Chapter 3 In Berlin
June 1863, University of Berlin.
As a descendant of a top noble family, Ernst used his father's relationship to attend the class as an auditor.
Ernst's schedule has been quite busy recently, but he is mainly studying economic principles. Other courses are mainly about aristocratic etiquette, ethos, and even religion, which are taught by Ernst's tutor.
Ernst was accompanied by his tutor Richard and his servant Tom.
Prior to this, Richard had been responsible for Ernst's early education.
The group first set out from Hechingen to Stuttgart, and finally took a train through Bavaria to Berlin.
A lot of time was wasted on the journey because of visiting familiar nobles, and it took nearly half a month to reach Berlin.
Fortunately, the second half of the journey was mainly by rail, which avoided some unnecessary banquets and social activities.
After arriving in Berlin, as a member of the Hohenzollern family, Ernst naturally had to visit the Prussian royal family first. He met his uncle, William I.
In fact, Ernst had met William I when he was a child, but he was very young at that time and his memory was not clear, and his memories of his past life had not yet awakened.
As for why there is an intersection, we have to talk about the unique status of Hechingen. As the birthplace of the Hohenzollern family, even though the Hohenzollern family of the Brandenburg system is so prominent that they became the Electors of the Holy Roman Empire and strengthened the current Kingdom of Prussia, blood ties cannot be overturned. The ancestors of the Prussian royal family also came from Hechingen.
The castle where his family lived was actually built jointly with the Prussian royal family. It's just that his family has lived in Hechingen for generations and has never left. The Hohenzollern family of Brandenburg would never leave Berlin, the power center of Prussia, to develop in the countryside like Hechingen. It was only because of the special nature of their ancestral land that the Brandenburg royal family funded the renovation of the Hohenzollern Castle in Hechingen. It was a matter of family reputation.
Hohenzollern Castle was actually an early military fortress, which was later destroyed in the war. The current Hohenzollern Castle is a newly rebuilt building.
Sometimes the Brandenburg Hohenzollern family would return to Hechingen for a visit. The last time the Prussian royal family sent someone there was when Hechingen and Sigmaringen formed the new Prussian Hohenzollern Province and incorporated it into the Kingdom of Prussia. Ernst was born not long ago at that time, so naturally he could not recognize the Prussian prince who visited here.
William I first asked about Prince Constantine's recent situation, then learned the reason why Ernst came to Berlin, and when he learned that Ernst came to study.
William I was very happy. The Prussian royal family had always attached great importance to education, which was a century-long plan that the Kingdom of Prussia valued as much as the military.
Now that Ernst chose Berlin as the first stop of his study tour, William I was very happy. This also indirectly proved the development of education in Prussia in recent years.
Finally, William I welcomed Ernst and promised that he could come to the palace for help if he encountered any trouble.
Ernst expressed his gratitude and met other members of the Hohenzollern family, Crown Prince Frederick and William II, who was still a little boy and would stir up the world in the future.
When he first arrived in Berlin, Ernst often attended gatherings among aristocrats, which was his only social activity.
Most of the rest of his time was spent in school or doing sports training. Medical care was difficult to guarantee in that era, so Ernst attached great importance to health.
In addition to basic strength training, there is also horse riding and, of course, firearms shooting. Ernst had been exposed to these basic military educations before. For Prussian nobles, this is the foundation of life.
Ernst also made many friends at the University of Berlin. Although he had a hard time studying and seemed dull compared to these genius classmates, Ernst had a good attitude and did not seek to compare his IQ with these monsters.
There were also some noble children similar to Ernst studying here, but they were all older. However, the slightly mature Ernst could chat with them.
There are many powerful people in the University of Berlin, but that's all in Germany. The nobles are more interested in military academies, and there are also competitors such as the University of Göttingen and the University of Bonn.
…
"Okay, that's all for today's class, get out of class dismissed!" the professor said seriously.
The professor packed up his teaching aids expressionlessly and left work without hesitation.
Ernst, looking tired, rubbed his eyes, packed up the notes and books in front of the desk, put them in his handbag, and stood up to leave.
Suddenly a voice came from behind: "Ernst! Where are you going after school?" Classmate Galit nudged Ernst, who was about to leave, with his elbow.
"Home, of course, Garrett," Ernst replied.
Galit pretended to be surprised and asked, "Aren't you going to attend the banquet tonight? I heard that it's organized by Karl, and there will be many ladies attending!"
"Garrit, I'm still young, don't try to lead me astray. Besides, there have been too many banquets and salons recently, so I still want to take a break for a while." Ernst said with a chuckle and nudged Garrit's shoulder with his arm.
"You bastard, you have more dirty jokes than me. I think you are just serious on the surface." Garrett used funny gestures and danced to "expose" the hypocritical Ernst.
…
Ernst left the school during the fight, and when he walked out of the school gate, Tom was already waiting there.
"Tom, go to the studio today!" Ernst ordered Tom.
"Yes, sir."
The carriage slowly left the school gate, shuttled through the streets of Berlin, turned corners, and after some time stopped in front of a blacksmith shop.
Ernst pushed open the door and walked into the house. The house was full of miscellaneous items, mostly tools, hammers, axes... thrown on the ground at random.
The furnace was burning, the room was full of the smell of charcoal, and there were splashes of solidified molten iron around the furnace.
The blacksmith shop, of course, is now the studio as Ernst calls it. It was rented by Ernst, and now in addition to the original blacksmith, he has also hired a junior high school student majoring in science and engineering. Ernst interrupted the junior high school student Pete who was adding fire to the furnace.
"Pete, is the thing made?" Ernst asked naturally.
