Chapter 17: Sights of Bopu

He was very interested in mathematics. As a youth, he had read many works by European and Arab authors in Macau and had a good understanding of geometry and algebra. However, outsiders only attributed his passion for mathematics to the needs of business accounting. There were even some ignorant people who mocked him, saying that Master Li loved money as much as his life, and was so afraid of being cheated by his accountants that he had to learn mathematics himself to become an expert.

Li Luoyou had occasionally heard such remarks. Although he didn’t need to argue, he couldn’t help but smile wryly to himself. The concept of mathematics for most of his countrymen was still at the most basic level of arithmetic application. Li Luoyou had read many works by great mathematicians from both China and abroad, and had also had contact with contemporary mathematicians, but this subject existed only as a “pastime” in a very small circle. Many people considered it a useless “curious skill and depraved craft.” At best, they would compliment it by calling it the “art of dragon slaying”—if it had any application, it was only in astronomy and calendrical calculations. Who would use it in daily life?

With Li Luoyou’s proficiency in algebra and geometry, he was a rare mathematical talent in the Great Ming of this time. However, this talent was almost useless. He could only solve geometry and algebra problems for recreation in his spare time, and couldn’t help but feel that his talents were not being recognized.

The content of the Mathematical Treatise in Nine Sections was roughly in the category of number theory, but it was not purely theoretical mathematics. It contained many practical examples, including astronomy and calendrical calculations, surveying, market transactions, and tax calculations. It had both theory and practical application. Li Luoyou was quite interested in it.

The more he read, the more interested he became. He simply spread out paper on the table and began to calculate the examples with a quill pen—a habit he had retained from his youth when he studied under the Jesuit priests.

He suffered from vertigo, and after calculating for a long time, he couldn’t help but feel dizzy. He got up and walked a few steps, then decided to go back on deck for some fresh air. Just as he stepped out of the cabin, he saw Saoye standing on a box, holding onto the mast and looking out. Seeing his master come out, he quickly jumped down to attend to him.

“What’s so interesting to look at?” Li Luoyou asked, puzzled. “Have some decorum.”

“Yes,” Saoye said respectfully. “Your lesson is well-taken, Master. I was watching the salt ships.”

Li Luoyou looked and saw a fleet of ships sailing on the left side of their vessel. This fleet consisted of small and medium-sized ships, including two-masted Fujian and Guangdong ships, as well as rice boats and wind-towed boats. The ship types were varied. The only common feature was that the bow of each ship was painted with white characters: “Lin Yun,” followed by Arabic numerals! Li Luoyou was startled. He recognized Arabic numerals and sometimes used them in his private accounts. However, his case was an exception. This was the first time he had seen them painted directly on the side of a ship.

“Are these ships from Lin’gao?”

“That’s right. They are salt ships from Ma Niao,” the captain said. “That over there is Ma Niao Port. There’s a saltworks there.”

Hearing this, Li Luoyou had a faint impression. There was indeed an official saltworks here, belonging to the Haibei Salt Administration.

“Where is all this salt being transported to?”

“To Bopu, of course,” the captain said.

The Australians are smuggling salt! Li Luoyou thought. He watched the fleet of salt ships. There were about ten of them, sailing in formation. Each was riding low in the water, indicating a large quantity of salt on board. To transport smuggled salt so openly, this group of people was truly audacious!

The fleet maintained a regular formation, sailing in a single file column. The sailors, like those on the patrol boat he had seen earlier, wore blue short jackets. Some carried long muskets and stood guard on both sides of the ship. Li Luoyou secretly counted. There were at least four men with muskets on each ship. On the deckhouses of several ships, there were strange objects: a round, Western-style goblet-shaped base with a long, black box mounted on it. Two sailors stood behind it, supporting it. He didn’t know what it was for. Li Luoyou guessed it might be a type of Australian cannon—since they were known for their sharp firearms, it was not surprising that they had some types of firearms that the Great Ming and the West did not.

With such a posture, no wonder the government can only turn a deaf ear, Li Luoyou thought. The business of seizing smuggled salt had always been about catching the small fry and letting the big fish go. The ones caught and punished were just small-time peddlers with a few catties or dozens of catties. Catching someone with a few shi was already considered a major case. The big-time salt smugglers who transported dozens or hundreds of shi were people no one dared to provoke. Not only were the smugglers fierce and willing to fight to the death, but such businesses often had gentry connections behind them.

