On November 1, 1669, the southern hemisphere had just entered the beautiful season of spring. On the hundreds of miles of fertile fields in the central valley in southern Chile, a scene of spring was also presented everywhere. Sergio Rivera quietly came to a county established in the middle of this year in Maolin County. It is under the jurisdiction of Maolin Town, Anling Township, Lutai Township and Gonggao Township. It is also the 81st county-level administrative unit in the country, with a population of more than 18,600 people, which is quite a lot, and the economy is relatively developed.

Maolin Town is the county town of the county. Due to the historical reasons of the special envoy, the county town still retains a large number of Spanish elements, especially the core old town area. Even the county government and town government are located in houses transformed from the original Spanish colonial institutions, not to mention the densely packed private villas in this block still live in the former Spanish merchants who have changed their nationality (abandoned Spanish nationality and joined the East Coast nationality). In short, this is a city with a strong Spanish style, and the Spanish merchants in the Peruvian Governor's District also like to come to this city to do business.

Sergio Rivera is a standard Tuscan man, and is very familiar with Spanish culture and adaptable to it. But today his destination is not here, but Boling Town, which is further north than this, is a Spanish town that was previously called "Osorno". Therefore, he is just a passerby in the city of Maolin.

As the highest person in charge of Prince Cosimo, the heir of the Tuscan Principality, Rivera has always been mainly based on the prince's personal and interests (ranked in sequence). This time, he came to Chile, with only one purpose, that is, to open up more wealth for Prince Cosimo. The delta company with 20% of the shares is well operated and can obtain considerable dividends every year. The sugarcane plantation that invested huge amounts of money in the Hue Port area has also gone through the early stages, and various undertakings are progressing steadily. Therefore, Prince Cosimo, who still has a lot of surplus capital, has set his mind elsewhere.

When Prince Cosimo first heard of the term Chile, when he was teaching geography by a tutor, he probably never thought that one day he would be related to this remote place. However, fate has never been predictable, and time in the world is often so bizarre. When one day an official on the East Coast found Rivera, the spokesperson of Prince Cosimo in the New World, and tentatively asked them if they were interested in organizing people from the Old Continent to go to Chile to start mining, Prince Cosimo finally agreed after thinking about it, because the people on the East Coast agreed to give priority to the construction of the third-class national highway near Prince Cosimo's plantation and finally connected it to the coastal terminal.

The East Coast people give face so much, so Prince Cosimo naturally cannot illiterate. As the East Coast people say, give me face, I give you face, so everyone has face. Therefore, Prince Cosimo appointed Sergio Rivera to take action on his behalf to inspect the mining matters in Chile. Well, it is said to be a sulfur mine, located dozens of kilometers east of Osorno. It was mined intermittently in the Spanish era, and later abandoned due to insufficient manpower.

Sulfur is definitely a shortage of materials on the east coast today. Not only does it require a lot of military industry, but also a lot of needs in civil industry, such as the production of sulfuric acid, a basic but extremely important intermediate product. However, there is no natural sulfur ore in the east coast itself. The sulfur needed in China, except for the small amount of recycling from coal, is only by-products in the emerging primary chlor-alkali chemical industry, but its output is relatively limited and far from meeting industrial and military needs. Therefore, the funds used to import sulfur on the east coast are astronomical every year, especially in the rapid development of industry and the demand for gunpowder rises sharply. This will develop sulfur ore in Chile, which is definitely a profitable thing.

Rivera has lived in the East Coast for many years and naturally knows the market and future of such materials as sulfur. Therefore, to be honest, I don’t resist this requirement from the East Coast people. Although he also thinks it’s a pity to waste money on sulfur with lower profit margins instead of investing in sugarcane plantations, there is nothing to do with it? If you don’t agree to the East Coast people, do you think that when you want to expand the scale of the plantation in the future, you will approve land for you? I’m afraid it’s very difficult!

