"What about you?"

"Up."

"Did you drink?"

"It's a little bit of a rush today, and I haven't drunk it yet!"

"Well, I just got it there. Didn't drink it, go up to me and drink it."

"Second Brother Cui, shout, I haven't seen you for a long time"

"Hey, go out and chew it."

"Second brother, what are you doing?" Another neighbor stuck out his head in greeting.

"It's not a brother, it's a match. Stir-fry bean sprouts to make porridge, and there are two nests in the drawer to live. ”

"Yes, you're busy, I'll go too."

"Why don't you deal with it here, and let's have a drink?"

"Don't mind, I have leftovers there, and I have to live when it's hot, so it's not easy. What's that, second brother, you are busy first, and we'll talk about it later. ”

"Good for you! Good for that! ”

"Chang Siye is good. Fourth master, have you heard, the Fengtai barracks have all set up a formation, and the roar of aircraft and artillery is rumbling against each other. "Second Master Cui saw Fourth Master Chang and hurriedly hit a thousand, although they were down, they were also hardcore crops.

"Hey, this Great Qing Kingdom is about to finish. When Xianfeng Ye made trouble with his long hair, Lin and Li both hit Jinghai, and no cannon sound was heard in this Beijing city. Now that the world is peaceful, the officers and men are fighting on their own. "Fourth Master Chang is not afraid of things, he is a banner man and does not say that the Great Qing Kingdom is good.

"That is, what are we people afraid of?" The short-dressed Xiangzi had just gotten off a business trip and was hired by Prince Alcohol to be a watchman and patrol the outer circle part-time. "Fourth Master Chang, I don't think we can fight at this time. You see, the dozens of foreigners in Dongjiaomin Lane have not seen any movement, the prince is also at home, and the good fighting camp and the tiger gun camp do not have a military order, I wonder if I will not be able to enter this forty-nine city for a while. ”

"How's that guy at the Huguang Guild Hall?" Cui Erye is also a well-informed lord, and as long as the neighbors in old Beijing are wearing long shirts, they are not well-informed to walk in the study, Chang Siye thinks that there is no war, anyway, it is the matter of Wu Chenxuan and Lord Wu in the capital, and the soldiers of Beiyang do not dare to go too far, and regard Wu Daguan as a weather vane of the current situation.

"Lord Wu is still there to meet guests, in the past two days, the prince has been more diligent than entering the palace to see the emperor, listening to what the second bar head Gangzi said, running to the Wu Mansion of the Huguang Hall every day, there is this Chenghuang Town, and there are no little ghosts rushing in."

"That's good, it's hard to find a mother-in-law outside the city, so I'll slip my little yellow oriole and look for more food along the roots of the city wall. I've seen you back. ”

"Alas, that's a good idea. See you later. ”

The well-informed people in the 49 cities of the Great Qing Dynasty did not take Beiyang into a chaotic commotion, because these rebellious soldiers did not dare to enter the city, but there was a marshal who held 100,000 tigers in his hand.

At this time, Wu Chenxuan did not sit in the Wu Mansion next to the Huguang Guild Hall, but ate Western food in the Liuguo Hotel in Dongjiaomin Lane.

"Hi Earl Sean, it's a pleasure to meet you." The white-haired gentleman stretched out his hand and immediately realized that this was a mistake, and that a Qing official would not meet with such etiquette.

But he obviously didn't expect that Wu Chenxuan naturally stretched out his hand to shake his hand, "I'm also very happy to meet you, Mr. Director Hurd." Of course, I have to correct that I am a first-class viscount of the Qing Dynasty, not an earl. ”

Standing in front of Wu Chenxuan is a legend who has lived on the land of the Qing Dynasty for longer than in his home country, Robert 61 Hart (February 20, 1835 – September 20, 1911), a British politician who came to China in 1854, served as the General Department of Customs and Excise in Shanghai from 1861, and officially succeeded him as the General Department of Customs and Excise in 1863, until he returned to China on leave of absence in 1908 and died in Buckinghamshire, England, in 1911, the Qing court posthumously awarded him the title of crown prince; Hurd served as the chief tax director of the late Qing Dynasty for half a century (1861-1911), during which he created a set of strict customs management systems such as taxation, statistics, dredging ports, and quarantine, and he also presided over the customs to create China's modern postal system; He is the author of "Collected Essays on China" and so on. Wu Chenxuan still has a lot of respect for this self-proclaimed "Englishman who is more like Chinese in thought."

Hurd was born on 20 February 1835 in Alma, southwest of Belfast, Northern Ireland, and graduated from Queen's College Belfast in 1853. In 1854, the British Foreign Office recruited diplomats to serve in China, and because of his excellent grades, Hurd was hired without examination and assigned to the British Trade Inspectorate in Hong Kong as a trainee translator. In the same year, he was transferred to the Ningbo Consulate.

