The Han culture is spreading strongly in Southeast Asia

Chapter 94 Hakkas and the Dutch East India Company

The people from the Ye family of Taogong City have arrived, but it can be seen that the Ye family members are quite wary of Mo Zibu.

Because the people who came were not the elders of the clan, but the brave young generation, who seemed to want to show their strength.

This sturdy man named Ye Xianyang was about twenty-seven or twenty-eight years old. Even with his clothes, you could see that he was muscular. He had a big braid on his head, a broad mouth, and a very square-looking face.

Behind Ye Xianyang, there were several strong men from the Ye family. They were wearing clothes similar to the uniforms of the Green Camp soldiers of the Qing Dynasty, holding long spears, short spears, waist swords, rattan shields, etc., and looked very alert.

Mo Zibu had another headache. If the disunity index between the Chaozhou people of Southeast Asia, the Cantonese people, the western Guangdong people, and the Qionghai people was ten, then the disunity index between the Hakka people and these people was at least fifty.

But this is not their fault, because at this time there were already signs of fighting between the natives and the Hakkas on the mainland.

In another twenty or thirty years, under tremendous survival pressure, the Han people who migrated south at different times split into two groups, the natives and the Hakkas, in order to grab survival resources, and started a fierce fight, which could even be called a war.

Historically, it even reached the point where a Cantonese-speaking Cantonese person published a book claiming, "There are two ethnic groups in Guangdong: the Hakka and the Fuk Lao. They are neither Cantonese nor Han. Their languages are chirpy and not very civilized."

The Fu Lao here does not refer to Fujianese, but refers to the Chaoshan people under the Greater Minnan language system.

The conflict between them has become so acute that the Cantonese-speaking community no longer considers Hakka and Teochew people as Han Chinese.

Moreover, this trend will become more and more serious with the instigation of the Qing government.

The situation was finally eased thanks to Mr. Sun Yat-sen and others who directed the conflict to the major issues of anti-Manchu revolution and national self-salvation, which allowed it to be gradually resolved.

Although the conflicts now are not as sharp as during the Hakka-Punti conflict in the late Qing Dynasty, they are still quite deep.

Therefore, Mo Zibu could understand Ye Xianyang's defensive mentality. From their perspective, who knows what you, a Cantonese-speaking Cantonese, want to do here?

“The reason why I invited Brother Ye here today is actually because of the unforeseen events in Pattani.

I'm afraid the Reds won't give up and will instigate the Sultan of Kelantan to intervene. Taogongcheng is on the route from Kelantan to Pattani, so Brother Ye should be on high alert."

Mo Zibu naturally couldn't speak Hakka, and his Teochew wasn't very good either, so he could only speak Cantonese first and then Wei Dakuan would relay it in his half-baked Hakka.

Ye Xianyang also had to speak as slowly as possible so that Wei Dakuan could understand him and translate it for Mo Zibu.

Although they are all Han Chinese, it is very difficult to communicate with each other.

Fortunately, Ye Xianyang was very sensible. He did not say that this was all caused by you guys from western Guangdong and implicated us. Instead, he thanked Mo Zibu for his reminder and then said:

"Mr. Mo, please rest assured about this matter. I have been deceived by the red-haired devils several times before. I hate them to the core and will not be deceived by them.

Although the natives of Kelantan do not intermarry with the Chinese, they rely heavily on people from Fujian and Guangdong for trade, mining, farming, etc.

The five surnames of Ye, Xie, Yang, Chen, and Wang all have Kapitans in Kelantan who can communicate with the government. If they really intend to start a war, they will definitely be stopped."

Ye Xianyang's words were righteous, but they made Mo Zibu feel suffocated.

Mo Dalongtou always felt that Ye Xianyang seemed to be afraid that he would interfere in the affairs of Kelantan, or even intend to attack Kelantan. He showed an overconfident contempt for the Dutch.

In general, his attitude is that he is unwilling to have much contact with Mo Zibu, and he seems to be hiding something.

Well, since others have shown this attitude, Mo Zibu can't say anything more.

All they could do was entertain Ye Xianyang, show enough goodwill, and then let the matter go.

However, he did not completely ignore it. In secret, Mo Zibu still asked Wei Dakuan to send someone to Kelantan to inquire about the matter.

. . . .

Five days later, the person who inquired for the news came back.

It turns out that the situation in the Kelantan Sultanate at that time was different from that in Pattani.

There are many gold mines in the mountains and rivers of Kelantan, which attracted a large number of Chinese to come here to pan for gold.

The Hakka people were mostly concentrated in a place called Pulai. The Cantonese-speaking Cantonese people were concentrated along the banks of the Kelantan River and on the hilltops. The Fulao people lived in several ports near the sea and engaged in trade.

Because of the gold mines, hundreds or even thousands of Chinese people arrive in Kelantan every year.

