Almost every day, there are always some foreigner compradors in and out of Tianjin's China Railway Company. Pen ~ fun ~ Ge www.biquge.info A month ago, the China Railway Company first presented its ambitious railway plan to the outside world - to build a railway connecting Zhili, Shandong and Henan within ten years, and this road network covering the entire Zhili Governor's area was obviously instructed by the Governor's Yamen.

As for where does this money come from?

In addition to the 2 million taels earmarked by the Governor-General's Yamen, it also issued bonds to raise road funds, which were even issued by the Bank of Korea in Tianjin and Shanghai.

In the past, the Tianjin Huashang Stock Exchange, like the Shanghai Huashang Stock Exchange, was the place where the Korean Unified Supervision Office raised funds for construction, and although it was quite difficult to set up, under several operations, and its dividends exceeded that of the Western Commercial Exchange founded at the same time, its operation has become increasingly prosperous, and because foreigners have issued bonds in China for decades, this bond stock matter has now been accepted by wealthy domestic businessmen.

Although it was affected by the war in the early stage, the exchanges in Tianjin and Shanghai had stopped trading for a time, with the end of the war, the Beiyang companies were all profitable, and those who invested in stocks and bonds all profited from it.

and the issuance of shares by China Railway Corporation and the construction bonds of the Zhili Railway. It just happened to take a ride on this "golden ticket", but in just one month, it successfully issued as many as 5 million taels of bonds and stocks in the two places. Sufficient funds have paved the way for China Railway Corporation to smoothly implement the construction of the project. The construction of this huge road network of thousands of kilometers has naturally attracted the attention of foreign businessmen from all over the world, and foreign businessmen who intend to sell materials such as rails, road materials, and locomotives have adopted various means to compete.

In addition to influencing the country's ministers and their advisers in the governor's yamen, what is more important is the promotion of foreign businessmen, and even the mutual bargaining. In the face of competition from Britain, Germany, France, the United States, Belgium and other foreign merchants, Sheng Xuanhuai, as the general manager of the railway company, tried his best to make concessions on price, and even formed an alliance with the Northeast Railway Company. The joint procurement of locomotives was conditional on the transfer of locomotive production technology and the establishment of two locomotive factories in Tangshan and Dalian. It is used for assembling and producing locomotives of the same type.

Of course, this negotiation was conducted entirely under the auspices of the Northeast Railway Company, and the China Railway Company was merely an observer. But Sheng Xuanhuai didn't mind asking Zhongtang for credit with this, and he didn't care about whether the Tangshan factory could build locomotives in the future. Compared with building locomotives in your own factory. What he values more is whether each locomotive can save 10,000 taels of silver as the Northeast Railway Company said, and for Lord Zhongtang, the 10,000 taels of silver saved is a real credit.

When the downstairs of the China Railway Company was as busy as ever, it was very quiet near the general manager's office upstairs, and those foreign businessmen had to persuade the section chiefs before the materials they submitted would be handed over to the general manager. Unless its backers are strong and can hold a letter of recommendation from Hurd and others. Otherwise, Sheng Xuanhuai will never be seen. Because of this, the general manager's office will be extremely quiet, and Sheng Xuanhuai, who is sitting in the office, is concentrating on reading the letter from the Niuzhuang Branch of China Merchants Shipping Bureau.

In addition to the position of general manager of China Railway Corporation, Sheng Xuanhuai is also the chairman of China Merchants Shipping Bureau, although now the limelight of China Merchants Shipping Bureau has been completely taken away by Beiyang Shipping, but there are still some routes, Tianjin to Niuzhuang is one of the few routes in Bohai Bay that are still retained, even so these routes are only barely maintained, and even Sheng Xuanhuai himself intends to withdraw these routes, but the increase or decrease of this route is not entirely up to it.

However, because of the convenience of holding the route, Sheng Xuanhuai also has the convenience that other Beiyang Yamen staff cannot enjoy, the convenience of collecting intelligence, this letter was brought with the ship, the letter is not long, but the information in it makes Sheng Xuanhuai unable to calm down for a long time: Tang Ziran in the northeast issued a decree to implement the military to grant land, and the land was granted according to the military rank.

