Rise of the 1630s South America

Chapter 644 Good News from the Netherlands

After finishing his lunch in a hurry, Siligu left the tavern immediately, and then went straight to a two-story brick building in the city, which is an office of the General Administration of Textile Industry in Luocha County.He has to have a good talk with the textile bureaucrats of the people on the east coast. In fact, the textile technology of the Dutch has been improving over the years, and their investment in this area has also been increasing. To a certain extent, it can gradually offset the "mechanized low-cost" production that the East Coast people are proud of, and rely on their strong distribution network to gradually squeeze the East Coast textiles out of their traditional markets such as Western Europe or the Baltic Sea.

The noble Doria family has just made a big bet on the East Coasters, and it just so happens that they and the Dutch have also been competitors for decades, so Sirigu very much does not want to see the East Coasters lose in this competition.Therefore, he felt that it was necessary for him to have a good chat with the people from the east coast.

No matter what Sirigu was thinking, Captain Couette, who had just experienced several months of sea trek, immediately ran to the Racha commodity market to deliver the cotton after eating lunch.Captain Couette brought high-quality cotton, so he sold it at a price of 120 yuan. Considering the irreversible depreciation trend of the Spanish peso, his net profit of this batch of cotton was 40 yuan per ton, and the gross profit rate reached 50%.

After the business was delivered, Captain Couette drove the ship out of Rocha Port without delay, and then followed the gentle current and the sudden northwest wind to Qingdao Port, which may be the southernmost territory on the east coast.

On November 11, Captain Couette's "Tesyer Shoal" slowly docked at the designated berth under the guidance of the steam pilot ship.These berths are cleared port areas, and the water depth is generally about 25 meters, which can berth large ships with deep draft.When getting off his own boat, Captain Couette couldn't help but take a second look at the pilot boat that was emitting black smoke.

Now in Holland and France, rumors about the people on the east coast of the New World having a magical ship that can breathe black smoke are getting more and more popular.Although there are always a lot of absurd or whimsical plots interspersed in these rumors, there are also some generally accepted facts about these ships.That is, the speed of this kind of ship is very fast. In addition, this kind of ship can do some maneuvers slowly when the ocean current and wind direction are unfavorable, and it is very convenient to enter and leave the port. Finally, there are very few sailors on this kind of ship. Maybe they used some special method.

An Italian who sneaked back to Europe from the east coast via Brazil once said that the magic of this kind of boat may have something to do with a huge "devil machine" used in the water pumping stations on the east coast.That kind of machine can generate great power and drive a very complicated system to serve the people on the east coast. This must have something to do with the pagan gods they believe in.

Although his words were laughed off by most people, some sharp-minded scholars were very interested in it. They didn't think it had anything to do with gods or devils. This was probably because the people on the east coast had mastered some unknown technologies.Therefore, they began to try to crack this technology by themselves, because they subconsciously believed that once this technology was mastered by them, maybe a great era would be presented to them.

Of course, Captain Couette did not have the keen sense of smell of these scholars. He was just curious about the small pilot boat that could sail freely without sails.After boarding the pier, Captain Couette went to the Qingdao Commercial Clearing Bank to open a current account after struggling for a while, and then deposited scattered silver coins of more than 2000 pesos into it. At present, this bank not only offers foreign exchange Transaction services, but also to absorb foreign currency deposits.

After depositing the scattered silver coins on hand into the account, Captain Couette heaved a sigh of relief. This is his retreat.In the event of another tragedy like a ship sinking in the future, he would not have nothing—provided he was still alive.In addition to these scattered silver coins, Captain Couette also has more than 1 silver dollars in cash from the sale of cotton. Nowadays, Qingdao Port no longer accepts cash transactions. In this place, only commercial papers denominated in marks or yuan are accepted. To be able to circulate, the currencies of other countries must be exchanged first, otherwise they cannot be traded at all.

The territories of Mark and Yuan are distinct, Mark is used for settlement of large trades with the Genoese, and Yuan is for small retail captains who come to Qingdao Port for transactions.Captain Couette did not hesitate, and directly exchanged the silver dollars on hand for acceptance bills denominated in gold dollars issued by Qingdao Commercial Bank, and then handed these brand new bills to his son, asking him to purchase goods according to the orders.As for himself, he naturally had a more important thing to do.

after an hour.Captain Couette, who had changed into a new set of clothes, appeared in a villa on the banks of the Great Qingdao River (Pantanoso River), and it was Gao Mo, a retired veteran of East Bank diplomacy, who went out to greet him.Gao Mo was also very happy to see Captain Couette, an old friend, again. After all, Captain Couette was the first to come to the east coast for business. This was the opportunity for the two to get to know each other.Unexpectedly, more than ten years have passed in a flash, and now things are different, and the situation and status of the two are also very different.

