Rise of the 1630s South America

Chapter 1738 Goals and Decisions

The continuous autumn rain has been falling for a long time. Louis XIV, who has just turned 38 years old, is standing on the porch in front of the hunting lodge with a heavy heart, not knowing what he is thinking.

The hunting lodge - ah no, it should be called Versailles Park now - is luxurious, this luxurious building complex designed by Le Notre in 1662 has been repaired for 2000 years, and it took a lot of money from [-] The people's fat and people's anointing contributed by the people of France, and they don't know when it will end.

The park covers a very large area, with natural landscapes such as lawns, lakes, groves, and gardens, as well as artificial buildings such as pavilions, swimming pools, sculptures, galleries, halls, offices, guard rooms, and barracks.Beginning in 1670, Mansard took over the design of Versailles Park. There are at least 3 people and thousands of horses working day and night. They not only build other parts of the palace, but also dig waterways. -The nearly 150-kilometer waterway that guides the water of the Eure River-supplies the lakes, streams, springs and swimming pools of Versailles. When manpower is insufficient, Louis XIV even ordered the army to help.

In addition, Louis XIV also repaired the Tuileries Palace for the queen, built the cathedral for the church, and invested a lot of money in the expansion of the Louvre, which undoubtedly cost the treasury a lot The funds, if it is in a peaceful age, it is fine, but in this war-torn era, it seems a bit terrible.For this reason, the financial director Colbert had to advise Louis XIV time and again, not to make such a large-scale construction project, but to cherish national power, otherwise the finance may not be able to support the long-term campaign of nearly 20 French troops in three directions.

Undoubtedly, Colbert's words were old-fashioned words, and Louis XIV was not a fool, so he temporarily stopped the repair and construction of most palaces and churches.However, it seems that this is still a bit late. Years of excessive taxation and heavy labor burdens (many caused by wars) have made the lives of the people in many French provinces and regions into an extremely difficult situation.Especially after the torrential rains in autumn for two consecutive years, many provinces in the east and south fell into a food shortage, and had to urgently allocate part of the grain reserved for war from the national treasury, and work with local church organizations to provide relief immediately.

However, the scope of the disaster is too large, and the number of people is too large. France's domestic food supply is not very good at the moment, so it has to seek assistance from outside, but who to turn to?English?No, after turning more and more arable land into pastures, the food in the Kingdom of England is not very rich. There is not much that can be shipped to support France?Then look for Russia and Poland, two traditional grain exporting countries, to purchase?No, it's impossible!The Baltic Sea is completely the back garden of the Dutch. French ships have no guts to enter this sea area, which has always been busy, because they are likely to face interception and attacks by Dutch and Danish warships at the same time; Russia is even more impossible, because the French are now Even the route to get there is not very clear, not to mention that there are also so many Dutch ships traveling between Russia and the United Provinces, which is very embarrassing!After much deliberation, I still can only find the Ottomans to import grain from traditional wheat producing areas such as Egypt and Syria.

Of course, even with such difficulties in the country, the proud and conceited Louis XIV still did not intend to withdraw his troops from Germany and the Southern Netherlands.At present, Prince Condé leads a supplemented 1 troops (more than 4 French casualties in the previous Battle of Sennafo) stationed in the Meuse River area, confronting the United Provinces and the German coalition forces, and some small-scale battles broke out from time to time , the battle line is at a stalemate; the Viscount Turenne's army has also been expanded, and there are about [-] people, but in Alsace, his enemy Charles IV, Duke of Lorraine, has [-] troops. Li also has tens of thousands of troops from Austria, the pressure is still not small, and the opponent's coach Montecuccoli is not a mediocre person. The Viscount Turenne can't completely defeat the opponent for a while. After several fights, the two sides have won each other. , each with thousands of casualties; the Duke of Buttville probably had tens of thousands of people on hand, mainly cavalry, stationed in Germany, and attacked each other with some local princes, and at the same time needed to take care of the Southern Netherlands and Alsa On the two battlefields of Sri Lanka, prepare for response and rescue.