In March 1858, Hurd was ordered to come to Canton and serve as a second deputy interpreter at the British Consulate in Canton. Here, Hurd became familiar with the etiquette and customs of Qing officialdom, and established good relations with the governors Bai Gui and Lao Chongguang with courtesy, generosity and fluency in Chinese. With this relationship, Hurd showed for the first time his ability to gather classified information. In a memorandum submitted to the British envoy to China, he accurately reported that Emperor Xianfeng was dissatisfied with the envoys of various countries stationed in Beijing, and that the task of blocking the British and French forces would be the responsibility of Seng Lingqin.

At the invitation of Lo Chongguang, Hurd resigned from his job at the consulate and became the deputy chief tax department of the Guangdong Customs in Guangzhou. As early as six years ago, in 1853, the Little Knife Society Uprising broke out in Shanghai, and the consuls of Britain, France, and the United States took the opportunity to seize the administrative power of Jiang Customs (Shanghai Customs) to collect taxes, and foreigners levied taxes on foreign goods, and the Qing court did not care about this. Since then, the customs of China's coastal ports have gradually fallen into the hands of foreigners, and it has become a common practice to "invite" foreigners to "help with taxation".

When Hurd joined, the most popular figure in China Customs was the Englishman Li Taitai, who was two years older than Hurd but had been the director of the Jiangxi Customs and Excise Department for several years. In March 1861, Prime Minister Yamen officially appointed Li Taitai as the chief tax department of the Qing Empire's customs and invited him to go north to discuss matters. Seeing the might of the Taiping army, the arrogant Li Taitai "did not want to maintain close ties with a dynasty that might be destroyed", so he took leave to return to China to recuperate, and before leaving, he appointed Hurd to go to Beijing to report to Prince Gong on his behalf.

Of course, Hurd will not miss the opportunity for Li Taitai to give up, and he has long been unaccustomed to Li Taitai's flying and domineering in front of the Chinese. On the way north, Hurd wrote in his diary, "I must always remember that the customs is a Chinese yamen, not a foreign agency. That being the case, every staff member must work around China's interests and avoid offending China or arousing the resentment of the Chinese." In May of that year, Hurd met with Yi's number one confidant, Prime Minister Wen Xiang, who prepared nine documents in advance and explained to Wen Xiang in detail the issues of trade and taxation at the Yangtze River port. Although Wen Xiang is the prime minister, he is actually a "rookie" in foreign affairs, and Hurd's explanation is like a sleepy pillow for him. Compared with Li Tai's commanding envoy, Hurd's humility and courtesy, and fluent Chinese, knowledgeable, and proficient in business, he talked and laughed with Wenxiang at the first meeting. A few days later, Hurd conquered the reserved Prince Gong, who called him "our Hurd" to outsiders. On June 30, he was officially appointed acting chief tax officer, and on July 9, Hurd recorded in his diary that the Qing government had doubled his salary to 800 taels of silver per month.

In Aspen, Hurd maneuvered between the two governments, doing a lot but not saving the breakdown of the cooperation. On November 15, 1863, Prime Minister Yamen announced the dismissal of Li Taitai and the appointment of the 28-year-old Hurd as the chief tax officer. Hurd, as the initiator of the incident, messed up the errand, but in the end became a vested interest, which has to be admired for his tactfulness.

Hurd, who has been righted from the "acting", can finally let go of his hands and feet, in fact, he is already eager to try. At the beginning, the acting chief tax department had a Fei Shilai in addition to him, but Hurd simply did not take Fei Shilai seriously, and on the first day of his appointment, he issued a general order to the tax departments of various ports in his own name. In the years that followed, he established a set of scientific, rigorous, and efficient management systems, making the customs the only bright spot in the corruption-ridden Qing government.

Hurd's salary for customs officers is very high, with a maximum annual salary of 9,000 taels, which is twice that of the same position in other countries. Employees who have worked for a certain number of years are also paid an honorarium equivalent to their annual salary. In addition, pensions, home travel expenses, and paid annual leave are all available. There are even pensions for unmarried people, pensions for disability due to merit, funeral expenses, medical expenses, and travel expenses for family members visiting relatives in China. Such a high cost of maintaining integrity, coupled with various supervision systems, made the customs the only department in the Qing Dynasty that was free of corruption.

