King of Mercenaries - Chapter 18: It turned out to be a coal mine

Returning to Hoffman Estate, after Marin settled five kittens, he began to house the four fishermen. These fishermen were fishing for generations by the sea. However, these families were not lucky. They sinked the fishing boats on the sea (a fishing boat bought by four families). Be aware that fishing boats are the most important property of fishermen. The fishing boat is gone, which is equal to the collapse of this family. The vessel is very expensive for ordinary fishermen. Without a fishing boat, it means that the whole family has no hope. Although they are able to escape browning in the water, it is hard to avoid the hunger at home. Seeing bankruptcy is just around the corner, just as Marin came to recruit fishermen. The four families who had nowhere to go, simply followed Marin.

Marin’s family land was on the riverside, he helped them build a house, and settled down the four families. But the problem is coming – they don’t have fishing boats. The four families have brought fishing nets, but there are no boats.

Originally, according to the wishes of the four families, they wanted to ask Marin to help them buy a Hansa speedboat- a single-decked dhow that is skilled in speed. However, Marin considered that the inland river is not the same as the outer sea. The wind is strong at sea, and the sail can drive the ship. In the river, there will be frequent wind or breeze. At that time, the sailboat is not moving.

Like the big “inland sea” like the Mediterranean, there are often no winds. Therefore, Venetians and Genoese are popular with paddle boats like the galley. Driven by sails when there is wind, sailors paddle together when there is no wind…

Although the Ruhr River is not small, it is not big. It would be a waste to introduce the Italian galley to fish. Thinking about it, Marin decided to use the inland river boat of the East – the shake boats.

Shake boats are generally not large, but the maximum displacement is more than ten tons. However, the rocker has a big advantage – it is labor saving. There is an old saying – “one scull three paddles”, which means that shaking one scull is equivalent to three paddles. But the invention of the Orientals is also a very scientific thing. His advanced point is that the rear of the seesaw is similar to the propeller of a later ship. The paddles are left and right, and it is more laborious to draw.

Marin found several craftsmen in the nearby town and spent several days working together to build a small wooden boat with a displacement of about five or six tons and built a seesaw. Not only that, Marin also asked the craftsmen to build an awning on the boat, which is convenient for hiding from the rain. Some are similar to the awning boats in Zhejiang. To be honest Marin knows that the captain is unwilling. So, when he started to give people a demonstration, the ship was swaying and sometimes spinning. Fortunately, the Frisian fishermen he recruited were more talented than him. A few days later, Marin did not know how to shake the demonstration, Frisian fishermen, but mastered how to shake, which made Marlin very shy.

Then, several Frisian fishermen began to smash the barges on the Ruhr River and cast nets for fishing. It seems that no one in this era caught the fish in the river. Therefore, the harvest of several fishermen is great. Each time you fish, you can hit back hundreds of pounds of various river fish.

As the lord of the four families, the Hoffman family got half of them and was given priority. But what makes Marin speechless is that Old Hoffman and others (except for Mrs. Mary) seem to be eating fish for the first time. Old Hoffman and Adler are stuck by the fishbone, and they are so painful. Fortunately, the three children were not stuck. Mrs. Mary decisively ordered that the child was only allowed to eat meat without a small fishbone on the belly. The rest of it was given to Mrs. Mary, who grew up on the beach. As a Frisian, Mrs. Mary grew up from how to eat a fish and naturally would not be stabbed. Since then, Hoffman’s family has eaten fish, and Mrs. Mary has covered the meat on her back. As for the meat and fish seeds on the fish belly, it is divided by others.

Marin also showed a handful of oriental cooking that was said to have been learned from “the monk Einstein”, using a Chinese-style iron pot custom-made from the blacksmith shop.

Made a lot of delicious meals. For example, fish, although there is no balsamic vinegar, but there is apple cider vinegar in Europe, Marin made a sweet and sour fish, it is very delicious. The sweet and sour fish has not yet been baked, and the saliva of the younger brothers and sisters has turned into a long river.

