The atmosphere in the compound of the Coal River Township Police Station was solemn today, and several officials of the Ministry of Internal Affairs wearing black uniforms were carefully questioning several captured prisoners. Behind them, there were a few patrolmen sweating profusely explaining something, and in short, everything here looked chaotic, and it was clear that something unusual had happened.

Several of the prisoners were typical Guarani faces, and although they were squatting on the ground at the moment, they still looked indignant, as if there was nothing wrong with what they had done. But whenever they wanted to make a move, several patrolmen who watched them smashed their heads and faces with batons, and they squatted down honestly.

"So, because the Mining Bureau decided to transfer your jobs, you joined forces to destroy the machine?" A Department of Internal Affairs agent in a tweed coat put his hands behind his back and stared at the tattered Guarani miners with gloomy eyes.

"That's not all." After a long period of silence, one of the leading men suddenly said in fluent Chinese: "Last year, a series of terrible disasters occurred in the No. 12 mine where we worked. There were not only coal mine flooding accidents, but also pit gas explosions, and many people died in our tribe. However, the compensation and bereavement benefits issued by the Mining Bureau are very small, and only two bags of wheat and one bag of corn are killed by one person, which is not enough to stuff the teeth. This time, the boss still thinks that our work efficiency is low, and is ready to use some machines to assist in coal mining, and they will lay off our employees. The Italians in the human resources department even called us barbarians and insulted us in every way, and we destroyed the machine in a moment of anger. ”

Hear the coherent words of this Guarani. The agent of the Ministry of Internal Affairs was a little surprised, only to see him walk up to the Guaraní man, lift the Guarani's chin with the tips of his riding boots, and look at him and say in a more stern tone: "As far as I know, the Government Council formulated a 'coal mine inspection system' at the beginning of this year to conduct regular inspections of the 21 mines of the Ping'an Coal Mine, where accidents are frequent, and our coal mine system has been improving. But in any case, you have destroyed tens of thousands of yuan worth of machines, which is an irrefutable fact, and you must accept legal sanctions. ”

Hear this agent's words. The Guarani people who were squatting on the ground were a little nervous. It is not known what these robbers who have taken over their land will do with them.

They were all Guaraní who originally lived in the mining area, and a judge from the North Duck Lake District Circuit Court on the East Bank came over to declare their possession of the land "illegal," and before they could understand what was going on, the East Bank militia evicted them. Then they dig mines on their farmlands, on top of their houses. Coal was collected.

And they were seized because of their land and houses. Men became miners, while women and children worked as hired laborers in harsh places such as coal washing plants, honeycomb coal factories, brick kilns and cement factories. Lived hard and tenaciously. It's just that these people's physique is poor, and they die for various reasons after a few years of work, so limited to the dilemma of increasing lack of manpower, Ping An Mining Bureau has gradually developed some simple shearers in the past two years to replace some workers and speed up work efficiency.

After all, the Indians were notoriously poor in health and intolerant of heavy work, as was the case with the Spanish miners in the Chilean region, who died more than half of them within a few years, far inferior to the blacks. Therefore, from a long-term perspective, Ping An Coal Mine has decided to gradually realize the steaming and mechanization of coal mining, and try to reduce the dependence on manpower.

Moreover, it is not only a matter of reducing the dependence on manpower, but as the mine digs deeper and deeper, it becomes more and more difficult to lift the mined coal out of the shaft, so the need for large cranes is officially on the agenda. With the gradual development of the domestic steel and machinery manufacturing industry, the East Coast people, who have accumulated many years of industrial development, have begun to research and develop coal mining machinery.

Steam-powered cranes first replaced human or animal-powered lifting machinery. For example, many mines in Ping'an Coal Mine now use cranes with a power of 175 horsepower, which can not only lift coal, but also can be used to lift miners, and the efficiency is far from comparable to the previous human pulley boom. The wicker baskets originally used to hold coal and miners have been replaced by metal boxes (iron) that can hold more people or coal, and it is said that the machinery department is already trying to produce stronger and lighter steel boxes.

At the beginning of this year, after the Government Council decided to strengthen the safety of coal mine production, it sent a large number of inspectors to inspect the mines and urged the Mining Bureau to install underground ventilation devices as much as possible. After a meeting of technical personnel, the Mining Bureau decided to ventilate the mine by releasing high-pressure steam through the guò steam boiler, and the effect was found to be quite good. In addition, a technician from Italy invented a special fan for coal mines, and obtained a technical patent, which was quickly bought out by the Ping An Mining Bureau and vigorously promoted in various mines.

