He had already talked about these truths when he was teaching in the village, so he didn't say more to Shen Huai and the others at this time, but instead counted the accounts with his fingers.

"Our family produced 30 million pieces of cloth last year, and this year's Shaanxi cotton harvest has reached four stones per mu, and another 60 million pieces of cloth have been produced."

"In addition to the 20 million horses in the inland trade and the 4 million horses needed by the family, there are still 36 million horses left for export, and every one more point in this shipment price can be an extra 360,000 taels of silver, and we will compete for the price of silver."

It's not that I don't know, but I'm shocked, the Liu family's output next year is actually 3 times the output of a house in Songjiang.

It is said that there are tens of thousands of weaver girls and more than 100,000 spinning workers in Songjiang, while the Liu family has only more than 60,000 female workers in production, and the efficiency is four or five times that of Jiangnan.

That's the beauty of technology.

Liu Xi's fate was painful for a while after calculating the account, and finally slapped the table and said:

"It's decided, let's trade directly with various merchants, we can't get from the thirteen lines, and it's best to get rid of the Zheng family's silver."

Shen Huai hesitated a little and said: "This, uncle, it's not a subordinate pouring cold water, these days, according to his subordinates, the Zheng family in Fujian is said to have more than 3,000 ships and more than 200,000 pirates, I'm afraid it's better to be cautious." ”

You Degao stood up suddenly, "Shen Xieli don't want to be angry with others to destroy his own prestige, I have 10,000 tigers in Fuboshi, and what I do is to gnaw hard bones, in order to protect our family's business route, what if I do a game with his family?" ”

After experiencing Ye Lan's espionage case, in order to help him get out of the shadows, Liu Ximing specially arranged another marriage for him.

"Hahaha, Degao's newborn calves are not afraid of tigers, which is a good thing, but it is still what we said in class, strategically despise the enemy, and tactically attach importance to the enemy."

"We must admit that the Zheng family is the overlord of the Southeast China Sea at the moment, so we can't be careless. Of course, his strength is not unbreakable. ”

"Of the three thousand ships, how many large warships can be used for combat? And how many small battleships are there? And how many merchant ships are there? Have you ever heard about these Shen assistants? ”

Shen Huai smiled bitterly and said: "Uncle, this specific data can't be heard by subordinates, I'm afraid I can only ask someone from Guangdong Sailor to find out." ”

Liu Ximing smashed his mouth twice, "Forget it, let's not talk about the Zheng family, let's see if we can find a merchant who can trade directly." ”

William Kent was an English merchant who had been out for ten years since he left his native Kent for the fabled Far East in 1626.

In the past ten years, he has been back to Europe four times, mainly to sell precious goods such as silk and tea that have been transported from that mysterious country in the Far East, as well as luxury goods such as gems and ivory purchased locally in India.

Each return to Europe made him a fortune, and in ten years he had grown from a small owner of a small carrak to now owning three Galen merchant ships and two armed carrak merchant ships.

However, with the establishment of the British East India Company, the number of British merchants who went to India to pan for gold suddenly increased.

Coupled with competition with the Portuguese, Dutch, and Spaniards, William's business in India gradually declined.

Unwilling to remain silent, William once again exerted his adventurous spirit in his bones, and secretly bypassed the Dutch's interception in Malacca when it was dark, and came to Daming smoothly.

When he first arrived in Daming, William was stunned by this prosperous land.

What kind of excesses this is, the city is neat and clean, the nobles live in luxury and elegance, even the commoners in the city can live a decent life, not to mention the mountains of precious silk, shiny porcelain, and so on.

All this made William so intoxicated, and his eyes were as if he had seen a glittering golden pound.

It's a pity that after walking around the market, he found that all the transactions on the market are controlled by a tooth shop organization called the Thirteen Lines, and if you don't handle transactions from them, someone will come to you for trouble soon.

But if you handle it from them, the handling fee is enough to make people feel painful.

William finally came to Daming for a trip, so he naturally didn't want to be slaughtered in vain, and besides, he didn't have much principal in his hand, so he had been walking around Guangzhou for more than ten days trying to find a way to buy goods.