This news made Sheng Xuanhuai feel relaxed and tense again, maybe he is just a businessman, and he doesn't know anything about military affairs, but as a businessman, he knows human nature very well, and the people of the country have asked for it all their lives, but they only have a meal to fill the hunger, a cloth to cover the body and a place to keep out the cold, and now he Tang Ziran waved his hand and awarded millions of acres of land to the Northeast Army, wouldn't it be enough to collect the hearts of the army? And how can the Northeast Army not be willing to die for it?

"This Northeast Army was originally a division of tigers and wolves, and now it is granted the land property in the future, wouldn't those Qiu Ba be even more desperate to fight in the future?"

Holding the letter in his hand, Sheng Xuanhuai couldn't help but think about it, and even became worried.

How could he not be worried, after all, for Sheng Xuanhuai, his personal wealth of honor and disgrace is completely based on Beiyang and Li Zhongtang's appreciation, although Tang Ziran is not the biggest political enemy for Zhongtang at the moment, but in the long run, even if Zhang Zhidong and Liu Kun are tied together, they are not a big threat.

Although it was said that he used to negotiate and force Tang Haoran to transfer 85,000 of his 100,000 tigers and wolves to Heilongjiang, Jilin and North Korea, it was just a solution to the immediate crisis.

Now that his 100,000 tigers and wolves have been lured by the fields, they will inevitably work harder in the future, and at that time, what army can Zhongtang use to resist those Siberian tigers and wolves who have entered the customs?

When Zeng Guofan relied on a small "double salary" to make the children of Xiangtan make the best use of it, when the Hunan people lured by the "double salary" fought with the bandits, they were all brave to die, and now Tang Haoran's grant of land is not more attractive than "double salary", after all, the silver is gone, and the land is passed on to future generations.

This Tang Haoran. The mind is too vicious!

Maybe it was because of the different positions, so Sheng Xuanhuai finally attributed this to his ruthlessness, after he Tang Haoran set this precedent. To put it mildly, the Northeast Army is willing to die for it, and to put it bigger, in the future, the strong men in the world will not be willing to join the army in the Northeast, and have no intention of entering the Beiyang. Even if this news comes out, the people in the Beiyang Army may have different intentions, and there is silver on one side. On one side of the land, which is more tempting?

"Xingsun, is Xingsun there?"

Just then, a slightly familiar-sounding voice. With the footsteps of several people, it came into Sheng Xuanhuai's ears from outside. His thoughts were completely interrupted, and he didn't hear who it was for a while, so he hurriedly put away the letter in his hand, got up and opened the door, and saw that the two people who came were acquaintances. Yan Xinhou, a general manager of Commerce Bank. One is Chen Shengjiao, a bank boss. These two are the presiding officers of the bank that he specially selected, and now the importance of the Commerce Bank to Sheng Xuanhuai is even far greater than that of the China Merchants Shipping Bureau, after all, the main purpose of his advocacy of the bank is to connect the enterprises he already controls through his own bank to form a unified economy, so as to further enhance his own strength.

After the establishment of the Commercial Bank, the enterprises under his auspices, such as the Commercial Bank, the China Merchants Steamship Bureau, and the Telegraph Office, all of them were able to obtain financing, and this convenience accelerated the development of other enterprises. Even the Beiyang Textile Bureau, which he founded, was founded entirely with loans from the Commerce Bank.

It is precisely because of this that he attaches great importance to the visit of Yan Xinhou, the general manager of the bank, and Chen Shengjiao, the head of the class. I even looked a little nervous, maybe something was wrong!

"Xiaofang, you are ......"

As soon as he saw Sheng Xuanhuai, Yan Xinhou stopped and turned back to Chen Shengjiao and said:

"Am I right? Since Xingsun is not in the middle hall, and she is not in the house, she will naturally be in the railway company. ”

After finishing speaking, Yan Xinhou and Sheng Xuanhuai played a haha:

"Xingsun, you won't blame me and Shenglin for taking the liberty of coming, right?"

