Compared with the Land Reform Bureau, the work style of the tax bureau is relatively rough, most of them are expressionless, and after checking the account books of the Meng family, they present the documents of the tax bureau, collect tax silver according to the tax rate, and issue tax payment certificates. Compared with the personal income tax levied on the Meng family, the agricultural tax that tenants need to pay is almost negligible. According to the administrative plan of the Provisional Government, the collection of agricultural taxes was to be abolished in 1905. Of course, at this stage, the tax bureau still has to rely on the assistance of the army in order to complete the tax collection work, and the law enforcement agency under the tax bureau is being set up, and the name is set to be the tax police corps, and I have heard that the corps is no worse than the regular army in terms of equipment except for large-caliber artillery.

On January 1, 1903, the Provisional Government issued a financial reform program, the main content of which was to change the form of currency and issue paper money. The newly established central bank was responsible for the issuance of banknotes, and the new currency, known as the "Huayuan", was well-made and generous-looking. Previously, Lü Liang had been using a large amount of undersea gold and silver to support economic operations and huge infrastructure construction expenditures, and after the issuance of paper money, these gold and silver could be used as the basis for issuing currency.

Through the strong control of the provisional government and the strong economic control ability, the implementation of Huayuan proceeded very quickly. Whether it is a heavy industrial enterprise or a light industrial enterprise, as long as it belongs to the Ziqiang Chamber of Commerce, they all use Huayuan for salary payment at the first time. The government-organized infrastructure has a workforce of millions of workers, whose wages are also in Chinese dollars, bank outlets have opened exchange platforms for metal currency and paper money, and shops under the Ziqiang Chamber of Commerce also use Chinese dollars for circulation. The new currency, the Chinese yuan, was soon widely circulated in the three provinces, and the initial results of the monetary reform were achieved.

In Mengzi, Yunnan, a huge contingent of people appeared in the dense jungle and mountains, these people were dressed in tatters and hunched bodies, under the supervision of foreigners armed with rifles, and from time to time people who worked fell to the ground and were thrown aside by the cruel overseers. This is the construction site of the Yunnan-Vietnam Railway.

In February 1903, France signed the "Regulations of the Yunnan-Vietnam Railway" with the Manchu Qing Dynasty and obtained the right to build the railway, and the sovereignty of the railway belonged to France. In fact, before the signing of this charter, the French Governor-General's Office of Indochina had been surveying, selecting and designing the railway for several years, and in 1901, the Governor's Office signed the "Haiphong Yunnan Province Railway Contract" with the French consortium, and the project was carried out in its entirety.

More than 200,000 Chinese workers recruited from Yunnan, Guizhou, Guangxi, Shandong, Sichuan and other places worked on this railway line, and in the original history, after the construction of this railway, more than 80,000 Chinese laborers died.

Song Sanpao was originally a farmer in the Jiaodong area of Shandong, and after being deceived into coming here, he had to complete two cubic meters of earthwork every day, working at least ten hours a day. There are a total of 30 people in Jiaodong who came with him on this construction site, and now three have died. Those foreign bag foremen were called twice a day, they would be whipped when they were tired and wanted to take a break, they couldn't eat, they were tired from work, they were abused, and there was a miasma everywhere, and Song Sanpao didn't know if he could survive tomorrow.

Like Song Sanpao, there are not a few who can't stand it anymore, and there are already more than fifty people secretly connected in series, ready to find an opportunity to escape, otherwise no one will survive! They stocked up a pitiful amount of food, looking for a possible opportunity to escape, and when one day when the mountain was blown up and rocks were blown up, more than 30 laborers were accidentally killed, and Song Sanpao and others could not wait any longer, so they decided to flee that night.

At midnight that day, more than 50 people walked out of the shed and plunged into the nearby mountains and forests while the guards were asleep. Unfortunately, one of the people at the end of the procession was weakened and came across a broken stone, which struck a shovel, and the sound of the collision was so harsh in the quiet darkness that the foreign guards were awakened to find the fleeing team.

The pursuit ensued, and fifty foreigners armed with rifles followed closely all the way, and the physically weak fugitives continued to be left behind, until dawn, and the exhausted crowd still did not escape the pursuit.

"Brother Song, you are our head, what do you say we should do?" Everyone panted and half-squatted on the ground, looked at Song Sanpao and asked. The escape team was organized by him, and the plan and escape route he chose were also set by him, and everyone faintly took him as the leader. What's more, Lao Song participated in the Boxer Rebellion back then, and he was also a small leader, and he only went home to work as a farmer after failure.

Song Sanpao looked around, the fifty-one people who had escaped were now only forty-two people left, and the others would definitely not be able to be found. Now the problem is that these people are all exhausted, and the one-night escape has exhausted everyone's physical strength, and they must find a place to rest!

