ps: Thank you to Yun Hai Shu You Shi Tong Zhou for 100 starting coins, and I am watching Haichao for 100 starting coins for your support!
The sky is gray and bright, and it is a small coastal fishing village in Hetao County (Pelotas) in southern Han Dynasty.
Yang Kaifu woke up to the sound of his wife's weaving creaking, reached for a coarse cloth jacket from the bedside, put it on skillfully, stood up and walked to his wife, saying softly, "Don't be too tired, kid. I'll borrow it from home."
The government money is almost finished, so I don’t have to get up so early in the morning."
"Yes, I know." The woman replied softly, turned to look at the three sleeping children, and said softly, "Put the rice in the pot. The head of the house, go and light the fire. After the meal is ready, ask the boss to get up. He
He has lost a lot of weight recently, let him sleep more."
"The school exam results are coming soon. If the eldest son gets good grades, the family will prepare the tuition for the eldest son to attend college preparatory courses."
Yang Kaifu frowned slightly when he mentioned his eldest son instead of following his wife's instructions to make a fire and cook.
"My dear, do you still want your eldest son to go to college preparatory courses?"
After hearing her husband's words, the woman stopped what she was doing and asked.
"There have been no scholars in the last three generations of the Yang family. The eldest has been studying for several years with great difficulty. It would be a pity if he cannot pass the college preparatory examination."
"Master, you also know your son's abilities. The eldest son started studying late, and his reading skills are not as good as those of other students. He has to read until late every day when he comes back from school. Your son has already tried his best to study. If his grades are good, you can just let it go.
His wish is to let him apply for the Naval War College and stop embarrassing him."
"Hey, I'll listen to you this time. If the boss's score exceeds the score of the Naval War College, let him apply for the Navy."
She knows her son better than her mother, and her wife knows her son's thoughts better than she does. The eldest son is already fifteen years old after the Chinese New Year and has his own opinions. As his father, although Yang Kaifu wants his son to go to college preparatory courses according to his own wishes, but
His eldest son struggled with his studies, so he was forced to apply for college preparatory courses, but he might not be able to graduate successfully during the preparatory period. Therefore, after making a difficult choice in his heart, Yang Kaifu decided to respect his son's opinion and agreed with him to apply for the Naval War College...
The sun is high in the sky, and the bright sunshine shines on the slightly undulating sea, creating layers of golden light.
On the sea illuminated by golden light, hundreds of ships, large and small, were scattered, moving slowly in different directions.
Most of the ships on the offshore sea are wooden fishing boats with a tonnage of no more than 500 tons. A small number of these wooden fishing boats are small fishing boats built by local civilian shipyards in Han Dynasty. Most of them are merchant ships captured by the National Defense Force and disposed of at a low price.
Sold to Chinese fishermen who immigrated to Han.
There are no particularly large fishing grounds on the southern Atlantic coast of South America. However, there are relatively abundant fishery resources in the thousands of miles of sea from southern Brazil to the northern coast of Argentina. Therefore, those Chinese immigrants from coastal areas such as Fujian and Zhejiang arrived in Han, South America.
, he soon returned to his old business and became a fisherman again, using the money earned from fishing as his main source of livelihood.
Yang Kaifu was originally an ordinary fisherman on the coast of Fujian Province. After immigrating to the Han Dynasty, Yang Kaifu's family was allocated 60 acres of land based on the size of his family of three. However, two years later, his wife gave him two more children. He was favored by the Han Dynasty.
Under the influence of the government and more than a dozen retired soldiers and neighbors, Yang Kaifu thought that 60 acres of land would be allocated to his three sons. Each son could only be allocated 20 acres of land. Moreover, the eldest son had to pay part of the tuition fee every year for school.
It was difficult to maintain expenses solely with the income from farming, so Yang Kaifu thought about continuing to be a fisherman. Through the guarantee of several familiar neighbors in the town, he borrowed money from the government to buy a small wooden boat, and then sailed on the beach.
After fishing for more than two years, excluding the tuition fees for his eldest son and family expenses, Yang Kaifu repaid 90% of the money he owed the government. The remaining money will be paid in two or three months according to his usual fishing volume.
It can be paid off.
The increasingly prosperous days gave Yang Kaifu the confidence and enthusiasm to work hard to support his family. On the vast sea, Yang Kaifu separated from the fishing boats and headed for an area with fewer fishing boats.
"Dad, the network has moved!"
Yang Kaifu's eldest son Yang Guangzong saw a violent shaking of the fishing nets under the boat and reminded him loudly.
"Hold the oars and don't move, I'll pull the net!"
Yang Kaifu handed the oar to his son, walked sideways to the bow of the boat where the fishing net was, propped up his body with his feet, and pulled the fishing net onto the boat with both hands.
"Boss, the ship is shaking too much. Fix the oars on both sides of the bow to stabilize the ship!"
"Hold on." Yang Guangzong replied, skillfully checking the two oars into the grooves on both sides of the bow. After the oars were fixed, the vibration amplitude of the ship's hull gradually became much smaller.
