Ohio, USA.

A strange stench emanating from a box of grain caught the attention of a stevedore, who, when he opened the box with a crowbar, found a pile of potatoes in the hay that had softened and browned.

The worker immediately recognized the seriousness of the situation, as the virus was contagious, and not only the potatoes that came into contact with the box would rot, but the potatoes of Ohio as a whole might not be spared.

However, the employer apparently didn't care about this, and ridiculed him in turn.

"Oh, Steven. Do you still think you're a state legislator? You're just a fucking, goddamn stevedore right now. ”

"Bobby, I'm not here to do this today. I want to tell you that you have to burn all the grains, not just the potatoes, or the bacteria will sweep through Ohio like the Black Death. If you can't transport it away, there will be no grass where the germ passes. ”

Bobby Stark's greasy face had a look of disgust.

"That's what you're talking about? So who will compensate for my losses? Or am I going to destroy my future and sleep on the streets like you?

I don't, a good friend like me, you can take me in, feed and clothe me, and now let you turn against me! ”

"You can file for federal compensation," Steven Sipier said, because he knew that it would be harder than it would be to get federal compensation through this kind of thing, and even if there were, the amount would be much smaller than Bobby's loss.

"Damn, you might as well pray to God that this damn mold will be gone from the world forever. I don't want to hear you be alarmist here. Listen! Steven, there's five dollars on the table, grab it and shut up and keep being your stevedore. Otherwise, fuck me off, the choice is yours. ”

Bobby Stark was simply disappointed in his friend, who was born with a golden spoon despite his ancestry, but he was on the wrong side every time, and now he can only survive by selling coolies.

"It seems that people really shouldn't read too many books, otherwise they will become stupid." Bobby Stark came to this conclusion.

Bobby Farms' produce travels down the Chesapeake and Ohio Canals to Washington, where they await being loaded onto Ireland across the ocean.

Steven Sipil was not alarmist, and potato late blight has been called a devastating disease to this day. Late blight infection can cause widespread death or drastic reduction in potato yields, and the mold can be spread not only by contact, but also by water and air, as long as the temperature and humidity are right.

Usually a crop infected with potato late blight is found in one area, and soon the whole area will be infected, although the degree of damage will vary depending on the local temperature, humidity, and crop variety.

Potato late blight is most popular in rainy, cold and humid climates, such as the United Kingdom and Ireland

Queen's Village, South of Ireland.

Skaha Jennings is twelve years old, and although she shares the same name as the ancient Irish hero, she knows neither magic nor the use of a spear.

If there is something special about her compared to ordinary people, it is that she can read and write. Yes, in Ireland at this time, as a Catholic, her ability to read and write was indeed an amazing skill.

This is because the British had begun a colony program many centuries earlier, confiscating the property of the indigenous people of Ireland and planning to build a large number of plantations, just as the Anglo-Saxons had done in North America.

And the fate of the Irish should have been the same as that of the Indians of North America, as well as the indigenous peoples of New Zealand and Australia. Fortunately, they chose to fight, and they were supported by the great powers of the continent (Spain, France, and France both tried to land on the island of Ireland), and for this reason the blood of the Irish did not stop even during the Glorious Revolution.

The Glorious Revolution was a non-violent coup d'état launched in 1688 by the English bourgeoisie and the new aristocracy to overthrow the rule of James II and prevent the restoration of Catholicism. The revolution did not take place in bloodshed, so historians call it the "Glorious Revolution".

But in reality, Cromwell went to Ireland himself, and the bodies piled up in Wexford alone were five meters high. Yes, it was to build landscapes, but 1688 was not the Middle Ages, and the English had already defined themselves as models of the civilized world.

The Irish aristocracy was the first to surrender to the British, and in order to be accepted by the British, they put on the clothes of the British, the way of life of the British, abandoned Catholicism, believed in the Anglican Church, spoke English, and were appointed by the British to manage the poor Irish aborigines.