So, in this context, Sergio Rivera first took the Nanhai Line Company ship to disembark at Xingnan Port, then arrived at Araucan Port, and then took the boat to Maolin Port, which was very damn. A few months before Rivera came, he had sent two subordinates to Maolin to contact him. With the help of East Coast officials, everything is currently in good condition. As soon as Rivera arrived here, he had rented a carriage in Boling Town north with solid rubber tires and shock-absorbing brass springs.

To be honest, from Maolin Port to Boling Town, it is inconvenient in terms of the current road conditions. Short trips may be tolerant, but long journeys are simply torture. Therefore, the local government has now planned to build a high-standard second-class national highway between the two to connect these two towns with very important geographical locations so that the people of the east bank will extend their power to the boundary river more quickly (the boundary river is the Bueno River, which is named because it is the natural dividing line between the east bank's leased land and Spain).

This second-class national highway will be all made of gravel and is constructed strictly in accordance with national standards, that is, the road width is 6 meters, and there are 2.5 meters wide roadbed roads on both sides for future widening. There are side ditches on the outside of the roadbed road, and the outermost layer will be planted with a spacing of 10 meters, in order to clarify the boundaries of highway land and add to the beauty of the road. The cross-sectional slope of the road surface is 7%. In accordance with the principle of saving construction costs, backup roadbeds, side ditches and other facilities on both sides can be omitted in places with high soil accumulation.

According to officials from the Ministry of Transportation, even if the materials are taken locally, the total construction cost of this second-class national highway is about 400,000 yuan, which is a big project. It is indeed a bit difficult to allocate such funds when the government has been in a tight financial situation. However, fortunately, they are backed by the wealthy Nan Railway Company in Chile, so they often receive subsidies that are difficult to obtain in maps. For example, this time, the construction of the second-class national highway, about 140 kilometers long between Maolin and Boling, can obtain 50,000 yuan in cash subsidies and 50,000 yuan in material subsidies from the Nan Railway Company, which undoubtedly greatly alleviates the financial pressure for road construction.

Since the Nan Railway Company has generously donated, the Ministry of Transportation is not too stingy. So they also allocated 70,000 to 80,000 yuan from the special funds of the transportation lottery to build this second-class national highway that directly connects the north and south. This is not useless, because since the East Coast people and the Kingdom of Spain have agreed to obtain more than 10,000 square kilometers of land south of the border river, they have decided to add some settlements here to accommodate some new immigrants and second-generation young people in their country.

These settlements are basically located in the central valley with mild climate, abundant light and fertile soil, and there is not a single mountainous area. They are: Shenze Township near the port of Barras in later generations (Lake Yankiway is also named Shenze Lake), Beixin Township near the port of Okotei in later generations, Wangdu Township near the city of Plank in later generations, Lunu Township near the town of Frescia in later generations, Xinchu Township near the town of Puyeway in later generations, and Lucheng Township near the town of Riobueno in later generations, and a total of six newly set settlements.

Of course, if you include the Boling Town mentioned earlier, it will be the basic structure of the two counties in the future, and this is basically the south of the Border River. However, although the size of Maolin County is only three counties, the more than 10,000 square kilometers of land that people from the East Coast "false" from the Kingdom of Spain this time is definitely a good place with abundant water and grass. If it is well managed, the existing agricultural conditions will definitely be able to support more than 150,000 people. Moreover, if more fields are reclaimed in the future, their ability to carry the population will be stronger.

What's more, from the north of Kalbuco Volcano, the series of volcanic groups not only provide a large amount of mineral nutrients to the soil in the central valley, but also give humans a large amount of sulfur, which is undoubtedly an extremely important output. At present, outside of Kalbuco Volcano and Osorno Volcano, there are several mining sites of different sizes established by the South Railway Company and the East Coast Materials Department. Due to the extreme danger of the work of purging sulfur, these mined mines basically use Indian non-national laborers as the main labor force, and the sulfur mined is also transported to Liucheng Port by land and water, and then loaded into the sea to various local factories as production materials.

