Great Song Super Scholar

Chapter 585
The fourth year of Zhiping came to an end amid the turmoil of overseas land purchases, but the Song Dynasty in the fifth year of Zhiping was shrouded in another uneasy atmosphere. In March, the Liao Kingdom blatantly declared the Tanyuan Covenant invalid, and General Yelu Yanshou led [-] cavalry Breaking through the Song Army's Bazhou defense line, going deep into the hinterland of Hebei East Road, looting Qingzhou City, and retreating from Xiongzhou to Liao territory.

The 3 cavalrymen of the Liao Army rushed to the land of no one, killed nearly a thousand border people, and plundered countless wealth and children. The Song Army responded in a panic, but failed to kill a single soldier of the Liao Army. This news caused an uproar and shock to the whole country Empress Dowager Cao immediately decreed to dismiss the defense envoys of Xiongzhou and Bazhou, invest [-] more troops, and strengthen border defense.

But the Liao Kingdom fell into silence after that, and the border was safe and sound for several months.

In July, [-] Xixia troops used rafts to cross the Yellow River at night to raid Huizhou. Zhang Lian, the defender of Huizhou, led [-] troops to defend Huizhou city. The Xixia army failed to capture the city. When he asked for help, he immediately led [-] troops to reinforce Huizhou. The Xixia army had no hope of going south. After looting thousands of herdsmen and tens of thousands of cattle and sheep, he withdrew to the north bank of the Yellow River.

The joint action of the Liaodong and Xixia armies made the Song court deeply vigilant. The Empress Dowager Cao immediately appointed Zhizheng Han Jiang as the Xuanfu envoy of Shaanxi Road, and once again appointed Di Qing, who was recuperating at home, as the deputy envoy of the Privy Council, and promoted Qin Fenglu. Han Jiang and Di Qing were fully responsible To defend against Xixia, at this time, the lord of Xixia, Li Liangjue, died suddenly. Xixia returned the plundered herdsmen, cattle and sheep, and the two countries stopped their troops.

In September, Han Qi took the blame and resigned from the position of prime minister due to the lack of defense in Hebei, and changed his sentence to Zhizhending Mansion.

In September, the Southern Continent is the beginning of spring, the birds are singing and the flowers are fragrant, and the trees are recovering. After more than nine months of hard work, Nanding County, the first county in the Southern Continent, has been completely completed. Five thousand immigrant households are distributed in and around the county, forming a Tens of thousands of hectares of land have been plowed in more than a dozen villages, and farmers have begun to sow wheat.

Compared with Kunzhou and other overseas state capitals, although the Southern Continent is far away, the treatment given by the imperial court is extremely generous. Each family has five hectares of fertile land and ten acres of house land, and is permanently exempted from taxes and corvees, unlike other places where only 50 yuan is exempted. annual tax.

The first batch of immigrants in the Southern Continent mainly came from the border area of ​​Hebei. Due to the instability in the border area, there were signs of war, so a large number of people applied to immigrate overseas. Almost all of the first batch of [-] immigrants came from Dingzhou, so the name of the state was changed from Dingnan Prefecture was changed to Nanding Prefecture, and the county name was also changed to Dingxian County.

Thirty thousand Japanese laborers continued to work on the Southern Continent. Under the supervision of two thousand Song soldiers, they felled wood, burned bricks, built roads, mined mines, and planted cotton in Nanding Prefecture. The scope of Nanding Prefecture has also gone inland. Three hundred miles away, gold mines and open-pit coal fields were discovered, and [-] workers were responsible for mining gold mines and coal fields, and refining gold and coke.

In addition, the government of Nanding Prefecture also introduced [-] Japanese girls to set up a textile workshop and a shoemaking workshop in Ding County, mainly weaving cotton cloth and making shoes.

Fan Ning led the first batch of immigrants to set sail in November last year. After two months of sailing, on the eighth day of January, the mighty immigrant fleet arrived in Ding County, which is the location of Brisbane in later generations. Three hundred soldiers built a temporary camp.

The eighth day of January was officially designated as the landing day of the Southern Continent. As a permanent festival to commemorate the landing, in late January, more than [-] Japanese laborers and girls also arrived in the Southern Continent and started their three-year contract.

Many workers went overseas to make money for the second time, and they have more experience. In addition, Nan Dingzhou is sunny and the climate is not hot, so the workers quickly devoted themselves to pioneering.

The development was mainly inland along the south bank of the Ding River. After the hard work of [-] households and tens of thousands of laborers, a tall and solid county town and tens of thousands of hectares of fertile land that nourished it have begun to take shape.

In the early morning, Fan Ning took a few officials to inspect outside the city. Along the south bank of the Ding River, there were endless wheat fields and corn fields. .

Li Hong, the county magistrate, pointed to the wheat field in the distance and said to Fan Ning: "So far, Ding County has opened up a total of [-] hectares of land, all of which are used to plant wheat and corn. Sufficient and abundant precipitation, it is estimated that this summer will be a good harvest."

