Recently, there has been some instability outside Yancheng Port.

The cause of instability does not come from the sea, but from the adjacent inland areas. The East Coasters were located in a small settlement in the salt marshes (in the later town of Medanos, named after the mountains of salt in the salt desert to the west) - a town that was clearly identified in the Treaty of Valladolid as belonging to the East Bank - and a group of Tverche people came nearby, and these tall Indians (generally more than 1.8 meters) brutally expelled some of the small Klandi tribes attached to the East Bankers, and then fetched salt and hunted nearby. Although they don't seem to have any intention of occupying the area for long, and they only come once a week or two, it still causes a certain amount of panic among the inhabitants of the East Coast who settle here and make a living from salt mining.

In desperation, Yancheng Port could only send people to build a ring of tall brick walls outside the settlement, and at the same time erect 6 light artillery pieces for them at the head of the wall. With these weapons that can be called killers, the local salt miners have made up their minds a little and continue to mine a huge amount of salt in the local area.

Shao Yuanyi hired several gauchos as escorts in Yancheng Port, and then followed the sandy road to Yanshan Fort along the sandy road where salt was transported. The road is full of large and small swamps and lakes on both sides, and the north and south sides almost extend out for tens of kilometers in width. Since the marshy area had just had a rainy winter, the large and small lakes and ponds were filled with water - unfortunately, most of these pools were brackish or brackish, and only a few were fresh.

The lakes vary in color, from red to blue (reflecting the sky). The lake is full of flocks of flamingos. They feed on crustacean insects or some other small animals in the swamp. Occasionally, some ostriches, swamp deer, and other animals come over to lick the raw salt. But they are rarely close to the road, where heavy carriages often run back and forth to Guò.

With the abundant rain, the salt crust (the silt covered with salt) that had been compacted in the summer has now melted, and the foul-smelling gray-black silt is everywhere. There is a large amount of snow-white salt piled up on the edge of the salt lake, it looks so white and flat, with a thickness of tens of centimeters, and under the water surface in the center of the salt lake, the thickness of the salt layer is more than one meter, which is full of wealth!

According to the sampling and testing of Wang Dali and others appointed by the Ministry of Geology and Mineral Resources. The salt marshes near the Salt Hill Fort, which stretches for tens of kilometers, produce very high levels of salt. For example, in the pure salt area near the salt lake that does not contain sodium sulfate, the mined salt hardly needs to be purified, except for 0.26% gypsum and 0.22% soil, the rest is basically sodium chloride, which is surprisingly pure.

"We have a mountain of salt here, but except for people from China who come to buy it, the foreign market is still blank. They either used salt collected by the Dutch from inside the salt lake on Curaçao, or sea salt that the Portuguese dried in Cape Verde. A cadre of the Corps Fort who was on his way to Yanshan Fort with Shao Yuanyi complained, "We have to change this unfavorable situation, or find a way to sell the salt abroad." Either find a way to develop the salt chemical industry, otherwise we will never be rich here. ”

"How do you solve the problem of drinking water in the salt marshes?" Shao Yuanyi suddenly remembered this question. So he asked. He was really curious, that kind of place is full of salt lakes and salt deserts, how do the workers who live there drink water?

"Digging wells, building artificial reservoirs, and looking for freshwater lakes in the wild...... the cadet cadres were stunned for a moment, and then quickly replied without thinking: "Well water is not always salty, and the well water drilled in many places is drinkable, but it is just a little saltier than the local water on the east coast; Artificial cisterns are very simple, and they are currently our main source of drinking water, because they are clean, and this water comes either from rainfall or from streams and rivers that flood after spring, when the Andes is flooded with snowmelt, and the water flowing in these streams will change from brackish to fresh; The other is the wild freshwater lakes, and for the same reason as above, there are even some aquatic animals living in these lakes, which is quite magical. ”

"Especially in the rainy winter and spring, the water in these lakes is very salty and completely drinkable." The cadet cadres gushed to Shao Yuanyi to introduce them. Perhaps his usual subordinates were a bunch of rough men—not very good people to talk to—so he was very eager to talk at the moment, so he continued: "But be careful when you go out during this season, and it's better to bring a helmet or hat, because hail is frequent. Last year, there were several hailstorms, one of which killed a lot of animals foraging outside, and I picked up the carcasses of 25 ostriches and 7 deer outside the walls of Salt Hill Fort - all of them were killed by hail - in short, in this amazing place, you have to be careful. ”

The group continued to move forward, and the lakes on both sides of the road gradually increased. The cadet cadres pointed out to Shao Yuanyi that the shore of the lake is sandy and gravel, and it is generally freshwater, and the shore and bottom of the lake must be a layer of clay, and the surrounding reeds are also extremely dense, guinea pigs, ostriches, wild ducks, swamp deer, foxes and even cougars will move here; As for the lakes with foul-smelling black silt on their shores, they were mostly saltwater lakes, and the bottom of the lake must have been a thick layer of crystalline salt. There are very few plants nearby, and few animals come here except for flamingos, which are happy to catch insects and eat them.

