Christmas in October 1872, Water and Fire Street outside the Haijing City.

It was a cloudy afternoon, with lead-colored clouds pressing against the sky, and the sky dimmed early, with clouds pressing and windlessness, which made the unique tinea oil smell on the Water and Fire Street clearer and pungent. The workers and coolies who finished work began to increase on the streets, but they seemed to be accustomed to this smell, and they were walking on the dirt road under their feet talking and laughing, looking for a drink in the tavern or bringing some food to their homes at the street stall.

Water and Fire Street, named as a street, you will know that it is a new place name after the founding of Haisong, because water and fire are called kerosene, also known as foreign oil. In the name of foreign oil, you can imagine that there would never be this street in the past. The American Mobil Oil Branch bought a large piece of land more than ten years ago. It built a foreign oil wholesale company here. The company that does this flammable and explosive business must have bought a wilderness. At that time, it was a lonely large courtyard with kerosene and a road leading to its doorstep. As a map map map of the imperial court, how could the unknown dirt road crossing reed marshes and cemeteries? It can only be seen from the flowing water and fire vendors on it, called Water and Fire Street.

This is located in the Shiligou area, and the so-called Shiligou is ten miles away from the city wall.

It turned out to be a graveyard and a reed marsh. Later, the business in Haisong exploded and flourished. There was a river and a wharf in this place. The land price was as low as a waste of money. There was even a large amount of land without a owner. Chinese and foreign merchants entered here to buy land and open business: First, two large factories of textiles and machinery were completed here, and the road was immediately built. The wharf was expanded. The court also specially established a public security police station for this. Coolie and unemployed farmers who wanted to work began to gather here. The commerce and real estate for workers began to rise for the workers began to rise, which created a cluster effect. Other factories also came to build around them. After all, factories also liked to build in groups. There were naturally logistics, labor gatherings, and trading markets. The larger the market, the more factories and people came, and the more land prices here were super cheap.

For the Haisong and Song dynasties of this era, even Britain, the United States and France, there must be slums where factories are gathered. Only slums can have the cheapest labor force, and cheap labor resources will inevitably bring more factories to enter. This is the "equilibrium point of industrial zones" mentioned by economists at that time.

When people from other places first arrived in Haijing, they had no jobs. They could not read and read. They could only go to several industrial areas that could change their destiny. Or they could also be called a must-visit slum. Shiligou is one of them, but the wages are definitely extremely low. Moreover, the competition is extremely fierce, and there are records of the poet:

The front of Shiligou,

Coincidence to make a living has a frontal relationship.

There is no more commission value,

Thank you for your hard work every year.

New refugees have no money, no skills, low income, or even no job, and can only sleep in sheds, so there is a spectacular rolling dragon in the Shiligou area (a shed built with reed bamboo poles, people sleep on the ground). Standing on a high place and looking around, it is exactly the same as twenty years ago: at that time it was an endless reed marsh, now it is an endless grass shed, and of course there were no smoke chimneys in the distance at that time.

This is how Shiligou is. From a cemetery, because of the choice of the times, it spontaneously became one of the largest slums in Haijing. Of course, according to the Haisong Emperor's newspaper, it is "a strongly rising industrial new area, another jewel in the crown of the Far East" - different perspectives.

But Shiligou is not just a boundless shed and stench. Slums are definitely not a place where people are gathering for death, but a concentration camp or a gathering place for refugees to fight.

This is not the place for starving candidates to die. On the contrary, slums are the treasures of labor: smart workers, mule-horse-like coolies, hardworking nannies, caring servants, and even the young masters who are infertile, can all be born here, and they are extremely cheap.

So simple wooden buildings, courtyards, and even Western-style shop buildings were built around the shed. Because the factory goods were sold, the men were relieved and the bosses made money. Then the money in the form of wages flowed into this slum. People who did well became skilled workers, managers and even bosses, so what they needed was better houses; and restaurants, rice, barber shops, etc. that provided services to workers also needed stores? Chinese and foreign real estate developers were very smart, and industrial areas and slums formed a balance, and then they also formed a balance with the real estate industry for renting houses of all sizes.

