Because of their fear of heights, the three officials from the Nagasaki Prosecution 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 sat behind three long tables covered with snow-white tablecloths. Except for Zhao Xin, everyone else wore 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 sit down. Sit down and talk about anything first." Lu Shoushan stretched out his hand to motion for the three of them to sit down, and a sailor brought three cups of tea.
The three officials looked at the Dongfang face in front of them like fools. These people all have short hair and wear yellow or green short coats. The weird patterns on them make people dizzy after looking at them; their pants are also the same color and have bulging bags; They are black thick-soled leather boots.
Except for the guards around him, the five people sitting across from him were all very tall. Except for the one in the middle, all four people wore glasses with black lenses on their faces.
"Don't these guys have bad eyesight?" The officials at the Nagasaki Administrative Office are well-informed and have all seen the myopia glasses brought by the Dutch. During this era, some businessmen in Osaka and Edo also prepared a pair of myopia glasses because they were busy settling accounts all year round.
Liu Sheng and others would not know how they would feel if they knew that their act of pretending to be AC was misunderstood as a sign of poor eyesight.
"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 actually speaks 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, 1.5 taels of 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 going 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 enter the port for trade. Please take the ship 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 also have to talk about the Choshu clan."
"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 started sweating.
At this time, the Tang Dynasty interpreter on the side asked Zhao Xin: "Excuse me, your Excellency, what does your crossing have to do with Changzhou Domain?"
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 Domain 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 might 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?"
"Asshole!" The leading official was choked by Zhao Xin and was speechless. His face turned from black to red, and from red to green. After so many years, no foreign merchant ship has ever dared to be so presumptuous towards me. He almost had a 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." Go to the second place! Remember to keep your people away. These days are not easy for anyone. It’s all about food, so it’s best to save a little life.”
"Cannon?!" The three officials were shocked when they heard this. There were actually cannons on the ship! You need to go back and report this matter immediately. Damn Maori family, what the hell did you do? Now people are coming to collect debts.
"Wait!"
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 dark and gloomy faces in front of him, Zhao Xin smiled faintly: "Lu Shoushan!"
"Master, please give me your orders!"
"Put down the ladder and let them 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 around and looked at the contemptuous 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 a consultant 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 own culture comes from China, so they often use Chinese drifters as interpreters of their Chinese knowledge.
However, these island country Confucianists looked down upon the Manchus very much, and some even believed that the Qing emperor was a descendant of the island country's nobles, as a way to prove their country's superiority. A Confucian scholar once asked the Chinese drifters: "Our country is Echizen people. Years ago (many years ago) they drifted to the Mantar Nurgan area. The image of Yoshitsune, the original judge painted on the door god painting (this is a misidentification of the Chinese door god It became Minamoto no Yoshitsune). The ancestors of your country may be called the Minamoto Judge. I wonder if there is anyone in your country who has passed it down?"
After listening to the old official's explanation, everyone present finally understood what happened fifty-eight years ago.
"Are these people the descendants of those people?" Toda Shimeng asked doubtfully.
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 Maori family do anything wrong back then? After hearing the explanation from the elderly official, Toda Shimon felt that he had gone too far. However, so many years have passed since the incident, and the shogunate has already made a conclusion, so no matter what, we cannot admit that we were wrong. Otherwise, where is the prestige of the shogunate? As the Tokugawa family's Hatamoto samurai, Toda Shimo must look at this matter from the standpoint of the shogunate.
As for rice, hum, the country is short of food now, but we must not lose our national identity just for a little bit of food. A big boat is nothing. When all the vassal armies gather together and fire thousands of bullets, I don’t believe they can’t sink him!
In this case, let's tighten it internally and loosen it externally. Let's stabilize the group of foreign barbarians for the time being.
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, so that they can relax. Didn't their leader say that he wants to see Qing merchants? You can go to Tangren 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 shouted, 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. Let me wait with them to go to the big ship tomorrow to meet with them. The barbarians will talk. 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 used a telescope to look at the big ship. The people on the ship seemed to be oriental in appearance. I guess these people came from Nanyang. of."
"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 it's an opportunity?"
When Lao Huang heard this, his eyes suddenly lit up, and he quickly smiled and said: "Okay, 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 ship?" 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, I heard what you and Boss Huang said, and I will go with you tomorrow."
"Nonsense! You are a girl, how can you be so crazy? You are not allowed to go!"
(End of chapter)