Since the Australians are so bold and reckless, who are the gentry behind them? Gao Ju could be considered one of their patrons. And the great official Gao was connected to Eunuch Yang in the capital…

However, even Eunuch Yang would not dare to support them in such a chaotic mess. The Australians were clearly not that simple. The fleet of salt ships gradually fell behind. Li Luoyou gazed at Ma Niao Port. On the coastline, patches of salt pans glittered under the sun. Among the salt pans stood windmills, their huge blades slowly turning in the wind. These giant water-lifting windmills had become a scenic feature of the Ma Niao coast.

“It looks very much like the scenery of the Netherlands,” Quaker commented.

“What are these windmills for?” Li Luoyou asked.

“I think they are for lifting water,” Quaker said. “Otherwise, I can’t think of any other use.”

“If it’s for lifting water, why lift the seawater?” Li Luoyou commented. “Wouldn’t it be simpler to dig a canal to lead the seawater into the salt pans?”

At this moment, the wind pushed the ship a little closer to the coastline. He could see wooden high platforms next to the windmills. On top of the platforms were water channels, in which bamboo strips were inserted. The bamboo strips were dense but very regular.

Li Luoyou looked very carefully, but the distance was still a bit too far. He could barely see that the windmills were indeed lifting water, and the lifted water was continuously sprinkled onto the high platforms and then flowed down.

Li Luoyou’s knowledge of salt making came entirely from books. He roughly knew that to make salt, you first had to make brine, and then you would get salt by boiling or sun-drying the brine. After watching for a long time, he still didn’t understand what was going on.

Of course, Quaker didn’t understand either. There were many other things he didn’t understand, for example, in the inland areas, thick black smoke billowed up, rushing straight into the clear sky. Was there a fire somewhere?

“It’s like this every day,” the captain said, seeming to have noticed the passengers’ confusion. “This black smoke can be seen everywhere in Lin’gao. It’s all coming from brick chimneys taller than trees. I don’t know what they are burning their furnaces for every day.”

The ship soon arrived at Bopu Port and docked at the Lin’gao Cape pier. The natural stone embankment had been repaired and extended into the harbor with more than a dozen wooden piers, serving as the passenger and cargo terminal of Bopu. Small and medium-sized ships could dock directly alongside the piers to load and unload passengers and cargo.

Li Luoyou stood on the deck, looking at the suddenly prosperous Bopu Port—he had never even heard of this port before. There were many ships in the harbor, but they were arranged very neatly, docked one after another at the piers. He noticed that although the water area was not large, the berthing of ships was clearly divided into zones, marked with colored floating objects on the water surface. Ships entering and leaving the port each had their own channels, and everything looked very orderly.

“That’s the great iron ship,” the captain said, pointing across the harbor like an enthusiastic tour guide.

It was indeed huge! Li Luoyou gasped. The height of this ship was comparable to the city walls of Guangzhou, no, it was probably even taller. And its volume was immense. How much cargo could it carry? Even a hundred thousand shi of goods would probably not be enough to fill its hold.

The Fengcheng completely surpassed his understanding. Li Luoyou’s first feeling was that this was not something that could be made by man.

“God!” Quaker voiced his thoughts. “This thing could only have been built by the devil!”

Li Luoyou nodded. He thought of the captain’s words that Lin’gao was full of chimneys spewing black smoke. Could it be that this group of Australians were followers of the devil, and they were conducting secret black magic here to enhance their power?

He couldn’t help but feel a sense of vigilance. He touched his cross and silently recited the Rosary.

“The largest ship that can be built in England is not even a tenth of its size!” Quaker continued to comment. “It’s incredible! It’s impossible for humans to build such a giant ship.” After saying this, he quickly made the sign of the cross.

“God bless us,” Li Luoyou couldn’t help but worry about the state of his soul.

“Hehe, it’s scary, isn’t it?” The captain was probably used to this reaction and seemed quite proud. “This ship is made of iron, isn’t that strange? Tsk tsk, a small iron nail will sink to the bottom when thrown into the water, but they made such a big ship and it can float on the sea!”

