Chapter 219 The sitter is free, but where can I grab the money?

"The autumn equinox is coming, hi!"

"Rice is fragrant, hey!"

On the Lushun wharf in the early morning, there were bursts of rough, roaring, passionate and high shouts. In the once calm First Army Port of the Far East, countless figures were busy and lively.

Since the day after the occupation of Lushun Port, the restoration work has begun. A large number of Russian prisoners became the first batch of builders, and later recruited craftsmen from neighboring villages to join it. Of course, the Nanyang sitter has been sent here one after another.

In order to repair this extremely important military port, Li Enfu, who took the lead in coming here, not only approved the funds, but also decisively transported the last two groups of natives who had been shipped to Taiwan. In addition, the materials that had already been hoarded in Ryukyu gradually arrived, and Lushun Port seemed to have become a huge construction site.

Standing on the deck, looking at the bustling scene in the bay, looking around this beautiful harbor, which is known as the pearl of the Far East and the only unfrozen seaport in the whole northeast, Master Li still frowned.

The damage brought by the Russian Far East Fleet to this beautiful military port is amazing. Looking around from the waterway, the port is now full of ruins and dilapidated walls. According to Witthft, who was released, they suffered very strong resistance here. In order to reduce sacrifices, he ordered the fleet to rectify the artillery. Hit for several hours.

Although the Russian [***] ship is not as powerful as the Pacific Fleet in terms of artillery power and shell loading quality, hours of shelling has caused unimaginable damage to this beautiful harbor.

And here is just one point. It extends from here to the north, as well as Liaodong, Jilin and Heilongjiang, two half-provincial places. It is indeed a big base in urgent need, but it is also the root cause of Li Mo's headache.

Because the Qing Dynasty did not pay attention to the development outside the customs over the years, that is, because of Lushun Port and Liaodong Bay, Fengtian and Liaodong are slightly better. As for the farther Jilin and Heilongjiang, it is even the scene of slash-burning and nomadic free-range breeding. If you want to completely change the three provinces and make it your most solid base, even Li Mo He is also a little worried that although he has the experience and knowledge of later generations, to be honest, he has never faced such a big project in his previous life or this life.

This is a challenge to himself and a test of the Honolulu political axe under his current control, so he wants to use these years to use the platform of the three northeastern provinces to build a solid foundation and hope to train a group of capable officials.

With a whistle, the Sky Surveyor slowly leaned against the dock in Li Mo's thoughts. Before he could get off the warship, a light cruiser flying a Russian [***] flag and two French cargo ships outside several docks suddenly attracted his attention. How could Russians come here at this time?

After disembarkation, Li Enfu, who came to the town first after finishing the handover procedures with the Qing court, answered his doubts. It turned out that the cruiser was not carried by anyone else, but the new commander of the Russian Far East Fleet, Makarov, who came all the way to pick up the first batch of Russian soldiers back to Vladivostok.

Probably there was no fate between the two. Before Li Mo saw the more capable officer in the Russian navy, the Russian cruiser had anchored and left, and the two French cargo ships slowly left the dock together.

"Hey, be careful of mines." Master Li pretended to shout with a smile, and his voice was still shaking in his throat. He was attracted by the hot scene in the port area. A large number of craftsmen were busy under the shouts of the engineers. During this period, there were also a lot of Nanyang hard labor bought and Russian soldiers who watched the freighter leave but had to be a hard worker first.

Of course, in order to ensure that these people do not make trouble, the Marines specially dispatched two battalions to monitor these guys at night. The soldiers with live ammunition made the port area look a little nervous.

Li Enfu's stay in Liaodong also means that a huge strategic transfer involving departments, including the State Council, the Construction Department of the Ministry of Equipment and other departments, has quietly begun. Although Honolulu, where the birthplace, and the first-scale Ryukyu are still the core of the Pacific Army's defense, for a long time to come, the important surnames of both places will be Temporarily give way to the three northeastern provinces.

Although the State Council has transferred more than 300 young officials trained over the years to come here, ready to rely on them to build a complete management framework of the three provinces, compared with the huge territory, more than 300 people can't even see a splash, so how to choose officials and set up the shelves of the three provinces as soon as possible. It has become Li Enfu's biggest problem.

