Zuo Jigao's idea of "dual-use military and commercial use" can only be said to be a good wish, but after all, it is only a wish, and it is inevitable to focus on it when it is really implemented in the design of warships; for example, the "No. 1 steamship" designed by the French for Qianguo is equipped with a vertical steam engine that is mostly used by merchant ships in accordance with Zuo Jigao's requirements. The vertical steam engine has both advantages and disadvantages, the advantage is that the vertical steam engine is more space-saving, and it is more valuable for commercial purposes that require a large amount of space in the ship to arrange the cargo hold. The disadvantage is that the vertical steam engine was mainly used by merchant ships at that time, and the height requirements for the installation position in the ship were large, which would inevitably cause the freeboard of the warship to be heightened, and then the broadside of the warboard was bombed in large areas, and the probability of being shot was also high, and there were many drawbacks in the use of gunboats. Judging from the characteristics of the French designed ship, such as the enlargement of the hull, the use of a vertical steam engine, the expansion of the cargo capacity to 260 tons, and the fact that the engine room and cargo hold occupy almost two-thirds of the space in the ship, the proportion of merchant ships in the design of the "No. 1 steamship" seems to be too large, but as a merchant ship, the cargo volume is too small and lacks competitiveness. Therefore, such a ship seems to be able to be used for both military and commercial purposes, but in fact it is "a mistake for both military and commercial purposes".

In addition, when choosing the site for the shipyard, the conceited Zuo Jigao also made a big mistake, and the location of the shipyard was determined by him, which had inherent deficiencies, which limited the development of the shipyard.

The shipyard area selected by Zuo Jigao is located on the river bank on the left side of Mawei Port, which is located at the confluence of the Wulong River, Bailong River and Qinjiang River in the lower reaches of the Minjiang River, 30 kilometers away from the mouth of the Minjiang River, with abundant water. It is surrounded by mountains. Outside the mouth of the Minjiang River, there are islands such as Langqi Island and Matsu Islands as natural barriers. It is a natural harbor with good shelter conditions, sufficient fresh water supply, and no freezing or silting.

Although the riverbank on the left side of Mawei Port, where the shipyard is located, is dangerous, easy to defend and difficult to attack, and has abundant water, no siltation, the water depth on the shore is too shallow, only 5 meters, and it is neither possible to berth ships with a deep draft, nor can any ships with a draft close to 5 meters be built (even if they are built, they cannot be launched).

Even if a ship with a draft of no more than 5 meters is built, it depends on the mood of the river when it is launched, and it can only be successfully launched at high tide; Moreover, the soil in Zhongqi Township is loose, which is not suitable for excavating traditional stone dry docks. Because the soil here is too loose. It is very easy to cause serious accidents such as water seepage or landslides, so the shipmaster later chose to use the "Labert" type tugboat dock, which is less difficult to construct. Although the tugboat owned by the Harbour Master was the largest in the Far East and the second largest in the world at that time, the largest number of ships of about 2,500 tons was allowed to be docked for maintenance, which objectively limited the tonnage of ships built by the Harbour Master's Bureau.

Lin Yizhe was naturally very clear about the improper selection of the site of the shipyard and the drawbacks of the idea of "dual-use of arms and businessmen", and he argued on the basis of reason that the site of the shipyard should be changed to the northwest of the Ma Limit Mountain, at the junction of the western part of the Yingyu Mountain, where the soil is solid and suitable for building a factory. There is also a barrier from the Ma Limit Mountain, which can block the typhoon from disturbing. However, Lin Yizhe's suggestion was opposed by Zhou Kaixi, the subordinate of Zuo Jigao. Although Shen Youdan, who was also Lin Yizhe's uncle at the time, believed that Lin Yizhe's suggestion was correct, he was afraid of offending Zuo Jigao because of this, so he hesitated. Soon after, however, a typhoon struck, causing a widespread collapse of the riverbank where the shipyard was located, destroying not only the hard-built slipway, but also killing and injuring many workers. This natural disaster made Shen Youan realize that the site of the shipyard must be changed, so he adopted Lin Yizhe's opinion and moved the site to the place proposed by Lin Yizhe, which is the site of today's shipyard.

In order not to offend Zuo Jigao, Shen Youdan wrote a letter to Zuo Jigao to inform Zuo Jigao and explained in detail the reason for the relocation while explaining to the imperial court that he had taken responsibility for the typhoon disaster and decided to relocate, Zuo Jigao was worried that the imperial court would hold him accountable for the improper location selection, so he agreed with Shen Youdan's decision to relocate, but he was always dissatisfied with Lin Yizhe, who initiated the relocation and accused him of improper site selection.

