Hong Tao understands Luo Youde's homesickness very well, and it is estimated that except for himself and Swan, most people have such feelings, which is human nature. They still want to go home and have a look, don't look at the time when they are at home, they rarely go back, since his father died, he basically doesn't come home. But if he really wants to leave the homeland where he was born and raised him for too long and too far, he can't help but think about it in his heart.

In the past, there was no such condition, and it was also a white concern, and just a Cape Town port separated him from the Great Song Dynasty. Now that he has a direct route to Da Song, the thought he hid in his heart has sprouted again, and he can't hold it anymore.

According to Hong Tao's plan, he was going to get the slaves needed to dig the canal from two places. One is to the north of Medini's secret territory, where there are countless tribes that are not under Medini's rule, and Medini does not have so much energy to conquer all the way north, and he cannot rule too much territory. Now that he has a need, he doesn't need to help him catch it, he only needs to provide him with a few guides and supply ports, and he will do the slave capture himself.

The other is the northeastern corner of the Mediterranean, the territory of the former Byzantine Empire. Now it has become a small country, there are Western Christians, Eastern Christians, Is, Lanism, and northern peoples who don't believe in anything, and the races are even more complicated, almost all the people in the south, east and northwest, and there are wars for many years.

Where there is war, there is no shortage of slaves, and prisoners of war are the best source of slaves. However, this place Hong Tao can't go by himself, so it's just right to let Carl do it for him. Doesn't his son happen to have a territory over there, so he can buy more slaves and send them over with him on an oil tanker.

As for whether Arabs and whites are suitable for living and working in the rainforest, and whether there will be no blacks to resist it, Hong Tao believes that these are not problems. With quinine to treat malaria, Arabs and whites should be able to withstand it for a while. In such a large project, and without modern construction machinery, relying only on explosives, manpower, and animal power, casualties are inevitable. These slaves may have died of disease before they could have died in various construction accidents.

Money means nothing to the Spring Alliance at the moment, this large area of land is completely self-sufficient, there is no need to import, and there is nowhere to spend money. Central America is rich in gold and silver, and it is useless to save more on your own, and it is worth exchanging a bunch of broken metal that you can't eat and drink for more labor, even if it's only temporary.

The Virginia-class shear-style sailing yacht is indeed more suitable for high-speed sailing in the ocean than the European galleons with a predominantly cross-sail, stubby hull and a deep draft, especially in headwinds, and it is more than twice as fast as the salmon class.

Heading east from Sun City, it was almost always a headwind until it reached the Florida peninsula, and after the peninsula, the wind direction changed to westerly, which continued until the middle of the North Atlantic, and then changed to a southwesterly wind. The Azores are the dividing line, with southwesterly winds to the north and northeasterly trade winds to the south.

The European colonizers of that year followed the northeast trade winds all the way to Central and South America, which is one of the reasons why North America was closest to them but was the latest to occupy Central and South America, in addition to population and precious metal production, the main reason was that the wind was not in the right direction. With the navigation technology and equipment of the Europeans at that time, it was impossible to reach the North American continent directly from the North Atlantic under the strong westerly winds, and it was necessary to transit through the Bahamas first.

Not to mention that the Europeans at that time needed to do this, even the Salmon-class, a galleon with a technical level close to the 19th century, had to travel from the south side of the Azores when it came from Karlburg, and if it wanted to take the northern route, it would have to be at least half as slow. However, the Virginia-class, which is mostly propelled by an upward diagonal schooner, is not needed, and as long as it is not over-angled and headwind, its speed is actually about the same as that of a tailwind. If it is really downwind, its sail shape will not be successful, and it must be angled crosswind to be suitable, which can be regarded as a weakness of the Bukentin sail.

For the first time on this kind of transoceanic voyage, the Indian sailors did not care what sail type was not sailed, and they were exhausted by the daily struggle with the wind and waves of the North Atlantic, and the temperature was getting colder and colder, making it very uncomfortable for those who were used to living in the tropics.

Originally, Hong Tao thought that these Indian sailors must not be as tough as the well-trained naval sailors of the Golden River Country, but the final result surprised him. No matter how tired, cold, or afraid, as long as the priests on the ship appeared to them on time and recited the scriptures with them, they would regain their strength and forget all suffering for a while. Not only did these Indian sailors listen to the scriptures as if they had been drugged, but the sailors from the Golden River Country on the ship were also a little infected.

