Forty-eight years of Qianlong

Chapter 91 From Xinpai to Hokkaido

In the conference room on the Thor, Zhao Xin and the six-member team of the Security Department were talking about the bullet production equipment.But this time it was just a briefing where everyone gathered to chat, not a formal meeting.

Zhao Xin took a few sips of tea and then said: "I just mentioned to Andrew when I placed the order. As a result, he told me the next day that there was a company that could no longer be maintained and was going to close down. Some equipment is ready for auction. He asked me if I wanted it. I agreed without thinking."

While eating the snacks that Zhao Xin brought back, Wang Yuanfang asked, "What about the price? Is it expensive?"

Liu Sheng said, "Squad leader, it's good to have it. What price do you care about?"

Zhao Liang said: "I took the time to reload the shells you used last time at Bear Island and tried them out, and the results were not bad."

"Don't worry, the quantity I ordered with Andrew this time will be enough for a while." Zhao Xin tore up another package of snacks and distributed them to everyone, and then said: "In addition, the two sides of the Sila River are connected. Things are going to speed up, I'll talk to Lao Chen about this later."

"You mean repairing the bridge?" Liu Sheng said vaguely, chewing something in his mouth.

"No, I mean to open the ferries on both sides of the strait first." Zhao Xin shook his head and said, "The bridge building is too professional, and I think our existing third-rate carpenters are not enough."

Ding Guofeng asked, "Now that the people on the Thor are almost gone, when are you going to leave? You have to call me to go with you this time."

"It's only been a few days. Don't worry, this time you and Wu Siyu both went to see him." Zhao Xin smiled and reached out to pat Ding Guofeng's shoulder. .

Deng Fei interjected: "Don't worry, after everyone disembarks, you have to do a cleaning of the cargo hold."

No one here has any opinions on this matter. It is said that thousands of people's food, drink and Lazarus are concentrated in the two cargo compartments, so let's not mention the taste.

Zhao Xin took out a pack of cigarettes and scattered them.After Ding Guofeng ordered it for him, he took two sips before he said, "After picking up people this time, I plan to go to Hokkaido first and then Nagasaki. We can't just stay here behind closed doors, we have to start trade."

Wu Siyu asked, "Do you understand the situation over there?"

"I don't know much about it, but I'll see how it goes. The purpose of this visit is to connect with the Ezo people first, and then I'll talk about what to do."

"Who are the Ebi people?" Wang Yuanfang asked.

"They are also called Ainu. The full name of the general in the shogunate of the island country is 'General Zhengyi', and the 'Yi' refers to the Ainu. Speaking of which, these people are the aborigines of Hokkaido."

After listening to Zhao Xin's explanation, Ding Guofeng asked curiously, "Why are you looking for those people?"

Zhao Xin glanced at the crowd and continued to explain: "Furs. There are a lot of furs in the hands of the Ezo people. Let's exchange furs from them first, and then go to Nagasaki to trade with Qing Dynasty merchants. Understand?"

It was said that he was going to Nagasaki for trade, but Zhao Xin had no credit card, and he couldn't get such a thing.This is a little trickier.

Regarding the original story of Xinpai, it actually starts from the 54th year of Kangxi (1715, when the eighth general of the shogunate was in power).

In order to prevent the increasing outflow of gold, silver and copper resources, the shogunate stipulated that the upper limit of Chinese merchant ships going to Japan for trade each year was 21, that is, [-] ships from Nanjing, Fuzhou, and Ningbo, and others such as Xiamen, Taiwan, Guangdong, Jiaozhi, Siam, and Jiaoliuba. There are nine ships in total.

The total trade volume of all Chinese merchant ships is limited to six thousand guan, with an average of about 190 guan for each ship; The total output of the ship’s oars) does not exceed 300 million catties; the number of Chinese merchant ships within the quota is managed by number, and a letter card is issued every year according to the number. Only those who have a letter card and the number matches are allowed to enter the port for trade. go.

This is the famous "Zhengde New Order".