"Talents have wealth, and slums are treasures." A proverb in industry and commerce.

Because of its simplicity, the lazy painter was too lazy to name and segment, so he drew it on the map too long. It now became the vertebrae of this slum. The factory area near the Jianghai Pier in the distance became the heart, and the internal organs and drainage were automatically generated between the spine and the heart. It was very dirty, but that was the source of power of the ocean of money;

The skin and nerves that are always beautiful around the spine are the luxury residential areas of factory owners and real estate developers in the north;

This is the structure under the beautiful appearance of the ocean of money. It is enough to be "ashamed" with the word "Pearl". Looking at the world, it is not ashamed.

Mobil, who first came to the city, made a profit and moved away because of the appreciation of the land, but he left behind a legacy: there are still many shops in Shiligou, such as Shuihuo Street, and Mobil, which sells Mobil, and every day, small vendors from all over the world come to purchase goods, including grocery stores, and merchants carrying rattles, relying on these ants-like lower classes. In the era when Mobil had no cars, planes, and internal combustion engines, he almost bought his oil products in remote corners around the world. The indigenous people may have never seen mechanical watches in their lives, but they knew that Shuihuo would buy such water-like things that were better than candle lighting. Infiltration marketing may be called the early magic weapon for the rise of the oil industry.

Therefore, there is always a strong smell of kerosene on the Water and Fire Street, and even the soil on the street looks oily. Even the rainy south cannot change the attribute that penetrates into the surface.

At this time, the bell sound came from afar, dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong

The nearby factory owners were very unhappy. The whistle sound of their own before getting off work was actually not five o'clock but seven o'clock. The most kind family also delayed half an hour before playing the flute and getting off work. The rustic workers who didn't know how to tell the bells about time were inexplicably for a while: "Hey, why do you feel that the sun is long now? The whistle is still bright when it rings." Of course, this doesn't matter. The whistle sounds in many factories are actually a signal of shifts. There is still night shift after the day shift.

At five o'clock in the afternoon, the factory was on shifts, and the taverns and restaurants on Shuihuo Street seemed to be open now. The waiter went to the street to get workers to work hard to consume. There were also many shops that would light kerosene lamps to open until night: such as clothing stalls, Chinese medicine shops, bath shops. Trafficking shops with the signature "Get Rich overnight, American and Australian Work Agency", banknote shops that exchange currencies from various countries, and of course, beggars who wanted to sell their children and daughters, as well as secret prostitutes who just got up with heavy makeup, and sheriffs who were holding batons to collect protection fees everywhere;

There are many coffin shops on the street that are open, because maybe the business will come to you at night. The coffin shop is another major industry on Shuihuo Street: Shiligou often dies, but even a poor man needs a coffin board, or even a coffin, which is the only dignity that their relatives can give;

Now, as the spine of the community, Water and Fire Street is already a famous commercial street outside the city.

However, the tinea oil business store on Shuihuo Street is early to get off work, and now they are starting to pack up and prepare to close. Even if they are small wholesalers, they are too afraid of fire. They are all large water tanks for putting out fires. They don’t like to light the lights at night: candles and foreign oil can’t do anything;

But this is not a good thing, it means that the boss will give employees less money, especially civilian employees.

Just a moment after the bell came, a gentle middle-aged man came out of the Dechang turtle Oil Store on Shuihuo Street. He was not tall, black and thin, with a separate head, and slightly worn leather shoes were exposed under his cloth robe, and a pair of black-framed glasses were stomped on the bridge of his nose. It looked like the account room or study in the store was off work. Sure enough, he came out of the store and turned around and carried the wooden sign "Selected Wholesale and Retail of the turtle oil, no smoking and fireworks" at the door respectfully back to the store. He bent down to greet the boss before stroking his hair, kerosene-flavored, and walked west along the street.

