Seas of Fortune(36)
Philip nodded politely. He could see the small speck marking the location of Dominica, on the near edge of the West Indies, but he knew nothing about it.
“But that’s not the best sailing for us,” David explained. “We’d have to fight our way southeast, against the current, to then get to Suriname from there.”
“So why not go farther south, and then turn west?”
“Spoken like a true landlubber,” David said, smiling to take out the sting. “If we went south to the latitude of your up-time town of Paramaribo, we would hit the doldrums. Do you understand that term?”
“No wind?”
“Often, nary a breath. Duppy Jonah’s Flytrap. You can be stuck there for weeks, as your provisions spoil and your men’s tempers do the same. The belt of doldrums moves north and south with the sun; that’s one of the reasons we set sail in winter.”
David paused for a bite. “With your fancy wristwatch to help us find our longitude, we can curve gradually south as we head west, hit South America here.” He jabbed his forefinger against the spot marking the up-time town of Cayenne, French Guiana. “We don’t have to sail down a latitude line anymore.”
* * *
“Philip, congratulations. Heyndrick told me that we made a very difficult sailing, thanks to your navigational help.”
“Thanks.” Philip kept his back to her.
Maria waited. “Is that all you’re going to say?”
“Yep.”
“When you’re tired of being a jerk, come and talk to me.” Maria stalked off.
“Wait, Maria,” called Philip, but his voice was lost in the wind, and he didn’t want to follow her and endure the catcalls from the sailors.
The Wild Coast of South America, February 1634
Their first view of Suriname was discouraging. As they cruised northwest along the Surinamese coast from Cayenne, they saw mile after unbroken mile of mangrove swamp. It didn’t look like a place the colonists would want to visit, let alone live.
At last, David led his small flotilla into the mouth of the Suriname River. Here, it was really more than a river, being several miles in breadth. They headed south for what the maps had shown to be the location of the twentieth-century capital of Suriname, Paramaribo, twelve miles upriver. The “Great Encyclopedia” said that it had been settled in the old time line in 1640, and it seemed that the location couldn’t be that bad if it had remained in use for over three centuries. And it added that the site was “on a plateau sixteen feet above low water level, well drained, clean, and in general healthy.” Even here, the river was a mile wide, and eighteen feet deep.
They solemnly raised the flag, and David christened the town “Gustavus.” Gustavus Adolphus was a hero to the Dutch and Germans, and the christening was a cheap price to pay for the Swedish support.
There were signs of a former Indian settlement on the plateau. Whether its abandonment was a heavenly blessing, or a warning, they couldn’t say.
In the days following the landing, they explored the countryside. Despite appearances, the marshes were just a narrow strip on the coast. Behind them lay an area of zwampen en ritsen: swamps and ridges. They weren’t sure just how far that terrain extended, but the up-time encyclopedias had told them that if they went far enough south, they would find savannas and the great rainforests.
They had deliberately arrived at the beginning of what the encyclopedia called the short dry season. That, they knew, would be the best time to clear ground. And, once they found it, to mine bauxite. In March, when the long wet season began, they would plant their crops—tobacco, cotton, and various food crops, by preference.
There had been much debate back in Grantville as to how to solve the perennial labor problem of tropical America without resort to slavery. It had to be solved, because the tropics had products that Grantville desperately wanted, like rubber. Part of the proposed solution was to use up-time medical knowledge so that Europeans wouldn’t die off so readily.
The botanical garden at Leiden, which Maria knew so well, was primarily a garden of medicinal plants for the education of the student physicians. So she knew her herbs. In Grantville, she had learned more about disease, and how to avoid it. On the ship, she had insisted that the sailors and colonists eat sauerkraut, to ward off scurvy. On shore, she lectured the settlers on mosquito control. And sanitation. Several of the colonists had gotten some medical training, too, since Maria wasn’t planning a permanent stay.
* * *
Carsten Claus and Johann Mueller walked along the wooded ridge line, grateful for the shade that the scrub forest provided. Even though they were miles from the sea, there were shells and shell fragments everywhere.