But Marin also has a depressed face – Europe is hard to find ginger, onions and garlic. However, the taste made is not so authentic. What surprised Marin was that in this era, ginger was regarded as a precious spice imported from the East and expensive. Although not as precious as the extremely expensive spices such as cloves and nutmeg, it is also expensive. According to Old Hoffman, in the northern part of Germany, a pound of ginger is generally worth 8 shillings (96 Finney), and in some places with inconvenient transportation it was replaced by a sheep.

A sheep has dozens of pounds of meat, according to 2 Finney a pound of lamb (wholesale purchase price), but also a large number of Finney, almost a hundred Finney, it is too expensive! In fact, counting the value of wool and sheepskin, a sheep, estimated to be worth about 160 Finney, is almost 1 mark.

(Note: Before the rise of Ottoman in Europe, the land trade with the East was still very smooth. So, the spices were not particularly expensive at the time. But after the rise of Ottoman, it began to block the land trade route, making European spice prices go crazy. For example, in the early Middle Ages, the price of ginger was only 2 shillings per pound. But because of the Turkish blockade, the price of spices began to skyrocket. When Turkey wiped out the Mamluk dynasty in Egypt, the land trade route was basically isolated. It can only be obtained by the Portuguese sea route. By the time of Elizabeth I, the price of ginger generally rose to the point where a pound of ginger was replaced by a sheep.)

Not to mention the fact that ginger, the whole family of the Hoffman family had eaten the oriental dishes made by Marin, and each of them was full of oil and could not care for the image.

Mrs. Mary seems to be aware of the value of this oriental cooking, personally studied oriental cooking with Marin, and plans to open a restaurant in the city.

But Marin strongly disagreed:

“Mom, I know that it is sure to make money with this oriental cooking. But, have you thought about it? If there are such delicious meals, those big nobles will let go of this secret technique? They will definitely find a way. It’s probably not a luck of the Hoffman family, but a huge disaster. After all, the Hoffman family is only the lowest level noble of the Empire.”

Marin said that the wise Mrs. Mary reacted. She was born in a large aristocratic family and naturally knew the aristocrats. My son said true, his family is only the lowest level of the bottom aristocrats, completely unable to hold the pressure. If Baron “allowed” them to hand over their culinary secrets, and the Hoffman family could not resist. In the end, Mrs. Mary decided that this kind of cooking was personally controlled by herself and was limited to being given to her own family.

…

On this day, Maring, who had enough to eat enough, decided to go to the back of his own territory to see. It is also strange to say that the Hoffman family’s 1,000-acre blockade, in addition to the 200-acre land on the Ruhr River, and other 800-acre hilly areas, can not only grow crops, trees can not grow, weeds grow very poor. So, Marin decided to go to the back hill to study and see why the hills of the Hoffman are so poor. Although Marin is not a geologist, as a student of history, geography is not bad. Not to mention the problem of soil, but some simple common sense is still known. Under the leadership of Marin, a few strong young people in Kahn went along with Marin to the back mountain area to excavate the soil for Marin sampling.

After investigation, Marin found that the land seems to be somewhat salinized in the hilly terrain. Therefore, the land here is very poor and the plants are growing badly. This made Marlin a little upliftings. He wondered if there was salt mine underground here. This suspicion is not unreasonable. Bochum is in the afterlife, but it is a famous mining city with abundant underground reserves. Maybe, underground, Hoffman Estate, buried a salt mine. You know, in the Middle Ages, salt prices were very expensive. How expensive is it? In the Middle Ages, as an island nation, the price of salt was relatively cheap, with a shilling (about 48 Finney) one quart (12.7 kg) (equivalent to 1.7 Finney / Penny a pound). In continental Europe, except for the salt prices in the Mediterranean coastal areas, which are similar to those in the UK, salt prices in other regions are much more expensive than those in the UK. In the Deutsche region, the price of salt in the northern coastal area is about 2.5 pounds a finney. Inland areas, like Bochum, are only a few hundred miles from the sea, about 3 pounds a hundred. In the inland areas of the south, the salt price can be as high as 5 Finney.

If a salt mine can be found underground in the Hoffman Estate, there is no difference between a silver mine and a silver mine. The salt of white flowers can exchange silver for white flowers, and it is not sold. The Duke of Lüneburg, relying on the salt mine of Lüneburg, became a famous tycoon Duke . With the enthusiasm for finding salt mines, Marin commanded a few people in Kahn to use Chinese iron shovel to start digging in the back hill. After digging a lot of places, finally, in a small hilly valley in Houshan, a few meters deep underground, Kahn dug up a black stone.

