On January 15, 1644, there was heavy rain in Xinhua Port.

The tropics of the rainy season are difficult. Continuous rain, humid and hot weather, and raging diseases all challenge the patience limits of newcomers. According to statistics, since the rainy season entered at the end of October 1943 in Xinhuaxia, the number of people suffering from illness in Xinhua Port has surged by about 20% compared to usual. Although many people have minor illnesses, and they will heal themselves after being hit, a considerable number of people are still infected with malaria.

Even though people on the east coast planted some cinchona trees in the hilly and mountainous areas north of Ping'an County, the number is still too rare and completely out of scale. Therefore, although the production of precious drug, Jinchona bark powder, has increased to a certain extent compared to before, it is still not available in large quantities. At this stage, the New China Colony only has military and political systems officials, senior soldiers, and technicians who are infected with malaria are qualified to use drug treatment. Ordinary people can only be next to each other after getting sick.

In the three months since the rainy season, more than 60 people have been infected with malaria, most of whom are residents who need to work in the fields or by the water. One-third of these people have died, but the condition of those who have not died is not optimistic. In addition to these, more than a dozen people have died of dysentery, typhoid fever and other diseases. In short, every rainy season is the time for a major outbreak in the New China region.

In fact, relatively speaking, Xinhua Port is much better than the colonial cities established by Europeans in the Caribbean, Africa, India, and Indonesia in all aspects, especially in terms of sanitation. First of all, the urban area is dry and tidy, with hardened pavements paved with bricks and stones, and the underground drainage pipeline that was built at a high cost at the beginning of urban construction. These two are not common in the Old European continent or in its overseas colonial cities. Even many towns planned in the early stage of the East Coast are not so luxurious.

Good drainage facilities greatly reduce the water accumulation inside and outside the urban area. This reduces the breeding environment for many mosquitoes, and relatively reduces the chance of people getting sick. In fact, we can compare Batavia and Xinhua Port at this time. Batavia has a vast urban area and a complex environment. There are small rivers and woods in the urban area. Many residents even artificially build fish ponds to raise fish. The city of Xinhua Fort is only 1,000 meters around, and the area is far less than Batavia. The urban area is full of brick and tile buildings. Apart from some wells and closed drinking water treatment facilities, there is no water surface, which makes mosquitoes almost no breeding place. In this way, it is no wonder that the living environment of the two cities in the same tropical areas is so huge.

The second is people's hygiene habits. Shi Qinjie, the captain of the Madagascar Development Team, issued an order from the beginning, strictly prohibiting the spilling of sewage into the streets and discarding garbage. Violators will be fined. Every day, residents must dump various garbage into designated places, and then burn or landfill by special personnel. Residents will also regularly have haircuts and bathes. The public bathhouses in the city burn hot water every day and there is no charge for any fees. Workers who are working do not mind enjoying a hot bath after work to remove physical fatigue.

As a result, the incidence of various diseases among residents of Xinhuaburg was reduced to the lowest level. It is incomparable to the terrifying figure of Batavia's annual mortality rate of 17%. Although a large number of people still develop and die during the rainy season, they are generally treated in a timely manner, so the mortality rate is also controlled within a tolerable range.

Compared with Xinhuaburg, the situation in Tacheng is much worse. The city wall construction has just been completed in this city, which has risen by coal, but various facilities in the city, the forts, lighthouses, Yonggu Wharf and other facilities outside the city have not been completed. Therefore, the living conditions of local residents are still quite harsh. Naturally, the mortality rate of residents is very high. For this reason, the Executive Committee even added 200 French immigrants from the local area to supplement the large number of diseases and staff reductions caused by logging, coal mining, and land reclamation. It can be said that every construction achievement in the primitive tropical areas was paved with a large number of corpses in this era.

Nine ships of all sizes are anchored at the docks of Xinhua Port. These nine ships arrived here from the local area through the baleen whale port and the river fortress, namely the four latest 1200-ton Scud class fly-slipper transport ships, two dedicated immigration ships with compartments and steam ventilation fans, two 1150-ton steam engine sailing ships, the Tarrow and Diversion, and a newly built guard gunboat Swordfish.

