The Rise of the Writers of the Republic of China

After the morning lectures, the students did not go home from school, but went to the cafeteria next door to queue up for dinner.

The cook is a peasant woman invited from nearby, with a monthly salary of 1 yuan, who is responsible for cooking for the teachers and students. There is no milk in the nutritious lunch, just ordinary home-cooked dishes and white flour steamed buns. Even so, the students ate with relish, licking and licking the oily tableware, and they didn't need to wash the dishes after they were all cleaned up.

While the reporters were taking pictures, Zhou Hexuan suddenly asked, "Hey, where is Shuai Liu?"

Feng Yong said: "The sixth son has already left, and he has to go to the north to take charge of the army."

Zhou Hexuan smiled and said, "You are free."

"I can't help it. The air force is too expensive, and the old man is not willing to use it," Feng Yong said mockingly, "I am now the commander who eats rice all day, and my bones are rusted."

Zhou Hexuan said, "Let's go, we'll go back too."

Feng Yong looked at the children with full bellies and happy smiles on their faces, and said with emotion: "I have lived for more than 20 years, and today I finally feel that I am doing something."

"Haha, each other!" Zhou Hexuan laughed.

The two returned to the concession in a rickshaw. When they passed the British concession, they suddenly saw a large number of students demonstrating. Holding banners and slogans, waving flags and shouting slogans, they marched mightily towards the British consulate.

"Down with British Imperialism!"

"Severely punish the murderer, protest against interference!"

"China is the China of the Chinese!"

"..."

The military and police from the British Concession quickly arrived and blocked the students who were marching in the street, and the scene became extremely tense for a while.

Zhou Hexuan couldn't do anything about it, he and Feng Yong could only stand by and watch the excitement. The students are in a state of passion and anger, so they don't even try to persuade them. As for the military and police in the concession, they will not listen to Zhou Hexuan's command.

Not only in Tianjin, but now there are demonstrations all over the country.

The cause was the Northern Expedition of the National Revolutionary Army, which successively occupied the middle and lower reaches of the Yangtze River despite the mediation and interference of the great powers. These are the traditional spheres of influence of the United Kingdom, and the war suffered a lot of losses. The British finally couldn't sit still and dispatched warships to provoke troubles in the Yangtze River Basin.

At the beginning, British ships and merchant ships made fun of sinking Chinese wooden ships and drowning Chinese people by taking advantage of their huge tonnage. In the Wanxian section of the Yangtze River Basin alone, more than 40 people were drowned within three months, and 4 Chinese civilian ships were hit and sunk.

The intensification of the conflict occurred at the end of August.

The British Merchant Ship Wanliu ran to the Yunyang River to make trouble, indiscriminately sank three wooden boats carrying military pay from Yang Sen, more than 50 soldiers and civilians on board were drowned, and more than 80,000 pay and a few guns sank to the bottom of the river.

In other words, Yang Sen is the governor of Sichuan Province appointed by Wu Peifu, and the British are now helping Wu Peifu. This incident was purely flooding the Dragon King Temple.

But the British guy is awesome, if you make a mistake, you will make a mistake. I don’t care who you are, anyway, Chinese people are cheap.

Yang Sen was also awesome. In a rage, he sent troops to seize the British merchant ships Wantong and Wanxian and demanded compensation from the British. The British responded by dispatching additional warships and issuing a 24-hour ultimatum to fire directly as soon as the time limit expired.

On September 5, the British ship blatantly bombarded the urban area of ​​Wanxian, shelling for nearly 3 hours, firing more than 300 artillery shells and incendiary bombs. Thousands of Chinese soldiers and civilians were killed and injured, and more than a thousand houses and shops were destroyed. It is known as the "Wanxian Massacre" in history.

After the tragedy, many newspapers across the country, including Ta Kung Pao, reported it in detail and severely condemned the crimes of the British. Naturally, the passionate and patriotic young people couldn't sit still, and took to the streets to demonstrate spontaneously.

If protests and marches work, what's the use of the military?

Today, the arrogance of the British is still arrogant. Not only did they refuse to hand over the murderer and compensate for the loss, but they threatened Wu Peifu to resolve the matter peacefully. Wu Peifu had no choice but to put pressure on Yang Sen, asking Yang Sen to apologize to the British and release the detained British merchant ship as soon as possible.

The universe is turned upside down, black and white are indistinguishable, and the majestic Republic of China has always been like this.