"Boss, it's made. Take a look and see if it looks like this!" After saying that, he took out a wooden box from the counter behind him.
He opened the lid of the box and took out a metal object from inside. It had a copper handle and a thin iron sheet sandwiched between two thick iron sheets. It was a T-shaped razor.
As a time traveler, the top priority is of course to make money. Although Ernst is born a noble, he will always be short of money. Not to mention other things, his noble identity is not secure. After the defeat of the German Empire in later generations, even the emperor had to step down and flee abroad.
As a noble from a small place, although he had a high status (Hechingen was a marquisate before it was annexed, Constantine was a marquis, and now he is the prince of Prussia, with the same status as princes), the Hohenzollern Province sounded high-sounding, but in fact it was not even as big as the county where he lived in his previous life, and the population was not even 100,000.
In such a small place, we are not the only one that dominates. Sigmaringen next door is obviously more prosperous than us.
Based on historical experience, it is better to make more money by using your current noble status. Even if the empire falls in the future, you will be able to settle down and not fall into destitution.
Of course, these are all things of the long run, and Ernst is not in a hurry yet. He is more trying to fulfill a bold idea that Ernst had in his heart in his previous life.
Once a person reaches a certain position, ambition will follow, and the same is true for Ernst.
Ernst, who understood the future situation, naturally was not optimistic about the future of the European continent. Not to mention the distant future, there was a series of wars for Prussia to unify Germany. When he got old, there would be two world wars.
If they insist on staying in Germany in the future, the demise of the German Empire alone will affect them. By then, the German nobles will be lambs to be slaughtered, and no matter how much wealth they have, it may be confiscated by the great powers and the republican government, so they must arrange a way out in advance.
Europe is by no means a good place. This continent is full of turbulent times and is dotted with powerful nations. Britain, France, Germany, Russia, and Austria-Hungary are all crowded here. There will also be interference from the United States and the Soviet Union in the future, so Europe has no future. Instead, now is the best era for Europe and the best era for Germany.
So where did Ernst want to go? Here we have to mention the place where he worked in his previous life, Tanzania.
When Ernst learned about the history of East Africa in his previous life, he always felt deeply moved. As Germany's most valuable colony, German East Africa was simply a place chosen by God.
Unfortunately, Germany went all in in the end, and German East Africa did not have time to be developed quickly, and the empire collapsed. Of course, this was also related to the fact that the German government at the time did not pay enough attention to it.
Currently, no country in Europe is paying attention to East Africa. Britain and France have vast colonies, Germany has not yet been unified, and only the Portuguese have some strongholds on the coast of East Africa. However, except for the plains along the coast of Mozambique, the Portuguese have not penetrated deep into the interior of East Africa.
In the past, when the Germans invaded East Africa, they did not encounter any decent resistance, and the only ones left were the indigenous tribes of Africa.
These natives are still living in primitive tribal society, you can imagine how savage East Africa is.
But for Ernst, barbarism is a good thing. As long as East Africa is slowly developed through immigration and the indigenous people in the primitive social system are transferred away through means, wouldn't it be easy to establish a country in the future?
First of all, East Africa did not have any decent resources (it was developed late), and few colonists paid attention to it.
Secondly, East Africa has a small population, unlike the Philippines in East Asia, which is densely populated. The colonists cannot squeeze out the value of human resources, which also means that the local population is small and easy to expel, which can avoid a recurrence of the South African incident.
Finally, East Africa has good agricultural conditions, vast land worth cultivating, and other conditions are not bad either.
In Ernst's eyes, as long as he could gain administrative rights in East Africa, he could establish an independent kingdom as his future retreat.
This kingdom may not be well-known in the world, but after the wave of African independence, the country it builds will surely be able to defeat the surrounding indigenous countries.
Of course, the prerequisite is not to be as stupid as the Boers, who wanted both and finally fled abroad.
It’s not that Ernst despised it, but even releasing a pig might be better than those African “benevolent kings” of later generations.
As for why Ernst felt he could start a business in faraway Africa, in addition to his own optimism about Africa's environment and resources, he also had the role model of a "benevolent monarch" like Leopold II of Belgium.
Before the great powers set their sights on the African continent, by creating a fait accompli, and finally using the German banner to win over Austria-Hungary and Germany, the Hohenzollern family could establish a foundation overseas.
Of course, the practical problem with all these fantasies is making money. Ernst cannot even come up with the initial capital for colonization, so naturally he has to use his decades of life experience to make money.
That’s right, the T-shaped razor in front of you is the first step. At that time, people still used straight-handled razors. Ernst was still young and not old enough to have a scruffy beard, but he still felt a pain on his face when he saw this straight-handled razor.
Fortunately, I had seen my grandfather’s old-fashioned razor in my previous life, which was invented by American Gillette.
Ernst only remembered the general idea of this razor, so after coming to Berlin, he asked Pete to replicate it based on the sketch. Now it seems that the preliminary form has been completed.
"Well done, Pete. How difficult do you think it would be to mass-produce this razor?"
Pete looked serious and answered Ernst carefully.
"Boss, look!" As he said this, he took off the blade of the razor, pinched the two ends of the blade and broke it. "Click", the blade broke.
The strength of this thin blade is too low to be used at all. If the strength problem of the blade cannot be solved, it will be impossible to sell it.
Ernst pondered for a moment and asked, "Is there any solution?"
"Maybe metallurgists have a way, we can ask for help. Another way is through repeated experiments," said Pitt.
"Well, okay, on the one hand you continue to experiment to find a solution, and as for the experts, I will find a way." Ernst decided to do both and solve the problem as soon as possible.
(End of this chapter)
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