In addition, in the Pyrenees in the south, Sicily in Italy, and even further away in the Caribbean Sea, there are also a large number of French troops fighting against the Spaniards and the Dutch, plus the domestic reserve army and garrison troops. If some coastal ports are guarding against the enemy's landing troops, the army mobilized and armed across the country is now close to 20, and most of them are in a state of combat all year round.

Even for the Kingdom of France, which has a population of more than 2000 million, the consumption of this scale of war is too much to bear after several years!As the chief steward of King Louis XIV of France and the financial director of the kingdom, Colbert was naturally worried about this, so he had to strongly suggest that Louis stop the construction of the palace, which was a waste of money and money, and invest all the limited funds in disaster relief and war go.

Today Colbert drove to Saint-Germain's Versailles Park again, nothing else, but to discuss financial issues with Louis XIV.More precisely, it is how to keep France's domestic finances from collapsing despite the ever-increasing military expenditures.There is no doubt that this is a serious issue. At a time when the war has reached a stalemate, when the enemy has twice as many troops as our own, and no matter how much they lose, they can quickly make up for it with money. Now that the three rounds of bonds have been issued, if the Kingdom of France cannot quickly break through from the battlefield, the finances will be a little unsustainable, unless they also increase taxes in the country, but this matter is very sensitive, and if it fails, it will cause trouble. Some defiance incidents come out.

"Your Majesty, the cost of building palaces and churches has exceeded [-] million livres so far. This is almost worth half of our annual financial income. It can support our invincible army to continue fighting for two years. It must be stopped. Otherwise we There will be no financial continuity, you know..."

"Please stop, dear Baptiste, haven't I stopped the construction of the Retirement Church Cathedral and the Versailles Park? You will be satisfied with the savings of this part of the funds?" Louis Fourteen sighed, interrupted his favorite minister's complaints, turned and said to him.

"But Your Majesty, you are still investing in the gardens of the Castle of Vaux-le-Vicam." Colbert continued to say with a blank expression: "Is this what Miss Lavalier requested, Your Majesty, please forgive me, at this moment At such a difficult time, you shouldn't let her go like this, it will spoil your business, don't you want those merchants in the seven provinces of the Netherlands to kneel and beg for mercy?"

Louis XIV was a little suffocated when he heard the words, and then he said helplessly: "I plan to renovate the castle of Vaux-le-Vicombe, and then see if I can sell it. You know, no one cares about this castle until now, because it is too big. old."

"But Ms. Lavalier doesn't think so. She found a lot of art from other places and sent it to the castle, decorated many rooms, and there is no sign of selling it." Colbert said seriously, not intending to retreat.

Louis XIV was even more speechless this time. After a long while of luck, he said with a little dissatisfaction and dissatisfaction: "My Excellency the Chief Financial Officer, did you come to me today to quarrel? In fact, Waller The repair and expansion of Wellcome Castle does not need to cost a lot of money, and it will not affect the battle on the front line."

Colbert quickly raised his eyes to look at Louis XIV, and found that his face was slightly ugly. The finance director, who knew his temper well, softened his tone a little, and decided not to pursue the matter of the Castle of Vaux-le-Vicam, but instead Speaking of the main purpose of coming today: "Of course not, Your Majesty the Wise. I came to Versailles today mainly to report to you about the cooperation with the people on the east coast. Recently we have reached some preliminary agreements, which will benefit the country. It's a good strategy."

"Let's listen to it." Louis XIV found a stone chair and sat down, staring at the large lawn in front of him, and said.The water droplets hit the lake next to the lawn, splashing ripples all over the sky. Usually, he enjoys the sunshine, chases women by the lawn and the lake, and occasionally entertains some married ladies (currently Louis XIV has put The 12 maids by the queen's side were replaced by 12 married noblewomen) or the generals who came to report their duties (the generals often brought news of victory), are all fond memories, so he enjoyed this lawn very much.

