Autumn of the 17th year of Chongzhen

Chapter 1307
At that moment, the Fuchuan furled its sails, sailed slowly to the pier, and threw two cables ashore. The soldiers on the pier pulled the Fuchuan over under the command of an officer, and then fixed the ropes on the wooden stakes.

The stick on the Fuzhou boat turned, and the iron chain made a sound, and the large iron anchor weighing hundreds of kilograms went into the water.

After the boat was moored, Gao Yihuan ordered several men and Hei Fan to stay on board, and he took Gao Laosan down from the boat plank on the pier.

He first handed ten taels of silver to the officer at the pier, and said with a smile, "Brothers, please drink tea." down into the city.

"Third brother, go find a restaurant to order some food, ask for more meat, and send it to the brothers on the ship. Then go to the inn to see if there are any sailors recruited, and if not, go to the shack outside the city to recruit some Guards are fine too." After entering the city, Gao Yihuan stood beside the street lined with banners and flags, and said to his third son Gao Yihuang.

After three years of development, Luzon City has begun to take shape, with everything it should have and what it should not have.

The expansion of the Ming Dynasty in Nanyang was mainly dominated by big companies and the court, and the Han people who went to Nanyang generally could only work for these big companies.

They either work as clerks and sailors in the business, or help the chamber of commerce to take care of the fields and shops, buy spices from the natives, sell goods and so on. Their identities have not changed much, and they have not broken through their own class.

The situation in Luzon is different. There is no strong government here, and the failure of the Zheng family's struggle has greatly weakened its strength. Instead, it has given many ordinary people opportunities.

Luzon is close to Fujian, Guangdong, and Zhejiang. Many Ming people who went to Nanyang to seek a living, the first stop was Luzon, and Luzon was still on the route from Nanyang to Japan and North Korea. Many Koreans and Japanese also Come to Luzon to find opportunities.

Here, as long as you have some capital and the courage to go to sea, you can go to the inn to recruit sailors, go to the shanty towns to recruit guards, find some rich people to participate in the shares, and rent a boat to go to sea.

In the area controlled by the Ming Dynasty, most of the air routes and trade were monopolized by large merchants, and it was difficult for small merchants to have a chance to rise. Therefore, many people with little strength came to Luzon to look for opportunities.

Such an environment made it easy for sailors and guards to find jobs, so people from all over the world gathered in Luzon City.

Gao Yihuan's comeback in Luzon is also because of such an environment in Luzon.

After finishing the order, Gao Yihuan came to Zheng's shop. The shopkeeper was overjoyed when he heard that he had sugar and tobacco leaves in his hand. These were exactly the goods they needed.

Most of the merchants in Luzon transported the goods of the Ming Dynasty to the Mughals as second-hand dealers, and few of them grew sugar cane and tobacco leaves for sale.

Cane sugar and tobacco leaves mainly come from the eastern continent controlled by Xiyi. There are very few in Luzon, and it has not formed a scale. Most people want to go to sea to make quick money, so basically no one thinks about it.

It is worth mentioning that the Ming Dynasty was still arguing about the theory of the round sky and the round earth. Song Yingxing, the minister of the Ministry of Industry, even led a fleet to follow a Portuguese merchant ship and sailed eastward to prove the correctness of the round earth theory. , but in Nanyang, most people already know that there is a continent to the east, no matter what the place is, and the Spaniards can come from it.

Now the Zheng family does not have many fleets going to sea. They mainly run the route from Luzon to Daming with empty ships, and then build ships in Luzon, sell or rent them to small businessmen, and take a cut of their sailing income.

In addition to shipbuilding, the Zheng family also helped merchants provide goods, weapons and cannons. They let others take risks, reduce their own risks, and profit behind the scenes.

Gao Yihuan said that he responded to the government's call to beat the Spaniards. The shopkeeper quickly agreed to take the man to see the goods, and promised him a [-]% discount in exchange for artillery and muskets.

On the other side, Gao Laosan first ordered meals in a restaurant, and asked his brother to wait for the meal to be delivered to the ship, and then went to an inn.

The inn looks like a courtyard. The guest rooms are in the courtyard. The store has two floors. The lower floor is a teahouse, which sells some snacks and tea, and there are storytellers to pass the time for the guests staying in the inn.

Luzon's maritime trade was blocked, and the inns in the city were on fire. Sailors had money but had no chance to go to sea. Most of them would stay in the inn and wait for the ship owner to come and recruit.

Gao Laosan entered the inn and saw a lot of people inside, all stretching their necks to listen to the story, he waited for a while, and gestured to the old storyteller, the old man stopped to drink tea to moisten his throat, and then he said loudly : "The triad recruits sailors, ten of them can sail, and one of 30, has anyone come?"