In 1861, the customs tax was 4.96 million taels, and under Hurd's management, by 1887, the customs revenue reached 20 million taels, accounting for 24.35% of the Qing court's fiscal revenue. Tariffs became the most stable and reliable source of revenue for the Qing court, and Hurd also became the "God of Wealth" of the Qing Dynasty. In the subsequent Sino-French War and the Gengzi Rebellion, Hurd also maintained a neutral and pro-Qing position, which allowed him to gain the trust and dependence of many high-level Qing officials.

On August 15, Gengzi year, the Eight-Nation Coalition attacked the British Embassy, and Hurd, who had held out for 56 days, was finally rescued. The next day, at the request of Prime Minister Yamen, the 65-year-old began to work again for armistice negotiations. At that time, how to deal with post-war relations with China, became the top priority of the governments, the German Emperor Wilhelm II first coined the term "yellow * peril", he believed that China will rise in the 20th century, and the rising China will repeat the history of the Mongol Empire, only by carving up China, can we prevent the emergence of "yellow * peril". The German emperor's proposal to carve up China aroused great acceptance in the West. Hurd published six articles in a series of British magazines, comprehensively analyzing three ways out: the first is to carve up China; the second is to support the new government; The third is to continue to support the Empress Dowager Cixi and Emperor Guangxu. He believes that only the third option is the best way to solve China's problems.

Having lived in China for more than 40 years, Hurd developed a deep affection for the Qing government and the Chinese. He was very unaccustomed to the rude attitude of foreigners towards the Chinese, and he was a little indignant at the Empress Dowager Cixi who received the children of the embassy in addition to the minister's wife.

In 1908, Hurd, who was ill, wrote such a poem, "You have frolicked enough, you have eaten and drunk enough, it is time for you to leave", this year he was 73 years old, lived in China for 54 years, and decided to return to China to recuperate. On the morning of April 13, more than 1,000 envoys from more than a dozen Western countries, Qing Dynasty officials, and people from all walks of life gathered at Beijing's Qianmen Station to see Hurd off. Hurd's private band repeatedly played national anthems, and the finale was "Friendship Lasts Forever", in which no Westerner said goodbye without tears. When the staff of the General Taxation Department returned to the yamen, they saw a note nailed to Hurd's desk, which read: "At 7 a.m. on April 13, 1908, Robert 61 Hurd was gone. On September 20, 1911, Hurd died in England at the age of 76. Twenty days later, the Wuchang Uprising broke out, followed by the fall of the Qing Dynasty, for which Hurd had served for nearly half a century.

Now this living legend is standing in front of Wu Chenxuan, and after the two of them sat down, Hurd smiled mysteriously.

"Mr. Sean, or you are more accustomed to me calling you Mr. Wu Chenxuan, you will soon be an earl, to be exact, you will be an earl in five hours." Hurd shrugged his shoulders, "Obviously, they have realized your importance, Prince Alcohol has been in the imperial court, you will become the governor of Shandong and the presidential officer of the Wuyi New Army, the minister of the general office of the Liangjiang Bandits, the first-class earl of the Qing Dynasty, the crown prince and the young master, and you will be dazzled." ”

"It seems that I have to thank you for telling me such good news, and I would like to express my sincere thanks to you again, Mr. Hurd." Wu Chenxuan smiled and said, all this is not unexpected, it is actually part of the conditions proposed by Prince Zaifeng yesterday, and of course the exchange conditions are also very attractive.

"It doesn't seem surprising to you, but as you can imagine, a central agency like a sieve can't be kept secret." Hurd's gray eyes stared at Wu Chenxuan's eyes, "Maybe you will control more than half of the military power in this country, but from my perspective as an outsider, for your reputation and the evaluation of future generations, I think you can completely maintain this Qing regime at this stage, which is good for you, the Qing Dynasty, and the people of this land, a coup d'état may not be too damaging, but if it turns into a big melee involving hundreds of millions of people, it will be a disaster that God can't forgive." ”

"I'd like to know, Mr. Hurd, do you think I can really resist this temptation? After all, this is the supreme right in the world. Wu Chenxuan leisurely tasted the cognac in his hand, like an old friend chatting about the weather in London.

"Perhaps, for the sake of your country and your people, you should try to suppress this desire, and you will be one of the greatest men of this century." Hurd suddenly cracked his mouth and smiled, "I'm leaving, I've been living on this land for half a century, maybe I regard him as my motherland, I hope that there will be no such bloody tragedy in the Qing Dynasty." Oh, God bless you, and also this calamity-stricken country and his people. ”

After saying Hurd's elegant farewell, Wu Chenxuan didn't promise anything, but he still felt that this old man's deep feelings for this country, Hurd, who had gone through two dynasties, was about to come to an end, would there be the kind of peace and tranquility he hoped for in this land in the future? Perhaps, but it will be defended with blood and steel.