Some of the mines east of Boling Town, which Sergio Rivera is about to go to, are undoubtedly not enough to see than those currently being mined by the East Coast people. Not only is the transportation not very convenient, but the output is also limited in the future. Of course, this is also normal. If a large mine or rich mine at that time, how could the East Coast people be handed over to outsiders to develop? The East Coast people are not idiots, and even if they lack labor, they would not do this!

Of course, this does not mean that the Italians will lose money after they start to build this mine. In fact, it is still profitable, but the profit is not as large as expected. Its future output is mostly used in Chile, because the State Council has decided to set up a rough sulfur factory in Liuchenggang to support the market demand in Chile nearby.

Okay, let's move the topic back to the second-class national highway. The Ministry of Transportation also earned the lottery. The transportation lottery was issued nationwide for the construction of water conservancy facilities in the Hejian area. Now the Ministry of Transportation uses it in Chile to build roads. Strictly speaking, it is misappropriated. The Hejian area is naturally very dissatisfied, but it cannot be attacked and only took out 80,000 yuan to build the road. After the Northern Chemical Industry, Northern Arsenal, Dayuhe Arsenal and other manufacturers that often use sulfur also took out some money and raised 20,000 yuan, which made the start-up capital of this national highway reach a huge amount of 200,000 yuan, and it can be started! As for what to do with the remaining 200,000 yuan, let's talk about it later! Whether it is issuing public bonds, lending to banks, appropriation from central banks or local finances, there are ways. After all, living people cannot be suffocated to death by urine.

Sergio Rivera and his group of six or seven people took a carriage and drove along the second-class national road route that had already begun surveying. The road was generally flat. Perhaps this was related to the fact that the central and southern Chile is not in a season of heavy rainfall. However, the mud pits, swamps and shrubs that appeared from time to time still showed Rivera and others how difficult it was to walk on the road, and it fully demonstrated the necessity of road construction. When mountains on both sides blocked traffic, a railway or highway that ran through the north and south was indeed quite necessary, and it could even be said to determine the speed of the development progress of the new settlements nearby.

Later that day, Rivera and others' carriages were parked in a military post (also used as a military station, a resting place for expedition teams and government staff). The post was not small in size, with about 30 militiamen affiliated to the Maolin County Security Corps stationed. Several carriages were parked in the courtyard surrounded by wooden fences, and there were also many mules and horses shouting in the stables in the corner. It seemed that people traveling between Boling Town and Maolin City would basically choose to rest here.

"We can take care of the horses who pull the cart, but they need care and fodder. Let's turn from here and there is the cafeteria. There is nothing good to eat inside, but there are still some trout and lake food produced in the Deep Lake. In addition, potatoes are full and there is no wine. Of course, these are all paid." A middle-aged militia with a little gray temple came over. After negotiating with the East Coast government officials accompanying Rivera, he looked at the Italians and said slowly: "But don't worry about safety issues. The hostile Indians here have been wiped out by the Southern Railway Company several times. Now they are either dead or swim across the Border River to the Spaniards. The rest are also working hard in the sulfur mine, so you can sleep well and nothing can disturb you."

"Thank you so much for your generous help, and we are very grateful for it." Sergio Rivera said sincerely in Chinese: "I think we are in need of something to fill our stomachs now. If you happen to be not having a meal, can you join us? I brought my wine and bought Snow Mountain beer in Port Araucan."

"Thank you very much for your kindness." The middle-aged militia sniffed and said regretfully: "But I think I have to go inspect the warehouse. Recently, a new batch of machines has been launched here, which is of great importance and has to be cautious."

After saying that, the middle-aged militia left with a saber. It seemed that the batch of machines he was talking about were indeed more important and could not bear the responsibility for something wrong.
Chapter completed!