"Of course, these English people used to be pirates and have always been robbers. Doing these things is best for them."
The people next to me smiled and nodded.
People in the Ming Dynasty basically did not directly participate in Europe's dirty affairs. Although these few merchants came to buy slaves with grain.
But some English people were hired to do the work. On the one hand, wages in England were low. Many English people were even slaves and were not even paid.
Another aspect is that by hiring these local people to do these things, they understand all the conditions here better, which can greatly reduce trouble and save costs.
As you can see, these English people are doing very well and working very hard.
"This is really a good opportunity to make a fortune."
"There is a great famine happening all over Europe. You can buy slaves with just a little bit of food. This change of hands is nothing but money."
"The population on the island of Ireland is not very large. The powerful businessmen have all gone to France and the Holy Roman Empire. I heard that slaves from all over the world are shipped to the Golden Continent and Africa. Many slaves are shipped to the Golden Continent and Africa.
Everyone is making a lot of money."
"Isn't that right? The most populous countries in Europe are France, the Holy Roman Empire and Spain. Spain is definitely not allowed to go, so France and the Holy Roman Empire are the only ones left."
"We can make a lot of money by getting a few ships of slaves here. Once we transport them to Hong Kong and resell them, we can make a lot of money. Then we can buy some grain and exchange them for slaves. I estimate that this business can last until
next year."
"Haha, this year is really a good harvest year."
Several Ming businessmen chatted happily and drank tea leisurely. From time to time, they looked down at the pier and showed disgust when they saw the skinny and dirty people.
These Europeans really don't care about hygiene, and they are really too dirty. They travel to many places in Europe, and the whole of Europe is almost the same. Even the castles of the nobles are extremely filthy.
.....
Paris, with the raging cold winter, the whole of Paris has fallen into a state of desolation. The severe cold has frozen the Seine River. On the thick ice, from time to time, you can see emaciated bodies frozen inside.
's corpse.
The streets of Paris are full of stench and filth, and a large number of people are constantly looking for anything to satisfy their hunger.
At this moment, even the rats were too scared to show their heads, because for hungry people, rat meat is extremely delicious food.
In the impression of later generations, it seems that famines rarely occur in Europe, and only in our eastern land there are famines from time to time.
This is actually very incorrect.
In ancient times, it was not just the East that was full of famines. In fact, it was the same all over the world. Famines existed almost everywhere, and they were very common.
In ancient times when science and technology was not developed, the output of food cultivation was very limited, and food was still very dependent on the weather. The weather was better when the weather was good. Once there was a famine, hunger was very common.
The Ming Dynasty has been basically a unified dynasty and has specialized historians and local chronicles to record these major events. Therefore, historical data can be consulted in detail from the Spring and Autumn Period and the Warring States Period, and even records are recorded in the Xia, Shang and Zhou Dynasties.
.
It's different in Europe. Europe has rarely been unified. Most of the time, it was divided. They didn't have a unified country, and they didn't have a unified historian to record these things.
At most, church people would occasionally record some things, so that when later generations studied these things, some people said that there were very few famines in Europe, but there were many famines in the East.
But in fact, in Europe, just like the East, famine is a common occurrence, and various plagues and diseases are rampant.
In the past two years, Europe has almost encountered the same situation as the Ming Dynasty. Last year, it encountered an extreme drought climate, which caused a sharp decrease in grain production in Europe, which itself was in short supply of food.
Then this year, the climate in Europe was extremely abnormal, with extremely heavy rainfall.
In Ireland and England, due to continuous rainfall, potato moldy diseases occurred and the harvest was almost eliminated. In France, the Holy Roman Empire, and Spain, wheat production also dropped significantly due to continuous rainfall.
These two consecutive years of famine have made the whole of Europe worse, plunging into boundless famine.
In addition to famine, man-made disasters are also one of the important reasons for this famine.
On the one hand, there are the Japanese pirates that are raging in the coastal areas of Europe. The Japanese regard Europe as their own cash machine. A large number of Japanese pirates are raging on the west coast of Europe, constantly plundering places, snatching property and slaves, and plundering a large number of people.
.
In order to deal with these Japanese pirates, the Europeans had to do their best and recruited a large number of young and strong labor forces to join the army to fight against the Japanese pirates. However, the Japanese pirates were well-equipped and well-trained, and the Europeans were often unable to defeat these Japanese pirates, resulting in the loss of a large number of young and strong labor forces.
