Chapter 721: Chapter Recommendation

Chapter Recommendation: "The Great Ming Salted Fish"

With the Ming mission to Europe departing from Shanghai Port southward in the autumn of the third year of Hongxing, the level of exchange between the Eastern and Western worlds had clearly been raised to its highest point. And in this era, it was not only the ascendant Ming, entrenched in the southeast, that was engaging with the West. The Qing Empire, entrenched in the north, had likewise thrown open the gates of foreign exchange.

At a fishing port called Haishenwai, facing the Whale Sea and not far from the northeastern border of Hamgyong Province in the Kingdom of Joseon, it was just a drizzly, foggy morning with a biting wind. At the entrance of Oxhorn Bay, shaped like an ox horn, atop a slender hill jutting into the sea, there was a newly built sea-viewing platform. Several men dressed in Qing military official robes were waiting there anxiously, from time to time casting their gazes out over the misty, drizzly sea.

It was now the season when the northwest wind rose, and the cold wind blowing in from Siberia seemed never to stop, with an autumn rain falling now and then, and the temperature dropping to near freezing. Truly, autumn wind and autumn rain could freeze a man to death!

No one knew how long they had waited, and the waiting men were already frozen numb in hands and feet, when they faintly made out a patch of white sail emerging on the sea, breaking through the rain and mist, using the northwest wind to struggle northeastward. Among those waiting, there was a middle-aged man with a baby face and a large beard who was stamping his feet in agitation: "Old Jia, Old Fan, why did you pick a day like this? It's freezing people to death!"

The one he called Old Jia was none other than Jia Bushi of the Jiale Market Firm, and he too was freezing, shivering uncontrollably. "Vice Regional Commander Shang, the Spanish galleons leave Manila Harbor every May, sail north to trade at the commercial ports along the Southern Ming coast, then depart from Shanghai in July for Joseon. By the time they reach us, wouldn't it have to be late autumn?"

The baby-faced Vice Regional Commander Shang was Shang Kexi's younger brother, Shang Ke'ai. After the Battle of Qufu ended, he had been transferred to the Mukden General's headquarters, serving under Dodo, and had also taken part in the campaign against the Khalkha Mongols.

After returning in triumph from the Khalkha Mongols, he had been appointed Meiren-i Janggin of Haishenwai — in Chinese, that was Vice Regional Commander of Haishenwai.

To prevent the Southern Ming from blockading the Qing's Bohai Bay coast, and also to avoid relying too heavily on Joseon, Dorgon, before Bruce departed, had ordered Dodo to search along the Whale Sea coast in the northeast for a suitable location to establish a trading port.

And the place Dodo finally selected was Haishenwai, not too far from both Jilin and the Kingdom of Joseon, to build a port. He also established a Meiren-i Janggin office at Haishenwai, appointing Shang Ke'ai as Meiren-i Janggin to oversee the construction of the port and the opening of trade there.

In truth, it was no great matter. Haishenwai was a natural sheltered harbor, and anywhere within the nearly twenty-li-long Oxhorn Bay could serve for building a port.

As for opening the port, that was even simpler, because hardly anyone would come to Haishenwai to trade. Only one or two of the Spanish galleons from the Philippines, on their return voyage to the Americas, would sail north into the Whale Sea and make a circuit to Haishenwai — according to the agreement reached between the Spanish envoy Caballero and Dorgon, the Spanish galleons would bring Spanish-made muskets and bronze cannons to exchange for furs and eastern pearls produced in northeastern China!

It was said that these two items were worth a great deal of money in Europe! The Cossacks of Russia wandered thousands of miles over precisely to seek precious furs.

Dorgon thought it over: since furs were so precious, and eastern pearls seemed even more valuable, why stand on ceremony? Rather than let Russia make the money, better that the Great Qing make the money itself.

As for hunting and such, the various tribes beyond the passes were all quite skilled at it. One edict from His Imperial Majesty the Ama, plus a bit of cotton cloth, grain, ironware and the like sent over — was there any fear of not getting furs in exchange?

Reselling them to the Spanish was pure money!

Of course, the Great Qing did not particularly need money. The Great Qing had no developed industry or commerce, so even with money there was nothing to spend it on. What the Great Qing needed now were weapons to arm itself against the Ming and Russia.

So Dorgon and Caballero reached an agreement to trade muskets and cannons for furs and eastern pearls.

