Rise of the 1630s South America

Chapter 1513 The direction of South Africa

The severe windy weather has been going on for several days.

Ximen Xiao climbed onto the roof of the small wooden two-story building and carefully observed the distant sky. The sky there was still gloomy, which seemed to indicate that the weather at sea would not improve in the next few days. Said it was particularly frustrating.

This is Hailan Harbor on the coast of the Namib Desert, located in the north of the Orange River and the city of Lüderitz in Namibia later.Due to the relatively rich fishery resources in the nearby waters, it has attracted a large group of fishing individuals or companies, including the old-fashioned integrity fishery company and the newly established Ximen Fishery Company every two years. Port of Walvis) as a base to catch all creatures including sea fish and sea animals. Sometimes (usually in the off-season) they also excavate some guano, sea animal droppings, etc. that are common in the offshore, and then sell them to people in the mid-river area of ​​South Africa. Farmers, more or less subsidize their own income.

Of course, their biggest income is fishing income, there is no doubt about it.Especially in Hailan Harbor, the Benguela cold current flows from south to north, and the strong upwelling currents form abundant primary productivity, which makes the seawater off the Namib Desert richer in nutrients—especially when it rises from August to October every year. When the current is the strongest - this provides extremely convenient conditions for the growth of hake and horse mackerel.

Facing this kind of resources bestowed by Heavenly Venerable, no one would remain indifferent.No, people in various villages and towns under the administrative office of the River Central Region of South Africa ordered fishing boats from Xinhua Island one after another (South Africa’s shipbuilding industry is not prosperous because of the lack of timber, or even none), and then based in the River Central Port and Hailan Port, they flocked Fishing for the extremely rich offshore fishery resources in groups, and because the fishery resources in the Namib Desert are far more than those in the South African coastal waters, most of these fishing boats are concentrated in Hailan Harbor on weekdays-a group spontaneously organized by fishermen, boat repairers, businessmen, etc. Formed a small fishing port.

Hailan Harbor currently has hundreds of permanent residents, and the number is still increasing.As for the number of floating population, it is even more indescribable, so that it has gradually developed to the point where the Hezhong District Administrative Office cannot ignore it.According to gossip, Commissioner Jiao Tangjiao in the river has planned to send officials to take office here, so as to bring Hailan Harbor under the control of the east bank as soon as possible.Otherwise, among other things, the large amount of tax money lost every year is enough to make people feel distressed.

The same is true for Seablue Harbor, and the same is true for some Walvis Bay ports further north and farther.The Angolan warm current flows down from the north and meets the Benguelan cold current near the sea area of ​​​​the Kunene Estuary, forming a fishing ground with a considerable output, mainly hake, supplemented by black horse mackerel, and South African that The side just adjusted one by one.Although the output of this fishing ground may not be larger than that of the other side, but because it produces mostly cape hake, Benguela hake and deep-sea hake, these cod are eaten by more people on the east coast, and they are sold at a higher price. Therefore, there are not a few people who fish in Walvis Bay. For example, Chengdong Zhu and Zamparini's Chengxin Fishing Company uses this place as its home.Correspondingly, the Ximen Fishery Company, which mainly catches black horse mackerel and sells it to the river and even New Courland, uses Hailan Harbor as its home port for fishing, and the division of labor is also clear.

This is the autumn time of the year in the southern hemisphere. Although it is not the best fishing season, it is still quite good. Therefore, there are more than [-] fishing boats, large and small, gathered in Hailan Harbor.These fishing boats are new and old, big and small, some are luxuriously equipped, some are extremely simple, with a total tonnage of over [-] tons, they are already considered a huge fishing force.At this time, it should have been a good time for them to set sail to fish in high spirits, but a sudden storm shattered everyone's dreams. , Either gambling and whoring, or sleeping with nothing to do, in short, a decadent appearance.

