From Chief to Ball

After walking for about seven or eight miles and crossing the dangerous river swell area, Chen Jian couldn't help but yelled.

Before his eyes, a field appeared, a field of corn.

It is not ridge farming, but more like slash-and-burn farming or so after sowing. Two cows are grazing next to the field, but it seems that there is no trace of using a plowshare. The back of the cow is flat and there is no thick pull out. neck.

Next to the cornfield was a piece of tobacco leaf. This Chen Jian would never admit that it was a tobacco leaf.Beside the tobacco leaf field is a piece of potato, and ladybugs have already flown up, biting the leaf full of holes.

At this time, a few more aborigines appeared, and after screaming a few times in horror, the aborigine who led the way came out and said something, and showed them the glass bead.

After crossing a slope, a typical village appeared in front of Chen Jian.

It looks peaceful and peaceful, but it is also extremely poor.The hut made of wood and thatched mud houses a few sheep and a few dogs that should be used for eating. There are bunches of red peppers hanging in front of the house, as well as woven corn cobs harvested last year.

Although the corn is not too long or too thick, it is indeed corn.

Two big turkeys were clucking at the entrance of the village, and several women seemed to be chatting at the entrance of the village holding a ball of cotton thread. They were not shy when they saw this group of people who suddenly appeared, but surrounded them.

At the entrance of the village, a pile of cigarettes was lit to disperse mosquitoes, and several men were smoking a puff of green smoke with a bamboo-like pipe.

Even though they were far away, Chen Jian still smelled the special stench of tobacco, and his hands trembled a little excitedly.

After many years, I smelled the smell of nicotine again, just like the familiarity and fetters after eating flour dumplings in the previous life.

Chen Jian felt an indescribably familiar taste in this seemingly simple village, which revealed poverty and private ownership.

This is not the tribe of the aborigines in the normal historical line, it is more like a rural commune under a slightly higher slavery city-state, and it may also be serfs or savages or the common king's slaves.

In short, people always have to distinguish between grades and grades.Where there are no slaves, there are universal slaves, either the division of castes, or the primitive public ownership empire with extremely underground productivity and extremely poor land. Various weird social forms will always emerge in endlessly, but there are still some shadows in the root.

The war for colonies that will inevitably arise in the future will completely involve this quiet and poor village.

Soon, the elders of the village came out and gathered more than a hundred people in the village to surround them.

The aborigines who were fishing were talking about what they had seen and heard in words. Chen Jian carefully observed the surrounding area and determined that these people should not be able to read or write. of.

Everyone in the village was extremely curious, but they could also see how poor they were. There were good and bad houses in the village, and the elders in the village came out of the best houses.

For the time being, Chen Jian couldn't figure out whether the village elder belonged to the leader of the serf manor, the leader of the wild village community outside the slave city, or something else.

The hair of these people is like a horse's tail, and it seems that they have not been washed often, and lice can be seen crawling on the dirty cotton clothes.

Chen Jian has the means to deal with these people, knowing that their food is not abundant with this kind of productivity, so he asked people to take off the iron pot they were carrying, and distributed candied fruit and the like to the women and children.

After a cheerful dinner, the attitudes of these people were obviously different from before, especially after drinking some strong alcohol, they began to sing and dance around the fire.

Chen Jian took the opportunity to ask for a handful of tobacco leaves, tore off a piece of paper from his diary, skillfully rolled up a cannon barrel, lit it with the help of a bonfire, inhaled hard and shivered all over, followed by a burst of nausea and stomach pain.

Lan Qi watched Chen Jian's strange movements from the side, sniffed the strange smelly smoke and asked, covering her nose, "Chen Jian, what are you smoking? Is this thing the same as hemp leaves?"

Chen Jianxin said that it was I who set the rule against smoking hemp leaves, but this thing is not the same as hemp. I can't help it. If we can monopolize the trade and get enough funds, we can also make match factories popular.

Smiling, he snuffed out the unsuitable tobacco leaves, coughed a few times, and asked, "What do you think of this place?"

"Very poor. There are no iron tools. The way they farm the land is also wrong. But these people are very enthusiastic. It should be because no outsiders have ever appeared?"

"Yeah, enthusiasm. Maybe we can live in peace with them. There is still a lot of land, as you have seen, and there is still a lot of land that has not been cultivated. These seeds... can feed more people and raise more Livestock and poultry. No matter what, even if you just get these seeds, this trip will not be in vain."

Lan Qi shrugged and said, "These people let you go, will you go?"

"These people...why do you let me go? I don't tax them, and I don't capture them as slaves. Instead, I teach them planting techniques, and they won't let me go. Don't take the concept of the people of the Republic , take it elsewhere, it’s different.”

