There are about 3,000 jia (42,000 mu) of paddy fields and 5,000 jia (70,000 mu) of sugar cane fields in the Chichi area. The population is 50,000 to 100,000, and the number is related to the agricultural time. The vast majority of them are from the mainland.

The Ming people rented paddy fields, although the king rent was only fifty percent, but the yield was not high, even if it was planted two crops of rice, after paying the rent tax, it was only one mu and two hundred catties a year, plus paying the poll tax, and the whole year was just a full stomach.

The same was true for renting sugar cane fields, where the poll tax was immediately halved, and the Dutch businessman also vaguely hinted that the poll tax might be completely eliminated for sugar cane farmers in the future. At the same time, they can also provide a six-month loan with a low interest rate.

It's just that all the sugar produced has to be given to the Dutch, no matter who grows it, even if you take time and effort to squeeze it from wild sugar cane in the jungle.

Whoever dares to sell it privately will be punished for being a pit family, or the whole family will be a coolie to death. The purchasers were all convicted of smuggling and hanged in the square of Geranza.

The continent is full of soldiers and bandits, and no one grows sugar cane anymore, so the price of sugar is almost one price a day.

At this time, there was a growing trend of drinking coffee, cocoa, chocolate, and tea in Europe, and they also liked to add sugar to it.

Cane sugar has now changed its role as ballast cargo to become a bulk necessity cargo.

A Dutch scholar also wrote a paper on the benefits of using sucrose as ballast. The paper wisely states that if sucrose is used as ballast, it can melt in the event of a leak in the bilge, reducing the weight of the ship with the displacement. And the sea sand can only get heavier and heavier. In retrospect, this was only the insight of schoolchildren, but at the time it earned the author a great reputation.

The European headquarters in Amsterdam gave orders to many merchant houses: sugar, as much as you want.

The quality of sugar in mainland Ming is the best, followed by Taiwan, Batavia is poor, and Siam is the worst.

Due to the war on the mainland, Taiwan's sugar has soared all the way, four taels, six taels, and eight taels a load! And as many as you want.

However, the Dutch businessman always gave the Taiwanese sugarcane farmers a price, four liels, two taels and two dollars. It is more ruthless than the tobacco monopoly department of a certain country in later generations to tobacco farmers.

In 1648, there was a bumper harvest of sugar, with an annual sugar output of 1.5 million catties.

300,000 jin was transported to Persia, 800,000 jin to Japan, and 300,000 jin was transported back to Europe from Batavia. Among them, the CIF price in Japan is 18 liels per quintal. Taiwan's Dayuan Merchant House made a fortune, becoming the second place in Asia to make a net profit after Japanese Merchant Houses. At one point, revenue accounted for 22 percent of the company's revenue.

The news of the devil's attack in the city of Geranza quickly spread in the Chichi area, and every family was terrified.

The family of the deer hunter Wang San also closed the doors and windows. The so-called doors and windows are just made of bamboo, and they can be broken with one foot without too much liliang. Closing it is to give yourself psychological comfort.

Wang San's home was built after the family moved to Taiwan, and Li Si helped a lot.

Still in October, the dry season in Tainan arrived, and after the rain was less, they also began to get busy.

Bamboo is cheap, ten pennies a bundle, and there are all thicknesses. Straw is a penny and five bundles, and everything you see.

His home is a kind of deformed stilted building.

The frame is made of thick bamboo, and the bottom is only slightly higher from the ground, only about one meter, of course, Wang San and Li Si did not know this unit of measurement when they designed it. They had only carefully observed that the weeds could not grow longer than the longest distance away from the riverbank. If it's too high, it's easy to be scraped over.

Then they use slightly thinner bamboo to weave bamboo rows, and tie them horizontally and vertically to form walls or make roofs, and they can also create small rooms in the house.