"Brothers, the foreigners are still chasing behind, they are well fed and have strength, unlike us. If you want me to say, if you want to live, you might as well fight and let's hide in that forest. ”

"Brother Song, there must be miasma in there! There are also poisonous snakes and mosquitoes, which may not be able to get out if you go in. Are there fewer of our laborers who are poisoned by miasma and swallowed by pythons? ”

"Life and death are fate, it's better to wait for death here! I'll go, will you go? ”

In fact, there was no choice, everyone followed Song Sanpao into the forest, and the pursuit of the foreigners ended here. Ten days later, according to the route chosen by Song Sanpao, the fleeing party finally had to run to Guangxi, where it was now the territory of the revolutionary party, and as long as they were willing to exert their strength, eat well and dress well, they could earn a lot of silver. If the Guangxi people among the laborers had not been deceived, they would not have gone to the mountains of Yunnan to suffer!

The straight-line distance from Mengzi to Guangxi is more than 200 kilometers, but in fact, it can be thousands of miles! When Song Sanpao walked into Guangxi and was discovered, he was also a savage and was almost not killed. After recuperating in the local village for a few days, Song Sanpao was picked up by the local government. Of the fifty-one people who set out from Mengzi together, only three survived with him, and the others all died on the way. Miasma, poisonous snakes, hunger, local Miao tribes, etc., are all deadly existences.

The news reached the upper echelons of the provisional government and attracted the attention of Lu Liang. In this era, the Chinese were treated like primitive people by the Western powers, and in the United States, in Southeast Asia, and even at home, countless Chinese people were bullied and even slaughtered!

"We already know about the Yunnan-Vietnam Railway built by the Viceroy of French Indochina, but what we didn't expect is that France has begun to build this railway, and a large number of Chinese laborers have been requisitioned to participate in the construction, and the imperial court even took the initiative to cooperate with the French colonists to build this railway artery without sovereignty. Laborer Song Sanpao escaped by chance, and the news he came from him was that our compatriots on the construction site were bullied, and people died on that construction site every day. ”

"Chief, I know what you want to do. Rational analysis, now is not the moment of war with France, one of the great powers, which is contrary to our strategic plan and not conducive to long-term development. Lu Yi said.

"In fact, we are not without contradictions with the French colonists, after the liberation of Guangxi, we bordered French Indochina, and we even placed a corps in the border area, just to guard against the wolf ambitions of the colonists. The most important thing is that our Zhanjiang port was originally a French colony - Guangzhou Bay. In 1899, the imperial court leased it to the French, and the French colonists continued to expand their influence near Zhanjiang. After the revolutionary uprising, we negotiated the construction of advanced torpedo boats and a large sum of money to redeem them, but there were still many people in France and the Viceroyalty of Indochina who were concerned about it. "Lu Min has been with Lu Liang for a long time, and his thinking ability has become more and more mature.

Speaking of Guangzhou Bay, there is also an interesting story, before the Russo-Japanese War, France was crazy obsessed with torpedo boats, a coastal defense weapon, Lu Liang through public relations activities in France, successfully used a World War II-level torpedo boat drawing, touched the arrogant heart of the French, and promoted the peaceful settlement of the Guangzhou Bay issue. Of course, in addition to the drawings, there is also a wealth of up to 50 million taels of silver, and now it seems that the money is spent in vain, and it still has to be solved through war!

"In the long run, the Yunnan-Vietnam Railway will be a big problem for us to conquer the Yunnan-Guizhou region. From a national point of view, we cannot remain indifferent to the loss of sovereignty and the dead and wounded workers. In the past, because of our limited ability and the lack of a whip, now we can no longer hide our ears and steal the bell, pretending that we can't see anything. After Lu Liang finished speaking, he fell into thought, and everyone stopped talking when they saw Lu Liang's thoughtful appearance, waiting for Lu Liang's decision.

More than 20 years ago, the undefeated defeat of the Sino-French War was still in Lu Liang's mind, like a dark cloud that could not be dispersed. When I learned this section in the history textbooks of that year, every teacher and every student would cry out for the humiliation of the country and the nation, and these humiliations also became a torch for young people to ignite their patriotic hearts. He is a hot-blooded young man, but he is also the leader of the provisional government, and the choice between war and peace is a decision between reason and blood.

Thinking of this, Lu Liang shook his head, reason, it is because of reason, the country in later generations still uses Taoguang to cover up the humiliation of the people, and it is because of reason that the people have to bear every "most serious protest", the provocation of the three fats, the plane being hit, and the island being occupied. Lu Liang doesn't want to continue to bear such sanity in this era! The backbone of the people of the country is not straightened by reason, but by fighting blood and fire again and again!