It was precisely for this business of "guns for fur, cannons for pearls" that Jia Bushi had been dispatched by Dodo to this freezing Haishenwai!

The other man called Old Fan was an elderly fellow wearing a sable cloak over his official robes, with an air of bold ease in his every gesture. This man's name was Fan Yongdou! The foremost of the nine great Shanxi merchants, originally registered under the Plain Yellow Banner Han Army, now transferred to the Bordered Green Banner, and moreover granted the hereditary rank of Adaha Hafan. He had been sent by Dorgon to do business together with Jia Bushi and Shang Ke'ai.

Hearing the two men's discussion, Fan Yongdou let out a few hearty laughs: "Brother Yihu is truly a formidable young man, knowing even the Spanish sailing schedule so clearly!"

"Sir, what are you saying? I make my living in this line of work, so how could I not know it clearly?" Jia Bushi said with a smile. "You, sir, are the truly remarkable one. Back when the Great Qing was still beyond the passes, you were already a meritorious subject of the Great Qing. All of us are your juniors!"

Fan Yongdou gave a few dry laughs and said nothing more.

The three men fell silent like this, and after an unknown length of time, a Spanish galleon of four or five hundred tons burden finally sailed into the entrance of Oxhorn Bay.

Shang Ke'ai let out a breath and said to Jia Bushi and Fan Yongdou: "They've finally come... Let's go down to the dock and see what good things those Spanish fellows have brought us."

Jia Bushi and Fan Yongdou nodded, and so the three men all donned their rain cloaks and left the lookout platform together, heading down the hill toward the dock.

The visitor was the Manila, commanded by de Velasco — the same galleon that had last time delivered Caballero to Shanghai. This ship had left Manila in May, but had not, as Jia Bushi had guessed, gone to Shanghai; instead it had gone to the port of Naha in the Ryukyu Kingdom.

This port, and the entire Ryukyu Kingdom, were currently under the de facto control of Japan's Satsuma Domain, though the Ryukyu King Shang Zhi had been enfeoffed by Zhu Cilang two years earlier. But Zhu Cilang had no pretext, even with the enfeoffment, to send troops to expel the Satsuma Domain forces from Ryukyu — there were too many places requiring his troops, and he had no time to deal with Ryukyu for the moment.

Moreover, ever since Shanghai had opened its port and the Zheng family had obtained trading rights to enter Uraga Harbor, Naha Port had declined sharply, and had now become a chicken rib in the hands of the Satsuma Domain. To make up for the losses caused by the decline in Naha's trade revenue, the Satsuma Domain lord Shimazu Mitsuhisa had no choice but to use Naha to engage in the business of arms smuggling!

The matchlock had entered Japan through Kagoshima in Satsuma Domain, and the Shimazu family had been renowned during Japan's Warring States period for their skilled use of "teppo." After the Winter and Summer Campaigns of Osaka, Japan's age of chaos had thoroughly ended, but the teppo production capacity built up during that chaotic age was not so easily eliminated.

Handicraft industry, after all! As long as the craftsmen remained, restoring production capacity was easy. It had been only a little over thirty years since the Summer Campaign of Osaka, and for a period Shimazu Tadatsune had still harbored unrepentant ambitions, maintaining teppo production capacity for a time, and thus had stockpiled a large quantity of finished teppo.

Besides maintaining teppo production capacity and stockpiling finished teppo, the Shimazu family had also used the special status of Naha Port to maintain secret contacts with the colonial forces of Catholic countries such as Spain and Portugal in the East.

It was for this reason that, several months earlier, they had received a large order from Manila — 3,000 six-monme barrels!

The Manila had gone to Naha precisely to load these six-monme barrels and sail north to Haishenwai to exchange them for furs and eastern pearls. Because the Great Qing needed muskets in very large quantities, and needed them urgently, the Spanish had no time to ship them from the Americas, nor time to order them from Guangdong and Fujian.

Although many new iron workshops had opened in Foshan and Anping, the output of handicraft industry still increased very slowly. All the iron workshops in both places combined could not produce 3,000 Hongxing Year Three model matchlocks in a month. And they could not all be sold to the Spanish, either — the Ming Ministry of War was still waiting for its stock!

So the Manila could only go to Naha to buy from the Japanese. And while this sailing ship was detained at Naha, the Governor-General of Manila, Chacón, had also dispatched a swift sloop, delivering a letter that needed to be forwarded immediately to the Qing side.