After Hard finished bargaining with the Ceylonese, he turned to Han Du and said, "Master Marquis, they can provide food, but they need to exchange it for cloth. And the price is a little cheaper than the last time Hard exchanged with them. According to him,
"Recently, fewer people have come to Ceylon to exchange food with them."
"Fewer people are coming here?" Han Du was suddenly stunned for a moment, and then he pondered. This is not a good phenomenon. Logically speaking, the goods in the old port are very attractive to Western merchants, and the West is very attractive to Western merchants.
The demand for goods in the Ming Dynasty is far from reaching saturation. Therefore, the number of merchants passing through here will only increase, not decrease.
There were suddenly fewer merchants, which gave Han Du a bad guess.
However, Han Du did not say what he was thinking, but asked Hard: "What do you think will happen?"
Hard had never thought that Han Du would ask him this question, and he really couldn't find a clue for a moment. Suddenly, Hard thought of a question, but he was a little unsure, so he had to tentatively reply: "Is it because of Ravi's sea situation?"
There are too many pirates, and they have robbed too many merchants, so that merchants are afraid to go to sea easily?"
Han Du nodded secretly, and this was the reason he thought of. The number of merchants passing through Ceylon suddenly decreased. Apart from this reason, Han Du could not think of any other possibilities.
It seems that these pirates really have to be wiped out. Otherwise, if the pirates really interrupt the trade between the East and the West, the Ming Dynasty will suffer a huge loss. Don't look at the tribute taxes in the old port. They are not much higher than other places.
, but various Western novelties are also very popular in the capital. ??
It can be said that at least half of the Ming Dynasty's maritime merchants came to the Old Port for the exotic gadgets from the West. If the sea route was blocked by pirates and Western merchants were lost, then more than half of the prosperity of the Old Port would definitely be lost.
On the contrary, the losses of those Western businessmen were negligible. At most, they would not go to sea, and they would not be able to make money with a guaranteed profit.
"Ask them, do they exchange gems?" Han Du was still thinking about Fu Yong's businessmen.
After Fu Yong heard this, he was moved in his heart. He did not expect that Han Du would still remember the purpose of these businessmen coming here.
"Change." Harder asked in advance, "But if it's for gems, they only want to trade for cloth, the best cloth."
If you want to spread it, it's easy. Han Du turned around and looked at Fu Yong.
Fu Yong nodded slightly in understanding, and when Han Du turned around, he quickly made arrangements again.
At this time, the leader of Ceylon started chattering again.
Harder listened carefully,
Then he smiled and explained to Han Du: "He wants to see how the cloth is. If it is good, he will invite us to his place."
Harder was quite surprised. Although he had known the leader for a long time, even he had never asked Harder to go in.
As a guest, it turns out that there are similarities between people.
This request was simple, and without Han Du's instructions, Fu Yong quickly asked someone to bring over a piece of hundred-fold cloth.
When the Ceylon leader saw the hundred folds of cloth, he immediately fell in love with it. He waved his hands eagerly, and words that were difficult to understand kept coming out of his mouth.
Fortunately, there was also Hader, who translated for everyone: "He is asking you to give him the cloth."
Fu Yong did not hesitate, waved his hand casually, agreed to the Ceylon leader's request, and gave him a piece of hundred-fold cloth.
The moment the Ceylon leader took over the hundred folds of cloth, he felt that the cloth was completely different from the cloth he had exchanged in the past. Although the cloth he had exchanged in the past was much stronger than leaves, it was very breathable and cool.
After all, it is linen, so the fibers are inevitably rough and will abrade the skin when worn.
But that kind of ephemeral yellow cloth is much worse than the current one. Not only is this cloth whiter in color, but it also feels extremely smooth and does not feel like it is rubbing against the skin at all.
The Ceylon leader suddenly seemed to feel something. He quickly turned his palm over and looked carefully, and found that the sweat in his palm had disappeared without a trace when his hand touched the cloth.
He tested it again with his other hand, and sure enough he saw the disappearing sweat again.
Is this cloth so magical? The leader of Ceylon screamed excitedly and hurriedly said something to Harder.
After Hard listened carefully, he explained to Fu Yong: "He said that if this kind of cloth is used in exchange, he is willing to exchange gems with you."
Seeing that Fu Yong and others were able to exchange gems so easily, Hader was still unhappy. It turned out that he had slowly accumulated trust through repeated contacts with these people, and finally got the exchange.
Qualifications for gemstones. However, he did not expect that Fu Yong and others would obtain them as soon as they arrived.
