Rise of the 1630s South America

Chapter 111 Cotton Cloth Market ([-])

After the minor incident of the Charuya attack passed, the iron ore working group continued westward.

Two hundred immigrants and two hundred pirates began the arduous dredging of the river.The further upstream, the narrower the river, the shallower the water depth, and the more serious the silting of the river. The phenomenon of cut-off that is rarely seen in the downstream reaches is very common here, and the navigation conditions are not optimistic.

In fact, strictly speaking, this section of the middle reaches of the Yihe River is not short of water. On the contrary, there are large swamps and wetlands everywhere.It is the trickles flowing from these swamps and wetlands that gather to provide a huge water source for the lower reaches of the Yi River. Therefore, Shao Shude plans to use these natural swamps and micro-lakes to dig channels and move forward.

This is a daunting task, and with the current manpower, it is impossible to complete it in a short time.Fortunately, now that there is the Xiayihe Fort, which has just taken shape, the distance to transport supplies is much shorter, and the whole project is still being carried out slowly but firmly.

Aside from these hard-working people on the east coast, let us turn our attention to the other side of the Atlantic Ocean - Bordeaux in the southwestern part of France on the Old World.

As far back as the Roman rule, the capital city of the province of Aquitania on the banks of the Gironde River was extremely prosperous because of foreign trade. Since Henry IV issued the tolerant Edict of Nantes in 1598, ending the Civil War of Religion, Bordeaux, which has been traumatized by war, has embarked on a fast track of development.

Due to its unique geographical location, Bordeaux is one of the large ports of France's foreign trade at this time.Sugar, tobacco, cocoa from the West Indies; pepper, cinnamon from Ceylon, Sumatra, and India; ginger and nutmeg from Arabia, India, and China; cloves from Malaya and the Moluccas; cloves from India, Gems from Ceylon and Persia, wool shawls, perfumes, incense, glass, porcelain, cotton textiles, silk products and other goods from all over the world from Kashmir gathered here, and then flowed from here to the French interior and even the neighboring German regions.

The prosperity of trade has brought economic prosperity and the improvement of the living standards of the people here.The life style of the local nobles and big businessmen in Bordeaux is extremely extravagant. Regarding this point, Xu Xin and the three who came to the Old Continent for the first time really opened their eyes.

At Julian's banquet at his luxurious estate on the banks of the Gironde, well-dressed servants lined up to deliver food such as Mexican turkey, Newfoundland cod, local foie gras, and delicious red wine and brandy. dining table.Moreover, both the host and the guests uniformly used silver cutlery such as silver knives and forks that were rarely seen in this era②.

It has to be said that after the development of the New World, the average living standard of the rich in Europe has risen a lot.On the contrary, the living standards of the Ming gentry class were generally declining at this time, and this trend between the two sides was still accelerating.

Since they arrived in Bordeaux with Julian and Mathilde of the Pasquale family in May, they have been busy investigating the market and setting up a business station.It was not until they arrived in Bordeaux that they realized how useless the £5 they had was. After buying a two-story house with a cellar on the banks of the Gironde River, most of their funds had been spent, and the remaining money might That's enough to hire a few gatekeepers.

The owner of this house was originally an old aristocrat. Unfortunately, during the period of social transformation after the Middle Ages and the Renaissance, he failed to manage his own business well, but continued to maintain the original vanity and luxury life, resulting in heavy debts. Had to sell part of his property to pay off debts.

This stone-built house is not small in size, with a courtyard in front, but its style and style are a little older.The style of the house is solid, heavy, and austere in the middle ages, and the furniture in the room is full of thick, cumbersome big guys, which is completely different from the Italian style that is popular in France today-gorgeous and bright mansions, exquisitely carved furniture. So out of place, it's no wonder the owner is willing to sell for the bargain price of £360.

But this is nothing to the crossing people, they originally used this place as a commercial station and warehouse.Even when they saw the thick oak furniture in the house, everyone felt a little pleasantly surprised: the materials are really rich.

The entire house is just a reception room. Due to the structure of the house, the reception room is a bit dark even during the day.Xu Xin found a few candles made of unknown animal fat from the utility room in the basement. After inserting them into iron candlesticks and lighting them, the room lit up.

"Tell me, you have been here for more than a month, how do you feel?" Xu Xin sat on an oak chair and asked while pouring some wine for everyone.