It's a pity that the greater the hope, the greater the disappointment.

Today is the last day, and if you can't find a suitable source of goods, you can only buy from the thirteen lines, William gritted his teeth and made up his mind to go to Xiguan again.

I don't know if the multi-day prayer had an effect, but as soon as he entered the market in Xiguan, William was keenly aware of a group of strangers.

He could swear to God that these people must have arrived in Guangzhou recently.

Looking at their fair skin, delicate and beautiful costumes, and groups of tall guards, William held back his excitement and quietly followed the gang around Xiguan, trying to figure out their purpose.

"Second brother, those red hairs have been following us, do you want to arrest them and send them to the official?"

The group of people followed by William Kent was naturally Liu Ximing and his party, and they walked around Xiguan for a few days, where there were many businessmen from various countries.

But as soon as they heard that they were going to bypass the thirteen lines of trading, the group of people all shook their heads like rattles.

After Shen Huai's inquiry, he learned that the people of the Thirteen Lines not only colluded with the government, but also implicated the Zheng family.

In order to ensure that the maximum amount of money is received, the Thirteen Lines are equivalent to the Zheng family's eyeliner, as long as the merchants who trade in Guangzhou City will all be reported by them to the Zheng family's person in charge in Guangzhou.

The Zheng family will naturally follow the clues provided by the thirteen lines to urge for the passage money, and their family is also real, clearly marked the price, 3,000 taels of silver per ship.

If you don't pay it, you can, and there will naturally be pirates coming to you when you leave the port.

Therefore, it is not that the merchants in Guangzhou are willing to be exploited by the Thirteen Banks, but they are forced by the situation and force everyone to bow their heads.

So at this moment, Liu Ximing was in a state of irritability, and when he heard Li Biao's suggestion, he didn't think much about it, and directly nodded and motioned for the guards to do it.

William and his several sailors and interpreters happened to follow Liu Ximing and the others, and saw that Liu Ximing and the others kept asking various merchants, and the content of the questions turned out to be whether they could trade directly.

This made William happy enough, and he was about to go up to talk, but found that more than two dozen guards from the gang came straight to himself and the others.

Before a few of them could react, they were directly dragged in front of Liu Ximing by the guards with their arms.

Liu Ximing looked at the red-haired, white-skinned, green-eyed European, dressed in a gold-inlaid gown, and a white lace scarf around his neck.

He stood with his hands in his hands and asked the man who looked like an interpreter, "Why did these people follow Benjue, you recruited them truthfully?" ”

Hearing Liu Ximing call himself Benjue in official language, the thin Ming man was shocked, and hurriedly shouted in very lame official language:

"The lord spares his life, the lord spares his life, these red hairs have no malice, they just want to inquire about what kind of business the old man does, they want to trade directly, but no one in this Guangzhou city dares to do this, and when I see the old man's gang of people, I just follow to take a look."

Liu Ximing's heart was relieved, and he pointed to William and several of his sailors.

"Which of them is the leader?"

William saw the nobleman in front of him and the interpreter chatting with each other, and pointed to himself and the others, for fear of being betrayed by the interpreter, he hurriedly pleaded out loud in Portuguese.

As he spoke, he subconsciously used his native language.

“We just want to do some business……”

Well?

Liu Ximing couldn't understand Portuguese either, who knew that the person in front of him was speaking English, although the British accent was very strong, but he could barely understand a few words.

We just want to do business.

Liu Ximing, who reacted, laughed, and then said in his American English: "Are you Britons? ”

This guy knows English!

William was like a treasure, and although it sounded like some kind of country accent, he still shouted excitedly.

"Yes, yes, we are from India......"

Liu Ximing was a little dizzy by his gun-like speed of speech, so he had to keep saying "slow down, slow down" in English.

"I'm sorry, I'm so excited, I didn't expect to meet people who can speak English in the great Ming Kingdom, my name is William Kent, I'm a British merchant, these are my sailors."

William, who reacted that he was talking too fast, smiled embarrassedly, and hurriedly slowed down his speech and introduced his group.