Chapter 130 Visit [Part 1]
In the fifth month after the opening of the Foreign Affairs Office, at the invitation of the East India Company and the Senior Commissioner of the Bank of England, Mr. Ruwang, the first batch of overseas merchants with strong capital finally obtained the permit issued by the Foreign Affairs Office and arrived at Shangyu Port by ship.
According to what Ruwang said in the letter, their purpose of this trip was to investigate the details of a certain mysterious Eastern country and to find business opportunities to make a fortune in the coastal area where the textile industry was well developed. Mr. Ruwang described the business opportunities as extremely attractive in his letters, but most wealthy businessmen came only reluctantly to save face, and they did not really believe in the so-called "opportunities" along the coast. They had been doing business in Southeast Asia for a long time, and most of their business was only conducted through Guangdong. Although they could get a glimpse of the exquisite craftsmanship of the East from the fragmentary goods they saw, they still did not dare to go deep into the inland of the Central Plains on a large scale and make a heavy bet.
——That's right. I heard that the textiles from China are of high quality and low price, enough to sweep away all the counterfeit and shoddy goods on the market in Southeast Asia. There are even many small vendors who have taken advantage of the situation and made a fortune by relying on the trade routes along the southeast coast. But big capital is always more cautious; it is okay to gamble with hundreds of thousands of taels of silver, but if the bet is millions of taels, no one can afford it.
To be honest, this time the wealthy merchants broke the convention and came in a group, partly because of the face of the Bank of England and Mr. Ruwang; the other part was also because of some strange rumors. Regardless of other things, the place name "Shangyu" alone has become famous in Southeast Asia over the past year or so, and has emerged above many explosive news, becoming an eye-catching hot spot in trade, and even the subsequent Sino-Japanese naval battle had to take a step back. Merchants who went to Southeast Asia all said that the old overlord Portugal had brazenly invaded China because of a religious conflict, but was beaten badly in Shangyu and was forced to sign and agree to a large number of unequal treaties.
The rumors spread by the merchants may not be true, but Portugal has indeed restrained itself a lot in the past year or two. It has kept a low profile and never caused any trouble. It has even tolerated Chinese merchant ships traveling freely in the waters it colonized. Judging from the law of the jungle in Southeast Asia, it is possible that he really suffered a heavy blow from the Chinese and is still unable to breathe.
Out of the merchants' instinct to curry favor with the powerful, traveling merchants had to pay tribute to the new winner in the South China Sea Colosseum. Therefore, the wealthy people came together this time, not only for the illusory business opportunities, but also with a large number of rare and precious treasures, hoping to present them to the local officials and seek undeserved status.
At that time, exchanges between China and foreign countries were still rare, and the wealthy merchants in Southeast Asia were not clear about the nature of the Da'an court, so they behaved very cautiously. They temporarily anchored their large ships overseas, patrolled outside the port in small boats, and only sent their eloquent followers to disembark and make requests. After obtaining permission from the government, the merchants carefully sailed into the port, anchored on the shore without moving, and waited for their master's call.
Of course, the wealthy merchants have extremely sharp eyesight. Even if they temporarily stop outside a deliberately isolated and remote coastline, they can still infer a lot of key things from the fleeting glimpse of the scene on the ship. For example, when the ship sailed in, they could see tall chimneys standing one after another, many of which were emitting thick smoke. If they looked out, they could see tall wooden poles behind the chimneys, with the flags flying on them.
"Sail?" Enli, an Italian businessman standing on the bow and looking out, murmured.
It is indeed a sail. Although the cloth had obviously been contaminated by smoke and dust and was almost unrecognizable, those present were all experienced sailors and would recognize the pattern of the sail. This triangular sail is made of a mixture of linen and tanned leather, which is a characteristic of Portuguese ships. Judging from its size and craftsmanship, it must be the mainsail of the top flagship of the Portuguese navy; this kind of thing is hung here...
There was a moment of silence on the ship, and the leading Dutch merchant Paul whispered the conclusion:
"It seems that the Portuguese have failed miserably."
