The weather in Uruguay in winter and spring is usually not very good. Rain and strong winds make it quite troublesome to go out during this season, but this is not a problem in the eyes of the people on the east bank of the Yi River. On August 20, 1644, Peng Zhicheng, the commissioner of the Yihe region, rode a war horse and patrolled along the Yihe River and Milin Lake surrounded by a large number of followers.

The sky was still drifting with heavy snow, but Peng Zhicheng, wearing a big cap and a military coat, had no intention of dodging, but stood at the mouth of the Yihe River and carefully inspected the construction of a new town. The new town is located on the north bank of the Yi River, later Enrique. A few kilometres east of the town of General Martinez, only a few hundred metres from the vast Lake Mirin. The name of the town was chosen by Peng Zhicheng himself, and it was called Qishan Fort to commemorate the first batch of local pioneer residents, 200 immigrants from Qishan Qianhusuo in Daming Mountain.

These men arrived at Dongfang Harbor at the beginning of the month, just as several ships carrying cloth had returned from New China, so they took these ships on board to venture through the stormy sea to return to the mainland. Less than 200 of their original 300 men eventually arrived on the East Coast, which is still a high percentage. In the last wave, only 700 of the 1,500 North Koreans arrived at Fort Chuy, east of Lake Mirin, less than 50 percent, which is embarrassing.

After spending the first 15 days in a quarantine camp at East Shore Harbor, they were taken by the Census Office of the Ministry of Civil Affairs to the Yihe area on the west bank of Lake Milin to begin building their homes with more than 2,000 South African laborers from the Second Bureau of Communications and Construction. The planned Qishan Fort is not large, and the circumference of the city is about 800 meters, which is much smaller than the Qishan Thousand Households where they used to live. But in terms of robustness, it is more than that.

Several brick kilns on the east coast, which were not small in later generations, produced large and small building bricks day and night. It is then supplied to construction sites throughout the country. But it's still not enough. This is mainly due to the fact that the houses distributed by the East Coast government to the people are all brick houses that do not spare any effort: a living room, two bedrooms, a kitchen, a pigsty, and a storeroom, and the average cost of a suite is 20,000 or 30,000 bricks. It doesn't seem like much, but once it is popularized throughout the country, it will be frighteningly much, not to mention anything else, 1,500 houses will consume the annual output of a large wheel kiln, and this is only enough for a few people?

Not to mention the castles that people on the East Coast have to build in almost every settlement, which is also a large brick gull. The dense bunch of forts on the eastern coast is a headache for any enemy, especially the pirates. They could plunder the walled towns of the Spaniards, but they had no place to say anything about the castles on the east coast, which were as hard as a tortoiseshell. In addition to the fortress, there are irrigation canals, reservoirs, docks and other facilities, unlike Europe, which are basically wooden and foolish facilities, the people on the east coast are all permanent brick and stone buildings considered in a century-old plan.

In the face of strong domestic demand, the Government Council intends to build the fifth brick and tile wheel kiln in the Yihe area, and the location is set in the area of Qishan Fort. Like the kiln in the Kamakang River Valley, this kiln will use the deep silt at the bottom of the river in the Yi River basin as a raw material to fire bricks to fill the growing shortage of building materials in the country.

At the mouth of the Yi River. The water is rippling and the reeds are dense. Extensive swampland. Some cute otters are foraging freely, and some waterfowl that have not wintered are harassed by them, croaking and flying from time to time, and then landing in the marsh to catch fish and shrimp. Otters and foxes are now Class II protected animals in China, and if someone kills them at will, they are likely to be sentenced to huge fines or even exile, so even if people covet their fur, not many people on the east coast of the militaristic rule of law dare to touch this mold.

Near the swamp is the Yi River, which flows a lot. The "Qingtang Jun No. 1" dredger, which is puffing black smoke and water vapor, is quietly moored on the north side of the mouth of the Yi River, and the four positioning anchors have been lowered to stabilize the hull. From time to time, it grabs a lump of silt from the bottom of the river and throws it directly at the bank. On the banks of the river are hundreds of South African labor construction workers and a few residents of Qishan Fort, carrying dung baskets to pick up the first batch of valuable shallow silt and pile it up on patches of cleared land – planned farmland.

Some of the younger children were digging in the mud for some interesting knick-knacks: small fish, small shrimp, crabs, etc., and each one of them immediately shouted and screamed, attracting a crowd of onlookers. Looking at these little kids covered in mud, the adults could only shake their heads and let them play on their own. Most of these children were the children of several groups of residents behind Qishan Fort—the children of more than 500 Estonians from Livonia, and the remaining dozen or so were killed by boat from the eastern part of Daming Mountain. The friendship of the little ones is always simple, they get acquainted within a few days, and although the language communication with each other is not very smooth, this does not prevent them from playing together.