"Let me talk about it first." Tao Chenxi took the wine glass, and was the first to speak: "A while ago, I went with Julian to visit his father—Old Pasquale's textile factory outside the city. To be honest Before I went there, I had imagined the situation of his textile factory many times in my mind, but when I first saw this large textile "factory", which is said to be one of the few in Bordeaux, I was still very surprised. There is no reason. He is really because the factory is too shabby, and there may be only 50 to 3 employees, most of whom are part-time farmers. These farmers come to the factory to work when they are slack or short of money, ginning, rinsing, spinning, weaving, washing and dyeing Wait, the efficiency of the labor process is very low, and the loss of raw materials is very large. It takes about 4-[-] catties of cotton to weave a piece of cloth. Moreover, their skills are very unskilled, and many workers need to be retrained. This is probably because the workers They are relatively mobile and not fixed.”

"How much lint do we need to weave a piece of cloth now?" Xu Xin asked, "I think it's less than three catties?"

"Now it only costs two to two and a half catties. The skilled workers, the sense of responsibility, and the management are in place, which will improve labor efficiency and reduce labor costs." Tao Chenxi said, "In fact, this is the combination of modern factories and traditional handicrafts. The industry is different. The textile factories of the Pasquale family, including those handmade woolen workshops in the UK, are actually just the prototype of a factory, and they are still traditional handicrafts in essence. For example, those British people gave wool to farmers on credit. , those farmers will sell these primary products to designated merchants after spinning the wool, and then go home to spin the yarn in exchange for the wool. More importantly, these jobs are their sideline jobs, and they are still a group of farmers in essence. Whether it is Britain or France, or Italy, where the handicraft industry is more developed, they all lack workers in the modern sense."

"En." Xu Xin nodded, and said, "The traditional handicraft industry is destined to be eliminated by the modern machine manufacturing industry. As far as I know, the Pasquale family's workshop still employs a large number of workers. Most of the handicraft workshops and workshops employ only a few people. According to statistics, until Napoleon Bonaparte’s French Second Empire period, three-quarters of French enterprises employed less than 10 people, which accounted for the total The number of employed workers is about 60%. Therefore, at this time, France can be said to be still a country with a very developed small-scale farming economy. Moreover, she did not adopt new agricultural technologies like the United Kingdom, which caused agriculture to tie too many people to the land. Alas, after all, there is no European country at this time that can match Britain in terms of social organization, industrial technology, religious tolerance, adventurous spirit, bourgeois power, etc. The Industrial Revolution took place in Britain. It's not by chance."

"Ahem, digressing." Sun Bo, who had been sitting beside him drinking and not talking, cleared his throat and said, "Let's ignore the industrial revolution. What we care about now is the sales of our products, Pasquale I also visited the family’s factory once, and it produces some cotton cloth, gloves, stockings and a small amount of woolen cloth, the quality is not good, the price is not low, but the sales volume is not bad, do you know why?”

"I probably know. Let me tell you first. You can see if you are right." Tao Chenxi put the wine glass on the table, sat up straight and said: "Currently, only 32 provinces in the central region of France have established tariffs. Alliance, the other 13 frontier provinces and regions still have a lot of checkpoints, local tax, consumption tax and other taxation items. What's worse, the weights and measures among these provinces and regions are mostly not unified, the taxation system is not the same, and some local regulations even contradict each other , conflicts, and the rigid and backward guild system are hindering the development and circulation of commerce. In a word, the cost of commodity circulation from one province to another will be quite high, and some goods can only be sold in It circulates in a small area. After all, although the French royal power has been greatly strengthened after the religious war, the local feudal separatist forces are still very strong, which is really incomparable with the British."

"The answer is correct, plus ten points." Xu Xin joked, and then said, "You have all seen that the market is huge and the purchasing power of residents is also strong, but the factors that hinder free trade and commodity circulation are still very strong. But we also Don't be too greedy, let's start with Bordeaux and slowly infiltrate the entire Gascony region, and then consider other provinces and regions after gaining a firm foothold. Our competitors are mainly local developed small-scale peasant economy handicraftsmen, and protectionist Local guilds, as for the influence of British goods, it is not very big here. So, everyone, let us let it go together."

"Done!" Several people clinked glasses together.

①Bordeaux is the capital city of the Gascogne-Guyenne region in southwestern France at this time.

②Until the beginning of the 18th century, the Austrian royal palace still used hands to grab food when dining.The promotion and popularization of tableware such as knives and forks came after French luxury culture became popular throughout Europe.

(End of this chapter)