After a period of entrenchment in the port of the East and meeting with a number of middle- and high-ranking officials of the East Coast Republic, on the 20th, William, a liaison officer from the Dutch West India Company, left the port of Qingdao on the three-masted Galen ship "Tesser's Shoal" of Captain Coot, loaded with wheat, leather goods, and cotton cloth on the east coast, and turned southeast toward South Africa.

They would stop at the riverine port on the east bank for supplies and then return north to Recife via the Dutch West African colony. The main reason for going around this is that there are only two ways to go north from the southern tip of the South American continent this season, one is to catch the westerly wind from the east coast between São Vicente, Brazil, and the port of safe on the east coast to West Africa, but this is obviously not very safe, after all, it is the area where Portuguese ships usually move; The other is to capture the westerly winds formed by the southward shift of the direct sun in the summer from the southeast of Buenos Aires, and then cross the sea to South Africa, then follow the ocean current to the Gulf of Guinea and then return to Recife. There are also several ports and cities along the route, so it's a good idea to do some trade along the way.

Not long after William's departure, on the 25th, Blanco, who had not appeared on the east coast for almost a year. Sosa. Morality. Almeida arrived at the port of Vostochny on a fast boat, and then quickly requested an audience with Xu Xin, the Minister of Foreign Affairs of the Republic of China, and was summoned by Xu Xin the next day.

"You can't do that!" Blanco's first words were this, "The Dutch are treacherous, money-only bitches who still smuggle all sorts of goods to the Spaniards in Peru." One fifth of the Spanish fleet that sailed from Cadiz or Seville each year was Dutch ships, laden with aircraft, munitions, cloth and all sorts of luxuries. Travel to Panama for sale. Otherwise, you would think that the Spaniards were relying solely on the efforts of the colonies themselves. How can I fight a war with you for so long? This qiē is all a Dutch trickster behind the scenes! ”

"So what?" Xu Xin stretched out his hand and asked Blanco, who was a little excited, to sit down. Then he lit himself a pipe, and his secretary sat behind him, spreading out his notebook and recording the conversation.

In fact, Xu Xin was a little surprised that Blanco got the news so quickly. You must know that the liaison officer of the Dutch West India Company has only been on the East Coast for only a month, and the news has already reached San Vicente, Brazil.

"The Dutch are your enemies too! Every musket you sell them will probably end up in the hands of the Spaniards! So you should ban the sale of weapons to the Dutch, it's clear that you're an enemy! Blanco's love was still a little emotional. I saw that he kept gesturing with his hands in various postures, intending to strengthen his persuasiveness.

"You have mobilized two thousand troops from the mainland last year, four hundred of whom have been deployed north of the Gérard Mountains, and in the second half of the year two hundred mercenaries from the Scottish Highlands have also been deployed there. They are armed with flintlock muskets and cannons, and their combat effectiveness is not bad, and they seem to have a lot of experience in warfare. Xu Xin ignored the excited Blanco, and after exhaling a puff of milky white smoke rings, he sat comfortably on the Taishi chair made of rosewood in Xinhuaxia, and continued: "Why are so many troops deployed there? Isn't there a war going on on your front? Why are hundreds of valuable and experienced soldiers deployed so close to us? What are you worried about? Worried about us? ”

Xu Xin's words made Blanco choke. This was not a good answer, as the Portuguese had deployed several hundred troops to the area north of the Gérards. Apparently stimulated by the fact that the people on the east coast had been extending the northern border to the north for the past two years, these people were obviously prepared to occupy the southern edge of the plateau and prevent the people on the east coast from continuing to advance northward with a condescending position. But you can't tell the truth, especially at this sensitive time.

For many years, the people of the East Coast had insisted that they had sovereignty over the entire Gérard Mountains under the Treaty of Rocha signed with Spain in 1633. However, the Portuguese refused to recognize the treaty signed by Spain, arguing that according to the agreement between Spain and Portugal at the time of the merger, the overseas colonies of the two sides would maintain the status quo, that is, the Kingdom of Spain had no right to dispose of the former Portuguese colonies, so the clause in the Treaty of Rocha that the northern frontier of the eastern border of the Republic of China "shall not cross the Gérard Mountains at the farthest" was invalid. The Portuguese had been protesting to the east coast until 1640 that the Gérard Mountains were Portuguese, and that the frequent exploration activities carried out by the people on the east coast had seriously violated their rights; After the de facto independence of Portugal in 1640, they began to plan to establish urban settlements in the Gérard region, in order to firmly control this outpost deep into the Brazilian highlands, and push back the black hands of the people on the east coast.

