Chapter 198 The British East India Company (Part 1)
The four numbers represent a Chinese character, which is very familiar to later generations, and it is the Morse Code.
During the Jianghuai Battle, the scouts who delivered the letter were captured by the Qing army. Fortunately, the scouts had undergone rigorous training and political and ideological education. Therefore, this time, basically no one revealed the secrets of the merchant army, but Shang Yi could not have been able to All hopes of not leaking secrets are placed on people's beliefs and will. In addition, there will be more and more information activities in the Qing Dynasty in the future, and there will definitely be mistakes, buy them, or search them by the Qing government. For security reasons, it is also very necessary to use passwords to write intelligence instead of Chinese characters.
And from a technical perspective, it is completely feasible in this era. Although theoretically speaking, the arrangement of four numbers can be arranged in total, but in reality, only about 2,000 commonly used Chinese characters are used. It's enough. When you really encounter the word "Shengyu", you can use homophones instead. Therefore, with the mother book, everyone can successfully decipher it. Without the mother book, it is useless to come. And once the mother book is just If it is leaked, just need to rearrange and combine the numbers, which is equivalent to replacing a new parent book, which is very convenient.
In this way, the problem of delivering messages was basically solved. Shang Yi ordered Cheng Jin and Duan Peng to test the transmission of the carrier pigeon, and asked Li Yan and Wu Hansheng, who was responsible for intelligence work, to train the password writers, and then Sent to Nanjing and Beijing, as well as various troops to start working. At the same time, the passwords used in the battlefield and the passwords used in intelligence work will be used to show the difference between the two.
After all these things came to an end, Li Gefei came to Shang Yi for something. Li Yan, Cheng Jin, Duan Peng knew that Li Gefei was responsible for the business sector. Now it is the main source of income in the entire Zhejiang region. He must have something to report to Shang Yi. Therefore, they all said goodbye to Shang Yi one by one.
After they all left, Shang Yi said, "Is Uncle Li a thing?" Because Li Gefei and Lin Zhiyang were sworn brothers, Shang Yi also treated him with the rituals of his elders. Like Lin Fengwu, he called him uncle.
However, Li Gefei did not dare to regard himself as an elder in front of Shang Yi, so he hurriedly gave a bow and said, "Sir, a Western ship came to the dock today, claiming to be an employee of Yingliji East India Company, hoping to establish a business relationship with us, and I want to see you again.”
Shang Yi was stunned and said, "British East India Company? They actually found this place."
In the 16th and 17th centuries, many European countries set up companies in India in order to expand trade in the East. As the Zhongchuan Station of Oriental Trade, later generations called these so-called companies East India Company. Because India happened to be located in The frontier location of the route from Europe to East Asia, and the area is vast and rich in food, jute, tobacco and other economic crops, can be self-sufficient. The important thing is that the Mughal dynasty, which accounted for 70% of India's land at that time, was very cowardly. Facing the Western invaders, there is no power of resistance at all, so they can only be merciless.
The British East India Company is also called the British East India Company. Its full name is a company that London merchants trade in East India. It was established in 1600 and was originally composed of a group of entrepreneurial and influential merchants. The British politics initially licensed their trade. The patent is only ten years old.
In 160, the British East India Company established its first trading point in Surat, India. In the following two years, the East India Company was able to establish its first factory in Mergilly Berdenham, Bay of Bengal.
. Officially gained a foothold in India. Because of the profitable trade, King James I of England issued an unlimited charter to the East India Company in 1609. The charter will only be in the event that the company has not made any profit for three consecutive years.
Will be cancelled.
However, at this time, Britain was a backward country in maritime trade, and it was not as good as old colonial countries like Spain, Portugal, and the Netherlands. They did not have enough strength to support ocean warfare, so they decided to establish a government support from both sides in India through diplomatic means.
A foothold.
So at the request of the British East India Company, in 1615, James I sent Sir Thomas Roy as an envoy to visit Jahanjill, the emperor of the Mughal Empire. The two sides reached an agreement that the Mughal Empire was in Surat and other regions.
Grant the British East India Company the unique right to settle and build factories. In exchange, the British East India Company is willing to provide Jahanjill with goods and treasures from the European market. It is this agreement that the British East India Company's influence in India has
With great development, he established base camps in Surat, Chennai, Kolkata and other places. In 1634, the Mughal Emperor extended his preferential treatment to the British East India Company to the Bangladesh region.
By this time, the British East India Company had established twenty-three factories, namely bases in India, with ninety employees. The largest bases were Fort William in Bangladesh, Fort St. George in Chennai and Castle Mumbai.