In addition to this heart disease, the follow-up construction has also become a headache for everyone.

Looking at the two dredgers that occupied the waterway after the Russian cruiser left, Li Mo also sighed that at the beginning of the construction of Lushun Port, the Qingzheng axe handed over all the works to the foreigners, and also allocated them to Germany, France, the United Kingdom, and even Italy in order to balance the interests, because of these countries They all have their own standards. In addition, there is a lack of planning at the beginning of construction. They often dig a piece here and fill a pile there, which makes the current seaport standards inconsistent.

Now it is bombarded by a cannon by the Russians, which is even more messy. It is definitely not enough to do maintenance alone, because this military port, which is known as the first in the Far East, can't even reach the passing line in his eyes. In addition, the construction did not consider that the tonnage of the ship would exceed 10,000 tons in the future, so it can only enter and exit the battleship at high tide. In order to make better use of this ice-free port in the future, this time is not just a repair, but a thorough expansion and transformation.

The navy is a century-old project, which is not just an empty word. Therefore, according to the plan, the long and narrow Tiger Tail Island Reef in Lushun Port will be completely blown up and cleared. In addition, it is necessary to expand and deepen the waterway, requiring a perennial water depth of at least 20 meters. In addition, eight new reefs will be built with a length of more than 250 meters. The deep-water wharf of large ships is required to station at least 20 warships and 10 10,000-ton-class cargo ships at a maximum of one time.

When I heard this plan, the newly established construction department, which had just left the equipment part, almost stared. Fortunately, everyone was also influenced by the development tide of Honolulu and Ryukyu. In addition, the navy also paid special attention to the recovery of this military port, so it sent more than 1,000 people to participate in Pearl Harbor and Bahai. After the funds and materials were guaranteed, the naval engineers in the port immediately rolled up their sleeves and worked hard after the preliminary planning was guaranteed.

Over the port area, the original Beiyang Marine Division barracks appeared in front of us, but it has now become a temporary camp for the Marines. At present, it is also under large-scale expansion. According to the plan, these old wooden barracks will also replace the three-story brick and wood structure barracks. Because these living technology content is not high, most of them are captured Russian soldiers. According to Zhang Shun, this is called labor reform!

"Damn it, you know how to learn from the young master to talk and then fool people!"

Li Mo kicked Zhang Shun away, but he didn't care about this treatment. Compared with being executed, now he just let them work and eat and drink, which is not bad!

Under the threat of death, the Russian soldiers are very "working hard", so the construction speed of the camp is the fastest, so that Li Enfu is a little reluctant to let these free hard workers who are better than fighting leave. However, due to the limited throughput of the port area under expansion, there is still a relatively large gap in building materials. Camp construction still takes time.

Accompanied by Li Enfu and other officials, Li Mo quickly climbed the most important Golden Mountain fort. The damage left by Russian shells was still vivid, but looking down from here, the whole Lushun was full of vitality because of the construction.

"How long does it take for the seaport to be expanded?" Master Li stood at the highest point and looked at several engineering ships that were salvaging Beiyang sunken ships at the foot of the Golden Mountain. His eyebrows became tighter and tighter.

"It was originally expected to be ten months, but now it seems." Li Enfu shook his head with a wry smile: "There are too many places that need to be demolished, and the construction schedule is very delayed. Now the Russian soldiers are about to leave again, and there will be a shortage of manpower."

"And it's now September, and it will snow in the northeast of October, so we estimate that if we can't continue to invest manpower, according to the current progress, it will take at least a year for the initial operation."

Hearing Li Enfu's words, Li Mo also frowned. It will take a year to repair a Lushun Port. What about the whole Liaodong and Heilongjiang, Jilin?

Now is the end of the Qing Dynasty. There are neither highways nor railways here, and water transportation is still the most important means. However, once the sea freezes in a few months and Anton Port cannot be put into use, all materials entering and leaving the northeast need to be transferred from Lushun to the inland via land!

You should know that some of the materials in the previous order to break the Liaoning Alliance have been shipped to various countries and will soon arrive here. If there is no seaport, will the huge amount of materials and goods be soaked in the sea?

