Dominate the Country

Qiongzhou is still as warm as spring in winter. As a tropical monsoon marine climate area, there is not much difference between the four seasons in this place. There is no extreme heat in summer and no severe cold in winter.

At the end of November and the beginning of December, when Chen Han's winter counterattack came to an end, the winter rice harvest season in Qiongzhou arrived. In recent years, grain prices have soared. In previous years, Qiongzhou, which only planted two crops of rice a year, now plants three crops of rice without exception. Other peppers, peanuts, sweet potatoes, etc., are planted in corners at most.

Nowadays, the largest buyer of Hainan grain is not Chen Han's official, but the Tiandihui in Fujian. This group of people now feel depressed, but they are unwilling to take the initiative to seek death, and of course they are unwilling to take the initiative to lay down their weapons. Chen Han has been doing their work, but there is no big effect.

Half of Fujian is divided into nearly ten forces of different sizes, and they are struggling day by day.

As an ally at the time, Tiandihui could not blame the Fu Han Army for crossing the river and demolishing the bridge, because the Fu Han Army had been generous enough to them, and the entire market was open to them. Grain and tea and silk are the most obvious examples.

Grain from outside can be brought in, and tea and silk inside can be transported out. Although it has to go through the hands of the "officials" in the middle.

Take a "small landlord" like Ling Liang as an example. He does not need to hang on a tree in Quanzhou. Fuzhou on the other side has opened the convenient door to the tea and silk on his territory, and the price is still very fair. Then it is natural to buy grain in Fuzhou.

Qiongzhou Prefecture in winter is a harvest season. Winter rice is harvested, dried, and then shelled and bagged in the shortest time. Farmers sell grain and earn money.

Gold Yuan Coupons have not been circulated on a large scale in Qiongzhou Prefecture. Everything still depends on real gold and silver. The heavy silver dollars reflect the joyful faces of the farmers.

On the fifth day of December, the entire grain trade was coming to an end, but Wenchang County was still crowded with people and traffic. It's not that there were no merchants going to the countryside to collect grain, but if that happened, the grain price would have to be lowered a bit. The farmers were reluctant to spend this little money, and would rather find a car, find cattle, horses, and donkeys, and pull them to the city to sell. Unable to find large livestock such as cattle, horses, and donkeys, they would rather use manpower to pull. Farmers' strength is the least valuable!

Flatbed four-wheeled vehicles were filled with grain, and from the county town to the Qinglan Port outside, the "mooing" sound of buffaloes was endless.

Qinglan Port is located in Bamen Bay. It is one of the three first-level ports that Qiongzhou Prefecture focuses on operating, and it is also the second largest fishing port in Qiongzhou Prefecture after Haikou. The gourd-shaped bay covers an area of ​​about 100,000 acres, and the area of ​​beach mangroves is no less than 100,000 acres.

It is now the third largest port in Qiongzhou after Changhua Port [Shilu] and Haikou.

Every day before dawn, farmers drove ox carts, donkey carts, and more often human-drawn carts, to gather outside the west city of Wenchang. When the city gates were opened, vehicles loaded with grain drove in from the west gate and out from the north and south gates, while the east gate was the route for transporting grain to Qinglan Port.

Chen Han himself had completely abolished the "Thirteen Factories" when trading with Europeans, but when they traded with the Fujian Tiandihui, the latter had to be stamped by the Industrial and Commercial Bureau because the Fu Han Army needed to have a rough estimate of the grain purchases from the Tiandihui.

The weather was not very good today. The sun was always covered by dark clouds, but the temperature was 22 or 23 degrees, and there was a sea breeze outside, which did not make people feel cold. What the people were more afraid of was that it would suddenly rain.

Li Kun [Li Xiaomei's brother] looked around and saw that half of Wenchang City was full of people selling grain. These people were wearing half-new clothes, mostly short-sleeved shirts and long trousers, with their upper bodies bare or wearing a cloth vest. Those with better family conditions wore a short shirt with a cross collar and narrow sleeves, and some men even exposed their chests in public.