“This is… coal…” Marin opened his mouth in surprise.

I did not expect the salt mine, but found the coal. Marin thought about it, but he felt normal. Where is Bochum? Ruhr area. The Hoffman Estate is on the banks of the Ruhr River. In the Ruhr area, the coal mines are everywhere, and the hills of the Hoffman Estate dug out of coal, which is very normal. However, coal in the Middle Ages is not as valuable as salt, nor is it very popular. Why? Very normal, everyone must eat salt. And coal, people do not have to use. Coal can be used as fuel and firewood can. Those areas far from the coal mines, instead of spending the time to transport the coal from a distant place, it is better to pick up the firewood as fuel.

Unless it is in the city, whether it is firewood or coal, it must be brought in from outside. Moreover, the transportation of this city should be convenient, and the transportation of coal mines should be convenient.

Now it’s the Middle Ages, not the era of steam engine that consumes a lot of coal. Plus there are coal mines everywhere in the Ruhr area. Therefore, coal mines are not so valuable. However, then again, the back mountain of the Hoffman family was originally a broken place. Now, there are coal mines in the area, so I will not waste this place.

When the whole family learned that there was a coal mine in Houshan, they were very happy. At the moment, although coal is not worth much, it can also sell money. Moreover, Hoffman Estate is on the banks of the Ruhr River. By then, as long as a dock is built on the banks of the Ruhr, coal can be sold out by ship. The Ruhr River passes through the Rhine River and can reach many cities, making transportation very convenient.

However, the price of coal is really not very high at the moment. For 288 gallons of coal (288 gallons, weighing about 1.5 to 1.7 tons), the retail price in the Ruhr area is only 3 shillings (36 Finney). Even if they are sold to the big cities on the Rhine, they are only about 5 shillings. Salt, one quart (12.7 kg), can be sold for at least 4 shillings. Therefore, coal and salt are incomparable. But in any case, Hoffman Manor is easy to transport water, dig out the coal and sell it to various cities, and still make money. Old Hoffman invited a professional miner to make an assessment. Assessed, the hills of the back hill of Hoffman Estate, all underground is coal. Moreover, they are all first class coal. It is estimated that it is not a problem to dig up millions of tons. These estimated coals that can be dug are not more than one hundred meters deep. As for the under 100 meters, it is still difficult to dig with medieval technology. Do not say anything else, the deep well drainage is a big problem. The British in the 18th century, in order to pump deep water, invented the steam engine. The steam engine is actually perfected on the basis of the coal pumping steam engine. It is not the first invention.

Because of the discovery of the coal mines, the Old Hoffmans and Marin began an urgent discussion on how to mine coal and transport sales. First of all, the Hoffman family must definitely go outside to recruit a group of serfs to become miners. The serfs that are now incapable of being replaced by the manor. The main reason is that there are many children born in the serf family, and the serfs required by the manor are limited. Therefore, every year the estate will drive away some redundant serfs. These serfs were forced to go to the city or the mine to work hard, like the Hoffman Manor, there are seven or eight young men who went to the city to work hard. Marlin knows that it is dangerous to mine coal underground. The Hoffman family’s coal mine is obviously an underground coal mine. Although it is not buried deep, it is also underground, not open-air. And going down the mine is dangerous. Coal mines often blast collapse. Therefore, Marin is not willing to use the farmer’s serf as a coal miner. Therefore, it is the best choice to recruit people outside. Then there is the transportation problem. After the mine is excavated, the track is laid and the mine car is pulled along the track to the Ruhr River. This distance is also about two kilometers away. After pulling to the Ruhr River, the Hoffman family also had to build a dock for the merchant ships that pulled the coal to park.

The Hoffman family itself does not have a merchant ship, so you can only contact those middlemen and let them come to the dock to pull coal. Of course, in this case, the Hoffman family can get up to 2 shillings per tons of coal. But even so, it can make the Hoffman family’s income increase a lot. After all, if you are purely relying on farming, then the income can not be high.