Speaking of the burning of Buckingham Palace, Wang Yue remembered the burning of the Old Summer Palace by the British and French forces, and couldn't help but touch his chin and wonder if he would go to Britain in the future.

Wang Yue not only knew London, but also Buckingham Palace, and he knew Britain so well that Weddell and others were very surprised. It was a time when information was very closed, and Britain was just on the rise, far less influential than Spain, Portugal and the Netherlands.

However, Wang Yue said that he was going to Europe to attack London and burn Buckingham Palace, and they all listened to it as a joke. Britain is thousands of miles away, and such an expedition of laborers cannot be done by any country on the planet at present, not to mention that Britain is not a vegetarian.

Now that they are captives, they still understand the consciousness of being a donkey: "Your Excellency, this is not what you mean. We can pay a fine to atone for our crimes, and according to the will of Lord Ge, the governor of Guangdong, hand over the perpetrator, a fine of two thousand eight hundred taels, and four cannons and fifty arquebuses. ”

He regarded Wang Yue as a group with the Guangdong government, and Wang Yue asked: "Is this proposed by Lord Ge Zhengqige, the governor of Guangdong?" ”

"Exactly, exactly!" Weddell hurriedly answered, "We are willing to accept this condition. ”

Originally, he was going to continue to bargain with the Guangzhou authorities, but he didn't expect to be taken prisoner so soon.

Wang Yue tapped his fingers on the tabletop and made a thinking motion. With the actions of the British army, it is not enough to kill them all, at most let them go to labor reform.

The main purpose of this visit to Guangdong to clean up the British troops was to maintain the maritime security of Hong Kong Island; The second is to safeguard the dignity of the country, and what the British army did to China 200 years later is undoubtedly an eternal pain in the hearts of the Chinese people.

Now that it has its own existence, history will certainly not repeat itself. Weddell and others tossed and turned in history until the end of November, when they agreed to one of the conditions of the Cantonese authorities, paying 2,800 taels in compensation, and the Cantonese authorities also saved face and released three British businessmen.

Weddell and the others listened to the sound of Wang Yue tapping on the table, as if they were knocking on the table, and they were particularly nervous.

"The compensation is 20,000 taels, eight cannons, and 100 arquebuses, and if the perpetrators are handed over, it will be handled as such." Wang Yue finally clapped his head.

Now these Britons still have some use, that is, to establish more trade channels with Europe.

Today's trade between Asia and Europe is mainly monopolized by the Netherlands, Spain, Portugal and other countries, and now that the Tiance Army has just attacked the Dutch and Spaniards in Taiwan, there is no need to kill the British as well, and if you want to solve the European problem, it will be a matter of the future, and now we will start doing business first.

As soon as Weddell heard Wang Yue's conditions, the corners of his mouth twitched, they came from afar to do business with Daming, of course, they came with money, but 20,000 taels is not a small amount, especially after the "Sun" was sunk. But the situation is stronger than people, and he can no longer be allowed not to agree, because the entire fleet is in Wang Yue's hands, and there is no difference between agreeing and not agreeing.

So Weddell nodded heavily: "We can agree to this condition, but ......!" Then he looked at Wang Yue's face, and stopped talking.

Wang Yue's face sank and said, "What? Do you still have to negotiate terms with this official? ”

The commercial representative Mount Turney hurriedly explained: "Your Excellency, we have come to Daming from far away Europe, and we have suffered heavy losses so far, and I hope that Lord Wang can be accommodating and let us buy some goods to go back, so that we can also make up for the loss of our voyage." ”

Wang Yue listened to the music, and the more he pondered it, the more funny he felt, and he couldn't help laughing out loud.

Weddell, Mount Mountney and the others were stunned when they saw Wang Yue laughing like this, thinking that they had said something wrong and provoked this Lord Wang to laugh like this.

Wang Yue really felt funny, and he was amused by Da Ming's wonder. These British people fought desperately on the coast of Guangdong for several months, and even wanted to start a war, just to buy the goods of the Ming Dynasty. Why did the Ming not allow the British to trade ashore? The reason is that Britain is not a tributary state of the Ming Dynasty.

The emperors of the Ming Dynasty believed that trade between overseas countries and China was not an act of mutual benefit, but a gift from the emperor. Therefore, the Ming Dynasty neither taxed overseas ships nor allowed them to trade freely.

The emperors believed that the only reason for foreigners to come to China was to admire China's Dehua and come to pay tribute. They treat all overseas merchant groups as diplomatic missions, not as businessmen.

If a foreigner wants to do business in China, he must disguise himself as a diplomatic envoy before he is allowed to import goods into China. After entering China, it could not be bought and sold freely, so it could only be handed over to the government and counted as tribute and sent to Beijing. The emperor, in turn, would reward the "messenger" with a large amount of money, which far exceeded the value of the goods.

The Ming Dynasty made this kind of loss-making business for two hundred years, and the emperors became more and more unable to play in the later period, because there was no money. So he constantly limited the number and scale of tribute from other countries, which means that if you come as little as possible, Lao Tzu will have no money to reward you.

Such a strange way of foreign trade in the Ming Dynasty led to many wars, because the volume of trade could not meet the demand, and this is how the Japanese came to be. Several naval battles between the Dutch and the Ming Dynasty were also for this reason. Even the war of the Tumubao Rebellion was because the leader of the Warat people first sent a large tributary group of 3,000 people, and Ming Yingzong finally couldn't bear to refuse to pay, which led to the war.

In fact, the sea ban and the closure of the country have enriched smuggling merchants, such as Zheng Zhilong, Jin merchants, etc., and the poor are the treasury.

Foreign trade, an area that had benefited all previous dynasties, was in the hands of the Ming emperors like a nightmare. To a large extent, this is related to the economic and financial ignorance of the founding emperor Zhu Yuanzhang. The ideal society in his mind was an agricultural society, where farmers farmed and the government collected agricultural taxes to maintain the Zhu family. As for other areas of the economy, he was neither interested nor able to do anything about it.

If it is in the later generations, there are overseas big bosses with a large amount of money to buy goods from you, businessmen are eager to beat gongs and drums to welcome him, and even the local government has to receive reception, in the eighties of the last century, there is a very fashionable term called investment promotion.

The Ming Dynasty is just the opposite, I am not willing to sell it to you if you give money, unless you kneel and lick, I am in a good mood, and then I will reward you with some goods.

We are indeed a cow in China, many commodities are unique in the world, there is no semicolon, such as tea, porcelain, raw silk, etc., are hundreds of years of monopoly, which is no wonder Europeans come from far and wide, crying and shouting to do business with us.