The New Year is approaching, and Jiangnan, which has been ruled by the Ming Empire for several years, is a little depressed because of a natural disaster, but it is already peaceful after all. Big cities such as Jiangdu, Lin'an, Qingyuan, Quanzhou, Putian, and Pingjiang have even shown a bit of prosperity. Behind this boom was the bankruptcy of a large number of yeoman farmers and tenant farmers, who were forced to move into the big cities to earn a living.

Such a thing has appeared in all the capitalist countries that have been the first mover in history, and the capitalization of the cities and the capitalization of the countryside have appeared at the same time, stimulating each other. While the level of productivity has increased dramatically, it has created great difficulties for producers.

Capitalism is not a good thing in the first place, it is very evil, it wants to eat people!

Cannibalistic capitalism is not only raging in the south of the Yangtze River, but its power has spread to Qiongzhou Prefecture, which is thousands of miles away from the Jiangdu, that is, Hainan Island.

Outside Linchuan Town, Jiyang County, the southernmost tip of Qiongzhou Prefecture, a group of farmers gathered to complain after plowing the land. Chewing the betel nut and spitting out the first sip of betel nut water, the whole person became excited, and there were more words.

"Why is the price of rice now a monkey, jumping up and down? Last year, the price of rice was still two, why is it only consistent this year? ”

"Alas, the price of rice has fallen, but the land rent, profits, and field taxes will not be halved, how can I live this life."

"It's better to make a fuss, we are here at the end of the world, and the court will not be too pressed."

"That was the old imperial court, and the current imperial court doesn't care about this, the land tax is self-supporting in the local area, and the lord in the county is willing to do it?"

"It's impossible to get rid of the land rent and profits. The current lords are all captains from the north, and they are all fierce. The opening is to fight and kill, and the eyes of us are like looking at animals. A while ago, there was an incident on Li Tong's side. Didn't you ask Captain Wang to send troops to suppress it? ”

"What's the use of saying that? Let's think about what to plant next year, shall we? ”

The Li compatriots here in Hainan are now also in trouble similar to those of the farmers in the south of the Yangtze River, the price of rice has plummeted, and the price of rice here has fallen even more fiercely than that of the south of the Yangtze River, and it has fallen by sixty percent!

The reason for this is actually related to the high price of rice in Hainan in the past two years and the Southern War. In the first two years, the Tang, Song, Xia, and Ying domains used troops here in Nanfan, and purchased a lot of military rations in Liangguang, and the price of rice in Hainan was naturally higher.

This year, however, food production has recovered in Java and Champa. These two lands, conquered by the Xia and Tang kingdoms, were both well-known grain-producing areas, especially on the island of Java, where many serf farms appeared. The yield of rice suddenly increased to the point that it was impossible to eat. Not only is it enough to supply the expeditionary forces of Chen Huaiqing and Li Tingzhi, but it can also be transported back to Liangguang for dumping. As a result, the price of rice in Hainan was crushed, making the tenants here in Hainan miserable.

That's right, it's a tenant!

The tenant system is only gradually declining, not sudden. Even in Jiangnan, where the scholar and landlord class suffered economic annihilation, tenants still existed extensively. In Guangxi Hainan (Hainan belonged to Guangnan West Road in the Song Dynasty, and Guangxi Province in Chenming), there was no such thing as a poetry heirloom. The land here was either occupied by the chiefs of Li Tong (mainly in the mountains) or by the Han people.

And these Han heroes were pulled into their own army by Wang Jian, Wang Yan and his sons, who once ruled Guangnan West Road. Now the father and son of the Wang family have taken refuge in Daming. Wang Jian made the duke and retired in Jiangdu. Wang Yan served as the governor of Guangxi, commanding the old Wang family to garrison Guangxi to defend against a possible invasion of the Great Song Dynasty. The officers of the old Wang family owned a large amount of land in Guangxi. On Hainan Island, it occupies most of the flat land.

These powerful figures were not just the fledgling lords and military households, but at best middle-class landlords, and they had little interest in managing the land themselves. They all continue to use the profit model of being officials, collecting rents, and lending money. Continue to oppress and exploit the working people of the Li nationality. He also used the power of the government to encroach on the land and mines of the Litongtou people in the mountainous areas. Not long ago, it also provoked a Li Tong uprising. It is a pity that the reactionary forces on Hainan Island are now very strong. Wang Yan stationed an entire battalion of steel-armored soldiers here, all of whom were invulnerable. easily put down the rebellious Li villages.

No one dared to mention the rebellion again, and the content of the conversation returned to the big problem of how to live.

"You can only grow cotton, our Li people's Jibeibu is famous all over the world, and it is the easiest to sell in the north, and it will not lose money when planting cotton weaving!"

"Yes, it's still a cotton weaver to make people feel at ease, and they won't lose money after all."

"But you can't afford to grow rice, it's a food in your mouth. Now that the rice and grain trade is monopolized in the hands of the northerners, if we don't grow it, these northerner profiteers should raise the price of grain again. ”

"But just like that, if you grow grain, you can't grow cotton, and if you plant cotton, there is no place to grow food, so what can you do?"