"The power of the crowd is terrifying...... Is this also the virtue you have above? Are you alone, or a group of people? Am I going to be able to go up and harm others with you after three crossings? Or do you want to go through ninety-nine-eighty-one difficulties like Tang Seng? Actually, I think it's no longer interesting for you to torture me alone, so it's better to let me go up and join the gang to do it together. I've come up with several ways to torture people, but it's interesting, don't you want to try it? Hong Tao had no one to confide in on the boat, but that didn't stop him from continuing to use that mouth at a high frequency, and he could tilt his head up to the sky and be confident that something could be heard from above. In the eyes of the sailors, this kind of behavior became a messenger communicating with the sun god, so they were even more afraid of those strong winds and waves!

"Toot toot toot...... "The ...... was really replied, it was a string of copper whistles.

"You're a ball! What kind of wolf with a big tail is ......" Hong Tao heard it, this was not a reply from heaven, but the lookout hand on the mast was blowing the whistle.

"Your Majesty, a few ships have been found ahead!" Soon the captain ran to Hong Tao's side and handed over the binoculars.

"Look at Mao, he can see it on it, we can't see anything! Let the three cargo ships behind speed up to catch up, their masts higher. Hong Tao glanced at the captain, with this kind of quality, he couldn't even be a second officer in the Royal Navy. What kind of virtue do you don't know? With such a low freeboard and no bow and stern, what else can you see but the waves?

The mast lookout was right, and when the cargo ship caught up, the distance was two kilometers closer. This time, I could see more clearly, there were at least ten ships on the sea about fifteen kilometers ahead, and the specific ship type was not clear at present. But there was one thing that made Hong Tao very puzzled, the lookout on the cargo ships said that these ships did not have a fixed course, as if they were going in circles.

"Let the cargo ship follow, let's go over and have a look." I can't figure out what the other party is doing, it's not far from the Azores, and if it's Karl's fleet, he won't be idle and run around here to play in circles. If it were a whaling ship, the waters around the Azores were a frequent spot for whales, but the problem was that Karl didn't have so many whaling ships, and even if he did, he would have to join the oil fleet. So whose boat is tossing and playing here? I can only take a closer look. Fortunately, the Virginia-class ship has a low hull and a low mast, so maybe the other party won't be able to spot these two small boats.

"Your Majesty, it seems that the other side is in the midst of an exchange of fire, and the lookout saw the light of the muzzle of the cannon...... There were eight ships chasing three boats, and they were flying flags that lookouts did not recognize. After more than half an hour, the captain came over again.

"Won't you go up and see for yourself? You're not waiting to see me climb the mast, are you? "This time the intelligence made Hong Tao even more confused, when will the Europeans play naval artillery? He also made more than a dozen warships at once and ran so far to fight a naval battle! It's a pity that no one can answer their own questions, and if you want to understand it earlier, you can only go up and see it yourself.

"Take off your gun jacket, reload, and get ready for battle!" Soon, Hong Tao saw on the mast lookout that the three ships that escaped in front were all wearing Jiang Zhuyi's tuanhua flags, and one of them looked like a Flying Fish, no wonder the sailors didn't know each other. I don't know the eight chasing ships in the back, and they look a bit like Jiao Shark class, but there is an extra bow tower.

There is one Flying Fish-class Karlburg, which has always been used by Karl as a whaling ship, if nothing else, these three ships should be Karl's whaling fleet, and the Azores are rich in whales. The flags on the other eight ships are not quite the same, there are about three kinds, and Hong Tao doesn't know any of them. But whether you know it or not, that Exocet-class is 100% of its own people, and it must participate in the war.

"Come, let's let the elderly enjoy themselves first, and you will have a chance in the future." The two Virginia-class ships accelerated away from the convoy and headed for the battlefield, and Hong Tao also climbed down from the mast. He was quite capable of tossing this old bone, and he was not idle for a moment, so he ran behind the bow gun, pushed the original gunner away, and personally shook the screw to lift the muzzle, and after adjusting the angle, the actions of opening the latch, loading the ball, and closing the latch were completed in one go.

The two Virginia-class battleships were getting closer and closer to the battlefield, and standing on the deck, you could see with the naked eye that the more than ten sailing ships two or three kilometers away were still chasing each other, and from time to time they were firing at each other, and almost no hits were made. At this time, Hong Tao could already determine that the three ships in front of him were Carl's whaling team, and their sails were not the same as European sailing ships, more like the sails of the Golden River Empire, especially the Exocet-class.

"Right rudder, close to six hundred meters!" No matter what the fight is, Hong Tao has to go up to help, Carl's enemy is naturally his own enemy, there is no discussion at this point, even if Carl offends the Pope, he has to go up to help. There are no reasonable conditions on the sea, the two fleets that are not familiar with each other cannot communicate at all, and the flag language can only be communicated between their own people, and outsiders cannot understand it at all.

(To be continued.) )