Zhangjiakou changes, and everyone thinks it's a big profit

Zhangjiakou Railway Station is built southeast of Zhangjiakou Fort, which is a distance from Laiyuan Fort where Ma City is located.

As a Mongolian businessman, Hadan could not leave Ma City, let alone go to the area of ​​the railway station.

Therefore, despite being curious about the train, Hadan could not go over and find out what was going on, and could only push and knock on one or two from the Ming merchants in Ma City.

There is no obvious intention to inquire.

Before Hadan came, he heard that there are many spies from the Jinyiwei in Zhangjiakou now.

The most important thing is that a large number of people in the Shanxi merchants in Zhangjiakou were sentenced to stolen the country, beheaded by the Tonglu, exiled by the exiled, and confiscated the house.

Therefore, the Ming merchants in Zhangjiakou now have a string in their hearts, for fear that the court would mistakenly think of the act of colluding with the enemy and selling the country. Not only would they speak out about some news, but they would also take the initiative to report Mongolian merchants who were suspected of spies.

Before Hadan, several Mongolian spies from the Eight Banners sent by the Qing Dynasty had already been involved in this situation, and Hadan didn't want to make the same mistake.

After worshiping the train from afar, Hadan entered Laiyuanbao (Mashi) with a group of Mongolian merchants.

As a spy, Hadan is not a novice. Three years ago, he had come to Zhangjiakou Ma Market several times as a merchant, and even disguised himself as a Han Chinese and went deep into Xuanfu to investigate.

Now that I enter Laiyuan Castle again, Hadan suddenly discovered that from the architecture to all aspects, this place is very different from what he remembers, and it is not an exaggeration to say that the changes are earth-shaking.

First of all, the streets are much cleaner than before.

In the past, mule and horse manure were everywhere on the streets of Mashi City, and some stalls were also everywhere, random and messy.

Now that I have just entered the Laiyuan Fort, I can’t see the stalls set up. The Mongolian merchants and horses who are traveling with each other carry slaughter bags behind them. Before entering the fort, the horses let their shit and urine, and almost no one after entering.

Horses urinating on the street.

Of course, horses are not like humans, and the urination and defecation on the street cannot be completely eliminated. If it really happens, a minor official will come to grab the horse owner and fine it, and then quickly clean up the feces and urine.

The neatness and cleanliness of the Ma City made the dirty Mongolian businessmen even more ashamed. They were careful when walking and doing anything.

Hadan was so angry that he saw it, but he had to do things like other Mongolian merchants.

Afterwards, he paid more attention to the ground and houses on both sides of the street market.

He found that the ground in the city was paved with some stone slabs, but he actually looked integrated. He even stabbed it quietly with a dagger and scratched it, and found that this kind of stone slab was harder than ordinary stones.

Many houses on both sides of the street are newly built, with the lowest level of two floors, and some are as high as three floors, and are basically mainly brick and stone buildings, unlike before, which are mostly wooden buildings.

Some novel products that were rare in the north appeared in various shops.

You can know a lot by listening to the yelling of the shops without going in and looking at them.

"Glass mirror, my own glass mirror produced by Daming, can be clearly reflected in people. It's cheap, only 300 taels per side!"

A glass mirror as big as a palm costs 300 taels, which is cheap - well, in Hadan's memory, this glass mirror originally from overseas was completely regarded as a rare treasure in the north. Now, 300 taels per piece is indeed considered

Very cheap.

Look, several powerful businessmen in the same industry were moved and went over to ask for the price.

Hadan knew very well that if this glass mirror was sold to Mongolian nobles, the price would probably double.

"Songjiang cotton cloth is much cheaper than last year, five taels of silver per piece!"

"Iron pot, good iron pot, if you have the imperial court purchase certificate, come and buy it now!"

"The price of reed salt has been greatly reduced! Coarse salt is thirteen cents per kilogram, and fine salt is only fifty cents per kilogram!"

