King of German Mercenaries

After rushing back to Texel Island, Marin began to inspect his territory. This was the first full-scale tour of Marin's territory since the New Year in 1496.

When visiting Thorenche, which is across the sea from the land, Marin was surprised to learn that there were traders who had taken a sack of imported British salt from fishing boats and wanted to sell them all over the island.

"Why, aren't we an island? Why are we still importing salt from the UK?" Marin asked in confusion.

Schwartz stayed here for a while, but happened to know something, so he replied:

"Boss, it's because the British have enough firewood to cook salt on a large scale. And the Lowlands (Netherlands) lack firewood, so no one cooks salt. So almost the entire Lowland salt is imported from the UK. ."

"Oh, is that so?" Marin raised his brows, as if he had grasped the point.

Then, Marin called the salt merchant and asked about it. The salt merchant was a Jew, and he did not dare to hide from the lord. These days, Jews have little status in Europe, especially small Jewish merchants, who are often oppressed and robbed by their lords. Therefore, he did not dare to provoke Marin.

"Lord Lord, this small batch of salt was bought in Amsterdam at a cost of 4.5 shillings per quart (the retail price of salt in the UK is 4 shillings per quart), and it will be shipped to Texel for 6 bucks. For every quarter..."

"Six shillings per quarter... so expensive?" Marin was a little surprised, this was the seaside.

"Lord, you don't know, this is still by the sea, so it's good. If it is in some inland areas, it is estimated that each quarter of salt can be sold for seven or eight shillings!"

"Isn't it very profitable to cook salt?"

"Making money? Lord, in the lowlands, we lack firewood, so we can't cook salt on a large scale! It is said that there is a lot of firewood in the British, so there is a lot of salt for cooking..."

Marin smiled, but he knew that the reason why the price of salt in the UK was low was because the British used abundant coal to cook salt, not firewood at all.

In the coastal areas of the North Sea, there are many wind and rain, and the temperature is not high, so it is more difficult to dry the salt. You sun for many days, maybe a rain will make your efforts in vain. Just like the four major salt fields in China, most of them are areas with little or seasonal precipitation, and it is better to control the drying of salt.

As for Northwest Europe, it has a temperate oceanic climate with a lot of precipitation and low temperature. It is suitable for drying salt. The coastal areas of southern Europe are actually suitable for drying salt. Because the Mediterranean climate, hot and dry in summer, is the most suitable for drying salt. However, Europeans still do not understand the method of drying salt, and even in the Ming Dynasty, Xu Guangqi had to wait until the end of the Ming Dynasty to popularize the method of drying salt. Of course, some areas of the Ming Dynasty already have the technology of drying salt, but it has not been promoted yet, and boiling salt is still the mainstream.

So, in warm and rainy places like Northwest Europe, boiled salt is a good choice…

"Wait... Boil salt... The British can use coal, why can't I use briquettes?" A flash of light flashed in Marin's mind, and he finally grasped the point...

"Ballets...boiled salt...hahahaha..." Marin laughed happily.

With Schwartz standing aside, it's inexplicable...

"Boss, what are you laughing at?"

"Schwartz, I've found a way to get rich!"

"What kind of way?" Schwartz is only interested in military affairs, and is very ignorant in other aspects.

"Let's cook salt!"

"Boil salt? Boss, you know the situation on the island. There is a lack of firewood. How to cook?"

"You stupid, you forgot what my family is doing?"

"Hoffman Manor?"

"Yes, our family is a coal boss who runs a coal mine..."

"You mean to... cook the salt with the coals of the estate?"

"It's not stupid. I've asked Kohler to contact the ship. The next shipment of coal is expected to arrive in two days. By the way, Schwartz, let's go and choose a place to boil the salt.

"

"Yes, boss!"

Then, Marin took Schwartz and others, and began to taste the sea along the coast around Texel Island...

The reason to taste the sea, Marin is trying the saltiness of the sea around the island. Since you want to boil salt, you must consider using seawater with the highest salt content for cooking. In this way, fuel can also be saved.

In his previous life, Marin had seen such a saying that boiled salt, a load of salt, cost 400 catties of firewood.

The calorific value of coal is two or three times that of firewood, so it takes up to 200 kilograms of briquettes to cook a load of salt. And a load of salt is 120 pounds, equivalent to 4.7 quarts. However, how much is 200 catties of briquettes? A chartron (1.5 tons) is no more than 4 shillings. Converted down, 200 pounds of briquettes, at most 3.2 pfennig. However, 4.7 quarts of salt, calculated at 4 shillings per quart, can be sold for 18.8 shillings, which is equivalent to 225.6 pfennig...

Of course, the manpower input for cooking salt is relatively large, and the cost of fuel cannot be considered alone. But even so, using briquettes as fuel, a load of salt costs no more than 10 pfennigs at most. This is still a high estimate, conservatively estimated, the cost of up to 6 pfennig.

In this way, using briquettes to cook salt, the income is estimated to be twenty or thirty times as great...

"Made, it's really good to make money! The British can make a fortune by selling salt."

It is said that the reason why Hanseatic merchants set up trading stations in England is to sell British wool to Flanders. At the same time, Britain's "cheap" salt was sold to the Low Countries and the Baltic Sea.

Among them, the Baltic Sea region, the salt price is particularly high. Because the Baltic Sea is the saltiest sea in the world. Because of the injection of a lot of fresh water around, coupled with the low temperature and low evaporation, the salt content of the Baltic Sea is very low. Even trying to boil salt is extremely fuel-intensive.

Therefore, the price of salt over there is quite high. The price of salt in the outback is at its highest, about ten shillings for a pound of salt for a sheep. And the Baltic Sea area, although it is not so exaggerated, but the British salt was shipped over, and sold for more than 10 shillings per quart of salt, which is frivolous.

Marin suffered a lot, tasted a lot of seawater, and finally determined that the seawater on the west coast was saltier than the sea on the east coast. So, boiled salt is naturally good on the West Coast.

Moreover, there are frequent human activities on the east coast, and the sea surface is polluted. From time to time, some garbage can be seen floating on the sea. The sea water here is not suitable for cooking salt.

The west coast has strong westerly winds, less human activities, relatively clean sea water, and high salinity, which is very suitable for cooking salt...

However, placing the boiling salt site on the upper vent will expose the downstream vent to air pollution. Because the black smoke from the burning of the briquettes will follow the northwest wind and drift to the southeast.

Marin originally planned to set up a salt cooking base in De Koch near the west coast, but the downwind of De Koch was Den Burg, where Marin lived. As a health-conscious person, Marin eventually canceled the plan.

In fact, the best place to cook salt is on the northwest corner of Texel Island. The salinity is highest there and the sea is clean. However, there is a big problem. That is, the coastline along the west coast and northeast of Texel Island, because of the tide, often exposes the shallows at low tide. This also led to the fact that, on the island of Texel, only Thoruncher and Odeshird to the south and southeast were suitable as ports.

The coal from the Rhine must have been unloaded at Thörencher. So Marin also had to take into account the transport of coal from Thorencher to the salt-boiled location.

After much deliberation, Marin finally placed the boiling salt site on the west coast beach northwest of Thorunche. At this location, it is relatively close to transport the coal unloaded from Thorencher, which is convenient for transportation. Moreover, even if the soot drifted away, driven by the northwest wind, it was the one who harmed Thorencher, not the Denburg where his Baron Marin was located... Well, it was decided so happily...

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