If this happened in Li Kun's hometown, people with this image would undoubtedly be scoundrels, but in Qiongzhou Prefecture, Li Kun also knew that this was the custom here. Local men and women still wear cloth skirts. Men exposed their arms and women exposed their calves. Li Kun was shocked when he first saw it.

Now it's commonplace, so it doesn't feel immoral. Different places have different customs.

Li Kun is now dressed straight and formally. He came to Wenchang County this time to sell grain. Li Kun no longer runs a bookstore. His father can run the bookstore. The world is "peaceful", and Li Xiucai took out his last savings to do business for Li Kun. They really lost everything and were penniless, but they still had a big backer, right?

Li Kun now traveled between Guangxi, Hainan and Guangzhou. Hainan mainly transported grain and cloth, and Guangxi transported tobacco and sugar. Guangdong was the place where goods were sold, and goods from all over the country and even the world could be bought from there. There was no need to worry about sales when bringing them back to Qiongzhou or Guangxi. By the way, Chen Ming assigned Lianzhou Prefecture in Guangdong, which was the coast of Beibu Gulf in later generations, to Guangxi. Otherwise, Guangxi would not even have an outlet to the sea.

Li Kun's grain and cloth had been loaded on the ship, but a cargo ship could not carry only his goods. Li Kun was just a small cargo owner who ran errands. For a business like him, five, six, seven or eight people had to gather together to charter a sea ship.

Li Kun did not live in Qinglan Port, but in Wenchang County. Opening the window, you can see the scene on the street. In the distance, in the Wenchang Farmers' Market, long grain carts were like yellow snakes winding outside the hotel. The grain carts parked on the side of the street were filled with grain bags. Regardless of whether they knew each other or not, the people next to each other sat together and chatted with each other, with cheerful expressions on their faces.

Yes, joy.

How could the people of Hainan not be happy? Since the Fu Han Army took over this place, it has only been a year. The miscellaneous taxes have been reduced, the agricultural taxes have also been reduced, the land rent is falling, and the grain and cotton prices are rising. Isn't the life of the people here better?

This scene made Li Kun feel a little emotional. It was two years ago, and their family had fled to Qiongzhou Prefecture for some time. At that time, the government began to increase miscellaneous taxes, donations, and grain in Qiongzhou. Not to mention Wenchang County, even in Qiongshan County, the capital of the poor state, it was often possible to see the miserable appearance of farmers who could not pay taxes, with unkempt hair and skinny bodies.

Such people are often caned by the public officials, and half of their lives are gone.

Li Kun remembered clearly that seven people were caned in front of the county government that day, and five of them died the next day. He also saw the children of local farmers outside the city. They were really as thin as firewood sticks. Regardless of whether they were men or women, they only had a bellyband or shorts to cover their shame. It can be seen how much the government oppressed the locals.

Who made Hainan produce three crops a year? Who made Huguang blocked by Chen Han, and the Qing Dynasty lacked food?

Qiongzhou itself did not have any powerful connections in the officialdom. If they did not oppress here, would they oppress Guangzhou?

Now, only a year has passed, and these skinny farmers have become ruddy. Even the local gentry in Hainan rarely resisted Chen Han's rule. The Qing Dynasty's oppression of the local area was too harsh, and the local farmers and people were even worse now. Except for those who had grudges against the Fu Han Army, it is estimated that few people in the entire Qiongzhou Prefecture would miss the big green fruit.

If the Fu Han Army came three or five years later, Li Kun really couldn't imagine what Qiongzhou Prefecture would become.

It is estimated that most of the people in Hainan would rebel again and be killed by the Qing soldiers.

