After hastily eating his lunch, Sirigu immediately left the tavern and headed straight for a two-story brick house in the city, an office of the General Administration of Textile Industry in Luoqia County. He had to talk to the textile bureaucrats of the East Coast, and in fact the Dutch had been making progress in textile technology over the years, and they had invested more and more money in it, and perhaps one day their technological progress would be able to offset the "mechanized low-cost" production that the East Coasters were proud of, and thus gradually squeeze East Coast textiles out of their traditional markets such as Western Europe or the Baltics, relying on their strong distribution networks.

The venerable Doria had just made a big bet on the Easterners, and it just so happened that they had been rivals with the Dutch for decades, so Sirigu did not want to see the Easterners lose in this competition. So, he felt the need for him to have a good chat with the East Coasters.

Whatever Sirigu was thinking, Captain Kouyt, who had just been on the sea for months, had just finished his lunch and went to the Rocha commodity market to deliver the cotton. Captain Cuette brought in high-quality cotton, so he sold it for 120 yuan, and considering the irreversible depreciation trend of the Spanish peso, he made a net profit of 40 yuan per ton of cotton, and the gross profit margin reached 50%.

After the business was settled, Captain Kuait did not delay, and drove the ship out of the port of Luocha, and then sailed with the gentle current and the sudden northwesterly wind towards the port of Qingdao, which was probably the southernmost territory on the east coast.

On November 25th, Captain Kouyt's "Tesser" slowly docked at the designated berth under the guidance of a steam pilot. These berths are all cleaned port areas, and the water depth is generally about 8 meters. Able to moor large vessels with deep draft. When getting off your own boat. Captain Kuayt couldn't help but glance twice at the smoky pilot.

Now in the Netherlands and France. Rumors of a magical ship capable of spitting black smoke from the people of the East Coast of the New World are growing louder and louder. While these rumors are always interspersed with a large number of absurd or whimsical episodes, there are also some accepted facts about these ships. That is, the speed of this kind of ship is very fast, and in addition, this kind of ship can also do some maneuvers slowly when the current and wind direction are unfavorable, and it is also extremely convenient to enter and exit the port; Finally, there were very few sailsailers on such ships, and perhaps they used some special methods.

An Italian who slipped back to Europe from the east coast via Brazil once said that the fact that this kind of boat could be so miraculous may have something to do with the huge "devil's machine" used in the water lifting station of the people on the east coast. It is capable of generating tremendous power to drive very complex systems to serve the people of the East Coast. This must have something to do with the pagan gods they believe in.

Although his words were laughed at by most people, they were intrigued by some astute-minded scholars, who did not think that it had anything to do with gods or demons, and that it was mostly due to the fact that the people of the East Coast had mastered some unknown technology. Therefore, they began to try to crack this technology on their own, because they subconsciously thought that once this technology was mastered by them, then maybe a great era would be presented to them.

Captain Kuayt, of course, did not have the keen sense of smell of these scholars, but he was only curious about the small pilot ship that could sail freely without sails. After boarding the dock, Captain Kuayt struggled for a while. I first went to the Qingdao Commercial Clearing Bank to open a current account, and then deposited a scattered amount of more than 2,000 pesos in silver coins -- this bank now offers not only foreign exchange trading services. At the same time, it also absorbs foreign currency deposits.

Captain Kuayt breathed a sigh of relief after depositing the scattered silver coins in his account, this was his way out. In the event of a tragedy such as the sinking of a ship, he would not be left with nothing - provided he was still alive. In addition to these scattered silver coins, Captain Kuaite also had more than 10,000 silver dollars in cash from the sale of cotton, and now the port of Qingdao no longer accepts cash transactions, where only commercial paper denominated in marks or yuan can be circulated, and other currencies of all countries must be exchanged for huàn first, otherwise they cannot be traded at all.

The territory of the mark and the yuan were clearly divided, with the mark being used for the settlement of large trade with the Genoese, and the circle being aimed at the small retail captains who came to the port of Qingdao to trade. Captain Kuaite did not hesitate, and directly exchanged the silver dollars in hand for the acceptance bills denominated in gold yuan issued by the Qingdao Commercial Bank, and then handed these brand-new bills to his son, so that he could buy the goods according to the order. As for him, there is naturally a more important thing to do.