"Is there a big threat from the Indians in the neighborhood? I mean the Tverche people, I have heard that they have a very unfriendly attitude and have expelled some of the Klandi tribes who are attached to us. Looking at the salt marsh area full of wealth, Shao Yuanyi's heart gradually became lively, and it was at this time that he was more concerned about the safety of this land.

"Yes, these barbarians!" Speaking of this question, the young student soldier changed to a hideous expression: "That Tverche tribe is a big tribe, and there are horses, I really don't know where they got it." They evicted a small village of Krandi living south of the salt marshes, killed four Krandi men, stole three cows and ten sheep, and sent men to warn us. ”

"Warning what?" Shao Yuanyi was a little surprised.

"Warning that we have usurped their land." "We took out the Valladolid Treaty, but they didn't recognize it. They said that the Spaniards wanted to buy land north of the Colorado River as far as Mar del Plata with only a hundred horses, but they did not agree. That is, it was the Spaniards who unilaterally declared their sovereignty over this land, which they considered inexpedient and therefore demanded that we withdraw from it, or pay them sufficiently. ”

"Pay these savages? You agreed? Shao Yuanyi asked again.

"Of course it's impossible." The cadet cadre pursed his lips and said, "Although the Kingdom of Spain does not have a single settlement in this vicinity, not even a single settler, this does not prevent their country from claiming sovereignty over this land. As for the Tverches, they are barbarians, do you think they have the right to occupy this vast and rich territory? ”

Shao Yuanyi was silent when he heard this. Yes, with the current trend of thought in the East Coast, it is enough for the Tverche people to take refuge in them, and if they dare to oppose the East Coast, then the end will obviously be extremely tragic. The people of the East Coast did not recognize their ownership of the land at all, on the contrary, the Spaniards, although they did not even have a single settler here, were civilized people, old colonial powers, and undoubtedly had sovereignty over the land, as is often the case in the world.

Of course, the people of the East Coast are not inflexible fools. In the future, if they had a quarrel with the Spaniards, they might have acknowledged without shame that the Tverces were the rightful owners of the land, and then, leaving Spain, would happily buy large tracts of land from the barbarians at a pittance of a few hundred cattle and a hundred and ten horses. One thing, two different views, two diametrically opposed methods of operation, the use of the magic of the same mind.

Yanshan Fort soon arrived, and Shao Yuanyi and others rode their horses to the outside of the fort wall. Some farmers here are busy, and the cadet cadres said that these people are plowing the land, and next month they will sow sorghum -- a drought-tolerant, salinity-tolerant, and barren-tolerant high-yield crop. Shao Yuanyi felt that these dozens of peasants were probably the few people in Yanshan Fort who made a living by growing grain, and they also set up some wooden fences under the fort wall and raised some ostriches and sheep in captivity. Ostrich provides eggs – a three-toed ostrich egg is the size of 11 eggs and is nutritious – and the sheep provide meat, leather and fur, accompanied by vegetables and sorghum grown by themselves, and life is not so difficult.

"Representatives of the army and the Southern Railway Company are here, they are holding a meeting in the township government, and Township Chief Wang asked you to go to the meeting as soon as you come back." Soon a militiaman trotted over to inform the cadet cadres who were traveling with him.

After hearing this, the cadet cadre straightened his hat, then turned his head to Shao Yuanyi and said apologetically: "I'm sorry, friend, I think I have to go to a meeting." It is estimated that it is a military meeting, and the army and the road convoy of the Southern Railway Company will be dispatched together to recruit these barbarians who threaten us, and by the way, also capture some slaves and send them to the construction site of the Southern Cone Interoceanic Railway. Okay, without further ado, I'll go to the meeting first, goodbye! ”

The words of the cadet cadres revealed a lot of information, and Shao Yuanyi had some doubts in his heart, it seemed that the local people would only tolerate any provocation from the barbarians, and a thunderous blow was coming. This is good news for Shao Yuanyi, after all, if he wants to invest in Yancheng Port to develop his business in the future, then a safe environment must be a must.

On October 10, 1650, after a brief two-day stay at Yanshan Fort, Shao Yuanyi hurried back to the port of Yancheng under the escort of the gauchos, preparing to return to the mainland—and by the way, also took Anna's two children to their grandfather to live for a while. (To be continued......)