(Those who describe going to Nagasaki for human trafficking are all nonsense. Not to mention that the shogunate does not allow citizens to go to sea at all, let’s say that you can’t enter the port. Unless you come up, you will start the fight, but the result of the fight is hard to say.)
Due to the restrictions on trade and the need to pass the letter card to enter the Nagasaki port for trading, the "trust card storm" was triggered in the Qing Dynasty.

After the implementation of the new Zhengde decree, the 42 ships that received the credit card were mainly [-] ships mainly from Jiangsu and Zhejiang merchants.After they returned to China, a group of captains of the Fujian Gang who had not received the letters filed a lawsuit against the county magistrate of Yin County, Ningbo Prefecture, suing the captains of the Jiangsu and Zhejiang Gangs to accept the letter cards with the Japanese year name, but they were exiled from outsiders and regarded as Zhengshuo. It belongs to disobedience to the imperial court.

To put it bluntly, it is pure envy and jealousy.I can't get it, and I can't let you get it.

The case was handed over to Xu Yuanmeng, the then governor of Zhejiang Province. Xu Yuanmeng believed that the Jiangsu-Zhejiang Merchant Gang "received Nagasaki's local licenses with Chinese merchant ships, which not only behaved well, but also had some drawbacks over time."

Therefore, all the 42 letter cards of Jiangsu and Zhejiang merchants were confiscated by Zhejiang customs supervision, and the Qing court Jiuqing was still planning to negotiate and convict them.

However, Kangxi at that time still understood, he said in the edict: "This ticket is only a token of mutual trade, not a document with the local officials of our country... The customs officials of our country give the foreign ship ticket, only the same. For inspection purposes, it is not possible to compare the printed texts and wills of the Ministry."

Kangxi meant that the governor of Zhejiang and the various ministries of the imperial court did not know the inside story of trade, and making fuss would inevitably affect the trade of merchants, so he ordered the original ticket to be returned to the merchants in Jiangsu and Zhejiang, and trade as usual.

In fact, the reason why Kangxi did this was because the Qing court at that time was extremely short of copper, and there was a large gap in the number of copper coins minted.Therefore, the copper from the island country must be transported in through these Jiangsu and Zhejiang merchants.

(Shen Jingdan mentioned above belongs to the Jiangsu-Zhejiang Merchant Gang)

So if Thor arrives in Nagasaki, if you want to trade, you can only force it.

Even if Zhao Xin found some novel and weird things to give to the shogunate (such as sending elephants to generals, someone really did this), in exchange for "reward cards", he would not be able to enter Hong Kong until the next year.

He doesn't have the time!No way, if you don't give a letter card, you can send shells for free.

Zhao Xin thought about it, and began to crook the building.

He thought of the next question, what kind of trade can he do with Qing Dynasty merchants in Nagasaki?
In the seventeenth century, the main trade commodity of Tang boats was gold sand or gold ingots.The Zheng family's fleet, which undertakes the transportation, transports the gold to the Coromandel coast of India for trading, and can obtain a profit of 20% to 40%.However, when the Qing Dynasty completed its unification, especially after the capture of Taiwan Island and the destruction of the Zheng family, the shogunate immediately stopped the export of gold ingots.

For the current Tang people who go to Japan to trade, the most attractive thing for them is copper.

The exporter in the island country responsible for processing the copper is called "Izumiya", which is the later "Sumitomo Trading Company"; in addition, there is also Echigoya, which is engaged in textile import trade, which is the later "Mitsui Trading Company".

As for the food, it is nothing more than shark fin abalone and sea cucumber, plus a small amount of handicrafts and samurai swords.

Zhao Xin didn't want to mix too much with copper trading.Because even if the price of copper in another time and space is very cheap, the merchants of the Qing Dynasty would not trade gold at all.

In this era, the most commodities shipped by Qing Dynasty merchants to Nagasaki were mainly raw silk, textiles, medicinal materials, sugar, and a small amount of minerals used for dyeing and miscellaneous books and paper.