An hour later. Captain Kuat, who had changed into a new outfit, appeared in a villa on the banks of the Great Qingdao River (Pantanoso River), and was greeted by a retired veteran of the East Coast diplomatic service. Gaumo was also very happy to meet Captain Kuayt again, an old friend, after all, it was Captain Kuayt who was the first to come to the East Coast to trade, and this was the opportunity for the two to meet. Unexpectedly, more than ten years have passed, and now things are different from people, and the circumstances and status of the two are also very different.

It could be seen that Gao Mo was very happy to see his old friend, and he specially asked his eldest son Gao Wengang to bring warm Abyssinian coffee to the two. Gao Wengang, who had just graduated from the Corps Fort, was only 16 years old this year, and after serving drinks to the two of them, he quietly left the reception room, and then sat quietly at the door, picked up a French book and flipped through it.

"Venerable Gao, I bring you greetings from Bahia." After taking a sip of bitter coffee, Captain Kuayt took a letter from his bag and handed it to Gaumore.

"Diplomatic letters from the Dutch West India Company?" Gao Mo was a little surprised when he got the letter in his hand, "Is this kind of letter really suitable for me to read?" Shouldn't it be duly presented to our diplomatic service by a representative of your company? I have left public office many years ago, and I am not involved in the country's foreign policymaking, so I don't think this letter is appropriate for me to read. ”

Although Golmo said this, he did not return the letter to Captain Kouat, because he knew that the other party must have a reason to do so.

Sure enough, I saw Captain Kuayt look at Gaumo, shook his head slowly, and then said in a resolute tone: "This is a personal letter from Mr. Hamel of the West India Company to you, and before he handed it to me, he told me that he would exchange some views with you on the situation in Brazil, as well as some discussions on trade cooperation. He said that these were only private and would not affect the agreement that we had reached so far. ”

Hearing Captain Kuayt say this, Gaumo was a little surprised, and saw him open the envelope, take out the stationery, and read it. The contents of the letter were written in French, in beautiful font, and Gaumo did not have much difficulty reading them, so he read them quickly.

After reading it, he did not rush to speak, but fell into deep thought, and Captain Kuayt did not urge, just sat there and drank coffee, anyway, his task was to deliver letters, and the rest had nothing to do with him.

The main reason why Gaumore fell into contemplation was the content of the letters written by the Spaniards. Governor of the West India Company, Hendrick. In his letter, Mr. Hamel asked whether there had been any change in the policy of neutrality (in fact, in favour of the Portuguese) that had been maintained by the East coasters for almost a decade in the Brazilian war.

This may sound like a test of the foreign policy of the East Coast, but in fact if you look at the current dire situation facing the Dutch West India Company, it is more of a euphemism to ask the East Coasters to sell weapons to the Dutch. As for why the Dutch whispered to the people on the east coast to sell weapons, it was because they were too expensive to buy weapons from Europe, and the quantity and quality were not guaranteed, and their transport ships were vulnerable to attack when they passed through the Portuguese coast, and many supplies were capsized in vain.

If the East Coasters were able to sell weapons and other war materiel to them nearby, the West India Company would have saved at least half of its money - a figure of about 200,000-300,000 guilders (less than 100,000 yuan). Don't underestimate this number, it's not a small amount for the West India Company, which is now in great financial crisis.

When the company's predecessor governor, Morris, was in office, he first spent a lot of money in Brazil because of his strong immigration (from the Netherlands and Germany); Then a large number of artists and architects were invited from the Old World to design various buildings for cities such as Recife and Olinda, which in turn cost a lot of money; In the end, this guy is also a war maniac, constantly attacking the Portuguese and even the British in the Caribbean, the Gulf of Guinea, the Congo in West Africa and other places, and the money spent is even more sea.

By the time he stepped down, the West India Company was in a huge financial crisis. In the middle of the year, some of the shareholders of the East India Company, who were partners in the company, proposed that the financially sound East India Company inject Rp 1.5 million to solve the financial difficulties faced by the West India Company due to the oversize of the company, provided that the other shareholders of the company gave up some of their interests.

This apparent attempt to compete for dominance of the company immediately detonated the entire boardroom. Since the West India Company was not in such a difficult financial position as it had historically been in the past one or two years, the West India Company had joined forces to veto the East India Company's offer of capital injection.

However, it is easy to refuse the East India Company's capital injection, but how to solve the financial difficulties is not simple. The West India Company now had vast colonies in North America, the Caribbean, South America, and West Africa, and a fleet of ships that often crossed the Strait of Magellan to the Pacific Ocean to attack the Spaniards. Therefore, in the absence of any improvement in the business, saving money is of course the most important thing, and this is one of the reasons why they are looking for East Coasters. (To be continued......)