But the British would not let them go, and the British colonized Ireland in a very primitive way, first choosing the "Tui En Order" of the Han Dynasty.

After forcing the death of the native Irish nobles, the land would be divided equally among all the sons, ensuring that there would be no large landowners on the island of Ireland.

But at this time, although he is shameless, he still does bad things in the name of fairness.

Soon the British found a new excuse, that is, the Irish were Catholics like the Spaniards, so they believed that the Irish were collaborators.

The British government began to massacre the Irish and confiscate their property. Then he took the opportunity to enact a series of punitive laws.

For example, the Irish are not allowed to own horses or donkeys, are not allowed to go to school, cannot vote for elections, cannot become public officials, cannot own land, cannot own property more than £15, etc

Some of these laws were in place even before Ireland's independence.

Later, the British in the Napoleonic era defined the Irish as allies of the French.

Interestingly, however, every time the British raised their butcher's knives, the Irish had not yet begun to ask for help from their "allies", and their "allies" did not notice this.

There is a paragraph about Ireland on January 23, 1799, when British Prime Minister William Pitt said so.

"Ireland is demonically possessed. This evil spirit is deeply rooted in this people, including their morals, manners, and habits, as well as their intellectual deficiencies, barbarism, ignorance, and backwardness.

Their religion and their hostility to the civilized world have fostered a prejudice against the world and allowed superstition and cruelty to take root."

To put it simply, the British did not see Ireland as their own people, or even as white, but as blacks, Indians, or whatever else.

Historically, in 1829, Daniel O'Connell finally qualified the Irish for education through several generations.

It was certainly not an ordinary school, but a school for Irish Catholics to protect the English from the plague of poverty and laziness.

But in reality, there are not many poor Irish people on the island who can get an education, and Skaha Jennings is one of them, thanks to a priest living near her home.

At that time, the Irish Catholics were miserable, but the clergy were not as miserable as they imagined. Although not as good as their counterparts in Europe, they can be said to be doing very well compared to the average Irish.

However, the disadvantage of pure religious education is also great, that is, the knowledge level of the local people is similar to that of the Middle Ages. The common sense in our mouths seems so "noble" or "deviant" in their eyes.

Skaha Jennings has an older brother, two younger brothers, and two younger sisters, and her family has two rooms, a covered cottage where her parents live, and six siblings live in an adobe house without a roof.

(I haven't been able to find out why, but at the time roofed houses were more advanced than unroofed adobe houses.) ）

There was only one bed in the room, but Skaha never worried about it collapsing, because it was made of stone and covered with dried hay, but unfortunately there was no bedspread.

Skaha's family has ten acres (sixty acres) of land, which is much better than the situation of most of their fellow Irishmen.

Since the Irish could not own their own land, the landlords rented it to them in small plots, and usually the family had only 3-4 acres of land to survive.

(Some people may think that 3-4 acres is not too little, but the productivity of land at that time was far less than that of modern times, and Grandpa Yuan was eternal.) Moreover, at that time, European landlords were generally more ruthless than Asians, and taking 60% of the profits was basically a routine operation. ）

In addition to this, Skaha's family has three pigs and an old dog, as well as five chicks, including a hen that lays eggs, which is all the Skaha's family's property.

The family's breakfast was potatoes, lunch was potatoes, and dinner was potatoes.

However, they don't eat baked potatoes, fried potatoes, sauced potatoes, cold potatoes, or shredded potatoes, potato chips, and mashed potatoes

In fact, the Irish people at that time usually had only one way to eat potatoes, and that was to cook them and sprinkle them with some salt.

It is this monotonous food that feeds the nearly 8.3 million people on the island of Ireland.

Imagine what a horrible picture it would be if there was a problem with this food one day.

Vienna, Schönbrunn Palace.

Archbishop Rauscher did not quite understand what Franz meant, including sending Austrian priests to the island of Ireland, and he felt that if he wanted the church to help gather information, he should also disguise himself as an Anglican member and go to a big city like London or Portsmouth.