"Don't look, let's go." Feng Yong said with a sigh.

Zhou Hexuan shook his head helplessly, the joy of successfully running the school was instantly washed away.

Returning to the newspaper office very depressed, Hu Zhengzhi and Zhang Jiluan came to him together before Zhou Hexuan's butt was hot.

Zhang Jiluan said: "We have just received a warning that Peking has ordered Ta Kung Pao to downplay the Wanxian tragedy and not to report too harshly. It seems that all newspapers in the Zhili area have received this telegram."

"President, tell me what to do." Hu Zhengzhi looked at Zhou Hexuan.

Zhou Hexuan asked back, "What's your opinion?"

Zhang Jiluan said: "How to report, how to report. No party, no selfishness, no sales, no blindness, these eight words must not be lost."

Zhou Hexuan carefully considered the gains and losses, and finally gritted his teeth and said, "Report!"

Hu Zhengzhi and Zhang Jiluan smiled at each other, and the former said, "I will write this editorial. I will try to be as subtle as possible, but the facts must be stated clearly."

If you want to run a newspaper in the Republic of China, you must have both backbone and tact. Hu Zhengzhi would not be so stupid as to intentionally provoke warlords and foreigners, but he had to stick to the bottom line at critical times. This is the real policy of "Ta Kung Pao".

In the in-depth report that Zhou Hexuan mentioned last time, Hu Zheng had already collected all the military expenditures of warlords in various places in recent years. But at this time, when the Northern Expeditionary Army was victorious one after another, he chose not to post it for the time being, because once this kind of article calling for peace is written, it is tantamount to speaking for Wu Peifu in disguise.

The real time to report is when the North and South armies are at a stalemate.

After dismissing Hu and Zhang, Zhou Hexuan sat in the office and sighed. He found that no matter what he did, it would not help the bad situation in China.

"Boom boom boom!"

There was a knock on the door.

Zhou Hexuan said angrily, "Please come in!"

A young man pushed the door open and said respectfully, "Mr. Zhou, I'm here to send invitations."

Zhou Hexuan opened the post, but it was Feng Wuyue, Zhang Xueliang's former adjutant and now the president of "Beiyang Pictorial", who invited him to a dance party on weekends.

"Please inform President Feng, I will be there then."

Zhou Hexuan felt it was very ironic. Now that the people all over the country are protesting against the big powers, the dance parties of the wealthy families are still going on. And he, Zhou Hexuan, is also one of those "unaware of the hatred of subjugation".

...

Chu Mansion.

Chu Yufeng slumped on the couch, smoking a big cigarette and asked, "It's been half a month, and I haven't found a chance yet?"

Du Xiaoshan said with a bitter face: "That chicken thief surnamed Zhou usually stays in the concession. Today he went to the eastern suburbs, but Zhang Xueliang and Feng Yong were also with him. It's not easy to handle."

Chu Yufeng said nonchalantly: "If he doesn't rent out the concession, then we will start in the concession."

"No way!"

Du Xiaoshan hurriedly dissuaded him: "Second Master, it is a taboo to use firearms in the concession, and foreigners will interfere if you are not careful."

"You are too timid," Chu Yufeng said with a smile, "Find a gunman, hide in the crowd and shoot, and run away after shooting. Can foreigners find out?"

"This..." Du Xiaoshan hesitated to speak. He really didn't want to care about this matter, anyway, Zhou Hexuan was from Zhang Xueliang, and he was also a well-known university student, if something went wrong, it would be Du Xiaoshan's turn to take the blame.

Chu Yufeng said with a grim expression: "You are a local snake in Tianjin, go and find me a gunman who will not die. Give him 1000 oceans, and be sure to bring Zhou Hexuan's head back. This is a military order, and you must not disobey it!"

"Okay... okay." Du Xiaoshan reluctantly agreed, already scolding all eighteen generations of Chu Yufeng's ancestors in his heart.

Don't look at Chu Yufeng's unscrupulous behavior in Tianjin City, but he is actually a coward. He didn't dare to kill people in the concession at all, and he even entrusted Du Xiaoshan to hire a gunman, so that in the future, accidents can be completely avoided.

Of course Du Xiaoshan is not a fool, he used to be a gunman for nothing. When he returned home, he thought about it, called his confidant and said, "Go and pass a message to Zhou Hexuan, tell him to be careful when going out, and beware of assassins."