Thinking of this, Li Mo immediately said, "In terms of manpower, you don't need to worry. I have ordered Chen Ping to transport 20,000 Nanyang natives sent to Ryukyu first. In addition, Mr. Yan has also replied to me that Luzon can provide another 50,000 people immediately. If by January next year, the number of people should reach 200,000. So I have asked the navy to send transport ships to cooperate with Lin Yongxiang to transport them here.

Hearing that there were so many free hard labors, everyone was relieved. Only Li Enfu frowned slightly. It's not that he didn't like free hard labor, but it became the most difficult problem for so many people to eat and wear after arriving. You know, it's only September that many natives sent from Nanyang feel uncomfortable. If it comes to the cold winter when it snows heavily, God knows if he can still work.

It seems that he can see Li Enfu's worries. Li Mo continued: "Mr. Li doesn't have to worry too much about grain. Anton has reserved some in the past two years. In addition, Tang Shaoyi has signed a procurement agreement with American grain merchants. In addition, I have also ordered Yan Fu to buy it through the French governor in Vietnam, and Australia has also set up a procurement. Buy some. If it really doesn't work, I will let Lao Long take the warship to the south of the Yangtze River to grab it, and it won't make everyone hungry.

"That's good, the navy has become a pirate, and the coast of the Qing Dynasty really doesn't dare to provoke us." Zhang Shun didn't know where he got out again and said with a funny smile.

"Well, the navy is a robber now!" Hearing what the young master said, Li Enfu, who had been constantly reaching out by the navy for funds, stared at several naval officers behind him. Unfortunately, the boss was not here, and several officers did not dare to fight with Li Enfu, so they had to shrank their necks.

"Now the first thing is that there are three." Li Mo stretched out his first finger with a smile and continued, "The first is to prepare as soon as possible to settle down those Nanyang Kuli. We have to find a way to order a batch of cotton-padded clothes and trousers for them. Although they don't take the money, I don't think everyone wants them to freeze to death after doing it for such a while, right? We also spent two taels of silver for one person.

Hearing Li Mo's words, everyone laughed one after another. Even the young government officials who held notepads and made records nodded repeatedly. It would be a pity that hundreds of thousands of free labor died at once. Anyway, they had to be squeezed clean.

"The second is to immediately set up temporary wharves in Jinzhou Bay, Dalian Bay, Yingkou and other qualified places. The State Council should immediately purchase enough animal power, organize manpower to be ready to transfer the arriving materials and machinery at any time, and transfer as many materials as possible before the sea is closed, so as to reduce the pressure on Lushun Port."

"Young master, where is Dalian?"

As soon as Li Mo was about to erect the third finger, he heard someone ask. Then he suddenly remembered that there was no place name Dalian at this moment, and he didn't know how to explain it. He had to say, "It's the current Qingniwa. I told Chen Ping last time that Qingniwa was not good, so I changed the name to Dalian."

Dalian?!

Although several people feel a little strange about the name, who dares to say no to the young master? He immediately marked the new name on the green mud.

Seeing that everyone had no strange performance of changing their names, Li Mo breathed a sigh of relief and raised his third finger: "The third is a sentence, saying, "If you want to be rich, build the road first."

Master Li moved to the big slogan of the rural whiteboard wall in later generations and said, "The road is smooth, which can not only promote the circulation of goods, but also accelerate the flow of people. When it is convenient for ordinary people to go out, they will be willing to work farther away. Therefore, the most urgent thing is that railways and highways must start construction immediately."

"If you want to be rich, build the road first."

When everyone was talking about Master Li's words and carefully understanding the meaning, Li Mo had waved his arm: "The land of the three provinces is very poor and almost nothing, but for all of us, it is like white paper spread out before painting. What we have to do is to fill in our own colors on the white paper, not to go. Modify it.

I believe that everyone knows that the 20-year lease period is just a cover, so I hope you can work together to overcome the current difficulties and build this land together. This place will be our home anytime and anywhere!"

"Do you have confidence?" When Master Li said this, he suddenly pointed to the vast land behind him, and his voice was passionate.

In addition to Li Enfu and others, they are all hot-blooded young people who can withstand the words of Master Li's encouragement, so after hearing the interrogation, they patted their chests one after another, and their faces were red to ensure that they would complete their mission.

Compared with the happy and excited young officials, Master Li sighed quietly in his heart.

Kuli is free, but where can I grab the money?

(to be continued)