The fleet of Baron Krivitz and others was also unfortunately involved in the storm, and then rushed into Hailan Harbor to avoid it. It would have been several days.Several captains were frowning all day long, while the sailors were working hard to repair the ship, but His Excellency the Baron himself was quite free, and today he still had time to sit and chat with Ximen Xiao and others in a teahouse.

"Mr. Krivitz, unfortunately, you may still need to be a guest in Seablue Harbor for a few more days. From my experience, the sea is still not suitable for adventurous sailing in the next few days, especially when your ship is still there. With a full load of goods.” Ximen Xiao walked down the wooden stairs, shaking his head and said: “But even if the wind and waves stop, you must be extremely careful when you go back. Because recently, pirates have become more and more active in the sea off Angola. Rampant, those people specifically focused on robbing the merchant ships coming and going, and the methods were very brutal. I heard that almost no one survived. The Dutch East India Company and China’s East African Shipping Company have recently reported several missing ships. If there is no If there is an accident, it should be done by these pirates. Sometimes they even rob fishing boats like us. What they do is simply heinous. At present, the Chinese government has decided to choose an opportunity to allocate two faster Fast warships—yes, you know, the kind of "star" class light cruisers—come to the river area to search and attack these hateful pirates. But this kind of thing is actually very difficult to do, the climate off Angola is complex, There are many changes, which is very conducive to pirate operations. At the same time, those people can also pretend to be merchant ships on weekdays. Cruising in the sea area, so this round of action against pirates is destined to be very unsatisfactory. At best, the arrogance of the pirates from Portugal, England and France can only be suppressed a little bit, and it cannot be completely eradicated. Therefore, Creevey Mr. Ci, you still have to be very careful and pay more attention to your own safety, those pirates can be snatched by anyone."

In fact, what Ximenxiao thinks is another sentence, if you die, who will sell the horse mackerel that our company's fleet has caught so hard next time?It can’t be transported thousands of miles back to the mainland or go around South Africa to the Yicheng area on the east coast for sale. Not to mention the risks on the road, the price is also lower than that offered by the Courlandians.After all, they are all Christians. They must eat fish (preferably cod) in many festivals of the year, and they also like to eat fish on weekdays, so the market is relatively broad, and they are generally very popular. Therefore, Ximen Xiao and others are still more willing to sell the fish (naturally salted or dried fish) to New Courland, and they will only consider it as a last resort. sold domestically.There is no way, whoever made the east coast advocate free trade all the time, isn't this just free trade, everything is based on money!

Baron Krivitz sighed when he heard the words, obviously he also knew about this situation, and he was very troubled by it.After all, any new Courland merchant ship returning from the east coast will inevitably pass through the waters off Angola, and it will inevitably be unable to avoid those Portuguese pirates. Qing Dao has an unknown relationship, so let's assume they are all Portuguese—a huge threat.New Courland already has a small number of ships, and the number of sailors available is only so large. If a few of these ships are robbed by pirates, is it still worth it?Foreign trade will inevitably be severely affected. At that time, the shortage of materials and rising prices in the colony will be inevitable. This is unacceptable to your Excellency the Prince and the Governor.

"It would be great if Governor Beveren also had a mobile fleet in hand and could be sent out to carry out the mission of suppressing pirates with the people on the east coast!" At this time, Baron Krivitz felt that New Kur Lan should also be equipped with a professional naval fleet, the number should not be large, and three or four warships with more than 20 guns like those from the East Coast are enough.

But then again, there is no professional warship moored in Wendao Port in Courland, so why is it a low-status colony thousands of miles away—although this colony already has a population of more than 2, and it gives The locals have contributed a lot of money, but the colony is the colony, and this inherent fact cannot be changed-how many professional warships can it have?This is simply impossible!

