The process of collecting the cash was relatively smooth, but the withdrawal of troops was a bit troublesome.

Zhou Lang's current prestige was simply not enough to make those British officers absolutely obedient, although these officers had lost their sense of direction because of Colin's sudden death, but everyone had their own independent thinking.

Like Colin, they are all young officers from England, and most of their officer status is bought with money, the purpose is to make meritorious promotions, it can be said that they have something in common with Colin in terms of winning military merits.

Let them evacuate Guangzhou in an advantageous situation, not convincing enough, it is indeed difficult to get them to agree.

The reason thrown out by Zhou Lang was the current situation, there were more and more Qing troops concentrated in the surrounding area, and it would be very dangerous not to leave now.

At the military meeting, several officers were very fierce, but the three adjutants appointed by Zhou Lang were obedient to him.

Zhou Lang didn't have the patience to argue with these officers, once they formed a habit, it would be difficult to order them in the future.

"It's not asking for your opinion, it's an order!"

Zhou Lang had a tough attitude, with the cooperation of Fischer and the others, even if some young officers did not obey, he could transfer most of the army, and even if these British officers and Indian soldiers did not leave, Zhou Lang had no loss, and he even had some plans to directly put these people in Guangzhou and let them continue to entangle with the Qing army.

"Withdraw troops from today. Turn the back road to the front road and withdraw the troops in turn! ”

The back road turns to the front road, this way is common in novels, in fact, it is not scientific, the back road is often some logistics troops, and their withdrawal is equivalent to cutting off supplies from the front road. In fact, when an officer arranges a retreat, he is often more cautious than when he advances, because it is more dangerous, and a careless retreat will turn into a rout.

But now Zhou Lang is doing it deliberately, he just wants to let the Chinese soldiers who are responsible for logistics and supply in the back go first, so that the Indian and British troops in front will have no supplies, and they have to go.

Wang Fuqian, who led the rear troops, was very cooperative, he was really a smart person, and it took a few months to learn English and communicate with Colin, which is nothing, but it can help Colin instantly cleanse the forces of the Heaven and Earth Society in the army, and then firmly control the army, this is the ability.

But it was already very difficult for a traditional scholar like Wang Fuqian to learn English in a few months and help the British to take control of the army, and it was a bit difficult for him to fully understand the East India Company, a commercial institution, and the meaning of the joint-stock system, shareholders' meetings, and so on.

So up to now, Wang Fuqian still looks at Zhou Lang with a traditional Chinese worldview, he doesn't understand that Zhou Lang set up a company in India, and then brought these Indian soldiers, and what it means to start an incident in Taiwan, according to his understanding, he compares more with the Japanese in the Ming Dynasty, and he sees Colin and others more as the Japanese Japanese recruited by Zhou Lang.

It's just that he has been by Colin's side for a long time, although Colin didn't say anything on the surface, but he also saw that Colin didn't seem to listen to Zhou Lang's words very much, and Wang Fuqian understood it as Zhou Lang was vacated by the widows he recruited.

Scholars like Wang Fuqian are full of desire for fame and fortune, and there have been all dynasties and dynasties that rebelled after failing to take the imperial examination, and they have no firm right and wrong in their hearts, and they believe in the domineering logic of becoming a king and defeating a villain.

When he was in the left camp, he could betray the Heaven and Earth Society, which actually controlled the army, and now that Colin is dead, he can also immediately take refuge in the new master. In his opinion, although Zhou Lang was set aside by Colin before, his subordinates still have a certain strength, the key is to have righteousness, Zhou Lang is the nominal leader after all, the leader of those Yi people, and now that Colin is dead, other small Yi people are in the general trend, and they can't compete with Zhou Lang at all. He Wang Fuqian has no capital to stand on his own, he used to rely on Colin, he had a certain influence among the Chinese soldiers, and helped Colin improve the establishment of 3,000 recruits, but these 3,000 recruits have no combat effectiveness, and they are not from his Wang Fuqian to lead the army's salary, to be precise, these people are not his Wang Fuqian's people.

The only ones who can compete with Zhou Lang are those Yi leaders, and there is nothing to do with him Wang Fuqian anyway. But Wang Fuqian was more optimistic about Zhou Lang, so when Xie Qinggao came to him, he immediately actively helped Xie Qinggao control the front-line army. The subsequent development was as he expected, the small leaders of the Yiren people, not only were they not able to compete with Zhou Lang, but they were the biggest small leaders, and they were directly co-opted by Zhou Lang.

Now Zhou Lang ordered the troops to retreat, no matter what those small leaders were, Wang Fuqian was the first to support him, his position is now unstable, and he needs to behave in front of the new master.

Therefore, after Zhou Lang's order was issued, Wang Fuqian acted quickly, immediately arranged for his subordinates to retreat, and ran together with the logistics materials, he obviously understood the purpose of Zhou Lang's back road to change the front road, which was to force the soldiers to obey.

When the Indian soldiers on the front line were still on Huiai Street, the Chinese recruits under Wang Fuqian had already retreated to Sanyuanli.

I don't know what the British officers thought inside, but in short, they honestly obeyed Zhou Lang's order and began to retreat.

The retreat of the army made the city of Guangzhou breathe a sigh of relief.

But Wei Lianli has not left yet, he is still in the yamen of Guangdong Customs, and all the silver has not been sent away, but only twenty boxes remain.

