Chapter 213: The Great Qing's Good Son-in-Law

"This." Dorgon turned his gaze back to the Manchu officials before the Gate of Imperial Supremacy. The matter of his daughter marrying the Ming Crown Prince was not only a matter of state, but also a family matter of the Aisin Gioro, and he had to hear the opinions of the Manchu officials, especially the several princes.

"Old Fifteen," Dorgon first asked his own full brother Dodo, "you speak first."

"Fourteenth Brother," Dodo said, "the Han people speak of discussing marriage and discussing betrothal, which shows that marriage matters can be discussed. There is no harm in first talking it over with the Zhu family's Crown Prince. He is also a man who will become emperor, and if it succeeds, it would not disgrace Dong'e."

Dorgon nodded slightly. He had no son, only this one daughter, and naturally hoped she would marry well. And although Zhu Cilang was a formidable enemy of the Great Qing, from another angle it also showed that he very likely could hold onto half of the Ming realm, which would naturally make him the sovereign of a state, and in Dorgon's eyes he was certainly worthy of Lady Dong'e.

"My Prince!" At that moment someone suddenly stepped out from the ranks of the Han officials, bowed to Dorgon, and said, "This subject believes the marriage alliance is inadvisable!"

Dorgon looked toward the voice and saw a Han official in his fifties: it was Vice Minister of War Jin Zhijun.

"How is it inadvisable?" Dodo asked.

"The weather is now cold and dry, and the northwest, the Central Plain, Hebei, and other places have suffered famine year after year, producing almost nothing, all relying on Jiangnan for relief. Since the calamity wrought by Li the Roving Bandit, southeastern grain has not reached the capital, so that grain prices in the north rise daily. If the court cannot obtain Jiangnan, then the grain transport will be blocked, and the north will also fall into chaos for lack of food! Therefore this subject beseeches the Prince, for the sake of the people of the north, to still seek unification and utterly wipe out the remnant Ming."

Dorgon frowned deeply. "Zhu Cilang is a lord of restoration. Why speak of unification? We take an inch where we can take an inch, a foot where we can take a foot."

"My Prince, even if the Zhu family's Crown Prince has great talent, the people of Jiangnan are soft and weak, unable to withstand a single blow." Sun Zhixie said, "As soon as our Great Qing's heavenly troops arrive, they will surely collapse like earth and tile!"

"My Prince, this subject also believes the southeast is frail and cannot withstand us. The Zhu family's Crown Prince also carries the taint of usurpation and rebellion, and will find it very hard to win the support of the literati. Our Great Qing's heavenly troops are invincible, and the southeast can be pacified in one stroke!"

"The Great Qing's heavenly troops are invincible; how could the southeast withstand a single blow!"

With Sun Zhixie and Jin Zhijun taking the lead, a crowd of civil officials who had served three masters finally let loose and began speaking, and nearly every one of them meant the same thing — the southeast must be pacified, and the remnant Ming must be destroyed!

But Dorgon would not believe them. A bunch of civil officials, not men of both letters and arms like Hong Chengchou — what the hell did they know! In matters of war he could not listen to them, or the state would surely perish.

"Prince Who Pacifies the West!" Dorgon caught sight of Wu Sangui, Prince Who Pacifies the West, still squinting over there. "You were a great general of the former Ming. You speak."

Wu Sangui had already shaved his head and changed into Manchu dress, so he stood among the Manchu officials, listless and looking utterly dejected.

He was now lying low and biding his time. He had sent his troops back to their old home in western Liaoning and had them start working the fields that had lain fallow for a time. At the same time, following the organizational methods of the Eight Banners soldiers, he had organized the thirty or forty thousand households under his command into a "Wu Banner" independent of the Eight Banners. And he himself had not long ago submitted a memorial requesting to return to Ningyuan in western Liaoning to soothe the people, rather than remain in Beijing.

Hearing Dorgon's question, Wu Sangui had no choice but to rouse himself, stride out of the ranks, bow, and say: "My Prince, this subject's ancestral home is Gaoyou County in the Southern Metropolitan Region. Qi Wuyi's ancestral home was Chuzhou in the Southern Metropolitan Region. The Great Ming's Exalted Emperor, the Grand Progenitor, was a man of Fengyang in the Southern Metropolitan Region."

Dorgon nodded. "Well said. It seems that among the southerners there is no lack of strong and valiant men!"

"But at present the north truly does need the grain of the southeast. Otherwise grain prices will soar, the people will lack food and clothing, and how can the Great Qing's realm be secure? Prince Who Pacifies the West, what do you say should be done?"

"This subject believes," Wu Sangui paused, "that we may demand from the southern court an annual tribute of four million shi of rice, equal to the grain transport levy."

"Then so be it!" Dorgon pointed at Jin Zhijun. "Vice Minister Jin, you and Vice Minister Sun will make a trip to Jiangnan together, in the name of marriage envoys."

He thought for a moment, then added: "As long as the southern court is willing to pay an annual tribute of four million shi of grain and cede Datong Prefecture, this Prince will give his daughter in marriage to the Zhu family's Crown Prince. However, my daughter is only six years old this year and cannot yet marry. She will be raised for some more years, and the marriage will take place when she turns eighteen.