But Blanco isn't stupid, wouldn't it add fuel to the fire if you tell the truth at this time? There had been six formal negotiations between the East Bank and the Portuguese over the ownership of the Gérard Mountains, but each time to no avail, and the disputed area was still under Portuguese de facto control, and had been a problem for the Portuguese - especially as their war with the Dutch continued.

"The Guarani people of the Paraguayan region often enter our territory illegally, stealing our livestock, damaging our crops and attacking our people. We have to take precautions against this, because we don't want our people to be harmed in any way. "Also, the smuggling trade on the border with Paraguay has become prevalent in recent years, and we must deploy enough men here to fight the heavily armed smuggling caravans and protect the economic interests of our regular merchants." ”

Xu Xin glanced at Blanco approvingly, as if surprised by his "professional diplomatic credentials."

"Speaking of the smuggling trade, according to the information that our army has received from the front, some of your country's smugglers are acting as suppliers of weapons to the Spanish defenders in Paraguay, while they also provide various other military supplies, which has caused some damage to the relations between our two countries. Don't you want to find a way to stop this smuggling trade, and isn't the relationship between your two countries as good as these petty commercial gains? Xu Xin still sat on the Taishi chair, still saying in a tone that was neither high nor low.

Blanco was somewhat silent. The reckless sale of weapons to the Dutch by the people on the east coast and the fact that the Portuguese are now not allowed to sell weapons to the Spaniards smacks of double standards, so Blanco seems to be protesting with silence.

"Are you dissatisfied? Are you protesting? Ignoring Blanco's somewhat ugly face, Xu Xin stood up and paced around the room and said: "Of course you have the right to be dissatisfied, and it seems unreasonable that we have blatantly promised to sell all kinds of cheap military materials to the Netherlands, but we are not allowed to sell even a barrel of gunpowder to Paraguay, but--so what? ”

Speaking of this, Xu Xin took a puff of his pipe, and Wang Bazhi's anger began to let go indiscriminately: "Blanco, we are also old friends who have worked together for many years, and we are not unaware of the many small actions you have made on the East Coast over the years. For example, you sent spies into the East Coast, stole some animal and plant puples, seeds, and some drawings and designs of machinery, and secretly collected all kinds of information about our society, all of which we didn't care too much about your country's many low-interest, interest-free loans. However, the deployment of troops in the Gérard Mountains to provide military resources to the remnants of the Spanish army in Paraguay is beyond the limits of our patience. To Yan zhòng, you are provoking a war! What do you think 2,000 troops and 1,500 mercenaries from the Old World can do? Believe it or not, our country will be able to mobilize thousands of well-trained soldiers to march north into the Gérard Mountains and completely destroy your stronghold? ”

After finishing speaking, he didn't wait for Blanco to refute, and immediately raised his voice and said: "Yes, we have indeed reached some agreements with the West India Company, and we will provide them with a batch of stockpiled ordnance. But to be honest, we are still considering whether or not to continue to provide military funds to the Dutch in the future, and your performance will be one of the important criteria for us to judge when making decisions. ”

"...... do you mean?" Hearing that Xu Xin didn't care about directly picking out some details of the cooperation with the Dutch, Blanco immediately pricked up his ears, and when he heard that Xu Xin seemed to have something to say, he immediately couldn't help but ask.

"You need to do two things." Xu Xin stretched out two fingers and said: "First, immediately ban trade with Paraguay, hear clearly, I am talking about a qiē trade, whether it is military trade or ordinary commodity trade, all must be banned, we don't want to see the Spaniards in Paraguay and even the La Plata region get even a single commodity from Brazil; Second, why did you reduce the quota of cotton exported to us a while ago? Because the merchants of the Old World offered higher prices? Or is it because the plantation owners of your country are sympathetic to the Spaniards for some religious reason and refuse to export cotton to our country? I am not interested in knowing what the reason is, but I only need your country to immediately resume cotton exports to our country, and at the same time the supply will increase by at least one-third on the previous basis, and the price will be according to the long-term agreement we have signed before. If you do both, then I will petition the Government not to consider the export of the second consignment of war materials to the Dutch for the time being. ”

"You are digging into the foundation of the Spanish rule in Paraguay, and they now have not many ways to communicate with the outside world, except for the jungle path to Chalcas, there is only one trade route leading to us. If we cut off trade with them as well, they will soon be unable to hold on. Blanco said weakly, "You have a lot of requests, I have to go back and discuss it before I can officially answer you, sorry." (To be continued......)