The second fierce conflict between Lin Zuo and the two was because of the "dual-use" ship type.

Although Lin Yizhe pointed out the mistake of the "No. 1 steamship" design idea of "dual-use military and business", Shen Youdan, the minister of shipping, did not want to offend Zuo Jigao because of this, so he did not accept Lin Yizhe's suggestion, but still built the "No. 1 steamer" according to the original design of "dual-use military and business", that is, the later "Wan Nianqing" (the name of the ship means "eternal evergreen").

The "Wan Nian Qing" belongs to the 150-horsepower large steamer in the shipbuilding plan of the Ship Administration, and can be roughly classified as a gunboat in terms of ship type. The design of the "Evergreen" is the French "LaMotte-Picquet" class gunboat, but it is not simply imitated, the "Evergreen" has been expanded in size and tonnage, and the reason why it is so is to meet the purpose of "dual-use weapons and businessmen" proposed by Zuo Zongtang, and increase the cargo compartment in the original gunboat design, so as to have the dual identity of a gunboat and a cargo ship at the same time.

With a displacement of 1,450 tons, almost twice as much as the parent type, the "Evergreen" largely retains the characteristics of a sail warship, with a mast in the bow and three mainmasts on the main deck that are slightly tilted back, which can be hung up for sailing if necessary. The open-air deck of the "Evergreen" is very simple in construction, in front of the middle mast is the engine room shed, chimney, hair dryer, the corresponding boiler and steam engine are in the hull below it, not far before the chimney is the command center of the whole ship - a flybridge across the two sides, equipped with standard compasses, navigation lights installed on the two wings, under the flybridge is a wooden wheelhouse, and there is no armored command tower necessary for later warships. As a common practice for warships in that era, in addition to the main hydraulic steering wheel in the wheelhouse, there was also a set of spare manpower steering wheels before the aftermath of the "Evergreen", because the warship was small in tonnage, so it was equipped with twin steering wheels. In the front and rear of the chimney and flybridge buildings, two sets of huge cargo covers with a capacity of 260 tons can be seen distributed on the deck. The engine room and cargo hold occupy almost two-thirds of the space in the "Evergreen" ship, and under the remaining bow deck are the anchor chain cabin, toilet, sailor cabin and other cabins, and the remaining space in the stern is all the officer's living quarters.

As a gunboat, the "Evergreen" is also armed with force, from the side side. The "Evergreen" has 5 gun doors per side. Theoretically, up to 10 guns can be installed. However, due to the very narrow door of the gun, the room for adjustment of the firing range of the gun was very small, which led to its weak firepower and low combat effectiveness.

The "Evergreen" went smoothly for the sea trial, but when it went to the open sea for sea trials, it happened to encounter pirates plundering merchant ships, and the "Evergreen" went forward to rescue the merchant ships and shell the pirates, but due to the lack of firepower (due to financial constraints. At that time, only three 24-pounder breech guns were installed on each side), which not only failed to repel the pirates, but led to a frenzied siege by the pirates, and the design idea of "dual-use weapons and merchants" can be described as a complete failure.

Seeing that there was an opportunity, the pirates attacked the "Evergreen" with artillery at the same time, and launched a broadside battle, intending to rob the "Evergreen", the situation was very dangerous for a time, but fortunately, in order to strengthen the firepower of the "Evergreen", Lin Yizhe installed three Gatling machine guns that he had modified from a "Montigany" platoon gun left by a Belgian merchant as a melee weapon in the mast of the "Evergreen". Relying on these three "Lin's machine guns" (equivalent to an improved version of the Gatling machine gun, because it was registered in the Qianguo before Gatling. Therefore, the "Evergreen" successfully destroyed more than 10 pirate ships, killed more than 100 pirates, and successfully rescued merchant ships.

After this turmoil, Shen Youdan, the Minister of Shipping, went to the imperial court, saying that he had sent the "Wan Nianqing" to set sail north, asked the imperial court to send a large official to inspect it, and respectfully asked the imperial court to "favor and give a good name". But what Shen Youdan never expected was that not long after, he actually received a reply from the imperial court that "the steamship built by Zuo Jigao is not perfect" and a copy of Zuo Jigao's impeachment of the shipmaster.