Now that the Fu Han Army has taken Hainan, everything is different. No matter rich or poor, they have been reborn. Looking at the cheerful and lively faces in front of him, Li Kun couldn't help but feel a little proud, because Chen Ming is his brother-in-law, and the Chen Han royal family is his in-laws. It was his brother-in-law who saved the entire Qiongzhou! It's an honor for him. Although this secret is never known to outsiders.

"Wangtou, it's almost time..." A 15- or 16-year-old boy walked gently into a small house outside the farmer's market and reminded respectfully beside the security captain.

This boy is a Tanka. The latter's true origin is far away, but they have been classified as low-class households in all dynasties. A few Tanka people came ashore to live since the abolition of the world's low-class registration during the Yongzheng period. In the following days, more and more Tanka people came ashore to live, but these people were still discriminated against by local people.

When the Fu Han Army seized Jiangnan and invaded southern Zhejiang and northern Fujian, and even Guangdong, the Tanka people have always been the most supportive of the Fu Han Army. Because many Tanka people are willing to serve as soldiers, and being a big soldier will get military merit land, which is what Tanka people have been longing for for many years.

The boy has an older brother who served in the army. The boy's age is awkward, and he is unwilling to work in the important fields. He came to the security team of the farmer's market to be a soldier. He can only be regarded as a substitute for the official members of the security team, and the boy also works with gusto.

It is said that this farmer's market will be developed into a commercial market in the future. The boy now knows what a market is called trade. Wenchang County relies on Qinglan Port, and it is a population center in the eastern part of Qiongzhou Prefecture, which is a densely populated area, and has the potential to develop trade. For the boy, he also firmly believes that he will learn more and more useful things in the commercial market in the near future.

The boy usually follows the captain Wang Zhong to read and practice calligraphy, and does some odd jobs. The young man is good at reading people's expressions and has a smart mind, so Wang Zhong appreciates him very much.

Wang Zhong is a retired soldier, a sailor of the Nanyang Fleet, and a native of Hainan. In his early years, he had no food to eat, so he followed his uncle to join the foreign bandits, and then transferred to the Nanyang Navy. He was injured in the battle in Guangdong, and was hit by a shrapnel in his leg. He lost half a pound of flesh on his thigh. He survived with great difficulty but could not work in the army. After retiring and returning to his hometown in Wenchang County, he was assigned to the market security team.

Wang Zhong looked at the floor clocks on the left and right. This was made in Guangzhou. It was ten minutes to eight o'clock. It was indeed time. "Lao Liu, Daniu, call the brothers to work. Open the fence outside and hold up the big umbrella." Ten minutes will pass, and people can be allowed to enter the market.

The farmers' market, which occupies a large piece of land in the east city of Wenchang County, is not very big if you look at it from a distance.

When the eight o'clock bell officially rang in the hut in the morning, the yellow snake that seemed to have stayed outside for a long time began to wriggle. Li Kun could see clearly that the farmers who were pulling food to sell on the street were happy.

...

In Jiading, Annan [Ho Chi Minh City], in the Mekong Delta, two merchant ships from China slowly docked in the berth of the dock. This was a rare scene. Since Guangdong was taken by the Fu Han Army, almost no Chinese merchant ships have been here.

The two Chinese merchant ships were flying red flags, which made the people of Guangnan think of the Nanyang Fleet rampant in the waters off Annan.

Those warships, which were much stronger than the Guangnan Navy, were flying such bloody flags.

Is this a sign? It means that Jiading Port, the leading port in Guangnan, has finally ended its isolation from China for a year and a half, and bilateral trade has resumed?

The two Chinese merchant ships were fully loaded with cloth and iron materials urgently needed by Guangnan, as well as porcelain, tea and other items. But the most important thing was that there was a middle-aged man in his thirties named Chen Baoguang.

After getting off the ship, Chen Baoguang did not contact the merchants or the price of the goods in Jiading, but went straight to Mo Tianci's place of residence in Jiading. Even though he obviously knew that someone was following him, Chen Baoguang came to the door in a big way.