After completing the work arranged by his father, Yang Guangzong saw several big fish in the fishing net still rushing around. He quickly picked up the harpoon placed in the middle of the cabin and came to the fishing net in three or two steps.
When he was about to stab the big fish with the harpoon as usual, Yang Kaifu's voice sounded in time: "Boss, don't stab them to death if you want them alive!"
"I got it." Yang Guangzong quickly put away the harpoon. After placing the harpoon, he immediately came to his father and helped his father put up the fishing net.
The strength of the several big fish in the fishing net was gradually consumed by the collision with the fishing net. After more than an hour, the large fish that no longer moved violently was wrapped in the fishing net and pulled into the cabin.
"Boss, look at these two fish, they are big tuna. I estimate the largest one weighs two hundred kilograms, and the smaller one weighs more than one hundred kilograms."
Yang Kaifu was lying on the cabin, his body covered with sweat and panting.
"Dad, how much can this boat of fish be sold for?"
Although he was very tired, Yang Guangzong asked with joy on his face when he saw the boat full of fish and the two larger tuna.
"Hey, ordinary tuna costs one tael of silver per catty, and high-quality tuna costs two taels of silver per catty. Of the two tuna we caught this time, the big one is a bluefin tuna. Look at its big belly. This
The kind of tuna is called big-bellied tuna, and the price is higher. A pound of tuna costs three taels of silver. This tuna alone can be sold for six to seven hundred taels of silver, and the smaller one can also be sold for more than a hundred taels of silver. Wait until this
A whole boat of fish has been sold, and we can get more than seven to eight hundred taels of silver."
Yang Kaifu said happily.
"Dad, can our family repay the money we owe the government?" Yang Guangzong asked happily.
"Ten taels of silver can be exchanged for eighteen han yuan. Our family owes the government 600 han yuan. After paying off the 800 taels of silver, more than half of it will be left."
The Han Yuan is the legal currency of the Han Dynasty and was officially issued in 1877 to replace silver.
The Han Dynasty implemented a gold standard monetary policy. After the gold treasures obtained from Peru were exhausted, Li Mingyuan took the risk and sent people disguised as black tea merchants to enter India to search for the famous Padmanabha Swamy Temple treasure.
At this time, all of India had fallen into the hands of the British. It was very risky to send men into India to search for treasures. However, in 1877, the Peruvian treasures were exhausted, and the establishment of Han's own monetary policy could not be postponed any longer.
So as a last resort, Li Mingyuan first announced that the Han Dynasty would implement a gold standard monetary policy, stipulating that one Han Yuan was equivalent to one gram of gold. People who owned Han Yuan could go to designated national bank branches to exchange the Han Yuan currency for gold of the same value. At the same time,
Silver was allowed to circulate as a transitional currency within five years. After five years, ordinary people could exchange Han Yuan currency at a silver-to-gold exchange ratio of twenty to one.
With the location provided by Li Mingyuan and the reputation of Padmanaba Swamy Temple in India, it is not difficult to find the treasure of Padmanaba Swamy Temple. What is difficult is to avoid the British inspection and transport the treasure to Han Dynasty.
country.
After finding the treasure in the basement of Padmanaba Swamy Temple, the treasure hunting team first secretly packed up the precious gold in the basement at night and transported it out in batches. Then, under the cover of hired white businessmen, they scattered the treasure among the tea leaves.
, coal and other goods were smuggled out of the country, and finally arrived in Han China at the end of 1877.
Although the value of the treasures in the Padmanabha Swamy Temple is not as high as the treasures discovered by Li Mingyuan in Peru, they are equally valuable.
After plundering all the collections in the six basements of the temple and selling some unimportant diamonds, jewelry, and jewelry, we obtained a total of 25 tons of gold.
25 tons of gold were placed in the National Bank of Han as a reserve. Except for a few precious treasures that were not sold, they were sent to the palace at the discretion of officials, and the rest were put into the Ministry of Finance to be used as reserve funds for the development of the Han Dynasty.
Searching for treasures is a tricky act to gain wealth. Li Ming knew that searching for treasures was not a long-term solution, but as the ruler of the country, he had to use various methods to obtain funds in order for the Han Kingdom to develop and grow smoothly.
With an increase of 25 tons of gold, the total gold reserves in the Han State Bank's treasury, together with the original remaining gold, reached 30 tons. Relying on the 30 tons of gold reserves, Han State's monetary policy was gradually accepted by ordinary people after one year of implementation.
In addition to still using silver as a currency of exchange, more and more people use Han Yuan banknotes to purchase goods.
And because Western countries all use the gold standard system, after the Han Yuan was linked to gold, the currency exchange rate between the Han Yuan and Western countries also stabilized. For example, one pound is equivalent to 7.3 grams of gold, so the exchange rate between the Han Yuan and the pound is
1 pound = 7.3 Chinese yuan. Similarly, the currency exchange rate between Han and several other major countries can also be settled through gold, 1 franc = 0.29 Chinese yuan, 1 US dollar = 1.5 Chinese yuan, 1 German gold mark = 10 German marks = 3.58