Zuo Jigao participated in the impeachment of "the Fujian Provincial Shipping Bureau's manufacture of steamships is arbitrarily delayed, and the Minister of Shipping deliberately conceals it." Zuo Jigao said in his recital that "the Fujian Provincial Shipping Bureau's manufacture of steamships has been attacked and the industry has become ill once it has been stormy." He also said that "I heard that in recent years, the bureau's staff and craftsmen have become more and more deteriorating, and the arrogance of the manufacturing gentry and the ineffective supervision of the work are not as good as when they were first established." It can be said that it has been a reversal of the blow with the phrase "to make an example of the future." Lin Yizhe and Shen Youdan were very angry about this, and the court immediately ordered Zeng Bohan, the governor of Liangjiang, to check the recital, Zeng Bohan learned more from Lin Yizhe, and the recital said, "At the beginning of the establishment of the shipyard, the Zuo family set the ship type as a dual-purpose ship for military and commercial purposes, that is, if there is something, it is thought that the military ship is in charge, and if there is nothing to do, it is thought that it is a merchant ship, and the cargo is captured and stolen." It is necessary to know that the method of shipbuilding in modern times, the function of the ship type is emphasized, the warship is mainly capable of war, and the merchant ship is mainly loaded with multiple cargo. The type of ship determined by Zuo is regarded as a warship, and the firepower is too single; It is a merchant ship, and the cargo capacity is small. Zuo's desire to use both soldiers and merchants is really a mistake between soldiers and merchants", the imperial court accepted Zeng Bohan's statement and rejected Zuo Jigao's recital.

After Zeng Bohan pointed out that Zuo Jigao did not know how to pretend to understand the policy of building a dual-purpose ship for military and commercial purposes, which caused the combat effectiveness of the "Wan Nian Qing" to be low, the angry Zuo Ji Gao could not find a word of excuse, and even put the blame on the two foreign superintendents of the ship administration, Ri Yige and Da Shibo, who defended himself and said that he was "deceived by foreigners", accusing Ri Yige of deliberately not providing him with the best ship type, and Da Shibo "harbored evil intentions" when designing Chinese steamships, and deliberately designed the "Wan Nian Qing" with low combat effectiveness. After learning the news, Riyige was speechless, and once wanted to resign, but was retained by Shen Youdan's kind words. As the chief designer of the "Evergreen", the scholarly Dasbo resolutely refused to be blackened, and he showed direct evidence - a set of drawings of the "Evergreen" full battleship plan, saying that this was his original design of the "Evergreen", but was personally vetoed by Zuo Jigao, who insisted on adding cargo hold to the battleship, so that the "Evergreen" was twice as large as the parent type. Riyige also confirmed to Shen Youdan that this was indeed the case, and said that the former deputy superintendent of the ship's administration, Dikebei, who is now serving in the Zuo Jigao Army in the northwest, also knew about it. Shen Youdan played the court according to this, Zuo Jigao made a fuss again, and the court suppressed the matter in order to prevent the escalation of the war of words, and specially instructed Zuo Jigao to "don't play anymore", which means that you don't want to make trouble anymore. Zuo Jigao had nowhere to come out, and in a fit of anger, he dismissed Dirk Bei and kicked him back to France.

After this turmoil, Zuo Jigao gritted his teeth and hated Shen Youdan and Lin Yizhe, and also hated the Harbour Bureau, and had stopped the shipmaster's funds under the pretext of "the west's expedition to pay in a hurry", but fortunately, Lin Yizhe and Shen Youdan managed to raise funds in many ways, coupled with donations from domestic businessmen, not only maintained the shipmaster's bureau, but also built the first steam fleet in the Qianguo country, the shipmaster's sailor.

Lin Yiqing knew that Zuo Lin's feud was due to a reason. And why did Hu Yulin have a grudge with Lin Yizhe. He didn't know. But he also understands a situation, that is, Hu Yulin, who is also the procurement office of the shipping master, left the shipping master shortly after Zuo Lin's friendship, and since then he has been cut off from the shipping master, which also seems to have an unknown inside story.

"The general doesn't know that the reason why Brother Ling has a grudge with the Hu family is not because of Zuo Gong, but because of Brother Ling's sister-in-law." Lu Qingyun smiled slightly and said.

"Oh?" I heard Lu Qingyun give such an answer. Lin Yiqing couldn't help but be a little surprised.