"Lord Mo [Is Mo Tianci's official official position the Commander-in-Chief of Ha Tien?] you should know that Zheng Xin has become the Lord of Siam, and he is separated from Siam because of the tiny land of Ha Tien. This makes His Royal Highness the Crown Prince feel very embarrassed. "

Mo Tianci is seventy-two years old, but his body is strong and strong. Chen Baoguang, who lost four or five kilograms of weight after just one boat ride, is quite envious of Chen Baoguang, who still feels a little weak.

Chen Baoguang stretched out his hand to stop Mo Tianci's clichés. Now that Mo Tianci had no money at all, his clichés were of no use, and Chen Baoguang was not willing to listen.

"This matter is highly controversial in the court. His Highness the Crown Prince cannot make arbitrary decisions. Therefore, I have come to Jiading to escort 500 muskets, ten cannons, two ships of cloth and iron, plus silk, porcelain, tea and other items to make a comeback as your lord. capital.”

It's a very simple thing. If Mo Tianci wanted to convert the land of Hexian to China, he must hold at least part of the land of Hexian in his hands. Chen Ming did not have a good impression of Zheng Xin, but Siam and Myanmar were mortal enemies, and the latter was a country that Chen Ming was determined to destroy. He was unwilling to get into trouble with Zheng Xin in the short term.

After Taksin unified Siam and successfully restored the country, the Burmese-Thailand War did not come to an end, but continued to develop. During this period, although Zheng Xin repeatedly sent troops to Laos, Cambodia and other places, in the final analysis, his main enemy was Myanmar.

The latter no longer had the heavy pressure of the Qing-Burmese War. It had gone through the downturn three years ago and had regained its momentum. How much energy could Zheng Xin have to focus on Ha Tien?

As long as Mo Tianci can raise an army to fight back against Hexian, and Chen Han sends people to negotiate with them, Mo Tianci will most likely be able to successfully restore the country, and then it will be natural for him to announce his naturalization to China.

"For the grace of the Kingdom, I am a member of the Mo family. I am so grateful." Mo Tianci is an absolute old fox. Don't think that because he was born in Ha Tien, he doesn't know anything about Sinology. In fact, Mo Tianci himself is well versed in classics and history, and he can do it in China. Be a gentleman.

Ever since he read the letter full of official arguments that Chen Baoguang handed him and his name was written as Mo Tianci, he knew mentally what to do.

"Angels, don't worry. I won't be able to pull out an army in less than a month. The Guangnan Kingdom is too poor to rescue Ha Xian due to the Xishan Uprising, but Zheng Xin can seize Ha Xian and fight against it with a sharp edge." That is to say, Mo If God is willing to mobilize troops to counterattack the Ha Tien area, Quang Nam Kingdom will definitely support it with both hands and feet.

"If the angel is willing to go to Hue [the capital of Quang Nam] with his party, I am willing to accompany him." This is to pull the strings.

Chen Baoguang laughed, "I am here just to see the boss. I heard that King Guangnan is over eighteen years old, and the power in the court is still in the hands of powerful ministers. It's okay not to see this young man."

"As far as I know, Zheng Sen has sent envoys to Lushan to meet with the King of Han. If you have any contact with Hue, you might as well inform them about the matter first." Chen Baoguang changed his name to Mo Tianci from 'Mo Da' "人'" was replaced by "老大人", and many meanings were hidden in it.

The goods of the two ships may not be sold for 100,000 silver dollars, but 70,000 to 80,000 silver dollars is still no problem. Coupled with those guns and cannons, it was enough for Mo Tianci to raise a team. This is Chen Han's show of goodwill towards Mo's Hongguoguo.

I believe that this news cannot be hidden from outsiders. If Zheng Xin sends spies to Guangnan, it will not take long for him to know about it. No matter when the special envoy sent by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs goes to Bangkok, Zheng Xin should know about Fuhan. The military means it.

