November 1, 1647, Mucaoling Township.

As the most economically backward township in Xihu County, which will be formally established on January 1 next year -- yes, you haven't seen it, even the low-bunkers that were established later than Mucaoling Township relied on their unique agricultural conditions to catch up and steadily surpass Mucaoling Township in the hilly area -- Mucaoling is cold in this spring.

The population of this township is now only 4,000, of which about 1,500 are young and middle-aged men. As the war with the Spaniards continued, the Eastern Republic of the East Bank, which was increasingly in need of troops, had been mobilized at home, and a large number of militiamen who had participated in military training were sent to the front. Mucaoling Township is no exception, this agriculture-based township has contributed 400 high-quality soldiers to the newly established Xihu County Militia Brigade in one go, which can be regarded as doing its best.

Shao Yuanyi's village is located on the fringe, and the local peasants often fight with the Guaraní people who have come over, so they have strong combat effectiveness, and they have won the first place in the militia competitions of dozens of villages in four townships and towns in Xihu County all the year round, so when the militia brigade was formed, the village was transferred as many as 30 people, almost nearly one-third of the village's adult male labor force.

When the men went to the front, the burden of the family fell on the women. Doing farm work in the fields, taking care of children at home, digging mud in the river, and going down to the ground to build roads, there is no work that these "healthy women" can't do. There is no way, the labor force in the village is too tight now, and even Shao Yuanyi, a well-known doctor from ten miles and eight towns, has to carry a rifle on his back every Friday and go to the village office to be on duty.

In the village office, there are generally two patrol policemen, a militia chief, a sentry militia squad leader, two weapons depot guards, and one handyman, of which the militia director takes two weapons depot guards next door. Handymen watch the door outside. The patrol and the militia squad leader on duty lived in the hall. The village office of each village was located on the south side of the road into the village at the time of construction. And in the immediate vicinity there is often a small turret, where seven or eight militiamen are stationed at any one time, under the command of the militia squad leader.

Shao Yuanyi is one of the militia squad leaders, and it happened to be his turn to be on duty today, so he went to the turret early in the morning to explain something, and then slipped into the village office. Petrov, the patrol sergeant of the village, was his father-in-law, and he just sat down and chatted with him when he was bored.

But today he had apparently forgotten to look at his calendar when he went out, for old Petrov was walking around the hall in anger at this time. Another patrol officer who was sitting in the room flipping through Pravda to read the latest news about the battle situation saw Shao Yuanyi come in. Immediately winked his eyes at him, and then went out for a stroll with a strange smile on his face - well, on patrol.

"Anna was abducted by a sailor, a poor man who had only come from the Ming Kingdom of the East at the beginning of this year. I had seen him at the time, and I should have been wary of that, that guy was a good talker and a good deception. He took a fancy to Anna's money and wanted to get her to spend money on a boat, so he spoke very sweetly to Anna. In the end, he got his hands on it! "Petrov said this, and scolded a few Russian slang words." That guy works on the South Sea Fishing Company's cod fishing boats, and recently went up to auction off a batch of small Spanish fishing boats from La Plata, which are very cheap. This guy didn't have enough money, so he tricked Anna out and wanted to buy a boat with her, alas, I shouldn't have given Anna so much money. ”

As soon as he came, he heard his father-in-law say this, and Shao Yuanyi was also a little speechless. His father-in-law always wanted his youngest daughter to marry an officer, or a decent person like an engineer, a technician, or in any case, not a sailor! However, Shao Yuanyi had a different opinion on this matter, he had met the young man, and chatted with him, this person had been a military man in the Heishui area for more than two years before coming to the East Coast, and it is said that he was a dart master before joining the East Coast system, and he had traveled south and north for many years and was well-informed, no wonder he could deceive Anna's little girl.

This person feels good about Shao Yuanyi, and he is relatively self-motivated, and it is not necessarily a bad thing for Anna to marry him. But at this time, he couldn't say this in front of his father-in-law, so he only persuaded him a little and then led the topic elsewhere: "The brick and tile kiln in the township is going to resume work, do you know?" ”

"Of course I do." Petrov sat down on a chair, took a sip of a warm cup of yerba mate, and then said: "This brick kiln was faced with a shortage of manpower at the beginning of production, and its production capacity has not been as good as the other four kilns in China. There are only a few dozen full-time workers, so a large number of seasonal temporary workers are usually recruited, many of whom are local residents, who come to do odd jobs and earn pocket money during the slack season, so this time is often the time when the output of the wheel kiln is the highest. However, once the busy farming season or other labor-intensive projects are launched, the output of the wheel kiln will drop sharply after a large number of temporary workers leave, and even stop production for a while. ”

