The literary giants of the late Ming Dynasty began by copying books

Chapter 17: Punishing Li Dan
Although Li Dan and the others are the overlords on the Fujian sea, these guys are not law-abiding citizens to the Ming Dynasty.

In the early years of the Ming Dynasty, the so-called merchants and pirates were often similar groups whose boundaries could not be distinguished.

Many of them, like Li Dan, were pirates in their early years or had various relationships with pirate forces.

The Ming Dynasty only dared to switch to the Longqing Dynasty after the Jiajing Dynasty suppressed the coastal Japanese pirates. Otherwise, the coastal defense alone would be a headache for Ming officials after the switch.

In his early years, Li Dan mainly engaged in trade between the Ming Dynasty and Luzon. Li Dan was called Captain Lee by the Portuguese colonists in Luzon because of his status as the master of the sea. This was not only the meaning of Captain Li, but also the name given by the Dutch to the Chinese in Luzon. An honorary title, which was translated as "Kapitan" at this time.

Li Dan and others made huge profits from Luzon trade, but in the past two years, the main force of Li Dan's trade turned to Japan.

Just because of the Wanli War to Aid Korea, Ming Dynasty started fighting with the Japanese in Korea. In order to cause trouble to Ming Dynasty, Japanese pirates began to attack Ming Dynasty's seaports.

Therefore, in the first two years of the Ming Dynasty, trade with Japan was again cut off to prevent the enemy from capitalizing on the enemy.

After the official ban, traders like Li Dan were able to gain huge benefits on the route to Japan.To put it bluntly, it is smuggling, or smuggling to an enemy country. It is not an exaggeration to say that it is collaboration with the enemy and treason.

Li Dan softened his attitude slightly, took out a letter from his pocket and said: "Father Mingjian, today I am going to verify the affairs of the owners of more than 20 sea-going ships. Their family members have written the details here. They are all sick. I am at home and have not left Fujian, and all the shipowners on Yuegang have also written proof that none of the more than 20 shipowners have been to Japan this year."

Lin Shiqing took Li Dan's certificate and handed it to Gao Yin with both hands.

Li Dan said with a smile: "This year our merchants in Yuegang have contributed tens of thousands of taels of silver to the imperial court. Every merchant said that if they deliberately create difficulties, they will probably chill everyone's heart."

Gao Yin opened the letter and looked at it without saying a word. After a long time, he raised his head, rolled his eyes and said: "Your brother said that they went to Luzon, so he deceived our family? Take him to jail." stand up."

Li Dan said quickly: "This brother of mine is indeed a little unstable. I would like to ask your father-in-law to ignore the faults of others. Today I meet your father-in-law for the first time. As a local proprietor, we also have a big gift to give."

He greeted the people behind him, and soon someone in the room took out a beautiful gift list and presented it to Gao Yin.

"Hahahaha," Gao Yin glanced at the contents of the gift list and suddenly changed his face, laughed loudly, and said: "I came to Fujian to supervise taxes to work for the emperor, how can anyone give me a gift?"

Hearing this, Li Dan couldn't help clenching his fists, but he could only swallow his anger and said: "Of course I will give him a gift for the current emperor."

"That's good," Gao Yin waved his hand, took the gift list, and asked everyone to prepare to leave. Before leaving, he raised the sedan curtain and looked at Li Dan and said:
"I told your brothers before to do their jobs well and not to do anything evil again. Your brothers don't seem to have kept this in mind!"

Li Dan was startled, lowered his head and bowed to see the guests off.

Gao Yin added: "If you continue to act recklessly, our family won't be so polite next time!"

Li Dan's face turned red and white, and he didn't dare to raise his head until Gao Yin's sedan walked out of the alley.

Wang Wenlong passed Li Dan's carriage in a carriage and saw that in addition to Li Dan's sedan there was a small sedan in the procession. At this time, the people in the sedan quietly opened the curtain and looked at the situation outside.

Just glancing into the sedan, Wang Wenlong saw the pretty face of a woman, about sixteen or seventeen years old, wearing the clothes of a young lady who had not left the court.

Seeing Wang Wenlong's car passing by, the woman quickly put the sedan down. The guard next to the sedan quickly walked to the front of the sedan to block Wang Wenlong's sight and said a few words to the woman in the sedan.

Wang Wenlong frowned when he heard this. People in the Ming Dynasty of this era might not understand the conversation between these two people. Since the pronunciation is different in the Fujian area, they probably thought it was a dialect of a certain place in Fujian.

But Wang Wenlong could tell right away that the two people were speaking Japanese, and the guard was asking the young lady in the sedan if she was frightened.

Back at his house, Gao Yin called Wang Wenlong, Lin Shiqing and several of his followers to the flower hall. "This Li Dan does business with the Japanese all day long, but he still has many connections to protect him. Even our family can't catch him. Can you give us an idea on how to deal with him?"

Lin Zongwen, the commander of Gao Yin's cavalry, immediately said: "Father, let's tie up his brothers and torture them severely when they come back. If you don't believe me, we won't get any information."

"Bullshit!" Gao Yin said, "Today we came to our door and he could even come up with a letter to excuse us. If we could arrest someone, we would have arrested him long ago. Do we really want to offend all the maritime merchants in Fujian?"

Lin Zongwen said quickly: "This is a villain who has not thought well. Please punish me, father-in-law."

Gao Yin glanced at Wang Wenlong and said, "What can you do?"

"Well," Wang Wenlong said with a smile, "if I go back to my father-in-law, I have just returned from overseas and am not familiar with the maritime merchants in Zhangquan. How can I do anything?"

"If you have no choice, just think about it. The Scholars is so well written, why can't you use your brain?"

Gao Yin directly ordered: "Think carefully, no matter whether your idea is good or bad, you must do something. I'll give you three days. If you can't think of something within three days, I'll send it directly to the official."

Wang Wenlong was stunned. He was really a bitch. He had no fame yet, and the Yellow Armor Law still applied to him.

Wang Wenlong was about to cry but had no tears. This damn eunuch was too damn hard to take care of.

Half an hour later, Wang Wenlong found Li Bajin, who was squatting in the courtyard holding a big bowl to eat, and said, "I've come up with an idea. Go talk to your father-in-law."

Li Bajin nodded, put down the bowl and went quickly.

After a while he ran back and said, "Father-in-law wants to see you."

When Wang Wenlong came to Gao Yin's bedroom, he saw Gao Yin wearing a nightgown and flipping through a book "The Scholars" in his hand.

He put down the book and asked Wang Wenlong: "Have you come up with the idea?"

Wang Wenlong nodded.

"Huh, I still have an idea."

Wang Wenlong's face darkened, and he could only pretend that he couldn't hear his sour words.

Gao Yin said to the maids waiting on his left and right: "You guys go out." When the maids all left the door, he pointed to Wang Wenlong: "Say it."

Wang Wenlong sat down and said, "I guess my father-in-law punished Li Dan not only because of the Japanese affairs, right?"

Gao Yin nodded, "Have you seen this?"

Can't you see it?If there was no profit, how could you, a eunuch, be so kind as to help the court catch smugglers?
Gao Yin waved his hand and said, "Don't worry about why. Anyway, I want to get him now."

Wang Wenlong nodded and said: "If you want to catch Li Dan's pigtails, you can start with the people around him."

"This idea is no different from what Lin Zongwen said." Gao Yin frowned slightly.

(End of this chapter)