Xinshun 1730

Chapter 947 European Trade Area
Now Liu Yu is holding up the banner of free trade, and the premise of the popularity of his own free trade theory in the UK is that under the background of "Ocean is a natural tariff", China's shipping trade is dominated by foreign countries and suppressed by tariffs.

Now the ship of Dashun Western Trading Company has successfully completed the first voyage of trade, and it has also brought an end to the ongoing debate in Britain about "merchant or free".

The originally powerful free trade supporters were instantly labeled as "traitors".

Along with the smuggling of Dashun cotton cloth in the UK, it has greatly damaged the interests of the British aristocracy—tea is fine, and will not harm the interests of the aristocracy, but the cotton cloth will lead to a decrease in the rent bound to woolen wool, which seriously damages the interests of the aristocracy.

Britain is not yet an industrial country, and the aristocracy still has absolute dominance.It's just because their land rent and industry and commerce showed a symbiotic relationship before. Once this symbiotic relationship breaks down, people will find that Britain is still a country dominated by aristocratic landlords.

Historically, this painted skin was uncovered, and it was the determination of the "Corn Law".

But now, the skin is uncovered, and it is the large amount of goods from Dashun's Western Trading Company that instantly filled the European market, which was in a frenzy of post-war consumption.

Tooke, who once debated Hume and firmly supported free trade, was ridiculed in public.

"Of course, you are a devout, kind-hearted expectant who firmly believes in God's love. Of course you will choose to be martyred in pursuit of eternal truth because of your piety."

"But are you worthy to let the cotton worker in Manchester, the woolen worker in London, and the farm laborer in the farm, be martyred for the eternal truth you pursue and believe in?"

"Anyone with a brain knows that free trade will destroy everything in England. And the Chinese are even godless and openly anti-Christ. As a devout priest, you choose to support these pagans to destroy England theory?"

Tu Ke was forced to completely withdraw from the political commentary circle and live in seclusion.

And this debate about free trade or mercantilism that broke out in the UK also ended in a very ridiculous way.

The proponents of mercantilism did not choose to engage in rational debate with the proponents of free trade.

Instead, they endorse, and even openly support, the free trade theory, arguing that "rationally and logically, it is correct, beyond doubt correct."

"But, realistically, it will destroy everything in England. From industry to the countryside, there will be a depression."

The mercantilists did not choose to debate the classics, but raised the banner of reality.

Is it for eternal truth?

Or England?

Also almost from this moment, in England.

"I support mercantilism" has become the equivalent of "I don't eat fish on Friday".

…Eating fish but not eating fish, in the Elizabethan era, compared to the era of the founding of Dashun, its weight is basically equivalent to shaving or not shaving.

Not only the British, but most Europeans along the coast will never forget the year when the cargo ship of the Dashun Western Ocean Trading Company first appeared on the European sea, and the shock it brought to the European economy.

That is, a year and a half ago.

That year, the War of the Austrian Succession had come to an end, and peace talks in Aachen had begun.

In that year, the British East India Company and the Portuguese caravan were temporarily closed down by Dashun because of the "opium case".

That year was the last year when the war between China and the Netherlands led to a shortage of Southeast Asian spices in Europe, soaring prices and hoarding of goods.

Although this is not the first time that Chinese merchant ships have appeared in Europe, as early as after Dashun conquered Junggar, Chinese merchant ships had already been to Sweden. They were sent to Sweden after being captured in the Great Northern War based on the "Confucian humanitarian principles of benevolence and righteousness". Swedish prisoners of war in Junggar go home.

But this is the first time that a fleet composed of a purely Chinese trading company went to Europe for trade. Although the negotiations with the Netherlands were successful at that time, the Dutch equity funds have not yet been injected, and the cargo ships of the former Dutch East India Company have not joined. formation.

More importantly, Dashun completely defeated the Netherlands in Southeast Asia, participated in two consecutive court coups in Europe, and appeared in Europe on a large scale for the first time since the background board became a real living thing.

At that time, an Englishman named Adams in the Netherlands recalled:
"After the huge fleet saluted, they discovered an embarrassing reality, that is, the two largest merchant ships in the Chinese fleet cannot berth in Amsterdam."

"The Dutch haven't built a new battleship for 50 years, and their port hasn't docked a cargo ship with such a heavy load for a long time. The port has silted up to this extent."

"Although China's diplomatic duke previously announced that their new company would fund the construction of the Dutch port, it will take a process to clean it up. Obviously, it will take some time before it is completed."

"Chinese merchant ships are very law-abiding. They wait quietly for the customs officers to calculate, and pay customs duties with Spanish silver coins or Dutch florins, which are very easy to calculate."

"In fact, we know that the Chinese don't have silver coins. Their official unit is a unit of pure silver, which they call a 'liang', which is about a third of a pound's worth of silver. But it's clear that they don't lack any European silver coins of any kind, whether British, Dutch, Spanish or whatever."