Among these ships, the special immigration ship "Sprint Champion" and the "Postman" were originally designed without steam power. However, later considering that the operating sections of the two ships were from Gushan Port in Australia to Xinhua Port in Xinhua, which had a long voyage, especially when it was back, sailing in tropical areas with relatively harsh conditions, so a 62.8 horsepower steam unit was added during construction. The ship used a propeller propeller with iron pear wood sleeves, with a normal speed of 11-12 knots, and the speed could reach about 16-17 knots when it was smooth. With such a high speed, in order to avoid unstable center of gravity of the ship, only one floor of the compartment for immigrants was covered above the deck, making the entire ship carry 800 people. Of course, if the steam power was not modified, it might be able to carry more people, but this undoubtedly does not conform to the original intention of the East Coast people to quickly transport immigration.

These two expensive ships could hardly carry any cargo. When they went from Xinhua Port to Australia, they were basically empty capsules. There was no one in the cabin except for the fifty gunners transported to Yantai Fortress. Therefore, they were standard "immigrant ships" and had no military equipment. The Executive Committee only built two trial waters in total. Only God knows when construction will start to be started in the future.

These two ships will transport immigrants together with two flute-type transport ships currently running on this section, which can transport more than 2,500 migrants per trip. Of course, they will not be with those slow-speed flute-type ships, which will not be able to exert their advantage of high speed. They will arrive at Gushan Port at the beginning of May every year and ship migrants back to Xinhua Castle; and the fleet of flute-type transport ships escorted by a fast cruiser will arrive at the end of May every year. The first fleet will take a break after arriving in Xinhua Castle, and then will arrive at Gushan Port again to transport the second batch of immigrants in late June; and in mid-August, the second fleet will arrive at Gushan Port again to transport the last batch of immigrants, and at this point, the year-round transportation mission is basically over.

From this we can see that the fleet of East Coast people can currently run two round trips a year from Xinhua Port to Gushan Port, transporting more than 5,000 people. Of course, if there are too many immigrants, it is not impossible to run one or two round trips. However, due to factors such as weather and sea conditions, the speed will slow down, especially for flute-type transport ships that rely on pure sail power. Therefore, if possible, East Coast people are still willing to end their year-on-year sailing missions between mid-October every year, and then give sailors a holiday to maintain the ship.

The four "Scud"-class sailing and scissor transport ships are responsible for the flight from their homeland to Xinhua Port through South Africa. The sailing time period is basically the same as before, that is, in the winter and spring of the southern hemisphere, you can run two round trips a year. During this period, the wind direction is conducive to sailing, and the storm waters in Cape Egarus, South Africa are calm in summer and the risk is also small. The four "Scud"-class sailing ships can transport almost 3,600-4,000 people at a time, but they are essentially cargo ships, and it is impossible to transport all the migrants on the return journey - in fact, there were not so many people transporting them in the early stage. In addition to transporting immigrants, they will also ship some wood back to the local area. Of course, if there are female slaves or livestock traded from Suez Port, they may also carry some on the return journey.

The last remaining guard gunboat and "Treading the Wave", the "Dianshui" multi-functional sailboat will be loaded with cargo, and go to Kingsoft Port through Gushan Port in Australia to meet with three ships (one guard gunboat, a flute-shaped transport ship, and an armed transport ship) that arrived there in the early stage, and then head north to Blackshui Port to join the sequence of Blackshui temporary dispatch fleet. At that time, the Blackshui Fleet will have a huge scale of six steam engine sailboats. Among them, two smaller tonnage paddle turbine sailboats may be placed in Australia, traveling between its two ports, and can be navigated throughout the year; the other four ships will set off from the Port of Rishiri Island in the winter and spring of the Northern Hemisphere to Kingsoft Port, which can transport 3,500-4,000 people at a time, and can also run two round trips a year, which is seven or eight thousand people.

There were so many more ships at once, so the number of sailors needed was quite huge. At least 250 sailors, 30-40 steam engine maintenance and repairmen, and more than 100 naval gunners were required. This pressure was quite huge. To this end, the local government increased its own efforts in sailor training and opened sailor training schools for large-scale training. At the same time, it also selected a part of the Malay sailors whom they thought were relatively reliable after years of observation, and finally pulled a part from the China-Portuguese joint fleet and local fishermen in the New China-Portuguese region, which barely supported it.
Chapter completed!