“···”

When he heard the price of salt, Hardan, who was originally calm, couldn't hold back.

Other Mongolian merchants looked over like him, and then simply surrounded the salt shop.

There are always only three types of trade hard currency on the prairie: salt, tea, and iron, among which salt is still ranked first.

Without iron, the herdsmen are just troublesome in their lives, which is nothing. Without tea, they are more likely to get sick at most, and they are nothing. But if they don’t have salt, they will die.

Most of the salt in the grasslands in the south of the desert comes from Shaanxi Yanchi or Hebei Lusal. The price is not too expensive, but it is definitely more expensive than the Ming Dynasty.

In Hadan's memory, selling rough salt from the Ming Dynasty to the grassland requires at least twenty or thirty cents, and fine salt per pound requires more than a hundred cents, or even hundreds of cents.

Why is the salt in this shop so cheap?

Is it private salt?

Or are their salt quality too poor?

Hadan first identified the first possibility - the horse market is full of Ming officials and soldiers, and no one dares to buy and sell private salt here.

But when he looked through the crowd, he found that the quality of the reed salt sold in this shop was not only good, but was better than before. Whether it was coarse or fine salt, the quality was very good.

"Why are you selling such good salt lower than before? There will be no problem with this salt, right?" A shrewd Mongolian businessman asked the questions in the hearts of others.

The shopkeeper of the second shop came out and said with a smile: "Dear friends from the grassland may not know that our Ming Dynasty salt administration has been innovated. Now the output of salt has increased greatly and the quality has also increased, so the price has naturally dropped.

We Ming merchants pay attention to the word "sincerity" when doing business. When you come from the grassland vendors, you will naturally not be stingy with selling low-priced salt on the grassland."

The Mongolian businessmen did not really believe the words of these two shopkeepers, but it is a fact that the price of good quality salt is very low.

So they didn't want to do that anymore, so they immediately bought it - salt is a hard currency in the grassland. Now they buy it at a low price and sell it at the current price. Isn't it profitable?

Seeing so many Mongolian merchants buying salt, the shopkeeper and the client couldn't stop laughing.

They knew that since the Changlu Salt Field learned the Huai Salt Reform, the price has been as cheap as it has been.

Not to mention the ex-factory price, in the mainland, only five cents per pound of coarse salt, and only twenty cents of fine salt. Only by selling it to merchants outside the Ming Dynasty can we not be subject to the pricing constraints of salt companies.

The goods they get at the factory wholesale price are even lower, so the selling price seems to have been lower than before, but in fact, the profit not only has not decreased, but has increased.

A big profit.

Hardan mingled among the crowd, carefully exploring various information.

However, the more he learned, the more desperate he felt, and he felt that the Qing Dynasty was about to be over.

When he was about to leave Ma City three days later, Hadan also heard an important news - the Ming Dynasty was indeed preparing to send troops to attack the Qing Dynasty. Perhaps after the spring planting or the autumn harvest, the specific time was not something he could find out.

.

However, when he left Laiyuan Fort and followed the merchants to the grassland and listened to the laughter of his companions, Hadan did not take this important information seriously.

He was thinking, or just be a real Mongolian businessman like this.

Now, the Ming Dynasty not only did not close the Ma market because the Mongolians invaded the Jurchens in the past few years, but instead opened the Ma market in the northern border to expand its trade scope and trade volume.

This has made Mongolian herders not as sad as they imagined in the past two years.

Many Mongolian businessmen who traveled with him even felt that their lives are much better than in the past few years.

I heard that the Chen County Magistrate from Zhangjiakou is calling on businessmen to jointly establish a felt factory and a wool spinning factory with the government. By then, the cheapest wool in herders' homes will become valuable.

If you can live a good life by grazing carefully, most Mongolians may not be willing to live a life of blood licking from the knife.

Second update.

Good night ~
Chapter completed!