Chapter 208.
Chapter 208 – Prospect
Theodore, the mayor of Fullan Harbor, warmly entertained Quake and his party at the town hall, and besides the crew of the Southern ship, the most active people at the banquet were the group of merchants.
“The buildings there are tall and big, even the houses of the commoners are beautifully decorated.”
“Merchants are well respected there and still have influence over the government.”
“People dress well, live in affluence, and are willing to pay for things.”
The crowd gathered around the four delegates who had been on a tour of Horn Bay, eagerly and enthusiastically discussing what they had seen in a foreign country.
Under the descriptions of several of the delegates, Horn Bay had become in the minds of the crowd a merchant’s paradise of gold, and many regretted that they had not been born there.
“I stayed at the docks for one full day, not for any other reason, just to count the number of merchant ships that came in and out of the harbor throughout the day, and guess what, there were fifty-five large merchant ships coming in and out of the harbor that day!”
“Oh, God, what a sight that must have been!”
Hearing one of the delegates say this, Mr. Bennett, who made his fortune in shipping, let out a sigh of relief, compared to the past, the port of Fulan did not have many merchant ships coming in and out of the port in a week, but recently, with the State Council vigorously supporting industry and commerce, this port is also gradually coming to life, and hopefully, it would become as prosperous as the Horned Cove.
“The market in Nisborough is a collection of goods from all over the world, and any goods you can imagine can be bought there, except for specialties that can’t be stored easily.”
A factory owner who had built a porcelain factory asked suspiciously, “Is it even porcelain, we haven’t been producing porcelain here for very long.”
Another delegate gave a sultry look as he put his hand over his mouth and whispered, “I’ll tell you something.”
The crowd saw how careful he was and put their heads together.
The representative whispered, “Porcelain has already appeared in Horned Bay, and our lord lord has quietly done business with Horned Bay, the partner is still the Foster family that occupies a seat in the Horned Bay Alliance Convocation.”
“What, so Lord Greymane had already gotten in touch with that side a long time ago? Surprisingly, he didn’t tell us about it.”
“I saw an unusual merchant team when I was in Lakeheart Town, their clothing is completely foreign style, it can’t be the Foster Family.”
“Then they should be coming from overland, this is really far, ah, a round trip would take more than two months anyways. It also has to cross the rebel territory in the south.”
“With the Foster family’s status and power, the royal families of various countries have to give a few points of face, and I’m sure that the Greedy Wolf Grand Duke won’t make things difficult for the Foster family’s merchant fleet, unless he doesn’t want to do business with his neighbors in the south.”
The merchants murmured, surprised that there was already a trade connection between Arda and Horned Bay.
The representative continued, “But I’ve only seen porcelain used for decorative purposes in the headquarters of one of the chambers of commerce, and I’ve yet to see any being sold in the market, so I’m sure that the land capacity is too small, and as soon as it arrives in Horned Bay, it’s immediately taken off the market, and the demand outstrips the supply. Besides, Count Greiman’s porcelain factory doesn’t produce very much.”
The factory owner from earlier looked excited, “So if I can ship the goods to Horn Bay, I can definitely make a big profit?”
“That’s for sure, the richness of the people of Horn Bay is not comparable to our poor people here, even the nobles in the Northwest are buckled to death. Oh-! I mean nobles other than Lord Gleeman.”
The representative of the merchants who had gone out for a stroll and seen the world spoke a bit tongue-in-cheek, but these words evoked the infinite reverie of a group of merchants, and many of them had the idea of investing in the porcelain industry.
“What about salt?”
Salt merchant Godwin Tobey saw several salt tanning factories under the technical guidance of the Council of State, and he was most concerned about whether his salt could be sold at a good price again in Horn Bay.
“The outlook for salt is also great, the salt there is boiled as we did before and it’s expensive as hell.”
“Good! Excellent!”
Gerdwin’s eyes were glowing, as if countless gold coins were about to fall from the sky and hit him on the head.
After the merchants eagerly discussed the bright scenarios of the future, they coincidentally realized that they had forgotten the most important issue – the problem of transportation capacity.
“How to transport the goods there?” “Naturally, we’ll use the kind of ships invented by Count Gleiman that are driven entirely by wind power, like the Hope and the South.”
“Although Lord Gleiman has stated that he will sell such ships to folk, it seems that the shipyard’s capacity is not very sufficient.”
The transportation of goods was really a headache, there was no need to think about the land route, they didn’t have the influence of the Foster family, and they would surely be screwed by the layers of barriers all the way there.
So the crowd came to the shipyard supervisor Rubin’s side and surrounded him.
“Supervisor Rubin, what is the shipyard’s current production plan? When will it be able to accept orders from the private sector?”
Although he knew that the merchants couldn’t wait any longer, Rubin couldn’t do anything about it, he said with a helpless look on his face, “Aiyaa, this is really not a good idea, at the moment, we have to prioritize the navy’s battleship needs.”
Just as the merchants were greatly disappointed, a voice rang out.
“We can instead give up a dockyard for building civilian ships.”
The crowd turned around to see that it was Naval Commander Austin.
The merchants were pleasantly surprised, “Really, Lord Commander?”
“Of course it’s true, but well …… cough!”
Austin coughed heavily.
“The Navy intends to establish a school that specializes in teaching knowledge about navigation in order to train a large number of qualified sailors. Of course, it’s not just for the military, the cadets are also able to find jobs in the civilian world.”
“This is a good thing!” The merchants exchanged praises.
“It’s just that in terms of the school’s grounds and expenses ……”
“Leave it to us, Lord Austin, it’s on us, isn’t it just a school?”
Immediately, someone patted his chest to mention Austin’s troubleshooting, and others who were half a beat slower echoed.
“You all are really enthusiastic, for the sake of you all being so forthcoming, we in the navy – let a dockyard be dedicated to the construction of merchant ships.”
The merchants beamed with joy and toasted Austin.
On the side of the shipyard supervisor Rubin, on the other hand, took out his handkerchief to wipe his sweat, the shipyard divided part of the production capacity to build civilian merchant ships was originally what Earl Gleiman had set out to do, but the Lord Commander asked him to cooperate in singing such a double act.
While Austin was exchanging glasses with the merchants, he was secretly delighted.
He proposed to Paul to establish a maritime school, but at that time the Council of State could not allocate too much money, so the two came up with such a method.
He decided to try and strike while the iron was hot.
“Gentlemen, perhaps you could raise funds to establish another technical school, specifically to train craftsmen for shipbuilding!”
To Austin’s delight, this proposal of his was once again approved by the crowd.
Of course, Rubin, the shipyard supervisor, was even happier than him.
(End of chapter)