Death and passing.
These labor forces are the most important labor force in farming society. Without them, a large amount of land cannot be cultivated.
Secondly, in order to obtain more profits, the nobles in Europe occupied a large amount of land to raise sheep and exported wool to the Ming Dynasty.
The price of wool has always been very good, and a large number of nobles have found business opportunities. Ships of wool were exported to the Ming Dynasty, but a large amount of land was converted from fertile land into pasture.
For the nobles here, the availability of food has little impact on them. They only care about whether the Ming Dynasty silver coins in their hands will become more and whether they can afford expensive luxury goods from the Ming Dynasty.
Furthermore, the farming methods here are still very primitive and backward. Europeans don’t even know about retting. They often cultivate fields one after another. After planting for a few years, they find that the fertility has declined, and then they cultivate new fields. Many of them
The cultivated fields are left uncultivated. If the cycle is repeated, the planting efficiency will be low and the yield will be lower.
Natural disasters and man-made disasters have caused hunger to ravage all over Europe. It is winter again, and countless people are suffering from hunger and cold. They cannot survive the winter at all.
Fortunately, at this time, there were kind-hearted Ming people who came to Paris with a steady stream of food.
It is almost the same as here in Ireland. The Ming Dynasty generously used grain to buy slaves here. One person can exchange for a bag of grain weighing dozens of kilograms. This is undoubtedly a big deal for the hungry Parisians.
Gospel.
Countless people lined up in long lines to sell their wives and children, and local French officials and nobles even had to come forward to help maintain order.
Although the big-nosed King Francois I of France knew very well that if this continued, the entire population of Paris would be transported away.
But he still had to support the Ming people's approach, because compared to starving to death, selling some of the people could at least exchange for life-saving food for the remaining people.
France is in great need of food now, and the whole of Europe has no food. Only the people of Ming Dynasty still have an endless supply of food in their hands.
It is said that the people of the Ming Dynasty have huge fertile fields in Huangjinzhou. They use machinery to cultivate the land. Only one person can cultivate thousands of acres of huge land, and there is so much food that they can't eat it all.
Although everyone doesn’t quite believe this rumor, how could one person cultivate thousands of acres of land?
But there is no doubt that the people of Ming Dynasty have food in their hands.
The whole of Europe is starving, but Hong Kong is still very prosperous and lively. Many people from all over the world go to Hong Kong to buy food.
But the cunning Ming people don't need your money. They need slaves. If you want to buy their food, you must exchange for slaves.
They were so greedy. It is said that a slave sold to the Ming Dynasty could be bought for dozens of taels of silver. If it was a beautiful woman, it could even be sold at a higher price.
However, now, the Ming people just wanted to use the food at the price of food in exchange for slaves. This made the Europeans refuse to cooperate with the Ming people for a while, but soon, they had to accept such a plan.
Because the whole of Europe is in great need of food, even if they are being suppressed by the Ming Dynasty in this way, they have to accept that a large number of people were sold as slaves to the Ming Dynasty, and all they got in exchange was just a bag
Just bags of food.
Houzhao City on the Baltic Sea Coast!
This city, which was built under the leadership of Zhu Houzhao, the crown prince of the Ming Dynasty, and was named after him, at this moment, trains were coming from the east, bringing carts of grain.
Compared to the great famine and production loss in Europe, the Black Soil Province on the Great Plains of Eastern Europe ushered in a great harvest.
Black Earth Province has fertile land and flat and open terrain, which is very suitable for mechanized farming. Ming immigrants used mechanized farming on this land on a large scale, making Black Earth Province the granary of Ming Dynasty.
At the same time, in the early years, the Ming Dynasty had built a railway line across the Eurasian continent, and the train could go directly to Houzhao City in the west.
At this moment, Houzhao City has completely turned into a huge slave market. Slaves from Western Europe and Eastern Europe are constantly gathering here, and then transported to the east in one train after another.
At the same time, from the east, train after train of food was continuously transported here, and then ship after ship, truck after truck, and truck were transported to various parts of Europe to be exchanged for slaves in these places.
The hungry and cold Europe has now become the best source of slaves for the Ming Dynasty, and also the cheapest source of slaves. Millions of slaves were imported into the Ming Dynasty, so that the price of slaves has dropped significantly.