Chapter 480: Shanghai Bund (Desperately Begging for Monthly Tickets)

While Zhu Cilang and Zheng Zhilong were plotting how to swindle and deceive their way into colonial aggression, the Dutch colonial mission led by Van Diemen and Bruce van Diemen had already returned to the Shanghai trading port, which was still under construction.

Unlike their last hurried pass-through, this time the Van Diemen brothers had time on their hands and could conduct a proper inspection.

And the first target of their inspection was the Wusong Fort and Baoshan Fort batteries, located north of the Shanghai trading port!

These were two bastion-style batteries under construction, situated on either side of the mouth of the Wusong River — the Ming dynasty's Baoshan Fort lay east of the Huangpu River, in the area of the later Waigaoqiao Free Trade Zone. Across the river from Baoshan Fort was Wusong Fort. Both places were originally key coastal-defense points, with old batteries already built.

But Zhu Cilang had no use for the shabby old-style batteries, so he had them torn down and rebuilt as two bastion batteries that would actually work. Nor were these simple bastions piled up from sandbags — they were masonry bastions built mainly from Yangtze stone and red brick. Neither bastion was very large; each had only six solid projecting gun platforms. Each bastion had three gun platforms facing the Yangtze and the Wusong River, all built extremely solidly. On each river-facing gun platform, four emplacements had been reserved for thirty-six-pound great cannon!

If both bastion batteries were fully equipped, they would possess twenty-four thirty-six-pound bronze cannon — enough to deal a fatal blow to any enemy attempting to approach the Shanghai trading port by water.

After viewing the two batteries, which were still under slow construction and estimated to need a year or two before completion, the Dutchmen followed a broad bluestone road called "Bund Long Street" into the Shanghai trading port for a tour.

The Shanghai trading port was divided into two towns, Pudong and Puxi. Puxi Town was located at a bend in the Wusong River — this was not the later central area of Shanghai city, but rather the Jiangwan, Wujiaochang, and Yangshupu area. To the east was a bend of the Wusong River (in this era the lower Huangpu River and the Suzhou Creek leading to Suzhou were counted together and called the Wusong River), and to the west was a straight brick-and-stone city wall twenty-five li long, separating the Shanghai trading port from Jiading County of Suzhou Prefecture. The area within the wall was not small either — about fifty square kilometers. Originally half of it had been military land belonging to Wusong Fort; of the remainder, half was government land under Shanghai County's jurisdiction, and the rest was all privately owned farmland.

The military land and government land were both allocated to a government office called the Shanghai Trade Bureau, while the private farmland was purchased at high prices through Wang Zhixin and placed under a firm called the Huangpu Trading Company — the major shareholder of the Huangpu Trading Company was, of course, Zhu Cilang himself.

At present, the vast majority of Puxi Town was still farmland — after all, it was some fifty square kilometers, all first-rate paddy fields. It could not be developed all at once, so of course the farming had to continue.

And the first "prime locations" to be developed were naturally the lands under the Huangpu Trading Company. This place would be the prime location of the future city of Shanghai!

The first-phase plan for the trading port was drawn up by Zhu Cilang personally: on the Huangpu Trading Company's land, four horizontal and four vertical avenues were to be built, along with a large passenger-and-cargo dock.

The large passenger-and-cargo dock was naturally built along the Wusong River. The dock was built very long, with sixteen berths in total, capable of simultaneously mooring sixteen of the largest sailing ships of this era. Because it had sixteen berths, the dock was named the "Sixteen Berths" Dock.

And the four "horizontal streets" all ran east from Sixteen Berths Dock to the four city gates of the trading-port wall — to facilitate the movement of goods, a total of eighteen gates had been opened in the trading-port wall, though only four were currently in use. The four avenues all ran east-west and, from north to south, were called "Beijing Street," "Ningbo Street," "Tianjin Street," and "Nanjing Street." The four vertical streets crossed the horizontal streets at right angles, all running north-south and, from east to west, were "Bund Street," "Sichuan Street," "Henan Street," and "Chengdu Street."

What excellent names for the eight avenues! One hears them and immediately knows they are prime locations!