"First of all, it is a good thing." Colbert said: "Your Majesty, the fleet you sent to the Caribbean Sea can get supplies from the people on the east coast nearby. We have already negotiated that a company called Caribbean Shipping Company will provide our Ships and soldiers sell all war necessities including weapons and ammunition, food and medicine, and at the same time promise to maintain ships at the ship repair yard at the mouth of the Mobile River, which will greatly enhance our chances of winning in the Caribbean Sea."

"In addition, this company will also sell us all tropical commodities including sugar, spices, coffee, cocoa, tobacco, and dyes. Your Majesty, you no longer have to worry about not having enough tropical food to entertain the generals, and I The guaranteed price is very fair, which is much fairer than the price of goods sold to us by those damn Portuguese, English, and Italians." Colbert added.

The three areas he mentioned are now the main sources of imported goods in the Kingdom of France, cheese, butter, ham, cloth and munitions from Italy, olive oil, salted fish, cured meat, ships and munitions from Portugal, and England’s Clothes, ironware, munitions and other commodities are all urgently needed by the French kingdom in deep war. This country spends a lot of precious metals in the above three places almost every quarter.

But at the same time, as the saying goes, no business, no evil, whether it is the Portuguese, Italians or the English, they tacitly raised the price of export commodities and lowered the purchase cost of imported commodities in their trade with France, which made the French at a huge disadvantage in trade.But what can you do about it? Who made you have enemies everywhere and few trading partners?In many cases, you can only admit it!You know, the market has been ruined by the Dutch. They waved their checkbooks and purchased all kinds of military supplies and daily necessities all over the world. It is rising, and the degree of inflation is deepening, so it is simply impossible for you to expect others not to raise prices!

Under such circumstances, the Kingdom of France, unwilling to be taken advantage of all the time—and of course directly related to their increasingly tight finances—in addition to finding ways to increase ties with the Ottoman Empire, its traditional trade partner, also found a position in the The East Coast Republic of China in the southern New World intends to sign a business cooperation agreement with this country, which is said to have quite good production capacity.

To be fair, this decision of the French is very wise!Because the people on the east coast have just been hurt by the United Provinces tearing up the business cooperation treaty, and now the French suddenly come to the top, how can they not be ecstatic?Moreover, the goods produced by the people on the east coast are cheap and high-quality, and some discounts can be obtained if they talk about it. This is undoubtedly very cost-effective for the Kingdom of France, which imports a huge amount of goods, and this is the basis for cooperation between the two parties.

In addition, it is said that the people on the east coast had just fallen out with the Prince of Orange and occupied the colony of the Dutch East India Company in South Africa. This undoubtedly greatly deteriorated the relationship between the two countries.Although there is no official war now, both Colbert and Louis XIV firmly believe that there is no possibility of reconciliation between the two countries in the short term, so they can safely and boldly fight with the people on the east coast. business, open the import of their goods, and reduce the outflow of treasury funds.The only thing that needs to be vigilant is probably to properly protect some industries that have been gradually cultivated at a great cost in the country, so that they cannot be shut down due to the influx of goods from the east coast, and then lead to bankruptcy.Many of these workshops have been established since the time of Richelieu, and have been managed and invested by three prime ministers. Now they are quite large and cannot be easily lost.

"What conditions did the people on the east coast put forward? They can't be so kind, right?" Louis XIV asked suddenly.

"What they want is a long-term trade agreement with our country, not just during the war. This is what their business representative and ambassador clearly expressed to me." Colbert replied immediately: "I don't think this is true. What's the problem, as long as we control the tariff rate and the types of imported goods, this will only benefit us, not harm. Anyway, these markets were also owned by the Dutch in the past, and it is not a big deal to lose them to the East Coast people now unacceptable thing."

"That's good." Louis XIV said succinctly: "Our goal has always been to seek expansion in the Lowlands, Franche-Comté, and Alsace-Lorraine. Any decision made by the Kingdom must serve this goal. The East Coast People are not in conflict with our goals for the time being, on the contrary, they are helpful. Baptiste, you can ask the ambassadors of the people on the east coast to see if they have any ideas of forming a closer alliance with the Kingdom of France, such as A military alliance."

(End of this chapter)