Because of their fear of heights, the three officials from the Nagasaki Office were so frightened that their legs became weak when they came out of the rope net.
Under the white awning built on the deck, Zhao Xin, Liu Sheng, Deng Fei, Zhao Liang, and Ding Guofeng were sitting behind three long tables covered with snow-white tablecloths. Except for Zhao Xin, everyone else was wearing sunglasses.
Heita, Kokichi, Yachiro and a dozen other people stood around the awning with guns in hand. The silver-white body of the lever rifle reflected dazzling light in the sun.
Seeing the scene in front of them, the three Nagasaki officials, who didn't even know where to put their feet, walked to the awning under the leadership of Lu Shoushan.
"You three, please take a seat. If you have any questions, please sit down and talk." Lu Shoushan stretched out his hand to signal the three of them to sit down, and a sailor brought tea.
The three officials looked at the oriental faces in front of them like fools. These people all had short hair and wore short coats that were either yellow or green. The strange patterns on them made people take a second look.
Wow; their pants are also the same color and bulging; their feet are black thick-soled leather boots.
The five people sitting across from each other are all very tall. Except for the one in the middle, all four of them wear glasses with black lenses on their faces.
"Don't these guys have good eyesight?" The officials at the Nagasaki Executive Office were well-informed and had all seen the myopia glasses brought by the Dutch. During this era, some businessmen from Osaka and Edo also had to pay attention to settling accounts all year round.
Prepare a pair of myopia glasses.
If Liu Sheng and others knew that their pretending to be AC was misunderstood as having poor eyesight, they would not know how they would feel.
"Excuse me, who is on the bow of the ship?" the leading official began to ask.
Lu Shoushan walked behind Zhao Xin, looked at the three officials and said, "This is my master."
The leading official said something in the island's dialect, and the Tang interpreter carefully translated it: "May I ask your surname?"
Zhao Xin chuckled and said in the island dialect: "You can call me Thor."
This man can actually speak the native language! The expressions of the three officials suddenly changed.
"Excuse me, where are you from? Can you tell me why you came here?"
"Do you want rice? Polished rice with the husk removed, one and a half gold per stone."
When the leading official heard this, he couldn't help but breathed a sigh of relief. It turned out that he was here to do business. He then said seriously: "Since you know our language, you must also understand the letter trade. Without the letter, it is impossible to trade in Hong Kong.
. Please take your boat and leave as soon as possible, otherwise as soon as our army arrives..."
"Forget about the army whose armor is rusty." Zhao Xin raised his hand to interrupt the other party. "In addition to giving you a chance to do business this time, we have to talk about the Changshu clan."
"If there are spies, there must be spies! The other party actually knows about the lack of armaments. This is terrible!" The leading official was interrupted by Zhao Xin. He was about to get angry, but when he heard such words, he suddenly broke out in sweat.
At this time, the Tang interpreter on the side asked Zhao Xin: "Excuse me, your Excellency, what does your crossing have to do with the Changzhou clan?"
Zhao Xin looked at this descendant of a Tang Dynasty resident in Japan and said calmly: "The Nanjing ship fifty-eight years ago."
The three Nagasaki officials were confused after hearing this and looked at each other. No one knew what happened fifty-eight years ago.
"I won't talk nonsense. If you go back and check it out, you will understand. If the Choshu clan doesn't have an explanation for this matter, we won't leave."
"Ugh!" After hearing this, the three officials stood up at the same time and shouted angrily: "Do you just want to fight against the power of our country with just a few of you?! Our country's nine states have no less than one hundred thousand soldiers!"
"Haha, I thought you were tongue-tied. One hundred thousand? Why don't you put together fifty thousand to open my eyes? By the way, is the knife on your waist made of bamboo wrapped in tinfoil?"
"Bastard!" The leading official was choked by Zhao Xin and was speechless. His face turned from black to red, and from red to green. In all these years, no foreign merchant ship has dared to be so presumptuous to him. He almost wanted to do it.
Duel with Zhao Xin.
Zhao Xin looked at the furious island officials in front of him and sneered: "Go back and tell the Nagasaki executive exactly what I said. I will only give you three days. If you don't reply for three days, we will bombard you in Chenzheng."
Rush to the second station! Remember to ask your people to stay away. These days are not easy for anyone. It is all about eating, so it is best to save a little life."
"Cannon?!" The three officials were shocked when they heard this. There was actually a cannon on the ship! They had to go back and report this quickly. Damn the Maori family, what on earth did you do? They are now coming to collect debts.
"Wait a minute!"
Seeing the three of them getting up and about to go to the rope net, Zhao Xin stopped them again.
"Do you have anything else to do?"
"Let me say one more thing. Even though we have Tang people here, we want to make things difficult for those Qing merchants on the shore. If you dare to send troops into the Tang people's house, I will blow up the official hall of the Nagasaki Office. Tomorrow you go and invite some Qing merchants here.
, I have something to talk to them about."
Looking at the three officials with gloomy expressions in front of him, Zhao Xin smiled faintly: "Lu Shoushan!"
"Master, please give your orders!"
"Put down the ladder for them to go down!"
Soon, a winch on the deck began to rotate, and the white telescopic gangway rose from the rack on the side of the ship and then moved out of the ship's side; at this time, another winch released the steel cable, and the gangway slowly stretched out until it reached the water.
"You!..." When the three officials saw this scene, they were almost furious to death. They turned to look at the disdainful looks that the people on the boat were looking at the three of them, and they immediately understood that they were just playing tricks on them.
"That's unreasonable! Let's go!"
When the three returned to the ship, they heard a burst of laughter coming from the Thor.
Ding Guofeng held his stomach and laughed: "Mr. Zhao, you are so mean! I can't stand looking at how angry those three people are."
