Agustín I stepped in and firmly settled the dispute.
With that, the weapons demonstration came to an end.
Before General Fernando left, I handed over several dozen rifles.
They were prototypes produced during the development of the rifling machine, and the army would need to conduct its own separate evaluation.
“These are only samples—old flintlock muskets that we modified by adding rifling.
We’re also considering offering an inexpensive service to convert the flintlock muskets already in service with the army.
Of course, if you order newly manufactured rifles, they’ll be considerably improved versions of these.”
“Thank you, Your Highness.
I look forward to seeing them.”
Although the rifling was the most important improvement, the mass-produced rifles would also incorporate several other modifications Eduardo had devised.
Less than a week later, the government sent us its first purchase order.
Modification of 5,000 existing flintlock muskets
1,000 new Eduardo-model rifles
1,000,000 Eduardo-model bullets
Delivery deadline: April 1827
‘One year to deliver everything… It sounds like plenty of time, but I’ll have to start immediately.’
If I delayed, the schedule would become tight.
I intended to invest tens of thousands of pesos as initial capital, but at the moment we possessed only a single rifling machine.
“Eduardo, don’t you think it’s time you left the academy?
You never wanted to become a soldier in the first place, and it doesn’t seem like the military is where you truly belong.”
“Yes, but… I’m already in my third year.
If I don’t graduate, my father is going to be furious.
Leaving the military academy just to become a technician at a weapons factory…?”
“What are you talking about?
You’re going to be the president of the company.
I’m planning to call it Vega Defense Industries.
I’ll give you ten percent of the shares.
Considering how much I’ve already invested—and how much more I’ll continue investing—I think it’s fair for me to hold the other ninety percent.”
Naturally, I also granted him the patent rights he deserved: one hundred percent ownership of the Eduardo bullet patent and twenty percent of the rifling-machine patent.
“What?
I’m going to be the president?
I thought I’d be perfectly happy just working as a weapons technician…”
Eduardo was so shocked that he practically shouted.
Then his voice faded as the weight of what I was offering finally sank in.
“There’s no one better suited to run a weapons company than you.
And there’s no one else in this field I trust as much.”
Eduardo deserved the reward.
“…Thank you.
I’ll do my best.”
Determination settled across his face.
“Since I’m leaving the academy, we won’t be classmates anymore.
From now on, I’ll address you properly, Your Highness.”
Where did that sudden formality come from?
I understood that people in this era placed enormous importance on rank and etiquette, but I had no desire to turn one of the few genuine friends I had made in this life into nothing more than a subordinate.
“…When we’re alone, talk to me normally.
Use the formal tone only when other people are around.
I won’t be able to stand it otherwise.”
“Seriously…?
All right.”
“Good.
And even though we’ve technically established the company, right now it exists mostly on paper.
Once you leave the academy, you’ll have to build everything from the ground up.
Can you handle that?”
“I’ll stake my life on it.”
“I’ll provide enough capital, so don’t worry about money too much.
First, hire the technicians who worked with us on the rifling machine and get started with them.”
“Understood.”
“Of course.”
“And while you’re doing that, start preparing for mass production of the improved artillery pieces we discussed.”
“…All right.”
There was an enormous amount of work ahead of him, but none of it was impossible.
‘I’ll make you rich, so work hard.’
Eduardo had accumulated practical experience while developing the rifling machine, and the technicians who had worked with us were already familiar with manufacturing weapons and ammunition.
I wasn’t particularly worried about the company’s future.
‘Hmm… This gives me a solid foundation for modernizing the army’s weapons.
But what am I supposed to do about the navy?
I know something about ports, but I know practically nothing about ships.’
My naval knowledge was embarrassingly shallow.
I knew that wooden ships of the line had once dominated the seas, that ironclads eventually made older warships obsolete, and that much later aircraft carriers surpassed the era of giant naval guns.
That was about it.
In other words, I was almost completely useless when it came to naval development.
‘No matter how powerful our army becomes, without a navy we won’t be able to properly resist the Europeans.
In the original history, the French simply sailed their fleet over and bombarded Mexican ports while Mexico could barely respond.’
The only realistic solution was to import expertise from Europe.
Britain would be ideal.
France would also work.
The Netherlands or even Spain might have useful specialists.
If all else failed, I could turn to the United States.
‘But building a navy won’t cost tens of thousands of pesos.
It’ll cost hundreds of thousands, perhaps much more.
First, I need to make money.
Then I can worry about that.’
If I could recruit skilled people and invest consistently, perhaps Mexico would eventually catch up with those arrogant imperial powers.
For now, that hope would have to be enough.
***
June 1826.
Exactly one year after the California Gold Rush truly began, a letter finally arrived from one of the representatives I had entrusted with managing my businesses there.
‘Later than I expected.
I was starting to worry.’
I broke the seal on Hernando’s letter from Sacramento with a letter opener.
I skimmed past the greetings and formalities and went straight to the important part.
[With the funds Your Highness provided, I have continued developing the gold mine in Sacramento while constructing several shops and lodging houses.