But for now these eight "golden avenues" were all empty and desolate. On either side of the bluestone-paved streets there was basically nothing but rice paddies and vegetable gardens. Only the stretch of Bund Long Street near Sixteen Berths Dock had any commercial activity.

Along the west side of Bund Long Street, many Chinese- and Western-style buildings had already been completed, and quite a few construction sites were underway.

Among the completed buildings was a two-story hotel with a touch of Manueline style (a Portuguese architectural style), called the Covro Hotel. It was opened by a Western merchant who had moved from Macao. Because the Shanghai trading port had not yet truly taken off, the hotel's business was mediocre. Van Diemen's mission simply rented out the entire hotel as their base of operations on Chinese soil.

Standing on the balcony of a large guest room facing the Wusong River, Van Diemen and his brother Bruce noticed the shipyards and ironworks across the river in the distance.

Unlike the quiet desolation here in Puxi Town, the industrial zone of Pudong Town occupied only a limited area — it merely enclosed a bit of military land originally belonging to Baoshan Fort, a narrow strip of land along the Wusong River. Yet two shipyards and two ironworks had already been partially completed and were in operation. From a distance, one could see the bustle there.

Van Diemen raised his telescope and observed for a while, discovering that in the two shipyards several slipways had already been put into use, with enormous keels laid down and many workers busy at their tasks.

Clearly, what was under construction were large vessels capable of ocean voyages — warships could not be ruled out!

In addition, Van Diemen also noticed European figures on two of the slipways.

It seemed the shipyards across the river had introduced European shipbuilding techniques. This was indeed a worrying problem!

The East India Company currently possessed fewer than forty warships in total — after all, the East India Company was a commercial enterprise and could not over-invest in military matters. If the Great Ming Celestial Dynasty began investing heavily in its navy, perhaps before long it could build a fleet capable of confronting the East India Company's navy on the open ocean!

At this thought, Van Diemen's brow knotted into a tight frown.

"Your Excellency Governor-General, the four factories you see belong respectively to Mr. Lopez and Mr. Shen," said the owner of the Covro Hotel, a somewhat elderly, short and stout Portuguese merchant who had been invited into the large guest room where Van Diemen was staying, introducing the factories across the Wusong River in stiff French.

"Alfonso Lopez of Macao?" Van Diemen asked.

Alfonso Lopez was something of a figure among Westerners in the East — a major arms dealer with an eye for money who dared sell anything! Van Diemen not only knew him but knew him well. However, their relations were not good, because Lopez was Portuguese, and Portugal and Holland had already come to blows several times in the Indian Ocean and the South Seas over the struggle for Eastern colonies!

"Yes." Covro likewise disliked this Governor-General of the Dutch East India Company before him, but in order to earn the sinful money in Van Diemen's pocket, he answered the question truthfully.

"Who is Mr. Shen?" Van Diemen asked again.

"He is China's Beiyang Minister, and also a wealthy maritime merchant. He is the boss of the Sea Sand Company."

"Sea Sand Company?" Van Diemen did not understand. "They sell sand?"

His brother Bruce, more familiar with East Asian affairs than he, said with a smile: "Not sand sellers — rather, a merchant active on the routes between China and Joseon. His standing along the northern Chinese coast and the Joseon coast is comparable to Zheng Zhilong's."

"Oh." Van Diemen nodded, then gestured for Covro to leave his large guest room.

After the Portuguese merchant had gone, Van Diemen said to his brother: "Without this Mr. Shen's consent, can our people enter Joseon's ports?"

"Enter Joseon?" Bruce was taken aback. "That does not depend on Mr. Shen."

"Then who has the say?"

Bruce van Diemen said: "It depends on the King of Joseon. That country, like the Great Ming and Japan, practices seclusion. Because Joseon was formerly a vassal of the Great Ming, it is open to Great Ming merchants."

"Formerly a vassal of the Great Ming? Not anymore?"

"Not anymore," Bruce said. "Now the Kingdom of Joseon submits to the Tartars who occupy northern China."

Chapter recommendation: a new science-fiction book, Black Thirteen's new work "The Advent of All Heavens," a wasteland-background infinite-flow genre. Those who enjoy the end of the world and the destruction of humanity, don't miss it.

(End of Chapter)