As for Ireland as a whole, cities including Dublin don't seem to be very important.

"Archduke Franz, if Ireland don't want to eat potatoes anymore, maybe they can choose to grow wheat, corn, sweet potatoes, rice, and the like.

Oh! Cassava is also a very good choice, and Grand Duke Franz has been very successful in growing cassava in Namibia.

The local natives saw that our people did not feel any discomfort after eating cassava, and they thought that our god was stronger than theirs, and the development of believers was very rapid. Several of the major tribes have converted to the Church, and the total number has grown from 200 to 100,000."

Apparently Archbishop Rauschel was equally unconcerned with the lives of the Irish, and he was more interested in the new indigenous faithful in Namibia.

"Archbishop, the land on the island of Ireland is very tight, and I am afraid that if you don't grow potatoes, you won't be able to feed so many people."

"Don't worry, Grand Duke Franz, they'll go to the mines, factories, or anywhere else to survive. Aren't you a smart person who doesn't know that there is more to a farmer than just farming if he wants to survive? ”

Archbishop Rauscher was not entirely unaware of the suffering of the people, but his years in Vienna had convinced him that there were always more choices than difficulties.

The economy of the Austrian Empire had improved dramatically under Franz's intervention compared to the same period in history, and this progress was particularly evident in Vienna as the center of the Empire.

All seemed to be treated gently, and hunger seemed to be gone, for even the great famine of 1838 in Vienna did not see hordes of people dying of cold and starvation.

Archbishop Rauschel was more concerned with Central America than Ireland, and Archduke Franz's policy of vacating the cage for birds had almost hollowed out the indigenous people there, and in order to fill this vacancy, the Church had to transfer people from elsewhere.

The situation in the Austrian Empire is very good, and few people are willing to leave, even if they want to develop overseas, they will give preference to royal colonies such as West Africa, after all, almost all Austrians in the Inner Letania region are shareholders of overseas development companies, and of course they are more motivated to work for themselves.

"Archbishop, you don't seem to care at all about those fellow Catholics in Ireland. I told you before that the British did not allow the Irish to do business, and there were not enough factories in the area to absorb so many people."

Franz was a little dissatisfied, and the god in front of him obviously wanted to help the Armenians who were far away from the Ottomans. Why is there such indifference to the Irish?

"Archduke Franz, you mentioned earlier a remark made by Louis Pasteur when he rejected your invitation. Science knows no borders, but scientists have nationalities.

In fact, it is the same with our church, if those Irish are subjects of the Austrian Empire like we are, then the church has an unshirkable duty and will do its best to help them.

But Ireland is in the UK, and the Irish are British. I'm the religious leader of the Austrian Empire, so it's not appropriate for me to use the donations of my subjects to save the people of an enemy country, right? ”

Franz was full of black lines when he heard this, and he had only thought that Archbishop Rauscher was just a magic stick, but now he realized that he was a smart magic stick.

"Archbishop, the Church's duty is not only to worship God, but also to preach the Gospel to the world. This gospel can be God's, of course, Austrian, or Habsburg's. ”

Franz's words, of course, were understood by Archbishop Rauscher, but he still could not understand the use of courting those Irishmen. Could it be that the Austrian Empire could still cut a piece of land next to the British mainland?

In fact, Franz's approach is similar to the preferential treatment of prisoners of war, after all, capital has no borders, and if the capitalists lose, it is a big deal to run from Britain to the United States.

But whether it was World War I or World War II, it was the common people who really died on the battlefield, either out of patriotism, or forced to do so, or to maintain world peace, or to plow land for their country, or to establish *****, in short, the rulers would get a high-sounding reason to make them feel that they were right.

What Franz had to do now was to fundamentally disintegrate the fighting power of the British, and the Irish were the best breakthrough.

(End of chapter)