"The general doesn't know, Ling's brother and sister-in-law Chen Wan is the beloved daughter of Chen Shi, the current governor of Moss Bay, and the Hu family covets her beauty and wants to be accepted as a concubine. It was because he refused to be invited, and Hu was very hateful, and said that Lord Chen was not in front of Zuo Gong, so Zuo Gong thought that it was unfavorable for Lord Chen to suppress the bandits, and he was impeached and dismissed. and assigned to Xinjiang, Chen Wan and her mother went to Yifuzhou, Shen Youdan, Lord Shen. Married to Brother Ling, and the Hu family did not give up, and wanted to get drunk with mixed liquor at the wedding banquet, but Brother Ling did not notice it, and fell asleep for three days before waking up. Lu Qingyun talked eloquently, "You must know that if Brother Ling is drunk to death, then Chen Wan will be a 'widow', and her life will be ruined, but fortunately, Brother Ling is in good health, and after being treated by the doctor, he woke up after three days, but it was also like a serious illness." ”

Hearing Lu Qingyun say this, Lin Yiqing suddenly remembered the dream he had about drunkenness at the wedding banquet when he first came to this time and space, and immediately understood that what Lu Qingyun said should be the truth.

Thinking of Hu Yulin being so insidious and vicious, Lin Yiqing couldn't help but change his face.

You must know that in this era, all kinds of feudal stereotypes have always bound traditional women. At this time, the Qianguo, like the previous feudal dynasties of the original time and space, was still a patriarchal society, and "from the beginning to the end" was considered to be the proper discipline of a woman from a good family. According to the customs of this era, after the engagement, if the fiancé dies first, the unmarried woman must keep the festival even if she is at home, and she is called "widow". A widowed woman is often considered to be "hard-hitting" and "kefu", so that it is difficult to remarry. Under the domination of this theory, the death of the fiancé often leaves a deep psychological shadow on the unfortunate woman, who thinks that she is "unlucky", and their end is only to be lonely for life.

In order to get a woman who refuses to succumb to her lustful desires, she actually resorts to such a cruel and vicious trick to ruin her life's happiness!

Hu Yulin's methods, compared with the "I can't get it, no one can think of it" paranoid people in historical time and space, but it is too far behind!

Thinking of Chen Wan's current situation, Lin Yiqing's heart ached.

"Although Brother Ling recovered later, it should have been at that time that he fell ill," Lu Qingyun continued, "Later, due to years of fatigue, coupled with the miasma in Moswan, and the wind and cold in Beijing, he died young......

"Thanks to what Mr. Lu said today, I learned that there was another hidden story in my brother's death." Lin Yiqing stared at Lu Qingyun and said in a deep voice, "The Hu family has wanted to harm my brother for a long time, I have always felt that my brother died of illness in Beijing, and there are many doubts, but now I understand it, I am afraid that the death of my brother is also what the Hu family has done to unknown people, right?" What does Mr. Lu think? ”

Hearing Lin Yiqing's words, Lu Qingyun's heart trembled, and then he realized that Lin Yiqing was really not easy to fool, and he was a powerful character like Lin Yizhe!

Regarding Lin Yizhe's death, he actually knew very well what Hu Yulin had done, but he didn't dare to say it in front of Lin Yiqing, for fear of affecting himself, so he just hinted vaguely with words, but he didn't expect Lin Yiqing to guess it at once!

"Lu thinks that it is possible that Lin Wenxiang was assassinated by the Hu family, as the general said." Lu Qingyun forcibly suppressed the panic in his heart, and said in a calm tone as much as possible, "The Hu family's methods of harming people have always been secretive and ruthless, and they want to harm Brother Ling for a long time, and they have the convenience of opening Hu Qingyu Hall, it is completely possible to come up with some invisible poison to assassinate Brother Ling." ”

"I must find out about this! Avenge your brother! Lin Yiqing gritted his teeth and said, "If it is really a thief, I will definitely cut him with a thousand knives!" ”

"Now that the Hu family tree has deep roots and Zuo Gong as its backstage, the general must not act impulsively." Lu Qingyun persuaded.

Now that he knows that he has sold Hu Yulin almost, it is time to plan for himself.

"What Mr. said is very true, I am angry in my heart, rude, please forgive me." Lin Yiqing nodded, took a deep breath, and made a gesture that he was trying to calm down.

"Lu came to say these words to the general today, not to betray the owner, but to provoke righteous indignation." Lu Qingyun sighed, "Lu knows that the Hu family is a person, if he has been from the Hu family for a long time, it will be difficult to ensure that he will not be harmed in the future, and he will retire early, but because of the embarrassment of his family, there is no way out, and he has not been able to make the trip. (To be continued......)

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