"Amsterdam's bankers, who had hoped that they would make a fortune from the exchange business - those involved in the Indian trade know that in India, the Mughal governors gave us Europeans the power to trade One of the conditions is that the various silver coins we bring need to be re-melted at their mint before they can be used, and Aljote’s princely mint often charges a seigniorage of about 7% of the total value—Amsterdam’s The bankers thought it might be possible to make as much minting profit from the Chinese as from the Indians."

"To their disappointment, however, the Chinese did not come with their official, denominations of pure silver ingots. They brought with them any coinage we could imagine--we have no shortage of your silver coins, in fact in our In Guangzhou, Songjiang and other places, Spanish silver coins are also a kind of currency in circulation. We will weigh them according to the silver content instead of counting the number when we trade in large amounts. It will waste too much time. A Chinese person in charge of the transaction said: Said, obviously, they were well aware of the European merchants' habit of rubbing the corners of silver coins to remove silver dust."

"After paying customs duties and calculating the value of the goods, the Chinese moved their goods to the warehouse of VOC. In fact, there is no company called VOC now. The Chinese erased the carvings of the original warehouse of VOC. It is time to use their name to prove that it is their property."

"According to the previous negotiations—of course, what I know is the public content. As for the content of the secret negotiations, I have no way of knowing—this batch of Chinese goods will be divided into two parts."

"Part of it is to take care of the interests of the seven provinces of the Netherlands. According to some old rules before the VOC, according to the respective shares of the seven provinces, let the seven provinces share a part at a fixed price."

"The other part is to adopt the auction system, but the auction will not be held separately in the seven provinces, but will only be held in Amsterdam."

"Rather than saying that this is the result of negotiations between China and the Netherlands, it is better to say that this is an acceptable result reached between the inter-provincial parliaments."

"Because everyone knows that if the auction system is adopted, the province of the Netherlands will benefit the most. The other six provinces do not think that only the province of the Netherlands can benefit from cooperation with China. If China, or the province of the Netherlands If the Chinese side does not accept the seven-province share system under the old rules, then they will firmly oppose cooperation with Chinese trading companies.”

"The Chinese side adopted a compromise method, promising to take out 20.00% of the five goods as a share. The remaining 70.00% of the five will be auctioned."

"At the beginning of the signing of the agreement, the provinces were not very satisfied with this figure. But when the Chinese cargo ship actually appeared in Amsterdam, the remaining provinces were horrified to find that they had underestimated the total trade volume and the Chinese trade volume."

"They have not prepared sufficient funds for the 20.00% five of the total goods promised by the Chinese."

"But everyone knows that this time the trade will be hugely profitable. Because the Chinese have rudely seized the British and Portuguese cargo ships and seized the business houses on the grounds of opposing opium."

"The ironic scene just happened in the Netherlands."

"A few years ago, the Chinese declared war on the Netherlands and seized Southeast Asia, which led to the bankruptcy of VOC, the inability to repay the bonds, and the financial market in Amsterdam fell into a cold winter. It is called the second disaster year of the Netherlands."

"A few years later, the Chinese cargo ship arrived in Amsterdam, which directly revived the financial market in Amsterdam, thriving, and even raised the interest rate on loans during the extreme time."

"The chambers of commerce in the provinces are looking for bankers to borrow enough capital to prepare to eat their province's share, for all know how profitable the opium case and the restocking of spices in a few years' time will be."

"The Chinese only accept silver, gold, and copper as compensation. They don't think the Netherlands has anything worth sending back."

"And so the winter in Amsterdam's financial markets passed."

"The bankers in Amsterdam affectionately called the flag of Dashun Western Trading Company 'the side marigold in the cold winter'."

"Because on their company's flag, in addition to the Chinese we don't recognize, there are two letters that we recognize——A·H."

"Amsterdam's bankers prefer to believe that A is the abbreviation of Adonis, the god of spring, and marigold; and H is the abbreviation of eternal winter hiems."

"Some people even suspect that A·H is the high pride of the Chinese people, who thinks that he is Aphrodite's favorite, the eternal Adonis who will resurrect in spring even after experiencing death and fall. Just like their dynasties, they were destroyed in the cold winter and reborn in the spring sun again and again.

"But afterwards I asked them what A·H meant. The Chinese told us that it was a phonetic system borrowed from Latin in their new learning, and it was not a marigold in the cold winter; nor did it mean Chinese When people come, the spring in Amsterdam will come; or they will compare themselves to their own civilization, which will survive the winter and spring again. Besides, who do they say knows who this Adonis is?"

"Actually, it's a very simple two-character Latin phonetic abbreviation - Aihua."

"I tried to pronounce 'Hua'. At least, there is one thing to be happy about. They probably don't like French too much."

(End of this chapter)