wait for his return.When he left Xuzhou, he once told those hungry people that after two months, they will come back and take them to Nanyang to ask for a bite, but it is best to let them wait near Haizhou (now Lianyungang) .

During the military rebellion in Dengzhou, the countryside was raided by rebels and officers and soldiers in turn, resulting in tens of thousands of refugees.

Now, due to the rebellion of refugees in Henan and Huaibei, tens of thousands of hungry people have been displaced. In the increasingly cold autumn and winter seasons, there will be a large number of frostbite injuries.Perhaps, half of them will not be able to survive this winter.

And their Hanzhou, with a population of only a few hundred, has a lot of Nanyang rice and food, and it costs tens of thousands of taels of silver, enough to survive thousands of people.

Therefore, Luo Rucheng decided that if Cao Xiong's fleet had not set off yet, he would try his best to persuade Cao Xiong to go to Daming to ship as many immigrants as possible.Even if your own ship can't hold it, you have to hire other ships to go to sea to bring those hungry people who are struggling to survive back to Hanzhou.

It's really too miserable, Nuo Da's refugee camp, countless hungry people, only wearing thin summer clothes, and then staring at you with a pair of dull eyes.Only when they saw a bowl of porridge or a steamed bun did they seem to come alive.

"Master Cao, you guys haven't left yet! It's really..., really... that's great!" Luo Rucheng rushed to the warehouse rented by Hanzhou near the port of Batavia after the ship docked at the pier.

Seeing Cao Xiong, Luo Rucheng had a sore nose, "I transported a lot of people back...let's save them!"

"What's the situation? Who to save?" Cao Xiong grabbed Luo Rucheng's arm. Could it be that the brothers on the boat were captured?

"Hungry people!... Countless hungry people!" Luo Rucheng shouted hoarsely: "Hundreds of people die every day!"

Luo Rucheng intermittently talked about the current situation of the hungry people in Huaibei and the inaction of the government.

"In Xuzhou, in the entire Huaibei, the price of food has skyrocketed!...I spent 500 taels of silver, but I only bought less than 1000 shi of grain! It's only [-] shi, not enough to feed [-] people for three days..."

Cao Xiong couldn't help frowning when he heard this.Huaibei is next to Shandong and has always been a major grain-producing area.Now there are countless hungry people, and food prices are high.Although there were rebellions by refugees and the poisoning of the countryside by the government and army, causing countless refugees to be scattered all over the place, but if hundreds of thousands of hungry people were gathered on both sides of the canal, wouldn't the government know how to open warehouses to release food and relieve the victims?
"There is probably no food in the official warehouse!" Zhou Yingping who was standing beside him said softly.

"What about the food?" Everyone looked at Zhou Yingping.

"Either went north to support Liaodong, or was recruited by the counter-insurgency army and taken to Henan."

"They're not afraid, the tens of thousands of people near the canal... are also reversed?"

"Isn't it porridge once a day?"

"It's winter, and many people will freeze to death..." Luo Rucheng said with widened eyes.

"...In normal times, people will freeze to death."

"In normal times, tens of hundreds will die from freezing, while those starving people will die by tens of thousands!" Cao Xiong said coldly.

Zhou Yingping sighed and stopped talking.In the Ming Dynasty, tens of hundreds of people died of cold and hunger every year are less and less, and there are more and more scenes where tens of thousands of hungry people are scattered everywhere.

Has Daming really reached the end of the world?

"Ru Cheng, you need to maintain and repair the boat, and then take people back to Hanzhou. We will leave for Daming in two days!"

"I'll go to Daming with you guys. There are already two boats in Hanzhou, and they can take two or 300 people back at a time. When we return to Batavia, they have almost finished transporting people." Luo Rucheng But I thought, if I have one more boat to go to Daming, more than 160 people can live.

"You have been running back and forth for more than four months, it's time to rest....Go back and let Lao Yu arrange a wife for you and your brothers!"

"To marry a daughter-in-law, it's the same one day at a time!...I want to go to Daming with you."

Cao Xiong and Hu Wenjin glanced at each other and couldn't help shaking their heads and smiling wryly.Luo Rucheng, a native of Suining, Huaibei, couldn't bear the oppression of the villains in the village, so he rose up to kill people, and fled to Dengzhou by boat through Haizhou, where he became a refugee.But Kong Youde made troubles in Dengzhou, and was engulfed by the rebels. When he fled to Liaodong Island, he belonged to Cao Xiong.

He returned to Daming so eagerly, presumably because of his hometown feelings, trying to save tens of thousands of starving people.However, even if we have two new large Western ships, how many people can we transport back at one time?

"We can occupy a small island near Chenla and transfer the hungry people here in batches. On the way back, when we stopped near Chenla to rest, we found an island about ten miles away from the mainland, with only a hundred fishermen. It should not be difficult for tens of thousands of people to stay on the island for a few months." Luo Rucheng said eagerly.

"Rucheng, you have such a fucking appetite!" Cao Xiong looked at Luo Rucheng for a while, "Not only do you want to transport the hungry people in Huaibei, but you also want to occupy the land of the Nanyang land!"

"Master Cao..." Luo Rucheng also felt that he was a bit bold. It seemed a bit risky to think of seizing an island before Han Zhou's strength had developed.

"It's done!" Cao Xiong waved his hand and said quite boldly.

"By the way, traveling to and from the coast of Daming, Zheng Zhilong and the others..." Hu Wenjin asked suddenly.

"Damn Zheng Zhilong, passing ships have to pay 3000 to [-] taels of silver to receive their Sea King flag. If they don't give it, they will detain the boat and people!" Luo Rucheng said angrily.

"Do you have to pay back and forth?"

"Pay only one! Return the Sea King Flag when you return."

"His grandma's!" Cao Xiong scolded, "After this year, I'm afraid he will charge tens of millions of taels of silver!"

(End of this chapter)