In the entire Indo-China Peninsula, Ha Tien is probably the place with the most obvious Chinese culture besides Bangkok. And unlike the official color of the Chinese in Bangkok - being superior to others, the Chinese version of Ha Tien is the Chinese version of the local indigenous people.

Mo Tianci actively recruited scholars from China. In Ha Tien, he "paid generously to recruit talented people. Since the Qing Dynasty and from all over the world, handsome people have come to meet him after hearing the news. Southeast culture and education began to flourish since the Duke Dynasty." After Mo Tianci received the support of these scholars, he conducted many academic Conference, compile and edit works, let them show their talents. The promotion of Han law, "making clothes, hats and hats, and building schools" in terms of academic etiquette, led to the local indigenous people living mostly in accordance with Han customs for decades. In Chen Ming's opinion, this ability is more meaningful than the Bangkok Chinese under Zheng Xin.

Although Mo Tianci is really older, as long as He Xian returns and Mo Tianci's body and bones can continue to work, Chen Ming will make full use of him, instead of just being a superficial cover like Abubakar. .

Things were not at all as Chen Baoguang expected. When Mo Tianci sent out the remaining manpower of his men to accept the two cargo ships, the entire Jiading fell into silence. At the same time, Mo Tianci also quickly sent a memorial to Hue. Is he still the Ha Tien Commander-in-Chief of Quang Nam Kingdom? It was like a bomb, shaking the whole Hue.

The current King of Quang Nam, Nguyen Phuc Thuan, is already eighteen years old. Nguyen Phuc Thuan died of illness six years ago. Minister Zhang Phuc Luan colluded with the eunuch Chu De and the master Nguyen Jiu Thong to tamper with Nguyen Phuc Thuan's legacy and support his 16th son Nguyen Phuc Thun who was 12 years old. Bit. Nguyen Phu Chun, for his support and meritorious service, was granted the title of Fu of the State, in charge of household affairs, in charge of central affairs, and of Xiangqi and other affairs. His sons Zhang Fucheng and Zhang Fuyue both married Ruan Fukuo's daughter, and they became extremely powerful.

Nguyen Phuc Chun was playful when he was young, but Zhang Fuluan let him go and even led him to play around. All the political affairs in Guangnan were managed by Zhang Fuluan. The Nguyen Lords were all Zhang's party, and their relatives and followers occupied important positions, corrupting the law. The people hated Zhang Fuluan and compared him to Qin Hui, calling him "Zhang Qin Hui".

An eighteen-year-old is an adult in the 21st century. But Nguyen Phuc Chun was still worshipped on the table by Zhang Fuluan like a tablet, and he himself was not in a hurry to take back his power.

Chen Ming's evaluation of him was just two words - waste.

So Mo Tianci's memorial was not so much for Nguyen Phuc Chun as for Zhang Fuluan.

After the latter received Mo Tianci's memorial, he was stunned at first, and then he was full of joy. Mo Tianci would not tell the Annan people that he would naturalize Ha Tien to China, but he won the assistance of Chen Han's Nanyang Navy on the condition that Ha Tien Port was open to Chen Han's Nanyang Navy. The two Chinese merchant ships in Jiading Port are the Nanyang Navy's assistance to him.

He wants to form a team to counterattack Ha Tien, and asks Guangnan to allow him to recruit troops in Jiading, and also asks Guangnan to support him appropriately.

Along with this memorial, a batch of gifts were sent to Hue. The best batch of porcelain, silk and tea among the goods transported by the two Chinese merchant ships became Mo Tianci's stepping stone to curry favor with Zhang Fuluan.

Mo Tianci counterattacked Ha Tien with the help of Chen Han's Nanyang Navy. Whether it succeeds or not, it is a good thing for Guangnan.

Zhang Fuluan happily agreed to the generous gift. He didn't think at all whether this would be a precursor to China's intervention in the Indochina Peninsula, Annan, and Guangnan?