With his voice, he immediately attracted the attention of the men in the teahouse, and all of them stared at Gao Laosan with shining eyes.

The room was silent for a while, but then a large group of people stood up with a "wow", shouting, "I'll go!"

The sailors earn money, but they can't afford to spend money lavishly, and they haven't started work for more than half a year, so all of them are cash-strapped.

Gao Laosan had chosen people before, so he had some experience. He was about to choose, when a dark-skinned kid came out and shouted: "Third brother, choose me!"

Gao Laosan saw it, and said happily: "Black donkey, yes, count you in."

The black donkey went to sea with Gao Yihuan before, and was detained together in Malacca for several months. After returning to Luzon, Gao Yihuan was going to farm. If he did not go to sea for a short time, the recruited sailors dispersed.

The black donkey walked out happily, followed by a muscular and muscular man in a black short suit.

"Third brother, this is a clan brother from my hometown. He came to Nanyang after committing a crime. You should take him with you too!"

The Han Chinese who went to Nanyang, in addition to those who could not survive, committed crimes and fled, and this kind of people is also needed at sea, and they are more suitable for going to sea than those stable farmers.

When Gao Laosan saw his figure, he couldn't help but cupped his hands and said, "This is a brother, what do you call him?"

The strong man clasped his fists and said, "My name is Chen Baogui from Yiwu, Zhejiang Province. He is of the same family as Chen Baoping. He killed the bully in the village the year before last. He couldn't stay in his hometown. I heard that Baoping was doing well in Luzon, so he came here by boat to seek refuge. gone."

Gao Laosan didn't ask much, "Okay, then count Brother Chen as one!"

Chen Baoping, nicknamed the Black Donkey, was overjoyed when he saw Gao Laosan agreed. Both of them spent about the same amount of money. , there are a few who can still go to farm.

"Third Brother, Zhao Si and the others don't have any jobs, so I'll call them in too!" Black Donkey said excitedly, not forgetting his brothers who had gone to sea.

The third child didn't expect the old brothers to be there, so he was happy in his heart, but then he remembered something, his face darkened, "I have to make something clear, this time I am following the army to fight the Spaniards, you have to think clearly. "

The black donkey knew the news a long time ago in the city, he and the big black guy looked at each other, and said with a smile, "Going to sea is to risk your life. We haven't been out to sea for more than half a year, so it's time to fight."

After hearing this, Gao Laosan smiled and said, "Okay! If that's the case, then go and call Zhao Si."

The black donkey nodded, and after a while, he brought out a few men who were still asleep, and they were all overjoyed when they saw Gao Laosan.

Gao Laosan counted the old brothers, and ordered a few more reliable ones. When ten people were gathered, he asked them to pack up and go to the boat. He left a brother to lead the way, and he followed the second brother's instructions. To the shantytowns outside the city.

Although guarding is a desperate profession, there is no threshold, so in terms of salary, it is not as good as sailors who know how to sail.

Compared with the inns in the city, the shantytowns are much more chaotic, full of dragons and snakes, and everyone. As soon as Mr. Gao arrived, he was surrounded by a group of people. He gave the local gang 30 taels of silver, and within a short time, nearly a hundred people were taken away. After coming out, Gao Laosan still chooses.

Gao Laosan chose five Japanese, three Koreans, and 22 strong Han Chinese, and took them to the city for a meal, and it was already dark when they were brought back to the boat.

Early the next morning, Gao Yihuan asked people to transport all the goods on the ship to the warehouse of the Zheng family. Sugar and tobacco were valuable goods. During the reign of Chongzhen, a few catties of tobacco could be exchanged for a horse in the north. Sugar was also eaten by wealthy families. thing.

The Zheng family gave him a discount of 500 taels for 18 10-pounder guns and 10 [-]-pounder guns, and gave him some knives and guns for free.

At the beginning, Xu Guangqi bought guns for 1000 taels, but the cost of each gun was actually less than 200 taels. Now the Ming Dynasty casts them by themselves, and each gun costs only 150 taels. 300 taels, it is said to be a discount, but in fact it is still a lot of money.

On the afternoon of the third day, with the help of Zheng's company, all the cannons were loaded onto the ship.

The men of the Zheng family piled up a bunch of blunderbusses and Japanese knives on the deck, Second Brother Gao went over to choose a Japanese knives, put them in his waist, and said: "This time it's a big battle, so we all choose the ones that are handy for self-defense. "

The sailors on the deck and the recruited guards stepped forward to choose weapons after hearing the words. Only five Japanese with shaved samurai heads held their heirloom swords and did not move.

Just when everyone was choosing, there was a sudden sound of drums in the city. Gao Yihuan and the others narrowed their eyes and looked towards the city, knowing that the government was going to summon soldiers to go to war...

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(End of this chapter)