"What else can I do? can only let the northerners and profiteers peel off the skin! ”

Speaking of the northerners profiteers, everyone sighed. Li people are honest after all, where are they so clever as Han people who can do business? The commerce of Hainan Island has always been controlled by Han merchants. Those Han merchants who do small business still have some conscience, but those big businessmen are like wolves and tigers. If the Li people have a variety of cotton, they will lower the price of cloth and raise the price of rice, and if the Li people have a variety of rice, they will press the price of rice and raise the price of cotton, in short, it is the Li people who suffer......

When everyone sighed, a man had just come over, and when he heard this, he said loudly: "Folks, why don't you plant cotton and sweet potatoes." ”

It was a woman dressed as a Li person, twenty-five or sixteen years old, but her skin was much fairer than that of ordinary Li people, and her facial features were relatively straight. The woman seemed to be a smallest-trader, leading a cart full of sweet potatoes.

"It's Sister Qiao'er, have you come to our village to collect Jibeibu again? What are you going to exchange for this time? ”

"What's on this car? One by one, they looked like clay clumps. ”

The Li people were polite to this Han woman who was doing small business, and they got up and surrounded her, looking curiously at a cart of sweet potatoes.

This woman's surname is Huang, her name is Qiao'er, and she is not a native of Hainan. She has been in Hainan for six or seven years, and it is said that she could not stand the abuse of her in-laws and husbands, so she secretly ran to the sea boat and begged the owner to bring her to Hainan Island.

When he arrived on Hainan Island, this Huang Qiaoer settled in Linchuan Town, Jiyang County, the southernmost tip of Hainan Island, and made a deal of Jibeibu. However, she doesn't have much capital, and the business is naturally not big, so she just gets some daily necessities or farm tools from the county town and pulls them to the countryside to exchange for Jibeibu. Sometimes I would ask my Li compatriots about weaving skills, but I didn't learn anything - weaving Jibei cloth is a housekeeping skill of the Li people, how can it be easily handed over to the Han people? If the Han people are allowed to learn and then produce and sell in large quantities, then the last means of saving the lives of the Li people will be gone......

Therefore, this Huang Qiao'er is the one who was called Huang Daopo in the original history - in this time and space, she is the Huang Fupo who was called the "mother of industry" by later generations, and spent six years making friends with her Li compatriots, humbly seeking advice, but still did not learn much weaving skills.

However, Huang Fupo is such an indomitable character, and she must do it to the end. If you can't do it in six years, you will have ten years, and if you can't do it in ten years, you will always learn the real skills!

And this time, when she listened to the Tao of Heaven in the county town (the future rich woman has already entered the Tao, she is the first batch of Tiandao disciples on Hainan Island), she saw a baby who could help her learn the weaving skills - sweet potato! These sweet potatoes were sent down by the Heavenly Dao Palace to the Taoist temples below, and they were distributed to the sect members for free tasting. But there are not a few Heavenly Daoists here in Jiyang County, and they can't eat it at all, so they were bought by Huang Qiaoer at a low price.

"What? Is there such a treasure in the world? Can you have ten stones per acre? And it is not suitable for no land? ”

"Really? Sister Qiao'er, don't bully us Li people to be honest. ”

Huang Qiao'er smiled slightly, picked up a sweet potato and said, "Really, don't you know if you try to plant a few acres?" If you don't believe it, sublease two acres of land to me, and you watch me plant, and if you can harvest twenty stone of sweet potatoes next year, we will plant them together. In this way, you will be able to grow sweet potatoes with 10% of your land and cotton with 90% of your land, and you will no longer be afraid of profiteers. ”

The Li people looked at each other and suddenly showed expressions of surprise. Now the Li people are poor, isn't it because there is too little land, and there is no way to grow rice after planting cotton, so they have to buy rice for the pot. However, the profiteers saw this, and when the time came, they raised the price of rice and suppressed the price of cloth. If the Li people can grow sweet potatoes on one percent of the land to support themselves, the remaining ninety percent of the land can grow cotton. It's been a lot better......

If this is the case, this Huang Qiaoer is really different from the profiteers of the northerners, she is a good person, a great benefactor of Li Zhai, and her own person in Li Zhai!

The simple Li compatriots have made a decision in their hearts, as long as this sweet potato really has such a large yield, so that the Li people can have no worries about food and clothing, they will give her the ability to weave cloth and the spinning machine.

Seeing the expressions of her Li compatriots, Huang Qiao'er's eyelashes flickered, and she smiled sweetly: "It's so decided, everyone will share this cart of sweet potatoes, let's take a few back and taste them, and see if they can fill their stomachs." If I can eat enough, I will go to the county and pull some more to make seeds. ”

……

"Million, I know what you said makes sense, this Beimingzhou cotton planting or something, it will not rise for decades. But since I have created the Chinese world, I can't help but think more about future generations. ”

When Chen Dexing said this, he had completely forgotten that there was a zodiac woman in the 13th century...... He has now built a "quasi-capitalist" country, everything is ready, plus Huang Daopo has succeeded in advance, this is not running into the industrial revolution?

Mingzhou cotton business, this time there is a lot to do! (To be continued......)