Everything that happened in the dream was strange and familiar to Hitotsubashi Keiki:

It is strange because there was no rise of the reformers, so Fuso was struggling, not only was it almost helpless against the great turmoil in opening the port, but it was also helpless in the face of the pressure of the Western countries.

But in his dreams, he couldn't remember these things, he just felt that something was wrong everywhere.

And the reason why it feels familiar is the recognition of these things in my bones.

For Qingxi, such a result and such a change are in line with his perception of Fusang.

At this time, Qingxi in the dream also felt that something was wrong, but he was stunned, so he could only wait and watch the development of the situation:

In September of the first year of Keio (1865), the joint warships of the four countries arrived in Osaka and demanded three things: "opening the port of Hyogo and Osaka ahead of schedule", "Fuso following the example of China to change taxes", and "the imperial court approved the opening of the country".

The excuse that the foreigners got on the surface was "mutual friendship" - "in view of the difficulty of raising funds for Fuso, the four countries gave up two-thirds of the compensation for the Shimonoseki incident, and in exchange, Fuso should completely abandon the reinstatement and further open the port to trade."

There are two factors that make this happen:

First of all, after the bombardment of Xiaguan by the four countries last year, the foreigners tasted the sweetness of using force, so this time the old trick was repeated;

Secondly, after three years of pro-government, General Jiamao finally began to be unwilling to be lonely.

Since the third year of Wenjiu (1863), after Jiamao went to Luo for the first time, the combination of public and military forces was officially formed.

Originally, the shogunate hoped that the prestige of the imperial court would suppress the opposition of the government and the opposition. However, in the first year of Keio (1865), the shogunates were shocked to find that the people were plotting against the tigers and the tigers, and the various families, especially the foreign feudal clans, actually suppressed the shogunate in the name of the combination of public and military forces.

For example, the delay in the second expedition of the governor made the shogunate look gloomy.

Similarly, the embezzlement of the interests of the Imperial Domain by the Keiki "Ichikai-san" forces also greatly caused unease within the shogunate.

It has to be said that in the first year of Genji (1864), the Tengu Party rebelled, causing the prestige of the Keiki faction among the shogunates to plummet.

At this time, the results of the mission to Europe led by Ikeda Nagafa were finally noticed:

The Ikeda mission was sent to Europa in December of the third year of Fumihisa and returned to Fuso in 1864.

His mission was mainly to persuade the Western countries to accept the "Yokohama Lock-up", to deal with the incident of the shelling of foreign ships in Shimonoseki that occurred in the third year of Bunhisa, and to discuss how to compensate the French officers and soldiers who were stabbed in the Itoya Incident.

However, Ikeda and his entourage received a cold reception in Europa, the "Yokohama port lock" was sternly rejected, and the Shimonoseki shelling of foreign ships could not be forgiven, and the solution to the Izutei incident was to pay a large sum of money and apologize.

As a result, Ikeda's entourage, who had almost achieved nothing, were severely punished by the shogunate upon their return to Fuso.

But Ikeda and the others did not really find nothing.

He agreed with Francis that "in order to better punish the Choshu Mori family, the culprit of the Shimonoseki affair, the Buddhists will assist the shogunate in terms of armaments and other means." ”

Shocked by Europa's wealth, Ikeda Nagafa and others boldly overstepped their powers, and reached an agreement with the Francis on an industrial cooperation.

After Ikeda and the others were severely punished, these things should have been over.

But the more I wanted to put it aside, the more I couldn't put it aside, and the Buddhist minister Rotheus was obsessed with this matter, and after he repeatedly expressed his goodwill in support of the shogunate, someone within the shogunate finally moved about it.

In February of the first year of Keio (1865), the shogunate and France signed an agreement to cooperate with the Yokosuka Iron Works.

Later, the expansion of the Yokohama Steel Works was also put on the agenda for a two-engine cooperation.

In fact, this is not difficult to understand, the Western countries have always joined forces to force the shogunate step by step, and now there is finally an opportunity to divide the opponent, and the shogunate must not give up.

And what Rosius and the Buddha said was "reasonable":

With the strength of the Tang people, they still have to open the country to trade, so how can Fusang be spared.

In addition to trade, Francis had great goodwill towards the shogunate, that is, as long as the shogunate supported the continuation of the founding of the country, the Buddhists would help the shogunate in all aspects.

At this time, after the Battle of Saying and the artillery bombardment of Shikoku, the entire Fuso felt that it was no longer realistic to use force.

Today, there were only two paths before the shogunate:

Either continue to beat around the bush, or honestly open the port to do business.

But if you think about it carefully, in fact, these two roads are one at all, but they are just going fast or slow on the road to the founding of the country.

Since the shogunate wanted to continue to open the country, the first thing the shogunate should consider was how to preserve and strengthen itself.

Therefore, before the arrival of the four-nation joint warfleet in Osaka in September, Edo had already begun to waver, and although it was not directly revealed to the public, in fact not only did it completely abandon the lock of the port of Yokohama, but also continued to resolutely resist the opening of the port.

Therefore, in the face of the "early opening of the port of Hyogo and Osaka", "tax reform", and "the opening of the port by the imperial court" proposed by the ministers of the four countries in Osaka, the shogun Ieshige and others did not stubbornly resist, and directly transferred this trouble to the Kyoto imperial court and the Keiki family.

The joy in the dream, he couldn't help but sigh.

Although he was appointed by the imperial court as the "Governor of the Imperial Guard", he was actually a bridge between the public and military forces, judging from the fact that the monthly service of 7,500 was provided by the shogunate.