Although the Gold Rush began somewhat later than expected, just as Your Highness predicted, large numbers of miners have now begun arriving.
Following your instructions, we have taken control only of the areas with the richest deposits and highest profitability while allowing miners to work freely in the remaining areas.]
‘If I want to attract more people, someone has to be finding gold.
Letting them mine part of the area is necessary.’
It was bait to draw in more prospectors.
[The restaurants, shops, and lodging houses we constructed remain full, and Your Highness’s other products—agricultural implements, mining tools, jeans, and tents—are selling extremely well.
The miners working directly in Your Highness’s mines receive wages of two pesos per day, twice the average rate.
Yet they spend nearly half of those wages in our own commercial establishments in Sacramento.
I am using the resulting revenue to expand the mines and construct additional commercial buildings.]
Levi Strauss became a millionaire selling little more than durable clothing and tents.
So what did that make my businesses, which supplied almost everything miners needed?
It was practically a money-printing machine.
[We continue encouraging miners to settle permanently in California and participate in colonization.
Many have already decided to remain.
The land we purchased is being claimed rapidly, and our available holdings are beginning to run low.
I would like to ask whether Your Highness believes we should purchase additional land.]
‘We’re already running low?’
In my previous life, land in this region had once been available for less than a peso per ten acres.
I should have bought far more when prices were still that low.
Land values were almost certainly rising now.
I would have liked to imitate Stephen Austin in Texas and charge settlers for their land, but doing that would draw exactly the kind of attention I wanted to avoid from the conservative landowners.
‘Looks like I’ll have to buy more land with my own money.’
Colonizing California did not produce an immediate direct benefit for me, but in the long run it would benefit the entire country.
At first glance, scattering the population across newly settled farmland might appear counterproductive to industrialization.
But there were advantages to creating a large class of small farmers.
Even so, food production would be abundant, and for the first five years the settlers would pay no taxes.
The result would be families that were relatively prosperous but chronically short of agricultural labor.
‘It’s exactly the kind of environment where population can grow rapidly.’
In short, colonization was an investment.
An investment in increasing the population.
The children of the families settling California now would marry, have children, and produce a third generation before long.
At present, Mexico’s population was somewhere between six and six and a half million, while the United States had roughly nine and a half to ten million.
The difference did not seem overwhelming.
The economic difference was another matter.
The United States already had a GDP roughly three and a half times Mexico’s.
Worse, by 1846—the year the Mexican-American War had begun in the history I knew—the population gap would become enormous.
Mexico would have roughly nine and a half million people, while the United States would have around twenty-one million.
‘And the GDP gap will be incomparable.’
Just thinking about it frightened me.
I finished considering the land issue and read the final section of Hernando’s letter.
It mentioned that Alfonso’s logistics and transportation company had begun operating in Sacramento and that increasing numbers of peasants and laborers were arriving in California.
‘Alfonso is handling everything perfectly, as usual.
But peasants leaving the estates… that could become dangerous.’
This was a sensitive issue.
Large landowners often treated their tenant farmers and laborers almost like personal property.
If enough people abandoned the estates, conservative anger could eventually boil over into political pressure to stop the Gold Rush altogether.
‘Before that happens, I need to complete the mechanical reaper and improve agricultural productivity enough to compensate for at least part of the lost labor.’
The letter from Isidro Solís, who was overseeing colonization and business operations around San Francisco, contained much the same information.
I replied to both men, praising their work and instructing them to continue purchasing land and investing in shops and mines.
***
‘This place feels strangely empty.’
The warehouse where Eduardo and I had spent years developing the rifling machine now seemed deserted without him.
CLAP!
I clapped my hands once and looked around.
“Well then.
Time to get serious.”
The next machine I wanted to build was a mechanical reaper—specifically, the type of machine that Cyrus McCormick would invent in 1831 in the history I remembered.
Of course, I knew only the general concept, not the exact engineering details.
‘Still, I’m only trying to build it about five years early.
Surely I can manage that much… right?’
The machine was known simply as the Reaper.
It could supposedly replace the labor of as many as five agricultural workers, dramatically reducing labor costs while increasing harvesting speed.
It was a revolutionary improvement in agricultural productivity.
By the time Cyrus McCormick died in 1884, more than one hundred thousand mechanical reapers had been sold.
One hundred thousand machines.
And these weren’t cheap consumer goods.
There was no question that the invention had made an enormous contribution to American agriculture.
‘But if mine is too expensive, the landowners will never adopt it.
To them, human labor is still the cheapest resource available.
Fortunately, the original Reaper wasn’t prohibitively expensive.’
Unlike the rifling machine, which required a full steam engine and substantial quantities of steel, the Reaper needed neither.
Steel was required only for components such as the wheels, gears, blades, and platform, along with the pieces connecting them.
Once I completed the design, I planned to use steam-powered factory machinery to mass-produce the components and reduce manufacturing costs.
‘In the original history, the machine sold for around 120 dollars during the 1840s.
I should aim for a unit price below 120 dollars as well.’
With the preliminary sketches I had drawn during my free time spread out before me, I picked up a sheet of steel.
And began.
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