The sails of the main fleet have been stolen. How can this naval battle not be brutal? The navy is an absolute money-eating beast, and the investment in aristocratic troops is incredibly high; even for a top power like Portugal, losing a main fleet at one time is an unbearable burden, no wonder it has been so quiet in the past one or two years.
"But the Central Plains didn't publicize it." Enli, who was standing at the bow, suddenly said, "Such a victory... Such a victory, we actually learned about it from gossip among merchants, so we are mostly skeptical."
Is it more than just half-believing and half-doubting? If we gossips of traveling merchants are to be believed, the Battle of Shangyu was no longer a large-scale naval war, but a desperate struggle between humans and gods. Needless to say, the strength of the Portuguese side was obvious, and the means used by the Chinese side was "rain of fire", with flames and sulfur pouring down from the sky, burning the Spanish warships and artillery in a moment, just as if God had burned Sodom and Gomorrah. Such absurd news was just like the nonsense of a drunkard sailor after drinking too much rum. Of course, no one would believe it. Because of such contempt, most people's view of the so-called Sino-Portuguese naval battle was just a limited-scale naval battle in a remote area - until now.
Of course, even after getting a glimpse of the true outcome of the Sino-Portuguese naval war, the merchants were still confused. The Age of Discovery was an absolute Darwin jungle, where the victors would absolutely insult the losers at all costs, draining their bones and marrow, skinning them, and pulling out all their tendons, until all their value was exploited. According to today's unspoken convention, as the new power that conquered the old overlord, Da'an should publicize this great victory and gloriously ascend to the throne by stepping on Portugal's head. This way of doing things in obscurity is really contrary to the code of conduct of businessmen.
"Maybe it's the Chinese habit." After a brief and confused silence, a certain merchant spoke up: "I have dealt with merchants from Guangdong. According to Oriental habits, they... they seem to value 'making a fortune in silence' and don't like to publicize their achievements. This may be a tradition..."
Everyone uttered an "oh" with different expressions. Generally speaking, this introverted and conservative behavior is actually not popular, because when businessmen travel around the world, the most important skill is to boast about their strength and gain greater trust. If you artificially build up your own momentum, you will be seen as weak and vulnerable, and everyone will trample on you.
Of course, ordinary examples do not apply now. The winner is never blamed. On the contrary, any of his actions will be considered wise and great, with profound meaning, and will arouse extremely deep imagination. For example, after just a few sentences of conversation, someone speculated something new based on the description of “making a fortune in silence.”
"I heard vaguely," Paul suddenly said, "In addition to fighting against Portugal, the Da'an court also went to war against Japan."
"Yes, many merchants who hired Japanese warriors knew about this." Enli said, "It is said that Da'an's expeditionary force bombarded Edo, and the situation was quite strange..."
Hearing this, the noise in the boat quieted down. Everyone was well-informed, so of course they knew what the so-called "strange situation" was. Whether the war was fierce or not was secondary. Just looking at the news spread by the Japanese, the area outside Edo Castle was simply a living hell with hundreds of demons parading at night. The scenes were absolutely unimaginable to humans. If it were in the past, such rumors that were almost weird would probably be laughed off, but now...
Most people who make a living on the sea are superstitious. Even if they are not foolish enough to truly believe in some strange oriental magic, they will inevitably feel some inexplicable fear in their hearts. But above the panic and trembling, there is a vague thought lingering:
“What do the Chinese want to do?”
·
The boat stayed at the port for two cups of tea before the merchants were taken ashore by local yamen runners and took horse-drawn carriages. According to the process notified in advance by the Chinese side, the first day is time for the merchants to rest. They can visit everywhere with the Kankou in hand. As long as they do not set foot in military restricted areas, there are no other taboos. So a few brave foreigners also lifted the curtain of the carriage and looked outside cautiously - they were all well-traveled and knowledgeable people, and after taking a quick look around, they quickly made comparisons in their minds. Judging from what we see on the market, the prosperity and wealth of this place is certainly not as good as colonial trading cities such as Manila and Mumbai; but if we observe the cityscape in detail, we will find that the construction of some infrastructure is so exquisite and complete that it is unbelievable and astonishing.
