Chapter 27: Colt Revolver

Feeling that the opportunity was almost there, Rainy Day changed the subject: "Although this has nothing to do with integrity, out of friendship and understanding, we are still willing to purchase a small portion of the spirits to reduce some of your losses."

Merchant Smith's expression eased a little, and after thinking for a moment, he said, "How much are you willing to buy?"

"Fifty gallons," Rainy Day said.

"Fifty gallons? That's too little!" Smith's face turned ugly again.

"We brought more than 600 gallons of wine, and 50 gallons is less than one-tenth of that. You have to buy at least 300 gallons, otherwise we will lose everything!"

"I said that the Apaches are determined to stop drinking. We will not let alcohol erode our bodies and souls." Rainy Day paused, then continued, "How about this, one hundred gallons, no more."

It can be packed in large wine bags, with one hundred gallons equaling about two hundred bags, which is more than enough for medical use. Some people with severe alcohol addiction who cannot quit in a short period of time can also drink a small amount to prolong their lives.

"Two hundred gallons." Smith wanted to get some more.

"Just a hundred gallons," Rainy Day said without hesitation.

Smith was silent for a while.

Rainy Day, however, added: "However, although we only need one hundred gallons of liquor, we are willing to buy more of the other goods."

"For other commodities, we may not have enough goods right now."

"It doesn't matter if it's not enough this time. This is not the only time we will buy from you. The Apaches will still be willing to buy from you in the future, and the scale of business will only increase, but they will no longer mainly buy spirits."

Smith thought for a moment and asked, "What do you want to buy, cloth? Knives? Or muskets?"

In his view, the three things most likely to replace spirits were the exquisite and varied fabrics of the industrial world, metal knives and axes, and muskets.

"Musketeers," said Rainy Day, "we need two hundred guns."

The decision to boycott liquor saved the Apaches a lot of money. After discussion, especially with the recommendation of Ma Shao, people decided to buy a batch of muskets, two hundred of them, not many but not too few.

"What type of musket do you need? How about this one?" Smith brought a gun.

Rainy day looked at Ma Shao, who nodded, stepped forward, took the gun from the merchant, and prepared to give it a try.

"Brown Bess, made in Britain, is said to have killed a Chinese officer in 1840," Smith said casually.

In order to take into account the Indians' English level, Smith used simple vocabulary and spoke slowly, so Ma Shao could understand.

There is no doubt that this is referring to the Opium War.

Ma Shao sighed a little, then fiddled with Brown Beth.

He didn't want this kind of gun. It was too old. In his impression, this thing seemed to have been invented in the early eighteenth century, which was more than a hundred years ago.

In fact, there are many people who use brown bess now. As Smith said, the British army was still equipped with brown bess until the Opium War. But as a future man, Ma Shao is not interested in this musket that is about to be eliminated.

He was about to ask what other models were available, but his eyes suddenly focused on a young white man behind Smith, or to be more precise, the gun in his hand.

Revolver!

Ma Shao took a closer look and confirmed that the other party was holding a revolver or a revolver. He pointed and said, "Let me see this."

"You're talking about this. This is a new thing my nephew bought. It's called a Colt revolver," said Smith.

"But I think this thing is very difficult to use, it breaks easily, the trigger feels terrible, and it's expensive. No wonder the company that produced it went bankrupt and the product was barely sold."

Ma Shao didn't say anything, but recalled the information he knew about Colt in his previous life.

Samuel Colt, the well-known American gun master, is almost synonymous with revolvers.

The early entrepreneurial experience of this master of firearms was not smooth, and he went through a period of embarrassment. As Smith said, due to the immature design of the pistol and the high price, the first company founded by Colt went bankrupt, leaving him with a backlog of unsold weapons.

But Ma Shao does not think that these defective weapons have no practical value, especially the Colt revolver. Even though it has flaws, it still has firepower advantages that many other firearms do not have.

Moreover, revolvers will be the trend in pistol structure for quite some time to come, so it is best to familiarize yourself with them as soon as possible.

He felt this was an opportunity.

It would not be long, at most two years before the Mexican-American War, before Samuel Colt would escape his difficulties and become a world-famous gun master.

By then, it would be extremely difficult for an Indian to buy a Colt pistol.

Now that Colt has gone bankrupt, it has a lot of unsold weapons sitting around, and you should be able to buy some at relatively low prices.

As for Colt himself...if the horse whistle was a white man, he could try to win him over and provide him with timely assistance, but forget about the Indians.

Under the guidance of Smith's nephew, Ma Shao fired a few test shots.

As Smith said, this Colt pistol does have many flaws. The folding trigger makes the shooting process quite cumbersome, and a strange operation must be performed every time after firing the gun: fold the trigger back into the gun body, then pull the hammer back to the ready-to-fire state, so that the trigger pops out again.

It is also said that this type of gun is easy to damage, and the one in front of you has been repaired once before.

But this is still a pistol that can quickly fire five bullets, so after a little consideration, Ma Shao said: "I'll take this one."

"Are you sure?" Smith wondered what was wrong with these Apaches today. They didn't want their favorite liquor anymore, but instead wanted to buy this broken pistol whose production company had gone bankrupt.

"Sure." Ma Shao said.

"Okay, but you have to wait until next time. I will bring you 200 revolvers in the next transaction, but this time we only have two." Smith said, "Besides, I can't guarantee that I will be able to buy them. Maybe the closed company has already cleared out all the guns that can't be sold."

"Would you consider other guns?" He brought two more guns. "We also have some rifles, such as Rocky Mountain rifles and Kentucky rifles."

Apache still bought two hundred rifles and a batch of ammunition. After all, Colt pistols would have to wait until next time, so it would be a good idea to equip themselves with a batch of rifles now.

In addition to muskets, the Apaches also bought many iron products, such as iron arrowheads, iron stirrups, horseshoes, daggers, short knives, and some production tools, such as wood saws.

Smith's team did not make any special preparations for these goods, especially stirrups, which the Indians had not needed before, and a considerable part of them were pre-ordered.

Smith felt that this transaction was really strange, as if the Apache tribe had become a different group of people.

But even stranger things are yet to come.

"What did you say? You want to buy newspapers?" Smith looked as if he had seen a ghost.