Like Sheng Xuanhuai, Yan Xinhou is also Li Hongzhang's staff, and has served as the manager of the official silver account of Shanghai Daoku Huitong for a long time, in charge of the public funds of Shanghai Dao. He founded the most prestigious Yuanfengrun ticket number in the Nanbang bill exchange industry in Shanghai, and after Sheng Xuanhuai applied for a bank, as the most direct executor of Sheng Xuanhuai's intentions, he also became the first general manager after preparing for the establishment of China Commerce Bank. During the preparation of the bank, it invited dozens of business directors to the bank, and used their fame and funds to make the bank look out. Even Sheng Xuanhuai admired this very much, not to mention that the railway company still needs the help of the bank, and the original intention of the bank was to make the bank, the railway company and other foreign enterprises help each other.

"Xiaofang!"

With a smile, Sheng Xuanhuai said politely:

"You two are both distinguished guests, I just can't invite you if you want to! Please. ”

Then he shouted to the attaché in front of him:

"Sheng San, hurry up and serve tea to the two distinguished guests!"

After a while, someone came in and was busy making tea for the three of them, and after the attaché left, Yan Xinhou smiled:

"Fang Cai and Shenglin went to the house to look for you just now, but you weren't there, so they came directly to the company."

Looking at Yan Xinhou, Sheng Xuanhuai smiled indifferently:

"It seems that Xiaofang must have something important to do, so he will come to me!"

What could it be? As long as it is not related to the funds of the railway company, Sheng Xuanhuai, who was thoughtful, said quietly.

"If there is something, just call and say, then you can find it in such a hurry!"

When Yan Xinhou heard this, he smiled and said:

"You see, this heart is in a hurry, so I forgot the phone, speaking of which is still the credit of Xingsun, if it weren't for Xingsun to introduce this Western telephone bureau to Tianjin, I'm afraid that the world still doesn't know, in addition to the telegraph, there is also this thousands of miles of sound transmission telephone."

This compliment is also true, although as early as 8 years ago, due to regulations, the Zhongtang, the governor of Zhili and the minister of Beiyang, would come to Tianjin to work every spring when the ice melted. Wait until winter comes, before the ice of the river, and then return to Baoding office, so back and forth naturally need to communicate, especially diplomatic matters can not be said by the telegram in a few words, so Sheng Xuanhuai, who presided over the telegraph office at that time, conveniently set up another telephone line from Tianjin to Baoding on the telegraph line, but that is also a special telephone line, too far away from the ordinary people.

However, when Sheng Xuanhuai learned that Incheon and Pyongyang had telephone bureaus, and then used the exchange to introduce telephones into the market, he immediately realized that the telephone bureau was more widely used than the telegraph office, and he immediately began to handle the matter for fear that others would take the lead, and even because he failed to prepare sufficient funds, he used a loan from the Bank of North Korea to build the Tianjin telephone office.

After the opening of the telephone bureau, the first to connect the telephone was naturally the yamen and the offices of foreign enterprises, and then the adults, but it was only a little more than a month of effort, not only did the telephone in Tianjin receive more than 1,000 units, and even relied on the low price to do business into the concession, in the concession installed hundreds of telephones, and even became the first choice of foreign businessmen from all over the world, in the newspaper is to greatly increase the morale of the Chinese people, after all, the Shanghai concession telephone bureau is to install telephones across the border, but in Tianjin it has been completely turned over, how can not make the people of the country excited.

Hearing Yan Xinhou's praise, Sheng Xuanhuai laughed:

"When I first set up a telephone bureau, there were many people who said bad things about me behind my back, saying that I borrowed money without authorization, but fortunately, it was the North Korean bank that I borrowed, and Wuchang was still the North Korean superintendent. If not......"

Sighing at the difficulty of doing things in China, Sheng Xuanhuai cherished the present more and more, and when he cherished it, he thought of the military granting land implemented in the Northeast, and a hidden worry appeared in his heart.

"Xingsun, in fact, running a bank is also doing business, his North Korean bank can do business with us, and we can also do business with them!"

Following Sheng Xuanhuai's words, Yan Xinhou turned the conversation around and said with a smile.

"Actually, I didn't come here for anything else, no, in the morning, there was a reclamation company from the northeast, which had been running reclamation in Horqin, but I didn't want to find a ......."

Wait, he's talking about reclamation! Sheng Xuanhuai, who suddenly lit up in front of him, hurriedly interrupted Yan Xin and asked anxiously.

"Korqin? You mean they're cultivating on Horqin's side? Where is that man now? (To be continued.) )