Chapter 159 (1/2)

”Big bear, do you think your tribe can smelt iron?” At dinner, Lei Ying finally couldn't help asking this question.

Stone bear nodded, ”yes, leader Lei Ying, my tribe can indeed smelt iron. You can see the knife, the bow and the arrows in my hand. They are all made by the people of our tribe. ”

”Is that true?” Lei Ying rubbed his hands excitedly.

”It's true, and the ironware smelted in our tribe can't be called ironware any more. You've seen my knife, too. Is it much better than yours? ”

Although Lei Ying was not willing to admit it, he simply nodded, ”yes, your knife is much stronger than mine. The knife in my hand can only be used as an appearance. If it's used for hunting, I have to come back to sharpen it if I can't chop a few. This knife is so brittle that sometimes you can break the edge when you chop bones. ”

”Ha ha, your knife is made of pig iron. It's hard, but it's not tough enough. It will break when it comes to hard things. But if the knife is made of steel, it will be different, just like the knife in my hand, which has not only hardness but also toughness. Generally speaking, as long as my knife doesn't cut hard at the stone, it's OK to cut other things, even wood. ”

”So good?”

”Well, that's it.” Stone bear very proud nod to say.

I'm kidding. In this era, let alone the new world, even in Europe, steel is rare. Don't you see the brown Beth rifles that Ferguson and they have, the barrel of which is made of iron?

Before the appearance of blast furnace, steel was in great shortage all over the world.

Lei Ying put down the meat in his hand and asked in a low voice, ”big bear, can you trade some steel from your tribe for us?”

Stone bear also put down the bone in his hand, looked at Lei Ying and said after a little hesitation: ”leader Lei Ying, before answering your question, I want to ask you a question. I hope you can answer me truthfully.”

Lei Ying nodded.

”Leader Lei Ying, in fact, after I came to your tribe, I always had a question in my heart that I wanted to ask you.” The stone bear thought it over for a while, and then said, ”you should admit that the location of Xiaohe tribe is very hidden, and it's in the deep mountains. It's a long distance from both the chekasa and the Cherokee.”

Lei Ying nodded happily and said, ”we must be like this. We are a secluded tribe and do not participate in the tribe's foreign war, so we must stay away and hide.”

”Well, I understand that. But there are not many war horses even in your chekasa royal court, right? Those vassichus didn't have such a good heart to offer us war horses. But I see a lot of horses in your tribe, and there seems to be a lot of iron in your tribe, so I'm very curious about how you trade these things. ”

After a pause, the stone bear added: ”in fact, it's just my curiosity. If you are not willing to answer, it doesn't matter.”

Hearing this, Lei Ying laughed boldly, ”big bear, there's nothing to hide. The vasichus who trade with our Xiaohe tribe are all franceans. Because not far from our tribe, there is a lot of things that the French need, so every year the French will send a special trading team to trade

”Frenchmen?” The stone bear nodded thoughtfully.

In this era, even though France has just lost to Britain in the seven-year war, and France has secretly united with the Spanish to fight against the increasingly powerful British, in the new continent of North America, the French have the same strength as the British.

If we only talk about territory, French Louisiana, which still belonged to France as early as the year before last, is much larger than the thirteen colonies established by the British on the east coast of the new world.

The whole French Louisiana occupies almost one third of the territory of the whole North American continent.

Now, although the French were defeated in the just concluded seven-year war and ceded the huge French Louisiana to Britain, Britain did not have the ability to take over such a large territory.

Not to mention the numerous French people who have lived in this territory for a long time.

Although most of the French people lived in Canada, there were still a large number of French people living in military fortresses and fortresses along the Mississippi River.

Originally, the chekasa people had a good relationship with the Frances. Some time ago, the leader of the letiqi tribe, the sentry snake, colluded with chretian Armand of okron fortress and formed a coalition to destroy the gaoshu tribe. But unexpectedly, stealing chickens was not successful. More than 300 coalition forces were destroyed in the fire ox formation. Even the sentry snake died and major Armand was captured, Four inland river armed transport ships, which can be called artifact in this era, were also obtained by the gaoshu tribe.

The river tribe originally belonged to the chekasa people, so it's not surprising that they made friends with the franceans.

”Leader Lei Ying, can I venture to ask you what is rich in Xiaohe tribe? How could it be so important for the French? ” Stone bear is really curious about this. At this time, the French were very powerful in the new world of North America, and they occupied the rich Mississippi River and the five lakes area. They wanted the special products of the new world more easily than the British, and they contacted far more North American Indian tribes than the British.

But even so, the Frenchmen still attach so much importance to the trade with Xiaohe tribe, which is enough to show that this kind of thing rich in Xiaohe tribe is urgently needed by the Frenchmen.

”It's nothing. When our Xiaohe tribe moved here more than 50 years ago, we found a cave in the East Mountain, which produced some white stones. At first, these stones were useless, but one day the tribe's trading team went to the west to exchange salt with the French. As a result, when the French saw the stone, they kept asking where it came from. ”

”Fortunately, the people who led the trading team at that time were more intelligent. Seeing that the French attached great importance to this kind of stone, they said that it was found in the mountains in the tribe. There were many of the same stones, but they were not easy to mine. As a result, the French came with them. Of course, they didn't enter the tribe, they traded with us on the North River. Over the years, every two months the franceans have come by boat, and we have traded a lot of horses, food and salt with these stones. Over the years, this tradition of trading has been maintained

”White stone? From the cave? ” The stone bear moved in his heart.

When the stone bear saw the white stone that Lei Ying said, he immediately recognized what this so-called ”stone” was.

This is a natural nitrate ore!

Although the stone bear can't tell whether this kind of natural nitrate ore is Indian nitrate ore dominated by potassium nitrate or Chilean nitrate ore dominated by sodium nitrate, there is no doubt that this kind of stone is a natural nitrate ore with high purity.

No wonder the French are willing to trade so many times a year, even if it's more than 300 miles straight from the Mississippi River.

This is natural nitrate ore, which is the main raw material for making gunpowder!

For the French military, the status and significance of this thing is no worse than salt!