"But fortunately, this wheel kiln is mainly for the supply of several towns and villages near us, and the demand is not particularly large, and the kiln is almost enough to burn a batch at intervals." Petrov continued, "But this time there is obviously some trouble, and there is a great demand for building materials in Dingxi Fort, Baoan Township, and the Northern Botanical Garden on the shore of Duck Lake to the north, all of which are expanding settlements and building water conservancy facilities to accommodate the wave of immigrants from the East who will arrive in two or three months. We are the closest brick kiln to North Duck Lake, and most of the bricks and tiles needed are required to be provided, and with the construction of the second phase of the irrigation canal in the low-bunker, the demand for red bricks is even greater. This time, the township government urgently demanded that the brick and tile wheel kiln factory resume work, which is the reason. ”

"Now that there is an urgent shortage of labor everywhere in the country, why are there so many projects to be started? Where does the manpower come from? Shao Yuanyi sat down a little depressed and said with a frown.

There is a reason why he is so depressed, because the township requires all villages to send people to the brick kiln to help in turn. Now the alfalfa fields in the mountains are about to be harvested, and the harvested grass has to be dried, cut, and silaged, which is time-consuming and laborious; The livestock at home should also be fed, and after some time it will be the estrus of the cattle, at this time, it is necessary to ask someone from the agricultural technology station to guide the artificial insemination technology technology to increase the number of pregnant cows as much as possible; In addition, the township has also issued a notice, the construction of gravel roads between the villages in the township should also be put on the agenda, the route site has been selected, and the township requires that the land leveling work will be carried out in the near future, which is another project that will occupy a lot of labor.

In the next few months, the people of the village were almost not idle, and when a large number of men were sent to the front to fight, the rest of the people had to work together and get up early and work late to finish what they were doing - after all, the wheat seedlings in the fields also needed to be cared for. In the case that the intensity of the use of such a labor force is extremely tight, how can it be possible that people from all villages should go to the brick and tile kiln factory to work and produce!

"If you don't have the manpower, you have to put together the project on your hands." Petrov's consciousness was not low, and he also expressed his understanding of the government's measures, but he continued: "Where is the difficulty now? There is a shortage of manpower, especially in the time of war! Then there will be a large influx of new immigrants into our country in the first few months of next year, which is a correct measure to alleviate the current situation of manpower shortage and improve our national strength. But if you want to settle these new immigrants, you have to build new settlements, you don't just stare at the three expanded old settlements in the north, in the depths of the southern grassland, at this time the technicians of the Construction Bureau of the Ministry of Communications are trying to plan and select sites for the new settlements, the construction of those places is the big head, really from scratch, bit by bit, built with bare hands, of course, most of these are the work of those new immigrants. ”

"With talents, there is an improvement in national strength." Petrov's cadre training course was not in vain, and at this time he commented on the major events of the country: "With people, wheat production will increase, roads will be built more conveniently, and with people, the catch of fish will increase significantly, and so on. Seeing that the war with the Spanish has no end in sight, maybe it will continue to fight for many years, and there are people on the front line who continue to die in battle and die of disease, which are all strong male laborers, if there are no new people to fill in, then how to fill the gap after they die? If there is no addition, how will this battle continue? Do we just throw in the towel now and let the Spaniards come over and snatch all of our qiē away? Of course not! ”

Hearing his father-in-law give him such a political lesson, Shao Yuanyi suddenly had a big head, and he now regretted leading the topic to this aspect. He just casually complained about the destruction of the domestic people's livelihood by the protracted war and the oppression of the labor force of the common people, and then guided his father-in-law to teach him a lesson, which was really a little depressed.

So he immediately explained: "Of course I am not against the government's decision-making, I am just worried about how to allocate labor, but this is not my business, it is the village chief's business, why do I cāo do this!" The big deal is to organize the dolls from the primary schools in the villages and the central primary schools in the townships, and gather them in the brick kiln factory to make bricks. This is not a heavy work, and it does not require too much technical content, organize them to suspend classes for ten days and a half months, and concentrate on the sudden production of a batch of red bricks to fool around with some of the most urgently needed projects. If this is not possible, allowing children to work during the day and attend classes at night should alleviate a considerable part of the labor shortage. ”

But when he said this, Shao Yuanyi couldn't help but complain again: "Even the dolls have to contribute their own strength to the war, it's really fucked!" Why is this battle not a head, I hope that after this truce, there will be no more wars, I don't know in peacetime, but I don't know that it is better to be peaceful after a long time in this fight. (To be continued......)

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