Furthermore, the Great Qing will not invade Shandong. The Dai princedom of Datong may go to Jinan and become Prince of Qi. The Great Qing and the Great Ming will take the Daqing River and the old course of the Yellow River, as well as the Yellow River within Kaifeng Prefecture and Henan Prefecture, as the border. Surely this is acceptable?"

At the time when Li Zicheng and Dorgon were both dispatching envoys to the Ming court, the man actually in charge of the Ming, Zhu Cilang, was escorting the Chongzhen Emperor on a sojourn at Yangzhou Prefecture.

Crates and rush-mat bales of munitions were being unloaded from two large hybrid Chinese-Western warships that had arrived at the Yangtze wharf of Guazhou Town. Over a thousand soldiers of the new makeshift army, under the direction of their officers, were carrying these life-saving munitions on their shoulders and in their hands, and the area around the Guazhou Town Yangtze wharf was under heavy guard.

Two Chiliarchs of the Military Administration Guard, Liu Liang and Li Shi, were leading several clerks, sweating profusely as they checked the weapons and ammunition sent by the Zheng family item by item. These two Chiliarchs had both been transferred from civil to military service. Liu Liang had even been a jinshi of the sixteenth year of Chongzhen! It was only because he had studied mathematics, chemistry, and gunnery under Western missionaries that Zhu Cilang had arranged for him to be transferred to a military post, and he now oversaw the Ordnance Office.

Although Li Shi had not passed the jinshi examination, he had previously been an official in the Directorate of Astronomy, also a civil post. Now, together with his father Li Zubai (also an official of the Directorate of Astronomy), he jointly supervised the Artisans' Office under the Military Supplies Bureau of the Military Administration Guard — which in practice meant managing the army's mobile arsenal.

Zhu Cilang's traveling court also had some artisans in its ranks, all artisan households who had followed from the Tianjin Guard. They were mainly blacksmiths, with some carpenters and shipwrights as well. But their skills were all quite poor, and they could not produce qualified cannons or firearms.

Zhu Cilang kept them mainly to repair equipment, cast lead shot, and forge bayonets — because in this age there was no standardized large-scale industry, so firearms were all non-standard equipment produced by manual workshops. Therefore the lead shot and bayonets used with them could only be non-standard as well. The bayonets even had to be custom-made: each one had to be forged individually, according to the different specifications of each firearm, so that it could be fitted onto the gun. Moreover, the quality of these bayonets was generally poor and they often broke, so they needed to be repaired or reforged in time. Thus a camp of artisans accompanying the army was absolutely indispensable!

Zhu Cilang stood at a corner of the wharf, strolling and looking around casually with his eldest senior fellow apprentice Zheng Sen, occasionally opening a crate and taking out firearms of various models to handle them. Zheng Sen at his side would promptly tell Zhu Cilang the model, place of origin, and price of each firearm.

"Thousand Years, this is a Kunitomo teppo, produced at the imperial teppo forge in Edo Castle in the country of Japan. Its range is not as great as the turtledove-foot matchlock and the Lumi musket produced in Foshan in our dynasty, but its workmanship is more refined. It can fire seven shots in succession, and it is relatively light and easy to carry, and does not require a rest when firing."

"Thousand Years, this is a Tanegashima teppo, produced in the Satsuma domain of Japan. It is a relic of Japan's age of civil war, but it has been very well maintained and is still serviceable."

"Thousand Years, this is a Negoro teppo, produced in the Kishu domain of Japan. It is likewise a relic of Japan's age of civil war, some forty or fifty years old, but still serviceable."

"Thousand Years, this is also an old piece of goods from Japan. From its appearance it looks like an old-style Kunitomo teppo. In the final period of Japan's so-called Warring States era, firearms were used in great numbers, so many old pieces were left behind. My family has connections and can purchase them in large quantities. Because Thousand Years urgently needs firearms, there was no time to order new muskets from Foshan, so we simply bought old muskets from Japan. Although these old muskets are things from decades ago, they have all been well maintained, and their quality is passable, and the price is cheap. When the Zheng family buys them, each one costs anywhere from three to five taels of silver."

"Three to five taels of silver?" Zhu Cilang was startled when he heard the price. "So cheap?"

Zheng Sen smiled. "Not cheap at all. A top-grade turtledove-foot matchlock from Foshan is also this price, and the power of the turtledove-foot matchlock is far greater than that of the Japanese teppo. But firearms are time-consuming and labor-intensive to make. A blacksmith's workshop with a few dozen men, equipped with fifteen drilling machines, can only produce a dozen or so turtledove-foot matchlocks or Japanese matchlock muskets in a month. Thousand Years wants ten thousand of them, which would require a thousand workshops busy for a month. All the workshops in the Great Ming and Japan that can make firearms combined do not number that many, so we could only go and buy some old goods. But even with my father trying every means, for now he has only managed to obtain five thousand. The rest will have to wait another year or so before they can all be gathered."

(End of Chapter)