At this point, the girl's matter is finally finished, and after everyone's gossip heart is fully satisfied, they finally put their mood away, and everyone starts to talk about some serious things.

At the request of those who stayed at home, Sun Lao explained in detail the secret agreement on mining development signed with Pimont, the governor of Timor.

It was also mentioned that Pimont had said to him in private, to the effect that the indigenous tribes of Timor Island have both a vicious side and a stupid side, and in short, this governor has a way to make the natives obediently mine for us......

Regarding the content of the secret agreement, of course, everyone agreed, and fools disagreed, but there were also sighs of conscience at the meeting.

Many people said that if only from the perspective of maximizing the interests of both parties, this agreement should indeed be kept secret, otherwise, it is obvious that a large cup of soup must be given to those natives who do not know the truth.

Sure enough, there has been a lot of things like making a fortune in the dark box since ancient times, and it is the same in ancient and modern times, but now we are the party of the pit people, not the party that is pitted, in short, the two sides have a tacit understanding, then live together, so let's do it.

However, there are also people who refute the term "pit man" on the spot, they claim that this development of mining is a necessary means to develop the economy, at least to make the local people employed, to prosper the local economy and not to mention it, but also to let the indigenous people who drink blood into a civilized society, in short, we are not wrong.

Thus, the ethical considerations for mining on the indigenous territory of Timor Island have been turned over.

Next, the meeting had a more detailed and in-depth discussion of the text of the agreement, after discussing some details, we felt that the provisions were rigorous and thoughtful, very professional, almost impeccable, when Sun Lao said that the text was from the hand of Li Junming Li barrister, everyone said that since the experts did it, it was not discussed, and it was passed! The document went to a vote and was quickly adopted by unanimous vote.

Subsequently, Holley spoke on behalf of the metallurgical group and said that we have great expectations for the business of this Diao Mining, because the iron sand ore on Timor Island is the most suitable iron ore resource for our smelting equipment, and compared with the bottom-grade pyrite on Mornington Island, the iron placer ore there is simply the best grain for metallurgical industry equipment, on the other hand, the so-called pyrite on our island is simply pigweed for livestock!

There is also the copper mine in Timor, although there is a copper mine on the Australian mainland, but we have no labor to mine, so we can only watch, and the labor force on the island of Timor is ready-made, the more people discuss it deeply, the more they feel that this Timor island will play an extremely important role in the early stage of our career development.

Then Ren Ke also stood up and said that the Huotang Club has already deduced that because Timor will be our bulk resource supply center, and we will use Timor as the main supply channel for a long time, we should exert a deeper influence on Timor Island.

Not only do we need to equip Hou Xianglin's Free Trade Zone Guard with breech-loading flintlock pistols as soon as possible, but we also need to grow it into a formidable armed force as soon as possible, so we should send more people over, and not only that, but we should also send the Nicole over! This will not only strengthen the confidence of our allies, but will further deter the Dutch and natives, in a word, make the island of Timor tremble in the face of our great ships' guns!

There is no doubt that this is Ren Ke speaking on behalf of the people of the Huotang Club, and whenever they encounter such a strategic topic, their speeches always have this more and more impassioned tone.

However, Ren Ke's words suddenly reminded everyone, yes! It seems that the issue of the use of this Nicole and the route to the sea should be put on the agenda!

At this time, Xia Xiaoou also stood up and said that these two overseas business trips have run down, and there is a fact in front of us: that is, our current trade volume in Macao is obviously not enough to support the sailing cost of Nicole.

Because the carrying capacity of the Nicole is too huge, although due to the profiteering nature of the commodity, our two voyages to the sea will not lose money, but if its carrying capacity does not exceed the break-even point, at least it will greatly increase our trade costs.

Judging from the results of the trade between this trip to and from Macao, a total of less than 100,000 taels of silver and nearly 800 tons of cargo were brought back, which could only occupy a small corner of the Nicole's cabin for the Nicole, which had a standard cargo capacity of 7,000 tons.

However, the consumption of coal on the Nicole is very large, which has not yet calculated our labor, although now we do not calculate the wages for ourselves, but this is because there is meat rotten in our own pot anyway, obviously, this is not a long-term solution, and it will have to be accounted for sooner or later in the future.

Xia Xiaoou said that in the future, all trade behaviors must do detailed cost accounting, calculate profits and losses, add our labor costs, and calculate the wear and tear depreciation of equipment, which are necessary for financial accounting!

Captain Gu said on the spot, our trade with Macao will basically be at this level for a long time in the future, so I am afraid that this situation will be difficult to change greatly, so I think that the standard cargo capacity of 450 tons of Pride class sailing ship is enough to undertake its trade volume with Macao.

And the Pride has a lot of advantages in running the Macau route, both in terms of speed and deadweight tonnage, it is very suitable, but if you want to take the children in the orphanage, it may be crowded, but if you add a Pride class sister ship in the future, it will be completely suitable, in a word, the Nicole is indeed too wasteful to sail in Macau.

Xia Xiaoou immediately nodded in agreement, and then added, obviously, the Nicole should run the Timor route, because it is actually a very uneconomical thing to let the Pride-class sailing ships transport copper ore and iron ore, and small and medium-sized ship carriers are best used for high value-added commodities, and for the transportation of low-value and consumable bulk commodities, large vehicles should be used to be economical, which is common sense in the transportation industry.

At this point, everyone was finally persuaded by Gu Xia's speech, and many people said that if we succeed in the trade of bulk goods such as grain and cash crops, various ores, coal and timber in Timor, in fact, it is a very good choice to take the Nicole to run the route from Mornington Island to Xin'an City.

At this time, Xu Zhi, the current chief officer of the Nicole, spoke, and said, everyone, theoretically speaking, it is all right, but how to solve the fuel supply problem of the Nicole?

Xu Zhi went on to say, Nicole is a coal eater! If you run the Timor Island route, the normal cruising speed, the round-trip voyage of five or six thousand kilometers, no matter how economical it is, you also need to load the ship to fifteen days of coal burning, and add some insurance coefficient, count twenty days, then, five hundred tons of coal must be prepared!

As soon as Xu Zhi finished speaking, Cao Limei immediately spoke, don't forget that we also have Zixia Island, which should be used as a midway coal station. As for the coal stored at home, a while ago, a total of less than 500 tons were produced, half of which was intended to be used by Mr. Zhao for coal coking and chemical industry, so it would take at least two months to prepare fuel for Nicole to sail again.

Gu Jin nodded when he heard this, and then shook his head, he said to everyone, there are only two months, and I don't know how many materials can be prepared for the Nicole on Timor Island, and it is estimated that it is not much, because Pimont also has the problem of how to mobilize indigenous labor.

Gu Jin said that at least in the early days, Pimont's ability to mobilize labor on the island was very limited, and it would take a process to get those local tribes to contribute to the mining company and transport it to the docks.