On the dirt road in a farm, Lu Hui and several colleagues walked slowly. In the fields on both sides of the road, green crops were planted. These crops were as tall as their waists, and their plants looked a bit like eggplant.

However, this is not eggplant, but a crop in the Americas. It is now grown on a large scale in Jiazhou. Just like many kinds of corn are planted in Lu Hui’s corn farm, there are many types of crops grown here.

The seeds collected from all over Central America were planted here in different areas using Beiyang Trading Company. It is now late summer and it is the harvest season.

The entire farm looks like a tea garden in the Central Plains.

In the fields, many American farmers who were originally slaves were picking the leaves of these plants, collect them and put them on carts, and some farmers put the leaves directly into their mouths to chew them, looking very enjoyable.

As noon approached, the sun was fierce. Lu Hui and others rode their horses toward the farm department ahead. When they approached the yard, a faint fragrance blew towards them.

This fragrance is a bit special. It will feel pungent at first, but after getting used to it, it will smell quite comfortable. After Lu Hui entered the yard, he looked around and finally looked at a corner of the courtyard, where there were many pergolas.

Many farmers were busy hanging the collected leaves on the long ropes under the pergola. There were many hanging leaves, densely packed, blocking the long ropes and looking like a wooden beam.

Some of the leaves hanging in the pergola are yellow and look golden. Some farmers tie up each of them and hang them on wooden racks under other pergolas in turn, looking like roast ducks with golden crusts.

Lu Hui saw that among the busy farmers, many people were holding a reed tube in their mouths. The outer end of the reed tube was burning, and the fire was dark and bright.

Lu Hui knew that this was a pastime for Native Americans, called "smoking". The reed tube was filled with debris of plant called "tobacco". After lit, a fragrant smoke would be produced. People would suck it into their bodies and feel energetic.

This plant called "Tobacco" is a similar eggplant plant that Lu Hui saw in the field just now. The leaves will turn golden after drying, also known as "golden leaves".

The leaves of this American plant are used as medicine by Native Americans to treat injuries and diseases, such as treating colds, headaches, toothaches, trauma, burns, abscesses, etc.

It can also refresh the mind and resist fatigue.

There are many ways to use it, such as breathing the smell of fresh tobacco, or ignite the tobacco and smoke it with your nostrils, or crushing the dry tobacco and mixing it with salt and lime to apply it to the affected area.

You can also chew the tobacco leaves, or chop them into a grass tube to ignite them, and "smoke".

You can also use a special smoking tool to "smoke". The smoking tool is called "pipes", and it comes in various styles. Lu Hui has seen various pipes brought back by the expedition team.

A common type is a long wooden pipe with a cup-shaped object shaped like a small teacup on the bottom. When used, lit the tobacco silk in a small cup. The tobacco silk will burn slowly, and then the person can inhale at the other end.

Lu Hui felt that tobacco's brain-revitalization function was the same as that of the tea in the Central Plains, but the strength seemed to be bigger, and smoking and drinking tea would be addictive.

He found Xiao Changyu, the director of the farm. Xiao Changyu was now outside a small house, sucking a pipe in his mouth, smoking while talking to the technician and several American farmers. Lu Hui looked at the small house and asked the other party:

"How, have you figured out the new technology?"

"Are you thinking about this?" Xiao Changyu replied, his mouth full of smoke, "I still can't grasp the heat well, and if I'm not careful, it will easily burn, or it will not be roasted enough."

After talking for a while, Xiao Changyu asked someone to bring a few reed tubes filled with tobacco silk to cheer up Lu Hui and his colleagues. Lu Hui waved his hand and said he would not smoke. Looking at the steaming little house, he asked again:

"Is there any difference between smoking flue-cured tobacco and drying cigarettes?"

"Not necessarily, the flavors are slightly different. Which one is better or worse depends on people." Xiao Changyu looked at the house with ignition tobacco in front of him and said:

"However, using fire to bake tobacco leaves is faster than the sun exposure, which is suitable for rapid and large-scale drying... After all, it may not be sunny every day, and when it rains, there is no way to dry the cigarette."

Xiao Changyu told his subordinates a few words and walked towards the office of the field office with Lu Hui. While walking, he said: "Native Americans treat tobacco leaves differently, but basically they mainly use tobacco drying (leaf). So now we have to spend more time exploring the tobacco curing method."

Like Lu Hui, Xiao Changyu is an employee of Beiyang Trading Company. Lu Hui is responsible for cultivating corn and Xiao Changyu is responsible for cultivating tobacco.

There are many types of corn, from Central America and even the west coast of South America. Tobacco grown by Xiao Changying Farm also comes from Central America and the west coast of South America.

Lu Hui wanted to cultivate high-yield corn, while Xiao Changying should choose tobacco varieties as much as possible, and research mature tobacco (silk) technology. At the same time, tobacco was planted on a large scale, using high-quality tobacco products as the "fist product" of Jiazhou, and exporting them to profit.