Zhao Xin looked calm, and after everyone had laughed, he said calmly: "The fun is over, we should prepare to fight."
More than half an hour later, in the official hall of the Nagasaki Prison.
"How unreasonable! A group of barbarians dare to insult our country like this and want to bombard the barracks on the shore. They simply don't take our country seriously!"
After a while, Toda Clan gradually calmed down. He turned to an elderly official next to him and asked: "What happened to the Choshu Domain fifty-eight years ago?"
The official immediately said: "Your Highness, do you remember the 'Susa Tangbune'?"
Toda Shimeng shook his head in confusion. Fifty-eight years ago, he was not born yet. Who had time to care about those things?
"Okay, let me tell you what happened..."
The official recounted the events of that year one by one. In addition to the official statement of the shogunate, he also mentioned some records of the matter written by Confucian scholars.
It is said that during the Edo period, Japan's shogunate and each domain had the position of Confucian scholar, who served as an adviser to the generals and daimyo in explaining sinology and related academic aspects.
When the Chinese ships first arrived, each domain would send Confucian scholars or people who knew Chinese to go to the drifting site to contact and talk with the Chinese drifters and investigate the drifting process; they would also go to Nagasaki on the same ship with the Chinese drifters and act as translators along the way.
Due to the restrictions of the "locked country" system, except for these Confucian scholars, ordinary Japanese were not allowed to have contact with Chinese drifters.
During the period of contact with the Chinese drifters, Confucian scholars often asked the Chinese drifters in written conversations about issues they were concerned about in China. A considerable part of the records of these written conversations have been preserved intact.
Confucian scholars in the island country know that most of their culture comes from China, so they often use Chinese drifters as interpreters of their Chinese knowledge.
However, the Confucian scholars of these island countries looked down upon the Manchus very much, and some even believed that the Qing emperor was a descendant of the aristocrats of the island country, in order to prove the superiority of their country. A Confucian scholar once asked the Chinese drifters: "The Yue Qian people of our country, years ago (many years ago)
) drifted to the place where Manta Nuer was working. When he saw the portrait of Minamoto Judge Yoshitsune painted by the gate god (this was a misidentification of the Chinese gate god as Minamoto no Yoshitsune), the world may have called the Taizu of your country the Minamoto Judge. I don’t know about your country.
Is there anyone who has passed it down?"
After listening to the old official's explanation, everyone present finally understood what happened fifty-eight years ago.
"Could these people be the descendants of those people?" Toda asked in confusion.
The old official shook his head: "I don't think it's like that. Those people are all Qing people. But the people on the big ship call themselves 'Beihai people', and they all have short hair without braids. I have never heard of such people."
.”
Did the Mori family do something wrong back then? After listening to the explanation from the elderly official, the Toda family felt that they had gone too far. However, so many years have passed and the shogunate has already made a conclusion, so no matter what, they cannot admit that they did something wrong back then.
Otherwise, where is the prestige of the shogunate? As the local acting official of the Tokugawa shogunate, Toda Ujimon must look at this matter from the standpoint of the shogunate.
As for rice, humph, the country is short of food now, but we must not lose the country for a mere bit of food. A big ship is nothing. When the armies of the vassals gather and thousands of bullets are fired, I don’t believe they can’t sink it!
In this case, let's tighten it internally and loosen it externally. Let's stabilize the group of foreign barbarians first before putting on a show.
Thinking of this, Toda Shimeng ordered: "For the time being, you can stabilize them and give them some water, rice, wine and food as a reward to let them relax. Didn't their leader say he wants to see the Qing merchants? You can go to the Tang Dynasty Yashiki
Find some Qing merchants there to board the ship. But you must record what they talked about and what they said, and then report to me."
The old official praised: "Your Highness's move is very clever."
"Haha!" All the officials and generals below obeyed the order in unison.
Inside the Tang Dynasty house.
"Boss Shen! Brother Shen! Are you at home?" Outside Shen Jingdan's house, Lao Huang called, patting the barrier door.
The barrier door opened quickly. Shen Jingdan looked at Old Huang who was sweating profusely and asked in surprise: "Brother Huang, why are you here to see me?"
"Oh! Don't mention it. Just now, officials from the Chinese Nianxingsi and Su Town came with a few people and said that the barbarians on the big ship wanted to see us merchants from the Qing Dynasty. They asked me to go with them to the big ship tomorrow.
The barbarians are talking to each other. You said this was a big deal. After I heard this, I hurriedly came to see my brother. How do you think we should deal with this?"
Shen Jingdan walked to the corridor, paced back and forth, and thought for a long time before saying: "To be honest, I just looked at the big ship with a telescope. The people on the ship seemed to be oriental in appearance. I guess these people are from Came from Nanyang."
"Nanyang? What are they doing here?"
"Then we won't know until we meet tomorrow." Shen Jingdan said, stroking his beard.
"What do you mean, brother, let's go take a look tomorrow?"
"It's a blessing, not a curse, but we can't avoid it. The Japanese officials are here, so it's hard for us not to show up. We are all businessmen, and we travel thousands of miles just for money. What if there is an opportunity?"
When Lao Huang heard this, his eyes suddenly lit up, and he quickly smiled and said: "Well, I will just follow my lead tomorrow."
"It's easy to talk about."
After Lao Huang left, Shen Jingdan returned to the house. He sat down and said to Lu Yun beside him: "Tomorrow you go to the town and see what news there is in the market."
"Is it that big boat?" Luyun asked in a low voice.
Shen Jingdan nodded and said, "I don't think it's that simple. This ship is so weird, I've never seen it before in my life."
"Dad, my daughter has heard what you and Boss Huang said, and I will go with you tomorrow."
"Nonsense! How can you behave like a daughter? You are so crazy. You are not allowed to go!"