It also consists of a governor and 24 directors. They are all appointed by all operators and must report regularly to all operators. All directors have ten committees that require regular reports.
Although the size of the British East India Company at this time had exceeded that of the East India Company established by the Netherlands and Portugal. However, in East Asia, the UK was still a latecomer, although at this time, it had begun to challenge the Dutch's monopoly on the spice trade.
But it is also limited to the Malacca Strait area, which is still far from China, the largest trading location in Asia.
In another time and space, until 1711, the British East India Company established a trading point in Guangdong, China to use silver for tea.
However, although I felt that the British East India Company suddenly arrived a little strange, Shang Yi was still very clear about the British's purpose. Anyway, Western countries coming to China at this time will not have any other purpose. It is for trade.
, probably also want to establish a trade point in China.
Although in another time and space, Britain was the first Western country to use force to open the door of China, forcing China to cede land and pay compensation, and causing China to humiliate in modern times, before Shang Yi traveled, the Chinese basically had little hatred for Britain.
, If the country that the Chinese dislikes most is named, the UK will definitely not be ranked among the top. It is estimated that this is related to the long-term era of the British invasion of China. The other two countries are also far apart in geography, and in international politics.
, there are not many conflicts.
Back to this time and space, Britain is far from the empire that never sets in later generations. It is still trying its best to strive for its own interests in the cracks of many old colonial countries. In East Asia and Southeast Asia, east of the Strait of Malacca,
It is basically the world of Spain, Portugal and the Netherlands. On the one hand, this is because the UK started a relatively late, and on the other hand, the UK's internal political and economic situation has been unstable over the past few decades, which has made the UK unable to go overseas with all its might.
develop.
However, this situation also applies to Shang Yi, because after the national strength of the Ming Dynasty weakened, it was unable to protect its overseas vassal states. As a result, not only did the vassal states in the ocean change their banners and surrender to Western countries,
Even the near-shore Ryukyu was controlled by Japan, and Taiwan was occupied by the Netherlands. In later generations, the island-chain blockade established by Western imperialist countries on China was actually formed in the 17th century.
Fortunately, Shang Yi's butterfly flew in this time, seized northern Taiwan and destroyed Japan's control over Ryukyu, which was considered to have broken the island chain blockade. But now Shang Yi's energy is mainly focused on dealing with the Qing Dynasty.
It is also impossible to develop to the ocean with all its might, which also makes Shang Yi very troubled. You should know that Shang Yi’s goal is not just to break the island chain, but to go all out to the ocean, participate in world trade competition, and establish the status of China’s Oriental Sea overlord.
Therefore, at this time, the British East India Company suddenly came to China, which made Shang Yi immediately realize that this might be a good opportunity. Now both China and the UK cannot fully expand their overseas forces because of domestic problems, and overseas space,
It has been occupied by other countries. If you reach a strategic cooperation relationship with the British side, join hands to seize the overseas market at the same time, break the monopoly of the West, Portugal and the Netherlands, and re-dividing the overseas sphere of influence, it is a good choice.
.
Although it is too early to talk about going to the ocean in full, this does not prevent Shang Yi from digging a few more holes in advance, so that he can't fill it up. If he fails, it doesn't matter, just pretend that there is no one.
Traveling through this.
Of course, Shang Yi is just a supervisor now, and it is not enough to represent the entire China, but Britain is also in division now, and a war of tit-for-tat is going on between the king and the parliament. Until three years later, Cromwell
Leading the new model army representing the parliament, he defeated the King's Army and captured King Charles I. The following year, the parliament passed a resolution to sentence Charles I to death, thus building a bourgeois-led country in Britain and starting Cromway
Your era.
Therefore, both sides are actually equally close. Although Shang Yi's territory is not large, it is basically all economically developed coastal areas in China. It has many excellent ports that can provide a large number of high-quality Chinese goods, and it still has a basis for cooperation. However, these
All of them are Shang Yi’s personal ideas. Whether it can be realized depends on the attitude of the UK.
So Shang Yi said, "Uncle Li, now you can arrange accommodation for the British and treat them well. And tell them that I will meet them tomorrow. It is best to find Johnson Chan to go with you, who is a foreigner and a missionary.
, It’s better to communicate, it’s best to touch their bottom. Wait for a while and we, Feng Wu, discuss how to meet the British.”
Li Gefei knew that there was a country like Britain, but he didn't understand why Shang Yi valued this country that had never been to China. However, he agreed and immediately went down to make arrangements.