After the promotion of these technologies, according to the Ping An Mining Bureau, the coal mine will produce about 280,000 tons of coal this year, but the potential market demand is about 570,000 tons, and this output has not even reached half of the demand. You must know that today's domestic industrial enterprises, inland steamboats and even civilian fuel consumption are all local coal produced by the Ping An Mining Bureau, rather than the Tacheng refined coal transported across the sea. The cost of the coal is prohibitive, and although the quality is significantly better, it is basically only used in large quantities by coking plants, the State Railway Administration and ocean-going vessels.

It can be seen that the domestic coal market is still far from reaching the saturation period, and there is still a lot of room for development, provided that Ping An Mining Bureau can gradually raise its own output. Of course, the Ping An Mining Bureau is not indifferent, as evidenced by the fact that they vigorously promoted various machinery in coal mines at the behest of their superiors, after all, in the case of not being able to recruit enough manpower, replacing manpower with machines is the only means.

And these Guarani are clearly the "victims" of the deepening of the mechanization process. Because with the further popularization of machine qì, their role is also decreasing, after all, with the already steam piston-driven hoe for coal mining, there is no longer a need for too many miners to dig slowly in low, damp tunnels. Especially at a time when these Guarani miners were out of step with the people around them, the Ping An Mining Bureau decided to transfer them to the newly opened coal mine to work as transport workers - this type of work was obviously much lower than that of underground miners - but how could these Guarani people, who were accustomed to a high salary of more than seven yuan a month, go back to work as transport workers who were tired to death but had a monthly income of only five yuan?

Therefore, the Guaraní people, who had been deprived of the right to work underground, were clearly enraged, and after being dominated by their anger, they took advantage of the carelessness of the mine managers to gather a crowd to destroy some of the mines and then demanded that the traditional way of mining coal be restored and let them continue to dig coal.

For this case, which caused a direct economic loss of nearly 10,000 yuan, the people below could not suppress it, and the matter was quickly reported to the Mining Bureau and the Ministry of Internal Affairs, so there was a scene of the Ministry of Internal Affairs police coming to the mine to investigate. The case itself was simple, not complicated at all, and the handling of the matter was even simpler after the possibility that the Guarani miners, which the Ministry of the Interior had feared, colluded with Spanish spies to sabotage production equipment, was ruled out.

The miners were sentenced to death by hanging, and the coerced miners were sentenced to exile and forced labor in New China or Australia. They can choose to go to serve alone, or they can choose to bring their families with them, in short, don't think about leaving the service. As for the coal mining machinery that was destroyed by them, the Mining Bureau first took out some spare machines from its own warehouse and sent them underground for production, and then the mine continued to place orders for production at the newly established coal machinery factory in Coal River Township. The economic loss is said to be tens of thousands of yuan, which is all a fictitious head, and the real production cost of four or five thousand yuan is amazing, and this is still the cost of research and development, otherwise it will be cheaper.

After dealing with the case of the smashing machine of the Ping An Mining Bureau, the special task force of the Ministry of Internal Affairs went to several places and found that there were many similar cases. For example, in Baoan Township, a village suddenly tore up a labor employment agreement with the Portuguese on the other side of the mountain, because they found it more cost-effective to use a steam plow to dig ditches and plough the land than to hire foreign laborers, so they resolutely tore up the agreement and refused to hire Scottish laborers from Portuguese towns.

Annoyed by the Portuguese labour broker, who had already paid a large amount of upfront fees and expenses along the way, he organized his workers to destroy two steam plows placed in the field by an agricultural machinery rental company. What's more, there are a few sneaky guys there who look closely at and depict the appearance of the steam plow, which seems to have a different plan.

Urgent police station patrols and a militia brigade quickly suppressed the riots, arresting more than 100 people, including labor brokers, on the spot, including two Portuguese who had stolen drawing paper, and were arrested on charges of espionage and sent to Ping'an County for detention, where they would undoubtedly be sentenced to death.

In addition to this case, there have also been a number of cases in various places where craftsmen and village millers have destroyed machines and disseminated defamatory statements about steam engines. It can be seen that in the Eastern Republic of China, where steam power was becoming more widespread and industrialization was deepening, the speed at which the traditional social order was disintegrating was extremely staggering. In this young country, which can be called a blank slate, without any old forces and rules, a new order of production and social order is being established at an unparalleled speed. (To be continued......)