The roof is made of bamboo to form a circular shelf, covered with four layers of straw curtains, and then straw bales. When it rains, the rainwater is hindered by the layers of straw, which reduces the infiltration rate, and it is easy to flow in the direction of the straw and towards the long eaves that are deliberately set aside without dripping into the house. If it rains too much or too quickly, it will not be good.

When they were working hard with the clay with the help of Father Wang and his younger brother Wang Si, the village was in the village, and Liu Laohan watched curiously, and chatted with Li Si, a distinguished guest of the Wang family.

The Dutch weave several or dozens of households together, called a "small knot", designate one person as the small "knot", and then make a number of "small knots" form a "big knot", and also designate a special person as the big "knot".

After Wang San's family paid the poll tax, they were arranged into this summary. Liu Laohan is the head of the group, of course, he is a distinguished guest. Of course, the distinguished guest can only be entertained by another distinguished guest, Li Si.

Liu Laohan has seen a lot of things, but he has never seen this method of building a house.

"But Nanban Bamboo Tower?" After speaking, he shook his head, "Why the dome?" ”

"When my third brother and I were fishing deer in the Lower Tamsui River, we saw the indigenous bamboo liao there, all of which were domes, which were far easier to protect from wind than spires, so this is the case."

Liu Laohan thought for a while and nodded: "That's true." Low-rise bamboo buildings should also be for this. Why and clay? ”

"Mix it with straw and smear it on the bamboo wall."

"Haha, no wonder you keep such a long eaves, I'm afraid that the rain will burst down and be damaged, so you should learn the method of Ganzhou farmers."

"Bow to the top."

Liu Laohan stroked his beard proudly and said, "I see that you don't have a guillotine, and it is not good to break the straw." Come up to my house in a moment to pick it up. The straw is not enough to take it yourself. ”

"Ahh

"What's the politeness? You and I are both drifters overseas, and we should help each other. I also have a method, I only remembered when I saw you and the clay. Oyster shells can be used as walls. ”

"Please teach me the end."

"I've seen it in Fujian. Local farmers use oyster shells inserted into the clay wall, the back shell xiangshang, the inner shell xiangxia, densely arranged. When the wall is dry and solid, it can also prevent rain from falling. ”

Li Si thought for a while, then bent down and bowed: "The kid has been taught." ”

Liu Laohan sighed at that time: "It's still the Dutchman's big house that is the right way." ”

Wang San's younger brother Wang Si said quickly: "My brother said that in two years, my family will also build a big house with red bricks and red tiles, glutinous rice soup syrup and oyster ashes!" Better than the ancestral house! ”

At that time, Daddy Wang scolded "mouthy", but his face showed a yearning look.

This situation made Wang San unforgettable for the rest of his life.

Now Wang San's whole family is hiding in the house, not daring to light the oil lamp, for fear of attracting the legendary devil. Wang San and Li Si went to the Tamsui River to hunt deer, and the family had no backbone, so they suddenly had no idea.

Wang Si said: "I saw a lot of Dutch people passing by here in the afternoon, and the big knot followed them. ”

Father Wang asked, "What about Liu Jieshou?" ”

"I was on my way back from the press house when I was working in the fields."

After Wang San's family came to the Chichi area, they had just rented land. They envisaged renting the paddy fields first, and then the sugarcane fields the following year.

After they had leveled the land, Wang San and Li Si continued their old jobs and came back when the planting began in February.

Wang Si is thirteen years old and can't eat at home. So he went out to work for a short time, and found an errand in the Dutchman's sugar press.

That house is actually a windmill house that is common in the lowlands of the Netherlands. The big windmill, seven or eight men tall, had been brought in from Batavia by the Dutch the year before.

The windmill surprised Wang Si. The windmill spins in the wind, which he is not surprised. The point is that the windmill can rotate no matter which direction the wind comes, which he can't understand.

