After boarding the navy's patrol ship from the port of Shanghai, Guedes had little interest in the patrol ship he was sitting on, because it was just an ordinary sand ship, not the kind of slender and graceful new ship.

However, when he passed by Wusong Port again, he sighed again when he saw more than a dozen warships, such a slender and beautiful battleship, no matter how long he looked at it, he would not feel bored!

Guedes didn't know much about these new warships of the Datang Navy, but he knew that they were specially designed by the Datang Navy, and there was no similar ship type in the world.

And all you can see is the appearance.

From the point of view of appearance, this new type of Datang warship, whether it is a cruiser or a frigate or a patrol ship, has an obvious feature in its hull, that is, it is relatively slender and has a relatively large length-to-width ratio.

However, all they can see is the appearance, they don't know that the inside of this kind of hull is watertight, and for the defense performance of the warship, the cabin that can be used to load cargo inside is not large, and after loading supplies and bringing sailors, it is basically impossible to load additional cargo.

Compared with other types of ships such as Galen and Karaka, which were mainly loaded and supplemented by combat, the combat performance was greatly improved, but the economy was not good.

This is also the reason why the Datang Navy has not used this type of ship on cargo ships for a long time after designing it, and this thing is not suitable for being used as a cargo ship.

If the watertight compartment inside is removed and the loading space is expanded, then it is possible, but in this way, the protective performance is lost, except for the speed, the loading capacity cannot reach the level of the Galen ship.

At the same time, the complex mast sail installation brings maneuverability and speed, but it also leads to an increase in cost.

So far, this new ship type of the Tang Dynasty has not been popularized in cargo transportation, and the difference between military and civilian ships is still relatively large.

What military ships need is combat effectiveness, and the cost is not too much of a problem for military ships.

However, civilian ships need to be economical, not only to be low-cost, but also to carry a large amount of cargo, and to have a certain economic speed.

The design concepts of the two are completely different.

At present, if the warship type of the Datang Navy is to be changed to a civilian cargo ship, it needs to be modified and designed in all aspects, but now, no one has done this kind of difficult work, and the civilian shipyard is more willing to build traditional sand ships, Guangzhou ships or lucky ships, well, recently someone has also begun to build Western-style Galen ships.

Military hulls are expensive and have not been tested by the market, and those shipbuilders are not willing to take risks to place orders, so the shipyards themselves will naturally not bother to refit thanklessly.

The shipyard of the Ministry of Industry, basically do not undertake orders, they are for the purpose of building warships, a focus on the design and development of various military ship types, recently they are studying the wise and great, greater than the sun of the ancient sage Li Xuan proposed a ship type: flying clippers.

Teachers and students of the shipbuilding department of the Royal Institute of Technology have designed a model based on this concept, and through various mathematical calculations, they swear that the speed of the hull of this shape will reach a new height, and the maximum speed may even exceed fifteen knots in the case of a tailwind, a reasonable hull design, and a reasonable sail arrangement.

This kind of ship, which can greatly increase the speed, is naturally not suitable for use as the main battleship, because it is difficult to arrange a large number of guns, and if the current battleship wants to gain an advantage, it is inevitable to deploy dense naval guns on it.

However, the navy wants to create such a clipper and use it as a fast transport ship.

At the same time, the shipping company under the Royal Family Industry Division is also very interested in this type of ship, the ocean trade in these years is very far away, and the existing ships are too slow, if you can sail faster, even if it is a ship with a smaller load, then it represents a vast market.

Don't be afraid to load less, it's a big deal to run more!

More importantly, the reduction of time is extremely advantageous for the traditional export goods of the Tang Dynasty 'tea', tea has a shelf life, and the sea humidity is large, the salt content is large, the taste of tea has a great impact, the shorter the transportation time at sea, the quality of tea can be preserved more intact.

The merchants of the Tang Dynasty have always wanted to open up the European tea market on a large scale.

However, this new ship type is not just a hollow wave splitting bow, the hull needs to be redesigned, and even the sails need to be redesigned, so it still can't be done for a while.

In the past few years of the Tang Dynasty, Guedes has recognized and is proud of the Tang Dynasty from the bottom of his heart!

It is extremely prosperous, almost everywhere is gold, there are many business opportunities, and the city is clean and tidy, the people are extremely high-quality, and the technology is developed, and there are countless scientific and technological products.

