1635 Han style rises again

Chapter 844 The Messenger from England (continued)
On August 1669, 8, Xuanhua, Xinxiang City (now the small town of Suai in East Timor).

The square located in the west of the city was already crowded with people before ten o'clock in the morning, making the whole Xinxiang city full of fireworks.

Today is the market rush day every tenth in Xinxiang County. People in several surrounding towns and villages temporarily put down their farm work and went to the city together to buy the daily necessities they need.Sickles, hoes, shovels, iron pots, white porcelain dishes, wooden barrels... as well as grain, oil, cloth and other production and living materials.

It has been more than 30 years since Xinxiang was the first overseas territory developed by Qi State.Although, more than 20 years ago, the resident of the Xuanhua District was moved from Xinxiang to Zhenhai (now Dili City, East Timor), which has a more advantageous geographical location, but still relied on its first-mover advantage to become the second most populous county and the largest in Xuanhua. business center.

Various special products from Nanyang and industrial products imported from Hanzhou are collected and transferred here. A large number of merchant ships and immigrants are transported here for a short rest during the annual immigration season. The Dutch East India Company travels to Hanzhou or Weiyuan. Trade and transportation... All these have created the prosperity of Xinxiang City.

According to the population statistics four years ago, the entire Xuanhua District has a population of more than [-], and Xinxiang County accounts for more than [-]%, reaching more than [-].

In addition to Xuanhua Island, the jurisdiction of Xuanhua General Administration District includes Niu Island (now Yandana Island, Indonesia), Beiyi Island (now Weta Island, Indonesia, north of Timor Island), Yanling Island (now Alor Island, Indonesia, North of Timor Island), Songling Island (now Indonesian Rodi Road, southwest of Timor Island), Yuanhe Island (now Indonesian Savu Island, southwest of Timor Island), Funing Island (now Indonesian Sumba Island) and hundreds of others The large and small islands were also placed under the jurisdiction of the Xuanhua General Administration, and became the northern outer barrier of the mainland of Hanzhou.

The Xuanhua general area is mainly based on agricultural planting and forestry logging. A large number of precious woods such as mahogany and sandalwood grow on several islands, as well as high-quality ship materials such as teak, camphor, and nanmu. After a little processing in the area, they will be shipped Shipped to the mainland of Hanzhou, and then processed into a set of expensive furniture and giant ships galloping on the ocean.

Xuanhua Island has abundant rainfall and criss-crossing rivers. After more than 30 years of continuous development, the land that was slightly barren due to soil erosion has become increasingly fertile in the hands of hard-working farmers. The successive irrigation projects have made local rice cultivation Can achieve two or three seasons a year.Today, the Xuanhua region has become the most important grain-producing area in Qi State, providing stable food security for the annual increase in the population (immigrants) in the country.

Viscount Maurice Macmillan, the British special envoy to the Far East, and his team, escorted by several national police officers, wandered among the bustling crowd, stopping and lingering at the stalls of vendors with great interest.

Gein, whether it is minted gold coins or silver coins, they will often be circulated in people's hands. Therefore, if they are not recycled and recast for a long time, they will be severely worn, and the weight of the worn coins will decrease, and they will actually become worthless Bad money.

"Lord Macmillan, they don't accept our silver coins." The entourage talked to the vendor for a long time, and when he took out a dozen silver coins from his pocket, he was rejected by the vendor and asked them to pay Han continental silver dollar.

"Lord Macmillan, the Hanzhou people have adopted the strictest secrecy measures for all new technologies and things." Steven said solemnly: "In order to block the spread of technology, the Hanzhou people have formulated very strict measures. The entry-exit management system will nip any risk of technology leakage and proliferation in the bud."

In order to ensure the stability of the currency value, the Hanzhou Silver Dollar will often recycle heavily worn gold and silver coins (gold coins are generally rarely used in the market and are only used for large-value transactions or cross-border trade) and recast them. .

"Oh, God!" Viscount McMillan listened, his face full of fascination, "Mr. Steven, if the things you described are not fictional, then any new thing that appears in Jianye City , will have a profound impact on the world. So, I'm curious, why didn't any of the manufacturing technology of these novelties spread to Europe?"