The flat and clean ground, the neat houses, the orderly crowds, and the deep ditches and wells that can often be seen on both sides of the road - the merchants' interpreter asked the coachman who drove their car, and the coachman said that these were the so-called "sewers" and "wells", which were used to drain sewage and bury dirt when it rained, and lime was added for regular disinfection; this small city was so clean and tidy because there were people cleaning it all the time.
——There are actually such meticulous measures! You know, although the trading cities at that time were prosperous, the large population gathered and the garbage piled up like mountains and could not be cleaned up. After the next rain, mosquitoes and cockroaches flew everywhere in dense swarms, just like the fly hell created by the devil Baalzebub. As for the old large cities in Europe... Alas, the current King of France still has to walk on the dunghill of Paris!
Because of this strategy of coexisting with garbage, the cities created by the colonists always have an upper limit on their capacity. Once the population exceeds 500,000, a great plague will inevitably come to reap lives. Most of the sea merchants had experienced escaping the plague, so they could especially appreciate the magical effect of cleansing. So when they reviewed the dishes and marveled at them, they couldn't help but feel a little ashamed.
To be honest, if you were to suddenly move from a cesspool and a pile of cockroaches to a simple but clean area, you would instinctively feel ashamed; not to mention that in order to cover up the stench of a long voyage, the sea merchants sprayed a lot of perfume on their bodies, which made the drivers sneeze and looked very irritated...
Of course, as smart businessmen, after a little bit of shame, they are concerned about the broader applications of this infrastructure.
"If this technology can be rolled out," Enyi whispered in French, "it will be no problem for this port to expand to 200,000 or 300,000 people. In this way..."
In this way, Shangyu becomes a very competitive port. If this port could be used properly and a new sea route could be opened up, it would probably be another golden rice bowl with endless benefits; maritime merchants were well-informed and obviously knew the importance of such a thing.
However, no one would take the initiative to express their opinion when the situation is unclear. The businessmen in the car looked at each other for a moment, and then looked out the window again; they had already made up their minds that they must remain utmost calm and composed on this trip, and never show excessive emotions in front of ordinary servants, so as not to let the nobles behind this mysterious oriental country underestimate them and lower the price of cooperation.
However, this calm and unhurried determination has indeed faced considerable challenges. The carriage arrived at the club where the guests rested for a while and were then guided by the arranged servants to wander around and have a look. Of course, the businessmen who were good at socializing would not miss this opportunity. Seeing that the runners sent by the government had left, they quickly asked the interpreter to give money to the servants, quietly pulled a few passers-by from the street, and tried every means to get information from the civilians. These men and women who make a living at the bottom of society have never seen the world, and they are very nervous when they see tall-nosed foreigners, so they can make up stories and say anything. But precisely because he was so honest and didn't know how to tell lies, the more he spoke, the more annoying it became.
These common people said that they were disaster victims from nearby areas who had fled here due to famine and were taken in by the local official Hai Gangfeng, and were lucky enough to have a place to stay. These common people also said that since Hai took office here, he has been recruiting refugees from all over, giving them food and clothes, and letting them work in workshops, weaving cloth, smelting iron, burning "lime", so that they finally had a way to make a living and were greatly rewarded by the higher-ups. Of course, these workshops were also very simple and small at the beginning, but since the "Foreign Affairs Office" of the court designated this place as a "special zone", the chimneys on the workshops have sprung up like bamboo shoots after rain. No matter how many refugees were recruited, they could not fill the endless needs of the workshops. The government even gave them subsidies so that they could try to call their relatives to work...
"The current market price is half a dollar for a strong laborer to work, and they say the price will increase in the future!" Several laborers who know the world told the merchants: "I don't know how long this market will last, we can only work day by day and see!"
The laborers worked day by day, but the wealthy merchants knew everything; they quietly calculated the theoretical output of each workshop according to the laborers, and then calculated the average cost of each piece of cloth, and kept silent after each calculation; after quietly sending away the people who came to ask questions, they tried to lobby the servants to cancel the usual arrangements of visiting historical sites and sightseeing, and instead went to the suburbs where the factories were concentrated to take a look.