It can be seen that Gao Mo was very happy to see his old friend. He specially asked his eldest son Gao Wengang to bring warm Abyssinian coffee to the two.Gao Wengang, who had just graduated from Bingtuanbao, was only 16 years old this year. After serving drinks to the two, he quietly left the reception room, then sat quietly at the door, and picked up a French book to read.

"Honorable Gao, I bring you greetings from Bahia." After taking a sip of the bitter coffee, Captain Couette took out a letter from his bag and handed it to Gao Mo.

"Diplomatic letter from the Dutch West India Company?" Gao Mo was a little surprised when he took the letter in his hand, "Is this kind of letter really suitable for me to read? Shouldn't your company's representative formally submit it to the diplomatic department of our country? I I have resigned from public office many years ago, and now I am not involved in the country's foreign policy decisions, so I don't think this letter is suitable for me to read."

Although Gao Mo said so, he did not hand the letter back to Captain Couette, because he knew that the other party must have a reason for doing so.

Sure enough, Captain Couette looked at Gaomo, shook his head slowly, and said in a firm tone: "This is a personal letter from Mr. Hamel of the West India Company. He is delivering the letter to you. I told me before that he would exchange some views on the situation in Brazil with you in the letter, as well as some discussions on trade cooperation. He said that these are only of a personal nature and will not affect the current relationship between our two parties. agreement reached."

Hearing what Captain Couette said, Gao Mo understood a little. He opened the envelope, took out the letter paper, and read it.The content of the letter was written in French with beautiful fonts, and Gao Mo didn't have much difficulty reading it, so he read it quickly.

After reading it, he didn't speak in a hurry, but fell into deep thought. Captain Couette didn't rush, but just sat there drinking coffee. Anyway, his task was to deliver the letter, and the rest had nothing to do with him.

The reason why Gaomo fell into contemplation was mainly because of the contents of the letters written by the Spaniards.Mr. Hendrik Hamel, the governor of the West India Company, asked in the letter whether the neutral policy (actually favoring the Portuguese) that the people on the east coast had maintained in the Brazilian war for nearly ten years had changed?

This sentence sounds like a test of the foreign policy of the East Bank, but in fact, if you look at it in conjunction with the current severe situation facing the Dutch West India Company, it is more of a tactful request for the East Coast to sell to the Dutch. arms.As for why the Dutch humbly asked the people on the east coast to sell weapons, it was really because it was too expensive for them to buy weapons all the way from Europe, and the quantity and quality could not be guaranteed. Vulnerable to attack, a lot of supplies were overturned in the sea for nothing.

If the people on the east coast can sell weapons and other war materials to them nearby, then the West India Company can save at least half of the money-this amount is about 20-30 dong (less than 10 yuan).Don't underestimate this number. This number is really not a small number for the West India Company, which is now in a huge financial crisis.

When Morris, the former governor of the company, was in office, he first spent a lot of money in Brazil on immigration (from the Netherlands and Germany); Linda and other cities design various buildings, which cost a lot of money; in the end, this guy is also a war madman, constantly attacking the Portuguese and even the British in the Caribbean Sea, the Gulf of Guinea, and the West African Congo. The money spent here It's even gone to the sea.

After doing so, by the time he stepped down, the West India Company had already fallen into a huge financial crisis.In the middle of this year, some shareholders who were former partners of the East India Company proposed that the East India Company, which is in good financial condition, inject 150 million dong to solve the financial difficulties faced by the West India Company due to the over-spreading of the stalls. It is the other shareholders of the company who give up part of their own rights and interests.

This proposal, which was clearly intended to compete for the company's dominance, immediately detonated the entire board of directors.Due to the sales rights of a large number of goods on the East Coast in the Americas and the Old World in the past one or two years, the financial situation of the West India Company is not as embarrassing as in history, so other shareholders jointly rejected the proposal of the East India Company to inject capital.

But it is very simple to reject the capital injection proposal of the East India Company, but how to solve the financial difficulties is not simple.The current West India Company has vast colonies in North America, the Caribbean, South America, and West Africa. In addition, they also have a fleet that often crosses the Strait of Magellan to the Pacific Ocean to attack Spanish ships. It is not a big daily expense to maintain such a large stall. decimal.Therefore, in the absence of any improvement in business operations, saving money is naturally the most important thing, and this is one of the reasons why they turned to people from the East Coast.

(End of this chapter)