This made him extremely glad that he was naturalized in the Tang Dynasty at that time and became a citizen of the Tang Dynasty, otherwise, he would be able to enjoy today's good life and become a decent gentry!

Yes, since Geedes successfully naturalized and became a citizen of the Tang Dynasty, he has been strict with himself in almost every moment, in all aspects, trying to make himself a real citizen of the Tang Dynasty, and a decent gentry.

He began to grow long hair, wore Hanfu robes, studied Chinese diligently, and hired Chinese housekeepers and retinues at high prices.

At the beginning, because of his foreigner status, it was not very easy to invite people, and many people looked down on him, so he could only pay a high price, and the housekeeper in his house was almost invited at ten times the market price.

And in the past few years, he has also regarded himself as a decent gentry of the Tang Dynasty all the time, and when he meets other former compatriots who do not take a bath, he will also cover his nose and scold: "Barbarian!" ”

In the past few years, Guedes felt that his soul had been sublimated, and he estimated that if he continued to sublimate like this, he might be able to enter the heavenly court when he died.

Well, it's not heaven!

Because as a decent Tang gentry, it is almost unbelievable that he still believes in the Catholicism of European barbarians, so from the day he joined the Tang Dynasty, he did not hesitate to change his religious beliefs, and after some choices, he also chose the traditional religion Taoism as his religious belief after referring to other Tang gentry.

As for Catholicism, he was already a heretic on the spot, and in his opinion, those heretics must be burned to death, but unfortunately, the Tang Dynasty was too kind to heresies, and it maintained an attitude of friendly contact with heretics.

Gedes, who thought that he had become a decent gentry of the Tang Dynasty, sat on a navy patrol ship all the way along the Yangtze River to Jiangyin, and after preparing to land in Jiangyin, he continued to follow the supply troops of the Army Logistics Department to Jinling.

The reason why Geddes went to Jinling, on the one hand, Geddes naturally wanted to see the prosperous places in the south of the Yangtze River along the way, when he was in Guangzhou and other places, he often heard that the south of the Yangtze River was very prosperous, and now he naturally wanted to see it when he had the opportunity, especially the most prosperous Jinling City.

In addition, he is also preparing to buy a house in Jinling City, so that he can have a place to settle, as a citizen of the Tang Dynasty, and a decent gentry, how can he not have a decent house in Jinling City, the capital of the Tang Dynasty.

But the more important reason is that he is ready to open up the business network in this area of Jiangnan!

After all, Guedes is still a merchant, even if he used to be a pirate, although he has not taken the initiative to plunder merchant ships when he went to sea in recent years, but the cannons on his merchant ships are not decorations, they are real armed merchant ships, and most of the sailors under him were pirates before.

Although he has changed careers now, if he has the opportunity and meets a big fat sheep, he doesn't mind making a cameo appearance in his old business.

Even now, when he searches for artisans all over Southeast Asia, the methods he uses are not necessarily very glorious.

Of course, this is all after going to sea, but once he arrives in the territory of Datang and goes ashore, then he will demand himself with the strictest posture and be a decent Tang gentry at all times.

After arriving in Jiangyin on the navy's downwind boat, before leaving, Guedes invited the sailors of the whole ship to have a big meal, and gave everyone a small gift, so that the navy officers shouted, Boss Ge is bold enough!

Boss Ge, this is the latest name given to him by the admiral, and this Ge is the surname of Gedes's Chinese name.

When he became naturalized, the household official wanted to take his name, but his name was particularly long, and in order to be gregarious, he directly regarded his transliterated name as a Chinese name, surname, and name.

After saying goodbye to the admiral, Guedes and his two retinue did not dare to run around, but he knew very well that his appearance was more peculiar, and in the eyes of many Chinese people, he was similar to a ghost, for this reason, he also felt inferior, so sometimes for the convenience of doing things, he would wear a hat, and then a veil.

When others asked, they said that it was inconvenient to show their faces or something.

This Jiangyin port is not big, it is the base of the navy itself, and it is also a material transfer station, most of which are from the navy and army, so he quickly found the army, showed his household registration certificate, and then showed the letter of recommendation from the Ministry of Commerce, but the people on the army side did not embarrass him, and allowed him to follow a supply team that set off the next day.

After setting off the next day, to a certain extent, Guedes really entered the prosperous land of Jiangnan, and what he saw and heard along the way was an eye-opener for him!