Chapter 235
Hilos thanked Cornelus for his compliment.
"I'll ask Amendolara to recommend a suitable patrol captain," the Devers said.
Cornelus immediately perked up. "Go ahead, Sir Consul."
"Epthenis. He'll make an excellent patrol captain," the Devers said confidently, pointing to the back row.
"Huh?!" Epthenis, who was talking to Cspit in a low voice, did not expect to be called. "Why me?!" he asked in surprise.
"So that you can focus more on the administration of the Alliance and be a good role model for your soldiers instead of wasting your time on the youngsters of Diónia!" the Devers said half-jokingly.
The crowd burst into laughter. Everyone knew that Epthenis liked handsome young men. Many elders had the same hobby, but Epthenis was more obvious about it. It was not only a fashion, but also a tradition, for the Greeks to like young men and guide them. Although the Devers did not like it, they still showed their respect and did not want to force the change. Apart from that, what the Devers admired the most about Epthenis was his ability to think calmly on the battlefield and react flexibly in complex situations. He always completed the tasks given to him, and even exceeded expectations.
Under the pressure of Divers and the repeated pleas of Cornelus, Epithenis had no choice but to agree.
Epthenis' helpless expression made Amyntas and the rest burst into laughter again.
It was already past noon when the meeting went on. Cornelus announced a half-hour recess. The slaves who had been waiting outside the Senate immediately came in and gave their masters food and water to fill their stomachs.
The Devers did not have any free time even after the half-hour recess. He munched on his bread while discussing with Scombras and Hilos about the problems they needed to solve after taking office, as well as how the two cities could cooperate and strengthen communication to deal with any situation that might arise in the south.
Then, Cunogorata found him to discuss the arrangement of the five new Senate elders. As an elder of the Senate, his family should naturally be settled in Turín so that it would be convenient for him to perform his duties. Even if he became the governor of another city, he would not move away from his mansion in Turín. After all, the governor only served for two years, while the elders served for life.
There was still a lot of unused public land in Turín that was under the control of the Senate and would not be given away easily. Allocating a small piece of land for the new Elder to build a house was naturally not free of charge. The Land of Dionysia Act clearly stipulated that even if Dyvers wanted to buy the land, he would still have to pay the market price. Due to the influx of people over the past year, the price of residential land in Turín had risen again. The price would rise even more after Diónia defeated Crotone.
Cunogorata hoped that the Senate would sell the land to the new elders at the original price in order to show the sincerity of the Senate of Diónia and appease the newcomers.
The Devers agreed. He also considered that if any of the five new Crimissa elders could not afford the money, the national treasury could pay for it first and repay it later.
The half-hour break was over and the Senate meeting continued.
The Devers stood up and said his first proposal, "Although Diónia won the war against Crotone this time, some problems were exposed. The most important and urgent one is the navy!"
As soon as the Devers's voice fell, it immediately resonated with the elders.
"The Consul is right! In this war, the biggest loss that the Crotone caused us was their fleet's continuous onshore raids. They burned many Turín villages and killed many of our people. Until now, the civil servants of Turín are still having a headache trying to resettle the people and rebuild their homes! "Cunogorata complained.
"If Diónia had a navy as strong as our army, Crotone would have surrendered when we won the war. There would be no need to surround Crimissa!" Amyntas emphasized.
"The trade of the Diónia Alliance is getting more and more prosperous. Diónia's territory is expanding rapidly. We need a strong fleet to protect our trade, to prevent our long coastline from being ambushed by enemy fleets and our ports from being blockaded by enemy warships!" Marigi reminded loudly.
"That's right! We need a strong navy to protect the safety of the Diónia Alliance! "The others agreed.
"Since we've reached a consensus, my suggestion is …" The Devers looked at the others and said, "Other than speeding up the completion of the three three-tiered oar warships that are under construction, we'll build seven more this year. I've asked Enanilos, and Turín's shipyards don't have enough docks to fulfill such a large order. Crimissa also has a larger shipyard that can build three-tiered oar warships. We can give them a small portion of the order to fulfill. In the future, we'll build ten three-tiered oar warships every year until we have 50 three-tiered oar warships in five years. At the same time, we'll be equipped with 20 medium-sized warships (100-man warships) and 10 small warships (50-man warships). That way, we'll have a relatively strong Diónia Navy with 80 warships. "
The others agreed that the plan was feasible. Only Mersis objected, "No! No! This way, the Alliance will have to spend more than a hundred Taliente every year. That's too much! "
"Although it's a little too much, I think our treasury will be able to handle it. Last year, the treasury received more than 200 Taliente just from the land tax, rent tax, and trade tax. This year, Marigi's lowest estimate is that the treasury's revenue will at least double. " When the Devers said this, many of the elders were shocked. Unknowingly, Diónia's treasury's revenue was almost equal to that of Tarantum and Crotone. Taking out a small portion of the money to build a fleet should be more than enough.