But tobacco is not grown anywhere. The climate in Jiazhou is hot in summer and the light time is long. Many places are not only suitable for growing corn, but also for growing tobacco.

According to the imperial court's plan, if Jiazhou, located thousands of miles away, wants to become a money tree instead of a useless rib, it must have special products, and it is best to discover gold and silver ores with rich minerals.

If not, at least improve the scale and output of cash crops. Tobacco is such a cash crop, so Jiazhou must become an important tobacco production base.

In the future, you will make a lot of money by trading tobacco.

The reason for planning this way is that the refreshing effect of "smoking" is very obvious and is as addictive as tea. As long as the native Americans live in areas where tobacco is grown, men will almost smoke. They have to take a few sips when they have time on weekdays, which is very demanding.

It is similar to the people in the southern Central Plains who are used to drinking tea.

A few years ago, when the members of the expedition teams that arrived in Central America for exploration, when they were dealing with chiefs from various places, they tried to "smoke" at the warm invitation of the other party, and were exposed to the "content" of the American "concept".

At first, many people are not used to it, but soon they feel happy. It is like drinking tea and drinking it. If you don’t smoke it once or twice a day, you will feel uncomfortable.

Of course, if you don’t smoke, you won’t get sick, and you won’t die. However, the expedition members found that Americans smoked and Central Plains were as common as drinking tea with people from Central Plains.

After research, the upper-level members of Beiyang Trading Company believed that since tea can be popular in the Central Plains and sold well overseas, American tobacco can be the same.

Therefore, in addition to using iron tools to exchange for real money and silver from Native Americans, the trade team also exchanged for the tobacco leaves in the other party's hands, which cost as much as possible, and then shipped back to the Central Plains for sale at the beginning of this year.

There are not plants similar to tobacco in the Central Plains, but there are also ways to take them similar to "smoking". It is said that there are similar plants and ways to take them in India and Persia, but except for the strange medicine of Western Regions, "Dieja", no known plant is as effective as tobacco.

Therefore, the Beiyang Trading Company, which made great efforts to explore the Americas, found a specialty crop of America that can really make a lot of money. It is inevitable that American tobacco will be planted on a large scale in the Central Plains like peppers.

But now, everyone does not know which areas of the Central Plains are suitable for growing tobacco, and which places are not sure about the quality of tobacco grown in their fields. Therefore, Jiazhou has become the first tobacco cultivation site and will be the tobacco production area that Beiyang Trading Company has effectively controlled.

Like Lu Hui, Xiao Changyu has been working hard to complete the heavy responsibilities assigned by the company. Because he has dealt with tobacco, he has developed the habit of smoking. Now he never leaves a pipe and takes a few sips whenever he has a mouthful.

Lu Hui did not smoke because he believed that smoking would inevitably lead to a large amount of smoke entering the lungs, which would lead to lung problems over time and affect health.

For Lu Hui, if you want to refresh yourself, just drink tea, what cigarettes should you smoke?

The Central Plains tea supply is sufficient, but tobacco has to be transported back from the Americas. If you become addicted to smoking, you must not spend a lot of money to buy imported tobacco? In this case, it is better to spend money to drink good tea.

Drinking tea will never hurt your body.

He advised Xiao Changyu to smoke less when he had time, but Xiao Changyu didn't care. Now seeing the old friend start to talk again, he smiled and said, "Excessive smoking is harmful to health. It is said that the emperor said so, and of course I know this."

"However, the court did not prohibit the company from transporting tobacco back to the Central Plains. What is the reason?"

Lu Hui advised: "Old Xiao! The court wants to open source and collect taxes, just like collecting tea taxes. In the future, the tobacco tax will be subsidized for finance, but the money is earned by the court, and your health is your own..."

"Oh, I'm a good person, and I'm not smoking all the time..." Xiao Changyu breathed a cigarette comfortably and said with a smile: "Alcoholism is harmful to health, but drinking moderately every day will make nothing? Smoking is the same."

"I tell you that from this year, the company will vigorously develop the tobacco industry, not only to purchase tobacco from the American chiefs on a large scale and transport it back to the Central Plains for sale, but also to turn Jiazhou into an important place of production for tobacco."

"Jiazhou Tobacco, if you want to become the most famous brand of tobacco, it will be like the most famous teas, and you may not be able to afford it in the future."

"Anyway, when the company sells tobacco, it will follow the requirements of the court, just as the wine merchants declare in advance, and inform customers of "excessive smoking is harmful to health". As for how many times a day after they go back to buy tobacco, it is their own business."

Speaking of this, Xiao Changying pointed to the tobacco-cured house in the distance and said with anticipation: "The tea business has made many people rich. I tell you that in the future, the gold leaf business will also make many people rich!"
Chapter completed!