On the south side of the dredger, a 72-ton river transport ship that also breathes black smoke passes by from time to time. These boats can be seen to be new, because they use propeller propellers, hang two sides of the shangsail as auxiliary power, and generally reach a speed of about 8 knots. The ship was loaded with iron ore, from where it entered Milin Lake and then headed north to the Ping'an Iron and Steel Plant at the northern end of Yazi Lake.

"How's the dredging going?" Peng Zhicheng looked at the swamp for a while, and then asked Liang Jian, the secretary who was following him.

Liang Jian immediately replied: "This dredger has been here for more than two months, and the section from Shangyi River Fort down has almost been dredged, only the last section is missing." This is the entrance to the lake, which was originally seriously silted, and only the center of the river can be navigated. After this period of cleaning, the navigable area has more than doubled, and I believe that in another half a month, it will almost be able to end here. ”

After finishing speaking, Liang Jian thought about it and couldn't help asking: "Mr. Peng, how did the state arrange Qishan Fort?" What is positioning? Purely agricultural township or industrial township? ”

"What a fart!" Peng Zhicheng picked up a four- or five-year-old child who accidentally fell into his lap during a crazy game, the child was wrapped in a thick cotton coat, dressed like a ball of cotton, and there was a snot hanging under his nose, which accidentally rubbed on the trousers of Peng Zhicheng's brand new military uniform. Peng Zhicheng pinched the child's fat face, and then let him go. His parents from Daming stood in the distance in confusion, and when they saw their child running back, they immediately grabbed their ears and carried them away.

"The state doesn't have a plan, but I do!" Peng added, "This large swamp near the mouth of the river is cleaned up according to the old rules, digging an artificial reservoir and draining all the stagnant water into it." These reeds are also cut down, didn't South Africa send a lot of ducks, I am ready, use these reeds to build some duck sheds along the river, let the farmers raise their own ducks. At present, there is a great demand for chickens, ducks and geese in China, and the price has always remained high. There are a lot of small fish and shrimp here, and raising ducks is not difficult at all, which can increase the income of farmers. There are also some small fishing wharves built around the lake, and fishermen can build small fishing boats on the tidal flats themselves, and they can follow the example of the Luoqia Lake and use lights to trap fish and shrimp. The fishery resources in this lake are so abundant that they cannot be wasted. ”

"Also, domestic hemp rope and twine cannot be imported from abroad. I have argued with people from the Ministry of Agriculture that the land here is relatively fertile only near the estuary, and the soil fertility in other places is really average. Therefore, I decided to promote the cultivation of flax in this place to gradually get rid of the dependence on imported hemp rope. Linen is still quite useful, whether it is military or civilian, it is in great demand. Money can't be made by foreigners, and if you can solve it yourself, you can solve it yourself. "With a steady output of flax, we can make ropes and weave fishing nets here." I heard that Lao Shao in the Xiling area in the south is planning to develop deep-sea fishing and even whaling in Luoqia Port, and the demand for these fishing nets and cables will definitely rise sharply in the future. As for the fertile soil, I'm going to arrange for them to grow soybeans and vegetables. In the future, a small ship repair yard and a coal and water station will be built here to provide supply and maintenance for incoming and outgoing ships. The geographical conditions here are quite superior, and the development will only be better than the place that is not embarrassing or embarrassing in Xiayihe Fort. ”

Liang Jian nodded, in fact, as Peng Zhicheng's secretary for many years, he had already had a general understanding of the planning of this place, and this time it was just to confirm. Previously, Xu Wenxuan, assistant to the county magistrate of Ping'an County, took Shao Shude's path and asked him about it, asking Commissioner Peng what arrangements for this place were. This guy has made a lot of money by opening an oil extraction workshop in recent years, although it is worse than the dividends that Liang Jian receives from the East Coast Company every year, but I have to admit that this guy is already one of the first people in China to get rich.

Xu Wenxuan has been in the oil extraction business for many years, and now his morale is getting higher and higher, this time he has attracted several new shareholders, including Liang Jian's 500 yuan investment, and then applied for a 3,500 yuan loan from the United Industrial Credit Bank to prepare for a machine oil mill project. At present, private capital is not prohibited from entering these industries that "do not involve the national economy and people's livelihood", so Xu Wenxuan's project to go to the large oil mill was quickly approved by the Ministry of Industry and Commerce.

At present, his only concern is that it is too troublesome to buy raw materials - because soybean cultivation in China has always been scattered, and when he heard that Commissioner Peng was planning to open a large soybean planting area around Qishanbao and use machines to harvest to improve efficiency, he moved his mind to open the factory here. As one of the shareholders, Liang Jian also appreciated his idea, and after helping him confirm it after the most difficult time, the matter was settled. (To be continued......)