After uncovering this topic, Chen Jian finally learned a few words during the time after eating.

Corn, turkey, chili... These things that are related to eating but that no one has seen before, he learned first.

He took out the hand-cranked corn thresher that he had pretended to have heard of before, and had already prepared it when the cotton gin started to be made. After taking a few corn cobs and skillfully twisting the corn kernels, all the people in the village gathered around excitedly.

I don't know what they discussed, and finally took out a bunch of peppers, a basket of corn on the cob, half a basket of peanuts, and more than a dozen balls of cotton thread, indicating that they wanted to trade the hand-operated corn thresher with Chen Jian.

In order to show friendship, Chen Jian only wanted some peanuts, but nothing else.

Peeling a peanut and throwing it into Lan Qi's hands, Lan Qi looked curiously at this crop that she had never seen before, and imitated Chen Jian's appearance and put it in her mouth to chew.

The unique sweetness of raw peanuts gradually turned into a paste and diffused in the mouth. Chen Jian suddenly thought of something, and said with a smile: "From my food experience, if this thing can be chewed with dried tofu, it will definitely have a smell. The smell of meat."

Lan Qi pursed her lips and smiled, but she felt a little strange in her heart. She always felt that Chen Jian seemed to have seen these things before, and no one needed to tell him how to eat them.

That night, Chen Jian gestured and said that he finally got a piece of news.

There is a city above this river. These people can't tell exactly how big and how many people live there.

Back in the fleet, Chen Jian fried some peanuts with sand and an iron pan, and distributed one to each of them. Those poor people ate it with great relish—this stuff has so much oil, it is really delicious and very fragrant.

And these people also expressed great interest in the crops such as corn brought back by Chen Jian. Corn is quite bluffing, after all, the ears of wheat can't grow so big.

Looking at these hopeful people, Chen Jian smiled happily.

At night, people in the party got together, and after discussing some things, Chen Jian suggested: "Tomorrow, divide into three teams. One team is looking for land suitable for building forts, forts, and villages near the mouth of the river. But be careful, Do not clash with people from nearby villages."

"The second team guards the fleet, replenishes fresh water, counts food and agricultural tools and various tools."

"The third team followed me to the cities mentioned by the villagers to see what kind of society this is and to determine how to obtain our land. This is the most important thing."

Lan Qi asked: "How do you get it? Is there any saying in it?"

Chen Jian nodded and said: "Yes, there is a theory. If the mountains, rivers and rivers, including the land of the village community, are all owned by the king or Hou Bo or someone like that, then there are many opinions. The land can be state-owned, But state ownership is not owned by the king Hobo alone. This must be clarified. You can also see how land ownership is different in different countries and different civilizations, and it will also help everyone find common ground in history.”

Lan Qi asked again: "If... If these lands are owned by the king, trading is prohibited, and there are even slaves, what should we do?"

Chen Jian said with a smile: "That's easy. As long as there are contradictions and struggles here, there is room for us to exist. These things can be used elsewhere. Not only do we need to use them here, but we also need to use freedom, equality, and republic. The idea of ​​​​waiting and so on is spread to other places... For example, the white man we rescued from the island. If there are nobles, kings, and priests on their side, they can be pulled down with this set of things."

Lan Qi thought for a while and said with a smile: "If there is, if he does that, he will be sentenced to treason or treason."

"Yeah, the revolutionary flames of republic, liberty, and equality will burn all over the world. As long as we live well, they will believe that we live well because of these. The reality is that we should live better than those people , as far as I guess."

"What's the reason for the guess?"

"Fewer people, more land, good guns, and advanced science. Don't forget, the man we rescued was still using an arquebus. He hadn't seen an octant yet. He was amazed at our large glass. Watch it , we will collapse everything those people believe in. Not everyone knows how to analyze the internal factors, and more people will only stare at the surface. A more magnificent cause in the world?"

When everyone was puzzled, Chen Jianchang sighed: "Don't forget that the person we saved was still holding that book in such a desperate situation. The deeper the faith, the more intense the collapse will be. They will put all the blame on their own traditions, culture or what they believe in."

Chen Jian thought, not only that.If you cut off the way of the immigration pressure relief valve, squeeze the space for the accumulation of colonial trade, translate these universal things, and help you with manual machinery 50 to 100 years in advance, let the flintlock that is most suitable for civilian revolution The age of guns was born prematurely... Europa's seventeenth century will write a magnificent anti-feudal revolutionary epic.

Chapter 5 Land

A few days later, an expedition team of more than 300 people was led by Chen Jian.

Be cautious and carry muskets and explosives, and a short sword in case of emergencies such as rain.