In general, this is still an era of barter trade.

Maybe... Zhao Xin suddenly thought that maybe the glass thing can be done.

The Qing court set up a glass factory under the Neijofu Manufacturing Office. Through the use of pigments, formulas and techniques introduced by early European missionaries and Western merchants, it developed and produced glass utensils for the imperial court.

Among these glass utensils, there are transparent and smooth flat glass, colorful monochromatic glass, trapezoidal glass, glass tire enamel, glass paintings, and multi-faceted inlaid glass.It is mainly used for doors and windows of palace buildings, vehicles, vehicles, eating utensils, stationery, and even body decorations; the most famous of which is the snuff bottle.

By the way, how much is a glass snuff bottle in another time and space?It's like only a few dozen bucks.Going a step further, selling flat glass for cabbage prices.

The more he thought about it, the more he felt that something was wrong.

So, apart from people and gold, what else do you need in the island country?

Zhao Xin's eyes turned to the conference table, and a bag of black melon seeds caught his attention.

Black... black..., I'll go!It's coal!
To be precise, it is the Ishikari Coal Mine in the Yubari area of ​​Ezo. Its coal reserves are 300 million tons, and it is also high-quality thermal coal.

There are actually coal mines near Beihai Town, but they are all low-quality lignite.The chemical reactivity of lignite is strong, and it is easy to be weathered and difficult to store and transport. When burning, it pollutes the air seriously and produces a large amount of black ash.However, the mined lignite is pulverized, but it is a very good fertilizer.

With coal, coupled with a steam motor, there is electricity, and maybe a large-scale fleet of sailboats can be realized.

Since there is going to be a conflict with the Tokugawa shogunate sooner or later, it's better to use the Ezo ground first.

Thinking of this, Zhao Xin clapped the table and said loudly, "I changed my mind, take Hokkaido first!"

There was silence in the Thor's conference room, and no one responded.

"I'm going, when did these guys leave? Don't say a word." Zhao Xin said helplessly, looking at the empty room.

Liu Sheng and the others had already slipped away.

Originally, a few of them were listening to what Zhao Xin said about "Ezo" and "Nagasaki", but Zhao Xin was silent as he spoke, and he lowered his head and didn't know what he was thinking about.

If only that was the case.But Liu Sheng and the others saw Zhao Xin's face gnashing his teeth for a while, and then grinning wickedly for a while; at the same time, they were still muttering something.

So Liu Sheng winked at the others, and the six quietly got up and went to the deck, standing on the side of the boat and chatting.

Ding Guofeng said to the other five: "I said, isn't Mr. Zhao thinking about who to pit again?"

"Why do you say it again?" Wang Yuanfang asked strangely, "Who has he cheated on?"

"Hunchun's Qing soldiers, and that Sendai clan." Ding Guofeng looked like I knew Zhao Xin very well.

"I think it's almost the same. He didn't say anything about Nagasaki when he was talking. I guess he was calculating someone." Liu Sheng crossed his hands, looking very authoritative.

"Do you think he is going to fight the shogunate?" Zhao Liang asked.

"Not really. By the way, we just signed an agreement with Sendai Fan. It's only been two days since we turned our face?" Wu Siyu said uncertainly.

"You don't know that. Let me tell you, Sendai Domain and the Shogunate are not the same." Ding Guofeng said proudly.

"Don't guess. You will know when you should know." Wang Yuanfang advised.

Wu Siyu looked up inadvertently and saw Zhao Xin walking out of the cabin.

"Look, he's out."

The six saw Zhao Xin walking slowly in front of him, lit a cigarette, smoked a few puffs before slowly saying: "Continue to recruit soldiers. When the next batch of refugees arrives, we will expand the team to at least 500 people."

Liu Sheng was stunned. He said last week not to easily expand the scale of conscription, why did he change his mind now?

"Give me a reason." Liu Sheng stared at Zhao Xin and asked.

"Take down the open-pit coal mine in Ezo!"

(End of this chapter)