Upon seeing this, Simon Steven, the senior manager of the British East India Company who accompanied him, immediately handed over a money bag to Viscount McMillan's entourage, which contained one hundred Hanzhou silver dollars.

"The regime in Hanzhou can sink to counties, villages and towns, and they have also implemented a national management system called household registration. Any outsider who has not been officially registered can hardly walk freely in the territory of Hanzhou. In addition, in Although there are European nationals in this country, the number is very small. This makes it very easy for any foreigner with a European face to be identified and monitored by the police and secret organizations in Hanzhou."

With the abundance of gold and silver mines controlled by Qi State, several local mint factories in Hanzhou disdain to deliberately reduce the gold and silver content in coins to seek huge profits (minting itself is a kind of huge profits).Therefore, Hanzhou silver dollars are widely circulated in many countries and regions such as Southeast Asia, the Malay Peninsula, Indochina Peninsula, India, Daming, Japan and North Korea due to their fineness and exquisite workmanship.

Therefore, when Qi State conducts trade with European countries including the Netherlands, it generally specifies the use of Hanzhou silver dollars as the settlement currency.If foreign businessmen and private individuals want to stay in Hanzhou mainland and overseas territories for a short time, they must exchange the currency in their hands into Hanzhou silver dollars according to the exchange rate given by the Hanzhou big bank, so that they can shop and receive services normally.

From the 17s to the 40s, the phenomena of coin wear, stealing files and cutting, and adulteration and forgery intensified in England and Europe, resulting in a large number of bad coins flooding the market, especially the bad silver coins, and there were also many bad coins in gold coins. .

"The city of wealth, I can understand this. As the seat of the government, it naturally gathers most of the wealth in the country, just like our London in England." Viscount McMillan said with great interest: "But why is this Jianye City Known as the capital of creation?"

"Isn't Hanzhou a regional power with a huge land area and many overseas territories? As long as it is still conducting trade exchanges with other countries and regions, I think it is impossible to implement an absolute technological blockade."

"No way?"

In the square of Nuoda, in addition to selling vegetables, fruits, spices, chickens, ducks, pigs, cattle and sheep, various sea fish and other daily non-staple foods, there are also tea, porcelain, gold handicrafts, sea cucumbers, tortoiseshell, etc. in many large and small stalls. Pearls and other precious commodities can be said to be dazzling and varied.

Another situation is that there are some minters working in mints (mainly controlled by the royal family) who will secretly collude with businessmen to secretly imitate or modify official casting molds and use their spare time to forge coins.Merchants gave the bullion to the minter, who then used the imitation molds to strike inferior coins mixed with other metals.

"Lord Macmillan called Jianye City the capital of creation, which was first proposed by the Dutch." Steven said, "Because countless novel things were invented and created in Jianye City. There There is a kind of power machinery that can drive the machine, so that their factories can continuously produce a large amount of goods; two steel tracks are laid on the road from Jianye City to the inland, a huge steel behemoth Dragging a long string of carriages weighing hundreds of tons on the rails; countless clearly visible glass products, a piece of clock with very accurate timing, and various amazing precision instruments are also produced there. For the cloisonne of a work of art, the design and construction of very advanced ships..."

In order to solve the problem of stealing files, cutting and imitation, as early as 1663, the Royal Mint in London, England began to use machines to mint coins, cut, stamp and cast precious metals, and stamped characters and patterns on the edges of coins, and created The vertical edge prevents filing and cutting.However, these new machine-made coins did not enter circulation quickly, but were hoarded by people because of their high silver content and stable currency value, or were melted and exported by some merchants.

During this period, Britain had not yet issued banknotes, the pound sterling, and still adopted the gold and silver bistandard system, and silver coins were commonly used in people's daily life.However, the coinage of Britain, like the currencies of most European countries, generally has the phenomenon of "short of catty and two".

Viscount McMillan carefully selected a dozen pearls in front of a vendor, and picked up some strange tortoise shells, and then asked his followers to discuss the price with the vendor.