Han Du looked at Hade, who was explaining to Fu Yong, and turned his head to look at the Shi family while he was not paying attention.
Facing Han Du's inquiry, the Shi family slowly
Closed his eyes.
This meant that Han Du frowned slightly, which meant that even the Shi family could not understand what was said between the two?
Forget it if you don’t understand. Since you’ve given it to Hader to do, let him go and do it.
On the other side, the people of Ceylon not only agreed to exchange gems with Fu Yong and others, but also warmly invited everyone to their settlement.
Han Du stayed beside Zhu Biao and walked into the Ceylonese settlement. Everything here made Han Du frown. There were no roads, no latrines, and many things that a settlement should have, but they were not available here.
.
It completely looks like a wild land.
Suddenly, Han Du caught a glimpse of a red glimmer from the corner of his eye. Han Du subconsciously looked towards the glimmer and saw that the source of the glimmer was a stone built on the stone wall nearby.
Han Du walked over quietly, stretched out his hand to explore, and found that the stone was not big, and it was still loose. Without stopping, Han Du used a little force to get the stone in his hand.
When Zhu Biao saw Han Du suddenly walking to the right and behaving strangely, he asked in confusion: "What are you doing?"
Han Du did not answer Zhu Biao immediately, but lowered his head and glanced at the stone in his hand. He quickly confirmed that it was not his eyesight, but a faint red light indeed coming from the stone.
His fingers vigorously rubbed off some of the sand on the surface. Han Du took one look and was not satisfied. He directly took out a dagger from Yu Da's waist and scraped the stone several times.
A ruddy and crystal-clear object the size of a fingernail came into view. A satisfied smile appeared on Han Du's face and he handed the stone to Zhu Biao.
Zhu Biao took the stone and took one look at it, and couldn't help but take a breath. There was clearly a ruby hidden inside the stone. And judging from the exposed part, the ruby was not small.
Where did this stone come from? Zhu Biao saw clearly just now that it was Han Du who casually broke it off from the stone wall of the house. With just a casual break, he was able to break off a large ruby?
When Han Du said this was an island of gems, Zhu Biao didn't pay much attention to it. But now Han Du's actions only shocked him.
Is there any natural reason? A ruby that was extremely rare in the Ming Dynasty can be easily picked up here?
Zhu Biao originally looked down upon such a stone house, but now he is shocked when he looks at it.
If you can break out a ruby, what if all these people's houses are bulldozed?
The harvest will definitely not be small!
It is very easy to trade food, as long as Hard is exchanging according to the agreement he made with the Ceylon leader. But the exchange of gems is troublesome, because Ceylon is rich in gems, and almost all common colored gems are produced here.
.Sapphire, ruby, cat's eye and other chrysoberyl, spinel, garnet, beryl, tourmaline, topaz, quartz and many other gemstones.
There is a dazzling array of all kinds of gems. These gems have different colors, sizes, and values. It is impossible to price them uniformly. Therefore, one gem can only be priced at one price and one gem can be traded once.
As a result, the transaction was very slow, because the Ceylonese people were not stupid, and they also wanted to sell the gems at a higher price. However, although Fu Yong and other businessmen had long been salivating over the gems in front of them, they still had to hold on tight.
He tensed up without showing any emotion, trying to desperately lower the price of gems.
The bargaining between the two parties also requires Harder to translate it. In this way, one can imagine how fast the transaction can be.
Zhu Biao and Han Du only participated for a while. Seeing that their transaction could not be completed in a short time, they returned to the ship.
The news that someone was exchanging gems in large quantities also reached the palace of the Ceylon Mountain Kingdom.
The king of Mount Ceylon, Ariel Kunel, was a short, dark, fat man.
"Your Majesty, your great king, your servant has gone to check, and the news is true." A richly decorated Ceylonese man knelt in front of Ariel Kunel.
Ariel Kunel jumped twice, stood up and walked closer, asking: "Do those outsiders really have a lot of goods?"
"Yes, they took out a lot of goods to trade gems, but these goods are only a few of their ships. There are many big ships on the sea."
"A lot?" Ariel Kunel's eyes lit up, his expression full of greed, "Where do these people come from? Have you asked clearly?"
"I heard from other people that these people are from a big eastern country called Ming Dynasty."
"Da Ming?" Ariel Kunel murmured it several times, making sure she had never heard of it.
Then he asked with a contemptuous smile: "A big country in the East? How big is it?"
"According to those people, it is very big. But it is also far away from here. Those people said that it would take three months for their ship to reach Daming."