Even with strict management and more advanced cleanliness concepts, the workshop environment in the early days of the Industrial Revolution was still quite harsh: humid, hot, tedious and noisy, and only the lower-class refugees could endure such work. As there was no prior arrangement, these businessmen barged in when the factory started working, paced back and forth amid the squeaking noise of thousands of looms, braved the billowing water mist, checked the flying shuttles one by one, and examined the improved steam structure; a few knowledgeable people even paid money to bribe the workers and weaved half a piece of cotton cloth themselves.
More than half an hour later, the visiting group of sea merchants finally withdrew from the workshop, their clothes and hair were soaked; they were sweating profusely, partly because of the steam and the unbearable heat from the baking coal inside; the other part was due to some unspeakable psychological effect - as an absolute bulk commodity in international trade at that time, there was probably no merchant who did not understand the market price of cloth; but precisely because they were well versed in the market, they were inevitably shocked.
"I've checked them one by one." Seeing the servants who were assigned to fetch water for them from a distance, Enli, who was familiar with the textile industry, said in a low voice: "On a minimum, a workshop like this can weave at least 16,000 bolts of cloth in a year."
"Sixteen thousand rolls of cloth," Paul said. "There are more than fifty workshops here."
"That's 800,000 bolts of cloth or more. The Spanish-occupied Luzon only produced 500,000 bolts of cloth a year, right?"
"... Exactly. And I've already asked, if the order quantity is sufficient, the workshop here can reduce the price to eight cents to one tael of silver per horse, which is about one-third of the Spanish price."
After a few words of conversation, the businessmen who were listening carefully were slightly stunned. We all grew up in the midst of war, so we certainly understand what a competitor with reliable quality at one-third the price means in business. Not to mention, the small town of Shangyu can easily produce 800,000 pieces of cloth, beating the Spanish in production...
"That's not right." Enli suddenly realized, "800,000 rolls of cloth, who can eat them all?"
"Of course it's the Portuguese." As a well-known merchant in Southeast Asia and a senior member of the Dutch Chamber of Commerce, Mr. Paul knew much more than most people could imagine: "According to the Shangyu Treaty signed between China and Portugal, Portugal's colonies in Southeast Asia have been fully opened to the Chinese, and they are not allowed to impose higher tariffs than in the mainland. This is called 'free trade'."
Having said this, Mr. Paul paused unconsciously. Of course, he had long understood the details of the Treaty of Shangyu, but at first he thought that China was using the threat of war to force Portugal to accept high-priced and low-quality goods. But judging from the current situation, the situation seems - it seems to be just the opposite?
You know, it’s different from the situation after the Industrial Revolution when productivity surged but demand was insufficient, and the old industrial countries around the world were desperately waging wars to grab markets. Today, productivity has not yet leaped, but Portugal and Spain’s consumption capacity has skyrocketed because of the gold and silver in the New World. They are in an era of strong consumer demand and scarce material supply, and they are waving silver around to find goods. It is also for this reason that the most primitive imperialism occupied colonies not to find markets to satisfy capital expansion, but purely to plunder materials and population, and to reduce all the indigenous people to slaves, forcing them to produce goods to satisfy their own desires. Under this logic, the strength and wealth of the Spanish Empire was precisely because they ruled the largest piece of land in Southeast Asia, had enough slaves to drive themselves, and could enjoy cheap cloth at two taels and five cents of silver per bolt...
——Wait, isn’t this whole logic a little bit wrong?
Paul opened his mouth, vaguely confused.
The Spaniards were the most powerful, the richest, and owned the most territory, so they could enjoy cloth at two taels and five cents of silver per piece; the other powerful countries were far inferior, so the price they had to pay was at least three taels of silver, and their cost and quality were far inferior - so far, the logic was very smooth and fluent, and in line with the common sense of businessmen. But now Portugal appeared; after being beaten up by the Chinese, the Portuguese signed an unequal treaty and could only accept cloth for eight cents to one ounce of silver in a sad and humiliating manner...
Well, isn't there something wrong with this matter?