Fan Ning nodded, "Vegetables and fisheries must keep up. In addition, the inland kangaroos are rampant. The army has hunted and killed thousands of them. The kangaroo meat can be eaten, and the skin can be used for leather. I think the army eats kangaroo meat very well. You To convince the people, there is nothing to be afraid of."

Li Hong smiled bitterly: "After all, you have never seen this kind of thing before, so you have to get used to it slowly."

Wei Quwenyi from the nearby county was a little worried: "I heard that the northern border of the Song Dynasty is unstable, and the attention of the Song Dynasty has turned to the north. Will it affect the operation of the southern continent?"

Fan Ning said with a slight smile: "The instability in the north is short-lived after all. Once the Song Dynasty restores stability, it will definitely double its operations in the southern continent. Maybe it will be two years later, but the trend will never change. You must calm down and take care of it." Ding County is running well, and early next year, the imperial court will send people to evaluate Ding County, the focus is on whether the people live and work in peace and contentment, everyone must do their best in this regard."

Several county magistrates bowed together and saluted, "We will never let down the envoy's great trust!"

Fan Ning also felt a little melancholy. At the end of September, his overseas strategic envoy's term of office expired, and there were still more than ten days left. He should also go back to Beijing to report on his duties.

At noon, Fan Ning boarded a [-] stone steam paddle boat, bid farewell to the people and officials of the Southern Continent, went to Ganjiang Island, and then returned directly to Song Dynasty from Ganjiang Island. When he came back, it was unknown how many years later.

Looking at the Dingxian Wharf that was getting farther and farther away, Fan Ning felt an indescribable sadness in his heart, but also a kind of sincere pride. The rule of the Central Plains Dynasty in the southern continent was finally established in his hands. I believe hundreds of years later , here will definitely be a prosperous and powerful Han Chinese overseas country.

The steam paddle boat sailed to the southern mainland in July this year, and it took a month on the road. This is the second steam boat sailing on the sea. The previous steam boat of [-] shi started to travel between Quanzhou and Luzon in March. For this reason, the Luzon government has specially established three coke warehouses for resupply. One of the coke warehouses is located in the southernmost part of Mindanao, which is dedicated to resupply for steam ships traveling to and from the southern mainland.

The 22-stone steamship Fan Ning was riding on was driven by two steam engines and two metal paddle wheels. The speed could reach 20 kilometers per hour. The people are extremely excited, which means that they are not far from the Song Dynasty.

This steamship carried out coke and fresh water supplies on the Rhinoceros Peninsula at the southernmost tip of Luzon Province. In addition to carrying sufficient coke, it also brought two spare steam engines and a spare boiler, as well as two craftsmen accompanying the ship. There was a small breakdown during Timor Island, one of the steam engines leaked steam, but it was repaired in time.

If you want to find a problem for this steamship, the biggest problem is that the consumption of coke is too large. It consumes two thousand catties of coke for one voyage. It is for this reason that Fan Ning mines coal fields in the southern continent and builds a coke field, which is mainly supplied to the southern continent. And North and South New Island.

Although the propeller has not been successfully developed, Fan Ning has to admit that the paddle wheel works perfectly with the steam engine. The waves are rough and the white waves are rolling. The two big paddle wheels push the big ship forward quickly, and the southern continent gradually disappears.

Five days later, the boat arrived at Wucheng at the southwestern tip of Ganjiang Island. The location of Wucheng was not on the northern shore of the strait as originally considered. There were too many mountains and small plains, which was not conducive to farming, and the mouth of the valley was too windy, with strong winds blowing all year round.

At the beginning, I considered it mainly for the convenience of contacting the Cao Gao family in the South Island.

But Cao Gao and his family also gave up building a city on the south bank of the canyon. There were too many fjords there, which was not good for navigation. As a result, they also placed the first city in the northwest corner, which is today's Jinwan.

Although the two cities are separated by hundreds of miles of bay, there will be steamships in the future, which means a one-day journey.

Zhu and Fan's family recruited [-] Japanese laborers to build a small county town with a circumference of [-] miles by the sea, equivalent to two kilometers from north to south and from east to west.

Fan Zhu's family and Cao Gao's family went south with Fan Ning. Fan Ning arrived in the southern continent with [-] immigrants, while the northern and southern islands each welcomed [-] new immigrants. Most of these immigrants followed their respective families. An old tenant and old steward for many years.

Although the frontiers of the Song Dynasty were tense this year, the tide of private immigration was very hot. After the first batch of [-] private land purchases and island purchases were completed last year, all major families began to recruit immigrants or mobilize their own tenants. The impact of the war.

The Fan family was no exception. Fan Tieniu brought his wife and children and nearly a hundred fellow villagers who were willing to emigrate overseas to the North Island, while the Zhu family brought more than [-] tenant farmers and old family members. batch of immigrants.

Amidst the muffled port bells, Fanning's big ship slowly sailed into the harbour.

(End of this chapter)