Now that General Jiamao and others are forcing the palace by the hands of foreigners, the most uncomfortable thing is not the imperial court, but their own family that is angry on both sides!

Sure enough, after the imperial court refused the invitation of the foreigners for the first time, the internal divisions of the shogunate were made public:

On October 3, 1865, the first year of Keio, Ieshige submitted his resignation to the Imperial Court, saying that he would surrender the Shogun to him, and then Ieshige resolutely embarked on a journey back to Edo.

But this is not so much a resignation as a break - although the shogunate is weak, it is still the first in the world, so the resignation is fake, and it is true to take the opportunity to force the court and himself to succumb.

The little doll who was held hostage by the powerful ministers back then has now become a British master.

The form is stronger than the person, if the combination of public and military forces is officially broken, he will lose the foundation of his existence for a while, so he has to bridge the two sides:

first stopped the shogun Iemo, who was returning eastward, and told him that the imperial court would definitely give in, and this time the shogunate would definitely not be roasted on the fire again;

Then, he returned to Kyoto and persuaded Emperor Fuso to forbear, saying that after the incident, the shogunate would have an explanation.

The final result is that in early October, everyone will give way:

The Imperial Court issued an edict recognizing all foreign treaties signed by the previous shogunate, and acquiescing in the tax change, but firmly disagreeing with the early opening of the port;

On the shogunate's side, he also punished the two old middle schools of Abe Masawai and Matsumae Takahiro, and gave an explanation for coercing the imperial court.

As for the foreigners, although the new British minister Pacus was extremely dissatisfied and was very annoyed that he could not reach an early opening of the port, but under the persuasion of the Buddhist minister Rocius, the four-nation alliance finally withdrew.

Hey, Qingxi in the dream suddenly found that he seemed to have discovered something vaguely.

During this period, there was an abnormality in the Satsuma Shimazu family.

His retainers, Saigo and Okubo, together with some of the ministers, secretly convened a meeting in Kyoto, at which they proposed the establishment of a union of the feudal domains to replace the shogunate

。

At this time, the furious Keiki suddenly fell into a trance, and found that he had also reached the second year of Keio (1866).

At this time, the food famine had begun to take shape, and the riots in various places began to become more frequent.

However, the first priority of the shogunate and itself was the second crusade against Choshu.

It turned out that after the change of Gongshan Temple in December of the first year of the Yuan Dynasty (1864), the chaotic ~ party began to govern Changzhou.

Later, although Choshu was superficially submissive, it actively contacted foreigners behind the scenes and reformed the Western military system, which was actually the idea of separating the country by force.

Let's just say that the compensation is good, and by April this year, the shogunate had advanced the third installment of 500,000 US dollars, but Choshu continued to cry poor and refused to pay even a single child.

It's tolerable, it's unbearable.

But few people know what is behind it:

In fact, after the four-nation coalition coerced Osaka last year, Edo's attitude towards the second expedition has eased a lot.

At that time, the price of rice began to soar, and riots began to increase in various places, and the shogunate, after investigation, believed that there was a high possibility of fierce resistance in Choshu, and the princes and families were also saddened by the death of rabbits and foxes, and demanded leniency for Choshu.

In this case, the shogunate, which had already gained the upper hand in the combination of public and military forces because of the imperial approval, was actually quite satisfied - Fuso was in such a state of decay, and it was better to live in peace than to make a big move.

But for Qingxi himself, last year, the four-nation alliance coerced Osaka, and the combination of public and military forces almost broke up, and he ran on both sides to bridge at that time, causing a lot of troubles:

First, neither the imperial court nor the shogunate were satisfied with their respective concessions, which caused themselves to begin to be marginalized by both sides.

Secondly, his biggest reliance is the huge prestige left by his father Qi Zhao.

But after the founding of the country, the original rebels thought that they had betrayed everyone by facilitating the incident, so the momentum of the change of the forbidden door began to disappear.

Therefore, in the first month of this year, he pushed for the passage of the imperial ruling, hoping that by severely punishing Choshu, he could not only re-establish his prestige, but also take over the hard-line princes and ministers.

But what happened next is really incredible:

First, negotiations with Choshu failed in May, and then in the engagement that began on June 7, the army of the conscription army actually lost the upper hand.

The 100,000-strong army attacked a few thousand people in four directions, and the battle situation was unfavorable, how did this happen?

In a trance, Qingxi saw that there was a black hand of the Satsuma clan behind it:

In the first year of Keio (1865), Satsuma began to help Choshu purchase new Western armaments.

In the first month of this year, the two families formed a secret alliance with the chief of the Sa, and then helped each other.

It is no wonder that the Shimazu family not only refused to send troops to assist in military service as they did when they were first recruited, but also spoke out against it, because it turned out that the people had rebelled long ago.

What made the dream happy and anxious was that he had been discovering about it.

Next, due to the unfavorable war of the second expedition, more and more troubles were caused:

In order to raise military funds, the shogunate and each family increased taxes.

In May, there had been a big fight in Hyogo and Nishinomiya, and because the shogunate demanded huge donations from merchants everywhere, there was also a serious rice riot in Osaka that month.

In June, it was even more terrible, and there were Wushu and Shangshu Daichi in Kanto, and in the same period, there was also a Xinda in Northeast Ozhou.

In the end, before the results of the second expedition were made, on July 20, the general Ieshige, who was sitting in the rear, died of a violent illness in Osaka.

Although he concealed the news and insisted on continuing the campaign, the more Changzhou fought, the more fierce he became, and he even began to counterattack.

At this point, everyone knows that this battle can no longer be fought, and now it is time to think about how to end it.