There are at least 30,000 to 40,000 Chinese in the entire Sultanate of Kelantan, accounting for almost 40% of the entire population of the Sultanate.

Because of the scarce resource of gold, the Sultan of Kelantan could not control the chieftains under him.

These small chieftains, known as Wanzhe and Duanzhe, joined forces with the Chinese and each occupied an area for mining.

The end-users do not participate in direct mining, nor do they care how much the Chinese mine.

Anyway, every time you come, you need to pay him a head tax of one or two taels of silver.

When they were about to leave, they would pay them a pound of gold sand as a reward, and they would not be responsible for anything else.

At the same time, the Duanzhe strictly restricted the women under his command and did not allow them to marry Chinese people, for fear that Chinese people would take root here.

The Chinese were also unwilling to marry these "extremely poor indigenous women, with no clothes on their upper body and no pants on their lower body, and they only had to wrap their lower body with the bark of large trees and live in caves in the wild."

In this situation, since the local king was only responsible for collecting taxes, the Chinese managed themselves and gradually formed six major families, such as the Ye, Chen, etc., based on clans and townships. The Sultan of Kelantan appointed the heads of these families as Kapitans.

This word is a transliteration of Kapitan. It was originally used by the Dutch to appoint Chinese leaders, and later the sultans also picked it up and used it.

As the gold rush continued to prosper, many Chinese began to take advantage of the situation.

Since the local people did not allow the Chinese to marry indigenous women, and the Chinese were unwilling to marry these uncivilized natives, they married Siamese women.

Kelantan was a vassal state of Siam for a period of time in history, and there are many Siamese people in the country who believe in Theravada Buddhism.

So the Chinese mixed with the Siamese, and a large number of Chinese married Siamese women and settled down there.

The Ye family, Chen family, etc. all developed in this way.

Of course, the Sultan and Tuanja of Kelantan were also jealous of the income earned by the Chinese from gold mining, but they did not want them to gain a foothold in the local area.

They drove out the Chinese several times in history and even joined forces with Dutch adventurers to attack gold mines controlled by the Chinese, but in the end they were beaten and repelled by the Chinese.

This is what Ye Xianyang said: a prudent person has been deceived by the red-haired devil several times and will definitely not be bewitched by him.

This is not about being cheated. In fact, I was defeated by the Chinese and had to accept the reality.

The reason why Ye Xianyang was so wary of Mo Zibu was simply because he was afraid that Mo Zibu, a dragon crossing the river, would come to Kelantan and rob their gold mine.

Well, there are many such things among Chinese people, and they almost run through the hundreds of years of the Chinese's journey to Southeast Asia.

Historically, the situation did not ease until the Chinese as a whole were suppressed.

"If that's the case, then let's not bother the Chinese in Kelantan," Mo Zibu said to Wei Dakuan. He knew that in this situation, even if he had good intentions, he would be misunderstood. It would be better to just stop there. He had no intention of getting involved in Kelantan anyway.

This is actually not a bad situation now. If the Dutch really want to intervene, they dare not do it themselves. They can only encourage sultans from all over the country to come, so they have to pass through Kelantan to reach Pattani.

There are so many Chinese Kapitans in Kelantan who control a large number of gold mines, so no matter who comes, they will be extremely vigilant.

More than 60% of their 30,000 to 40,000 men are men and able-bodied, and the miners are quite organized, so under extreme circumstances they can produce 20,000 soldiers.

With this kind of combat effectiveness, even if they fight on their own, no other army can pass through at will.

This is equivalent to them being the alarm of Pattani, which relieves Mo Zibu of his worries.

"Brother Wei, you should give a heads-up to the Ye family and other Chinese in Kelantan. If anything happens, have them come to Pattani and let us know."

But in the end, Mo Zibu softened his heart. No matter what, he could not bear to see the Chinese in Kelantan being attacked because of his arrival.

. . . .

In early November, the foundation stone of Mozibu's arsenal was laid. After a large number of technicians and other personnel arrived in Pattani from Nakhon Si Thammarat, the Dutch envoys finally arrived here.

I have to say that Mo Zibu's tactic of using the French to suppress the Dutch was still effective.

In Southeast Asia, Mo Zibu was naturally no match for the Dutch.

But in Europe, the Dutch were unable to compete with the French on land.

Of course, it is impossible for the French to teach the Dutch a lesson just for Mozibu, so their own strength is also a great guarantee.

It would be difficult for the Dutch to kill Mo Zibu easily, not to mention that Mo Zibu had the entire Hexian behind him.

Therefore, under this double pressure, the Dutch were still a little timid about Mozibu's attempt to break the balance in the Malay Peninsula.

The Dutchman brought by Captain Cadell was named Arnold Adrian Holdyke.

He is the current chief clerk of the Dutch East India Company in Banten. He is an indigenous white man who was born on the island of Java and has never been to Europe in his life.

