Chapter 50 (2/2)

Thomas' beard fell into the gla.s.s. He took it out and drank another big mouthful.

Huang Xuan showed his disdain by wrinkling his nose.

”I want to spend the night here and go to Ludwigshafen in a carriage tomorrow morning. I'd like to trade the sugar for that,” Huang Xuan said with his back toward Thomas.

”No problem.” Thomas raised the gla.s.s again and said to the bartender, ”Hunter, take him to a room. It's on me.” Then he started drinking more beer.

Huang Xuan had wanted to remind him of the carriage, but seeing his face, he shook his head and walked away. The house stank.

The bed in the room was made of birch that was hard and uncomfortable. Huang Xuan got up early. The house was quiet.

”Sir, the carriage is leaving soon. Are you coming?”

”Of course.” Huang Xuan washed his face carelessly and went with the bartender. He thought Thomas was effective despite his sloppy looks.

However, he changed his mind as soon as he saw the carriage, which was a four-horse one, filled with eight people.

”Are you coming?” The coachman was a Prussian with a weathered face and a gruff voice.

”Thomas paid for him.” The bartender tried to help.

Obviously, it was a coach shuttling between two places. Huang Xuan hadn't known there already were public coaches in Europe, and he had intended to hire a carriage for himself.

The carriage was smelly. ”I've made a mistake and brought this to myself,” Huang Xuan thought.

A Prussian man with fair skin was sitting opposite Huang Xuan. The woman with brown hair next to him seemed to be his wife. They were whispering intimately. Huang Xuan wasn't trying to eavesdrop, but their voices kept coming into his ears.

”Fisher, are we going to cut the woods too?”

”Yes, Hartig is right. Planted coniferous forests have more volume growing points, and the output will be higher.”

”Are we going to buy saplings and fertile?”

”Certainly. I think the coniferous forest is a better choice.”

Although Huang Xuan knew eavesdropping was bad, he couldn't help asking in a low voice, ”Rolin, what are they talking about? Planted forest?”

Rolin searched the materials and answered, ”It was an afforestation campaign in the 19th century. Hartig was the minister of the Bureau of Forestry of Prussia, who advocated cutting down all the trees and planting conifers that grew faster like crops.”

”One can do that?” Huang Xuan was shocked.

”Of course, it failed eventually. But from the second half of the 19th century to the beginning of the 20th century, it was popular, and the output was indeed higher. However, their extreme mode of production finally led to the degradation of the soil and the diminis.h.i.+ng of the forest. Many trees died of pests and diseases.”

”They must have cut down many natural forests.”

”They had kept cutting for 50 years and regretted it.”