Quaker was still asking him if it was really made of iron and if anyone had been on board to see. Li Luoyou stood by without a word. Whether it was made of iron was no longer important to him. Such a large ship, even if it were made of wood, would be shocking enough. He shook his head, even feeling a hint of regret about his decision to come to Lin’gao—he was increasingly suspecting that the Australians were followers of the devil, or at the very least, had used some fallen, forbidden arts.

Quaker, on the other hand, was not very concerned about this and looked around with great interest. On the embankment, two parallel black iron bars were laid. On top of them, flatbed carts were being pushed by manpower, the iron wheels making a rumbling sound on the iron bars. The carts seemed to be able to carry very heavy goods. Quaker watched as two or three people could push a fully loaded flatbed cart quickly. Some of the carts were box-shaped, filled with black coal.

“What a good idea,” Quaker thought. This method could move heavy goods with very little effort. If horses were used to pull them, the efficiency would be even better. However, China seemed to have a serious shortage of horses, so using manpower was understandable.

Li Luoyou’s gaze, however, was drawn to the tall towers on the embankment. The towers varied in height, but even the smallest was no less than two zhang. They were all built of iron bars and sturdy wood on stone circular platforms. Long arms extended diagonally into the air from the top of the towers, with black ropes hanging from the ends.

Such towers were scattered all over Bopu harbor. Across the harbor, where the shipyard was said to be, they were even more densely packed.

“Attention! Attention!” someone on the embankment was shouting while blowing a whistle. “Berth 15 is starting to load!”

With a rumbling sound, a long train of flatbed carts moved along the track. Li Luoyou and Quaker were both startled—this train of railcars was not being pushed by manpower.

Not only was there no manpower, but there were no horses, mules, donkeys, cows, or any other draft animals they could think of. The flatbed carts had no sails either. This long train of flatbed carts just moved on its own, making a rumbling sound.

If anything was pulling the vehicles, it must have been the first car. On it was a black iron contraption the size of half a table, and a round, tin-can-like thing. On this black tin can hung a large wooden board with four large characters written in red: “No Smoking or Fire,” and a picture of a flame.

Next to this pile of strange things sat the driver. His face was stained black with soot, and his clothes were so stained that their original color could not be seen. A once-white towel, now gray, hung around his neck. This person held an iron lever, constantly pushing and pulling it, and from time to time shouting something loudly to the people on the embankment.

“I heard the Australians’ ships can move without sails or oars. This cart is probably the same,” Li Luoyou said in a low voice.

Quaker Qiong watched for a while, a look of terror on his face. “The devil!”

The flatbed carts stopped. With a whistle, several men in blue cloth jackets jumped down from the rear flatbed carts—Li Luoyou noticed that everyone here wore this kind of short blue cloth jacket, but some had a belt around their waist, while others did not. The common feature was that they all wore a helmet probably made of rattan. Li Luoyou couldn’t figure out what these helmets were for. Had the Australians learned from the southern barbarians in the Romance of the Three Kingdoms and were training rattan-armored soldiers?

These few men got into a round cage under the tower. They ran quickly inside the cage, making it rotate. The long arm on the tower rose accordingly. Then, other men pushed the tower with all their might, turning it towards the flatbed carts. One person constantly blew a whistle and waved two small flags, one red and one green. After watching for a while, Li Luoyou understood that this was to direct the men in the treadmill crane to turn in the right direction. Under his command, the long arm slowly extended over the first flatbed cart, and a huge iron hook was lowered. The men on the flatbed cart hooked the hook onto a pile of nets and ropes on the cart and quickly jumped off. At the sound of the whistle, the men in the cage started running again, and the head of the iron frame began to rise.

The large pile of rope nets turned out to be a net bag, filled with many hemp and straw sacks.

“A treadmill crane!” Quaker recognized the device. This thing was also used in Europe, but it was quite clumsy and required a lot of manpower. This treadmill crane looked much simpler and lighter, probably an improvement made by the Australians.

The long arm began to move towards the ship. On the deck, there was also a person blowing a whistle and waving two small flags. The long arm moved over the ship’s deck, and the sling was slowly loosened. The net bag landed safely on the deck.

Then the crane lifted cargo from another flatbed cart. This time, it was not a net bag, but a wooden pallet, on which crates were neatly stacked, with a net bag securely wrapped around them.