"Everyone, Lord Mersis, actually, building ten three-tiered oar warships every year won't cost more than a hundred Taliente." Marigi stood up and reminded everyone, "The cost of building a warship is mainly divided into two parts. One is the wood, and the other is the manufacturing cost. In the mountains of our Alliance's territory, especially in Lucania, there are countless high-quality cedar trees that are most suitable for building three-tiered oar warships. I heard that Athens had a special agreement with Turís. Every year, Turís had to provide Athens with a certain amount of shipbuilding wood. "
"There was indeed such an agreement. Turís had to provide Athens with at least a thousand pieces of shipbuilding wood every year, and if necessary, the number could be doubled," Enanilus said. Back then, in order to complete this agreement, the Turís had cut down a lot of trees for decades. Although they earned some money from the wood, the older cedar trees in the mountains around Turís became fewer and fewer. Moreover, there were more than a dozen large shipyards in Athens, so there was no need for them to build ships in Turís. Enanilus's family had always complained about this. Later, because of excessive logging, many barren hills appeared around Turís. Only then did the people discover this drawback. They began to buy wood from other Greek city-states and resell it to Athens, earning a little bit of the difference.
"In the later stages of the war between Athens and Sparta, we were forced to cancel this agreement after the Sparta navy gained the upper hand," Cunogorata added.
Devers nodded. After becoming the Alliance Consul, he understood this agreement. He even believed that when General Pericles of Athens agreed to build Turís and called for the establishment of a great Pan-Hellenic city-state, one of the real strategic purposes was for wood. Athens had two natural flaws. First, it didn't produce a lot of food, and it had to rely on imports to maintain the huge population of the city-state. Therefore, along the coast of Greece to the Black Sea, it built many colonies or controlled city-states in key locations, such as Byzantium, to ensure the smooth transportation of food from the Black Sea. It needed a powerful navy, and the people of Athens were ambitious to establish a powerful Mediterranean Greek City-State Alliance, so they needed a powerful navy even more. However, the second flaw of Athens was that it didn't have a lot of forests, and it didn't have trees that could make high-quality warships. Also, with the size of Athens' navy and merchant ships, the amount of wood they needed was massive. Therefore, finding wood for ships became a strategic issue that determined whether Athens could maintain its strength or not. Egypt didn't have forests. Persia had wood, but they wouldn't sell it to the enemy, Athens. Northern Greece and Thrace had forests, but they were inland, and it was difficult to cut and transport the wood. Therefore, Greece, which was surrounded by the Apennines Mountains, became an important place for Athens to buy wood, and Turís, which was built by the people of Athens, was the main source of wood.
"Therefore, I asked the Senate to discuss a plan to allow the slaves of the Alliance to cut a certain number of cedars every year to make wood for the warships. It doesn't cost a single Opol. As for the production fee … "Marigi looked at Enanilus and jokingly said," I think Mr. Enanilus will not charge too much. "
Enanilus smiled helplessly.
Everyone felt that Marigi's words made sense, and the worry about the cost dissipated a lot.
"But have you considered the maintenance of these warships after they are built? It's also not a small cost!" Mersius said, unconvinced.
"Enanilus and I have discussed this issue before," Devers said. Enanilus nodded to show that it was true.
"When there is no war, of course, we won't leave the warships idle at the docks. Other than a small number of them patrolling the coast of the Alliance, and some of them in the docks for maintenance, the rest can be used as guards for merchant ships, especially on the route from the Adriatic Sea to the mainland of Greece, where pirate attacks are frequent. They can also temporarily serve as large cargo ships to transport goods to friendly city-states … You see, not only can we earn maintenance fees for our navy, but we can also train the crew's sailing skills at the same time. Isn't that good? "After Devers said his thoughts, Mersius stopped talking.
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