He walked past the coolies in groups of three or three, stopped and looked at the fish stalls and vegetable markets on the street, but hesitated and walked away lonelyly. This was the case with people who made less money on Water and Fire Street.

When he passed the intersection, he saw a **-year-old newspaper boy running over in a hurry. At that time, the newspaper boy was holding a pile of newspapers in his arms, and there was another pile of new newspapers behind him. The child ran and shouted, "Gentlemen, the latest news: We are going to marry Annan! The opium merchant is going to fight! The second son of the emperor inspected the Zhujiang War Zone! The fight started in the parliament again! Song You Tie Electric President Changes! Buy one, buy one!"

There are heavy newspapers on the chest, making this child run like a staggering foal carrying too much weight. There is no way. Recently, it is a period of high news in Empire. The fun that the lottery parliament gave to the people may be much more than just gambling horses. And for this child, it is time to work hard now. The few hours of get off work in Shiligou are at the highest abortion, and the abortion represents newspaper sales.

It was two or three hours before dawn and dark that he decided that he could bring back a few taels of rice for his seriously ill mother and younger brothers and sisters. If he is lucky, he might even buy a reed mat to cover the shed that leaks at home.

Just as the newspaper boy was running across the road in a passing coal carriage, he twisted his neck and shouted everywhere, suddenly feeling something tripped on his ankle, and he flew forward in an instant.

However, a pair of powerful hands wrapped around his waist, stopped him in the air, and then lowered him heavily. The newspaper boy glared at his horrified eyes, and the man who looked very gentle was a man who had just been tripped away from him, and it was the man who twisted his waist and pulled himself back from the prospect of rolling all over the ground.

"Thank you...sir! Are you going to buy newspapers recently?...big news!" The newspaper boy stared at this black and thin little gentleman, and he was a little stuttering for a moment. After all, gratitude and sales are often different things in the minds of Chinese people.

"Walk and watch the road! If I don't pull you, you will be crushed to death by a coal truck! Why don't you leave quickly?!" Unexpectedly, the gentleman wearing glasses looked fierce. He roared up and the newspaper boy shrank his head timidly, and he took two steps back like a hen who noticed danger. After all, as a newspaper boy, being beaten, kicked, or even hit by a car during business is common.

But he still wanted to thank, or was planning how to thank the gentleman who helped, who had already glared and shouted: "Don't get out yet?"

He bowed in a hurry, and the newspaper boy turned around the intersection. After a long time, he heard his hawking again. This time he was too confident and probably was scared.

He pricked up his ears until he heard the trembling hawking of the newspaper boy dozens of meters away, the thin black-skinned man in glasses breathed a sigh of relief and hurriedly crossed the road. While walking, he pulled out a newspaper from his sleeve and looked around with his eyes behind his glasses. This time he no longer looked like a gentleman, but like a thief - this newspaper was snatched by the newspaper boy and took the opportunity to steal it out of the child's back.

He leaned against a tree and trembled with his thumb full of tinder oil, trembling and rubbing the newspaper open. His eyes rolled up and down as if he was licking his glasses, muttering: "President Song You Yiren? President Song You Yiren? President Song You Yiren?" This news is not on the front page. The front page is now occupied by the Opium War, the harm of opium smuggling and the attacks of the two parties, but he still found the news in bold on the back of the first page, which is big news after all.

He trembled with horror, and then the newspaper was like wings. The man buried his entire head and face in the wings of the newspaper like a goose bent his neck.

After a long time, he raised his face, which was already gritting his teeth and hummed a few words from his teeth: "Weng Jianguang, you are retribution!"

But when he gritted his teeth and grabbed the stolen newspaper under his armpit and walked a few meters, his expression suddenly collapsed, and he was completely disheartened. Several people who approached thought that this person was an opium ghost who was addicted to it, and he kept dodging away. At this time, what he heard was a whine: "Song You is my hope, it's gone, what should I do?"
Chapter completed!