Ordinary people and street vendors in Qi State generally do not recognize foreign currencies, because they cannot distinguish the fineness of these gold and silver coins, and they don't know much about the so-called currency exchange rate officially released, so they simply accept Hanzhou silver dollars.

Viscount McMillan and other British people did not attract special attention from the people in the market.This Dutch red-haired barbarian often travels to and from Xinxiang, or stops for supplies, or purchases a large amount of local supplies. This Westerner has seen many faces, so it is nothing unusual.However, seeing that their group was guarded by several policemen, it was reckoned that they were important figures from the barbarians, and they were going to Hanzhou to meet our King of Qi.

"They...they seem to dislike the lack of quality of our silver coins." The entourage said with some embarrassment: "They only accept Hanzhou silver dollars to pay for the goods we purchased."

"Are other places in Hanzhou as rich and full of vitality as this small town?" Viscount McMillan asked.

"Why?" Viscount McMillan asked in amazement: "When we purchased supplies in Batavia, the Dutch accepted our silver coins. Why didn't the Han Chinese accept them?"

"Oh, God! Listen to what you say, why do I think Hanzhou is a very terrible country."

"Lord Macmillan, in the past 20 years, the Dutch have tried to steal Hanzhou's technology and manufacturing methods of new things, and they have also succeeded. The fast boats that appear in Europe are similar to the shape of flying shears, It is the technology that the Dutch obtained from Hanzhou. However, the Dutch have also lost no less than a hundred technical spies for this over the past 20 years. It is said that those captured Dutch spies ended up dying Not very good, all were exiled to wild overseas islands, either died of tropical diseases, or were tortured into a walking corpse by heavy labor. Our East India Company has also sent similar technical spies to sneak into the Hanzhou continent, but none of them can Get out safely."

Even Hanzhou silver dollars flowed into Europe through the Dutch East India Company, becoming one of the precious metals stored by the European people.

"Lord Macmillan, this small town is just one of the many overseas territories of Hanzhou." Simon Steven said: "As for whether other places in Hanzhou are so full of vitality, I am not very clear. After all, I have no I have been to too many places in Hanzhou. However, the seat of their government - Jianye City, is definitely a city of wealth and a capital of creation."

In addition to the problem of natural wear and tear, folks also privately file or cut coins.Since metal coins were hand-made at that time, the production was relatively rough, and the edges of the coins were often uneven, so some people secretly filed or cut off the edges of the coins, and then put them into circulation.And after these "leftovers" that have been stolen or cut have accumulated to a certain amount over time, they can be recast into new coins.

"Yes, Hanzhou is indeed a very scary country." Steven thought deeply, "I'm afraid you don't know yet, Hanzhou is still a country where all the people are soldiers. Their citizens, when they reach their age, have to serve in the military Moreover, all their male nationals, aged from 15 to 45, undergo several weeks of military training every year. That is to say, once a war breaks out, Hanzhou can mobilize hundreds of thousands of troops to the battlefield at any time. "

"Hundreds of thousands of troops!...Oh, God! In Europe, perhaps only France can have such a large-scale generosity. So, Hanzhou should be a barbaric country with poor soldiers and ransoms?"

"Yes, Lord Macmillan." Steven shook his head and said, "Hanzhou has undisguised territorial ambitions for the entire East Indies. They have built a powerful navy for this purpose, and they are using various means to Cannibalize and embezzle this vast area with countless islands. At the same time, they are also full of greed for India, Persia, Arabia, and even Africa. I believe that this country may try to place the entire Indian Ocean in the future. Within their sphere of influence, they have become the masters of the Eastern world."

"According to the accurate world map provided by our East India Company, Hanzhou seems to be a huge island in the vast ocean. Their geographical environment is very similar to our England, and they are far away from the mainland. In my opinion, As the same maritime country, England and Hanzhou should have a common destiny. That is to control the ocean and check and balance the mainland. Perhaps, we can have the same interests and the basis for cooperation.”

(End of this chapter)