At that time in Batavia, there were quite a lot of white people born in this way. Many of them had never been to Europe, and their fathers or even grandfathers had never returned to Europe.

Although they are not mixed-race, it is quite a stretch to say that they are European. They should be considered indigenous people like the Chinese.

Therefore, this clerk Holdyke was very familiar with Nanyang and could speak Guangzhou Cantonese more standard than Mo Zibu, without Mo Zibu's strong western Guangdong accent.

After the two exchanged a few pleasantries, Holdyke said directly, "Mr. Mo Wu, your Mo family's interests do not lie in this land.

I really don't understand why you did such a horrific thing in Pattani. Was this the instruction of the Khmer King?

This is not a good choice, as it will cause panic among the various sultanates and will be a provocation to the Dutch Republic, which has made great contributions to maintaining peace in Southeast Asia.

Mo Zibu deliberately sneered as if he couldn't hold it back, but then he seemed to remember something and returned to his serious expression.

Captain Cadell's expression grew angry again, but Holdyke's face remained unchanged.

This is nothing. When he said this for the first time, he almost laughed out loud.

"Mr. Holdyk, if I say this has nothing to do with my father, His Majesty the King of Cambodia, I don't think you will believe me.

But the fact is that I went to Pattani to stop a rebellion and the premeditated killing of my compatriots."

Holdyke snorted noncommittally, “Fifth Young Master, but I didn’t see any possibility that the Sultan would launch any attack on you Tang people in Pattani.

But you brutally murdered the entire Pattani royal family. This is unacceptable."

"No, no, I swear on my life, absolutely nothing like this happened!
Although the Sultan himself was unfortunately killed in the battle, his family was safely brought to Ayutthaya."

Mo Zibu quickly shook his head and denied it three times, as if saying, "Don't accuse me."

Now even Holdyke's face turned dark. The damn Ayutthaya city was now besieged by the Burmese, and the King of Siam himself didn't know whether he could escape.

Mo Zibu now says that he sent people to Ayutthaya, which is clearly an attempt to frame the Burmese so that there is no evidence to prove his mistake.

"Mr. Holdyke, the Sultan of Pattani is a vassal of the Kingdom of Siam. This is recognized by the Dutch East India Company, right?

So, I was sent by King Agada of Siam to quell the rebellion, and after completing it, I sent these rebels to Ayutthaya, the capital of Siam. Doesn't that make sense?"

Mo Zibu said with a smile, Well, there is nothing wrong with it.

"Even if the Fifth Prince came to quell the rebellion, he cannot declare himself the Sultan of Pattani. I don't think King Agada has appointed the Fifth Prince as the Sultan of Pattani."

Holdyk never bothered to find out whether Mozibu was sent by King Agada, because he knew that with the deep infiltration of these Chinese into Siam, such an edict could be fabricated at any time.

"Of course, I am only temporarily serving as the Sultan. I will leave after King Agada selects a new Sultan."

Mo Zibu nodded. Hehe, the royal family of the Pattani Sultanate was wiped out by him, and the King of Siam will soon be replaced by a Chinese.

If it really doesn't work, the slain Bahadur still has two daughters in his hands, so it doesn't matter if he marries any of them.
Anyway, the positions of these sultans can still be inherited by their sons-in-law.

But that would be a bit too shameless, and Mo Zibu would not use it unless it was absolutely necessary.

After saying this, Mo Zibu looked at Holdyk seriously and said, "During this period, any legitimate merchant ship can dock and resupply at Pattani Port without any hindrance, just as before."

This promise is what the Dutch care about most.

Because the Dutch also had a large amount of crudely processed tin ore to transport to Guangzhou, and in the season when there was no southeast trade wind, sailboats had to sail along the near sea, avoiding the northwest wind and using the small amount of southeast wind to reach Guangzhou.

In this case, Pattani and Ha Tien are both very important ports for supply and docking.

Even if there are southeast trade winds, it is often necessary to stop in Pattani and Ha Tien for various reasons.

Now that Mozibu has control over both ports, it has seriously affected the Dutch East India Company's control over this tin mining route. That is why they are concerned about Mozibu's actions in Pattani.

After hearing Mo Zibu's promise, Holdyk nodded and said, "I will report the Fifth Young Master's words to the Governor of Batavia. I sincerely hope that the Fifth Young Master will keep his promise."

That was all Holdek could say. Even without the pressure from the French, the VOC company could not immediately strike Mo Zibu.

This is not an easy opponent to deal with, and VOC is a joint-stock company. To undertake such a large military adventure, it must obtain the consent of the company's board of directors.

And what businessmen hate most is going to war with a tough opponent.

So under the current circumstances, as long as Mo Zibu abides by the rules of the game, from a businessman's perspective, there is no need for armed intervention.

(End of this chapter)