Paul turned around blankly and saw the equally blank faces of his companions - apparently, they had also thought of this fatal loophole at the same time:
After getting beaten, you can get a piece of cloth worth one or two taels of silver. Is this a punishment or a reward?
“Strange… No wonder.” After being stunned for a long time, Paul murmured to himself, his tone almost hazy: “No wonder the Portuguese have not had any special reaction after being beaten up. They are so strangely calm…”
Being beaten is of course humiliating and painful, but if after being beaten up you can get abundant and sufficient goods, a stable market, and the coveted industrial products, then the humiliation of being beaten doesn't seem to matter. It is true that Portugal paid several million in compensation in the Treaty of Yu, but how could the fleet's expenditure over the past few decades in search of reliable supplies for the colonies be limited to this amount? If spending a few million taels could solve a problem that had troubled the kingdom for a generation, then it would be a deal that couldn't be better.
——It seems that after being beaten up by the Chinese, Portugal still made a lot of money!
Of course, after the defeat in Shangyu, there would definitely be some ungrateful radicals in the navy clamoring all day long, intending to reorganize the troops and train martial arts to retaliate against China or something like that, but the fact that the Portuguese have been able to restrain themselves until now shows that the old imperialism is indeed capable, and the top leaders have already cleared away the fog of emotions and seen the essence of the facts, and will not be shaken by a little humiliation. All expenditures of the empire should have a purpose, so why rashly increase armaments? Is it to protect the trade between China and Portugal from being disrupted by the Chinese?
——That’s enough.
People who are involved in politics must have a sense of the overall situation and know how to look at problems from the essence. China certainly won the Battle of Shangyu, but the Portuguese were able to enjoy fabrics, porcelain and all kinds of fine industrial products from then on, which was also a big win; this is called a win-win situation, this is called the best of both worlds - when other countries were still struggling with high-priced, low-quality goods that cost only three or four taels per piece, the Portuguese had already enjoyed the high-end goods after the Industrial Revolution in advance. So choice is always more important than hard work. If someone loses a hand in Shangyu, they can instantly surpass the efforts of your three generations of ancestors for decades...
Damn, why? !
Why can you feel superior by signing an unequal treaty? Are we, a country that has never lost a war or signed an unequal treaty, now second-rate? Is there some serious disease in this world? !
Isn't it just an unequal treaty? Who do you think can't sign? We, the Dutch, are actually not unable to accept this humiliation!
——As a senior executive of the Dutch Chamber of Commerce and a top capitalist who had purchased the title with a huge sum of money, Paul took a deep breath and his eyes bulged unconsciously!
·
After a day's rest, Paul and others were summoned by Hai Gangfeng to meet with senior officials from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs at the local government office. It is said that in order to open up the South Seas trade route, the cabinet took the matter very seriously and even condescended to specially send the prince of Duke Mu to various special zones to preside over the matter. This was an undeserved honor, and made Paul and others flattered and grateful beyond words.
Because he had other things to do, Prince Mu only showed up once before the banquet and gave a short impromptu speech. His original intention was probably to ease the atmosphere and win over foreign guests, so the content of his speech was very straightforward and easy to understand (of course, most later historians suspected that this kind of vernacular speech was not only out of consideration, but also because the host's cultural level was too low to support a long speech in classical Chinese); but such attentive and considerate behavior directly led to an extremely terrible accident at the banquet.
Overall, everything seemed fine and normal as the prince saluted everyone gracefully; until he glanced at the manuscript in his hand and began to speak loudly:
[In this new era, merchant ships and carriages have connected the world; all merchants from the Western Regions, you are spreading not only goods, but also precious friendship, the traditional friendship between China and the Arab world...]
Hai Gangfeng, who was standing next to him, coughed very loudly, and managed to calm the situation and prevent it from getting worse, maintaining the calm and seriousness of the scene. But if this little mistake was embarrassing, then the next thing the prince said after changing the manuscript could only be described as horrifying. Anyway, Mu took out another piece of paper from his bosom and continued to read aloud:
[In this new era, merchant ships and carriages have connected the world; all merchants from the West, you are spreading not only goods, but also precious friendship, the traditional friendship between China and European countries...]
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