The man in charge of the windmill is an old red-haired man with rotten legs, and I heard that he has been here for twenty years. He married an indigenous woman, and when he died, he lived alone, eating and living in a press. The old red hair sometimes beat him, and sometimes secretly brought him candy and asked him to take it back to his parents to eat.

There are always a few days a month when the old red hair will sit outside the press room in a daze, watching the big windmill in a daze, humming a little song he doesn't understand, and occasionally secretly wiping his tears. Wang Si knew that he must not be provoked at this time, he would be extremely angry. But Wang Si could go home early at this time, and the old red hair was in a daze for a long time. There was no way to know that he had run away.

Wang Si jumped on the country road.

On both sides of the road are endless fields, most of which have been leveled, and by the time February arrives, there will be countless busy farmers.

There was a faint smell of burned grass in the air, and Wang Si knew that it was someone who was handling the rice roots in the field.

In the distance, there are also rows of fruit trees planted on the edge of the fields. Wang Si heard that it was a fruit tree brought by the Dutch from Batavia.

The Dutch allowed the tenant farmers to plant on the boundaries of their own leased land to prevent entanglement. One year, immigrants from eastern Guangdong and southern Fujian fought fiercely over the border of rented fields, and it was not until the city of Geranza sent troops to suppress it, and the Dutch came up with such a solution.

The fruit tree is called Pengwu, and it can bear fruit two or three times a year, and it is easy to live. After planting, it often bears fruit every other year, and it is sweet and sour, and it is delicious. Wang Si liked it as soon as he came here, and he didn't finish it if he didn't eat it.

Wang Si walked onto the path on the riverbank.

The upper reaches of the river bank are mainly sugar cane fields. From a distance, the fields with roots resemble the scalp of a monk with fresh hair. In fact, it should be more like a blood vessel rooted in the earth, and the blood and sweat of countless Ming people dripped on the earth, turning into sweet syrup and being sucked away by the Dutch.

Of course, Wang Si didn't think that far, he just glanced at that side, thinking to himself, in another month, those sugarcane fields with roots will need a lot of manpower to clear the fields, make ridges and pine roots. At that time, the labor money can be a little more than usual. When you are older, you can rent a cane field.

What Wang Si didn't understand was that the sugarcane field was actually rented by the people who went to open up the land and plant it themselves, but they had to pay them the land rent, and the sugar could only be sold to the Dutch. But he didn't think much about it, he just felt lucky, fortunately the paddy fields were ready-made. He knew that it was because other people's families thought that their income was low, so they changed to renting sugar cane fields. That's their turn.

Wang Si looked at the clear water of the Chiji River, and had the idea of rushing in to play in the water, and if he couldn't get it, he could touch a few fish and wear them back. It's a pity that it's not the right time, the water is too cold.

As he was thinking, he jerked his head and saw a lot of Dutchmen coming across the bridge, carrying large bags and small bags, dragging their families along with them. Everyone's expressions were weird, not as proud as they used to be.

In the past, they beat people at every turn, and the third brother said that they were tired of poaching the second brother. No matter how expensive the deer is, can it be expensive to have a second brother? The second brother is good at archery.

He was a little stunned. Not far away, Liu Jietou, who was preparing the field and preparing to roast the field, shouted at him:

"Siwa, you ran home again while Andre was homesick, right?!"

Wang Si knew that Liu Jieshou and the old red-haired Andre were friends, and the two of them drank tea and wine when they were fine, and they hated that they drank coffee without sugar, and every time he drank secretly, he would spit it out, which made the two old guys laugh.

Wang Si touched his hair and smiled.

Liu Jieshou then shouted: "Hurry home, hurry home, don't worry about your parents." The world is going to be chaotic again! ”

Wang Si told his father what had happened.

Father Wang said: "If Liu Jieshou doesn't run, we won't run either." ”

"If we run away, the third brother won't be able to find us when he comes back."

Through the bamboo-bark window, Wang Si could see several bonfires in the fields in the distance. He knew it was lit by a Dutchman who couldn't walk.

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