Sheng Zhu didn't see Wei Lianli, he prides himself on his noble status, even if Wei Lianli stays in his yamen, the person who communicates with Wei Lianli has always been his master, and Cai Shiwen often comes to communicate with Wei Lianli.

The person responsible for handing over the ransom fee to the city is Cai Shiwen and the customs master.

Both of them were puzzled, not knowing why Wei Lianli didn't accept the last batch of silver.

"These are for the grand lord, my family handsome said, I want to make friends with the grand lord, and the days of relying on the grand lord will be long in the future."

This money is given as a gift to Shengzhu, which is also reasonable, who doesn't eat a kickback.

But Cai Shiwen heard something unusual from Wei Lianli's words: "In the future? ”

Wei Lianli nodded and said: "My marshal will inevitably come to Guangzhou to do trade in the future, and it is indispensable to deal with the customs." ”

The customs master and Cai Shiwen's faces have become not very good-looking, this time there has been such a big commotion, if they come often, who can stand it.

Wei Lianli didn't care about their feelings, and continued to taunt: "These are nothing, my family has a generous gift, but you have to go outside the city to get it yourself!" ”

Then Wei Lianli explained, and he went out of the city.

Wei Lianli also has an important task to do, that is, to help Zhou Lang recruit shipbuilders in the Huangpu area.

Most of the ships used by Guangdong merchants were built in the nearby shipyards near Guangzhou, in fact, they were in the Huangpu and Changzhou areas, especially in Huangpu.

The main reason why Zhou Lang values these craftsmen is that they can create a type of ship called the old lock boat. Local craftsmen also called this type of ship the Red Single Boat, mainly because of the strict management of maritime affairs by the Manchu Qing Dynasty. Just like the pilot, if the craftsman wants to build a ship, he also needs the local armor to sign a knot, and the government agrees. When building a vessel, it must be declared to customs, which will issue a red slip for inspection. Over time, the people called this kind of merchant ship that must be built with a red list as a red single ship.

Because the Qing Dynasty had strict restrictions on merchants going to sea for trade, there were strict regulations on the size of ships, loads, and even sailors, supplies and armaments, which led to the backwardness of China's shipbuilding industry in the Qing Dynasty.

It is no longer surpassed by Westerners, not even India, India's East India Company shipyard, which can build serious battleships for the British Navy, but no shipyard in China has this level.

However, it is not realistic to go to India to find shipbuilders for the East India Company, and it must be based on the use of local Chinese talents. More importantly, as a treaty port, Guangzhou has never severed its ties with Western shipbuilding technology. Therefore, unlike the traditional Chinese sailing boats, these Guangdong red single boats are boat types that combine Western technology.

As early as the Ming Dynasty, the Portuguese, who had obtained the right of abode in Macao, used a large number of Chinese sailing ships to carry out regional trade between China and the South Seas. The Portuguese found that Chinese sailing ships were thin and inferior to their thick Western ships in terms of protection against wind and waves and pirate attacks. But Chinese hard sails are easy to use, low cost, lighter weight, the key is that only a small amount of manpower can be lifted, which is very attractive to the Portuguese who are short of manpower, so the Portuguese will combine the long side of the Western-style sailing ship with the hull of the Chinese sailing ship and the hard sail of the Chinese-style sailing ship to create a new sailing ship with the advantages of both Chinese and Western sailing ships, which the Chinese call the old lock boat.

After this kind of ship was designed, because of the outstanding advantages, in addition to the use of the Portuguese, the shipwrights of Guangdong also imitated a large number of ships, and this type of ship was preferred by China's sea voyages.

However, this kind of ship is not absolutely advanced, it is just more suitable for the current situation in China. Because the Portuguese's own shipbuilding technology was not first-class in Europe, it was not comparable to the Netherlands in the past, and now it is not comparable to the British. The type of ship, designed with a combination of Portuguese and Chinese technology, also lagged behind the British ships.

Of course, this is still mainly limited by the inexplicable shipbuilding policy of the Qing government, because the Qing government does not allow the construction of large ships, resulting in the construction of such old lock ships can only be built of small models, the Portuguese are slightly more relaxed in shipbuilding in Macao, and can also build three-masted sailing ships, and Chinese merchants can only use two-masted small boats. After all, the Portuguese demand was limited, which led to the fact that this combination of Chinese and Western old lock ships did not develop with the times, and in the era when the British began to build warships with more than 100 cannons, the old lock ships could only be installed with 20 or 30 cannons at most.

However, Zhou Lang felt that the old lock ship is a combination of Chinese and Western technology after all, even if the hull structure is slightly backward, but the basic principle and structure are the same, as long as you are willing to pay tuition, I believe that Guangzhou craftsmen can build a British-level ship, even if the quality cannot catch up temporarily, at least in terms of firepower.

And in the unlikely event that such old locks proved to be indeed less suitable for combat than Western ships, then Zhou Lang intended to directly copy British warships, and in this respect the craftsmen of Canton were more helpful than those of other parts of China. Because although the Guangzhou shipwrights did not directly build Western ships, they knew the structure of Western ships very well. This is due to the conservative policy of the Qing government, which did not allow Westerners to build shipyards in Guangzhou, but the ships needed to be repaired, so they could only ask local craftsmen to help.

But the shipwrights in Whampoa, they were craftsmen, they were not rich and they could not starve, they refused to respond to Zhou Lang's recruitment, they did not want to leave Guangdong to go elsewhere.

When conventional means don't work, Zhou Lang has to use unconventional means, and Zhou Lang thinks that Wei Lianli is good at this kind of means.