The two then chatted about the recent development of South Africa, and at the same time tasted the high-grade camellia ordered by the owner of the teahouse from Ningbo in the Far East.It is worth mentioning that in a place like Hailan Harbor, due to the existence of the Benguela cold current, there are only a handful of days of precipitation in a year, so it is extremely dry.Therefore, if you want to drink tea in this kind of place, you have to be a rich person. It is really interesting for the owner of the teahouse to open a teahouse here. This is probably related to the fact that he is also a wholesaler of marine products. Drinking tea may be just for others. It's just that he opened a whole teahouse to satisfy his personal hobbies.

The main source of drinking water in the area, except for some intermittent dry streams, is the water vapor collected artificially by using the dense fog that diffuses near the sea at night or early morning.These water vapors should have turned into rain, but because of the cold current, they could not form rain and could only exist in the form of mist.And it is precisely the existence of these fogs that greatly nourished a large number of weeds and shrubs in the Namib Desert, making it difficult for the extensive nomadic economy to survive here. They are close to the two ports of Hailan and Walvis Bay, where people gather on the east coast, and they are also afraid of being taken away as slaves for a lifetime.

Ximen Xiao has lived in Hailan and Hezhong for most of the past two years, and he is familiar with the situation in South Africa.In his view, South Africa, the only overseas territory of the East Coast Republic of China, is now only so-so in relation to its local economy, but its economic ties with New Courland, New China and other places are becoming increasingly close.For example, they exported a large amount of livestock, cured meat, salted fish, wine, wheat, flour, cheese, butter and even construction materials to New Courland, and then imported tobacco, sugar, pepper, tropical dried fruits, timber and other specialty commodities from there; For example, they exported salted fish (the production of Xinhua Island's fishery industry is seriously insufficient), wine, wheat, flour and other commodities to Xinhua Island, and then imported a large amount of tropical specialties such as coffee, cocoa, sisal and even entrepot trade. The trade was very frequent with imported foreign goods.

Even after South Africa has won the treatment it deserves (the Riverside region of South Africa is theoretically the mainland, and the Yicheng region will soon be classified as the mainland in the future), the central government is now gradually releasing restrictions on the development of local industries. Many businessmen took a fancy to South Africa's rich wool resources and planned to come here to set up wool textile factories for the markets of the Indian Ocean and the Southeast Atlantic.Since then, South Africa’s wool no longer needs to be shipped back to the mainland for processing in sacks. They already have the right to produce their own cloth, which undoubtedly further connects South Africa with the above two regions.

Of course, this does not mean that there is already a separation between the South African region and the mainland. In fact, it is impossible for South Africa to become independent in any case when it is so close to the mainland and there are cadres and troops dispatched by the local government. .In fact, this is just the normal development direction of the South African region. Whenever any regional commissioner appointed by the central government comes here, he must start from this line of thinking.The future of South Africa is destined to be in Africa and in the Indian Ocean. Of course, the trade with the mainland will not be partial, after all, it relies on the mainland for a lot.

On April 1668, 4, the wind stopped and the rain stopped, and the sea was clear and clear.Baron Krivitz shook hands with Ximen Xiao to say goodbye, and then left Hailan Harbor one by one with several merchant ships of his own, embarking on the return journey.And Ximen Xiao called a few of his confidants over, and then asked them to go to the tavern to summon all the drunk sailors (many of them were non-nationals from the Old World) and prepare to go fishing.

This time their goal was the waters north of Whale Bay, where they went fishing for cod.In a few months, it will be the New Year's Eve in China. At that time, the consumption of cod will increase greatly. Smart people know that it is time to increase the stock of cod in order to make a fortune before the year. Ximen Xiao naturally does this too. thought up.

And after working in the waters north of Walvis Bay for a month or two, he will set off across the Atlantic Ocean and return to his hometown in the native Rocha Port via Jiaohe Port.He hasn't been back to his hometown for the New Year for two consecutive years, and this time he has to go back anyway, and deal with the backlog of seal skins by the way.South Africa, after all, is just a place to make money!

(End of this chapter)