For Antony, now the Acting Governor and Speaker of Goa, 1641 was clearly a bad year. More than two years ago, he was persuaded by Noreti, a representative of the Macau Restoration Committee, to unite the nobles and big merchants of Goa to persecute the former governor Anthony Murphy. Lested. Meneses relinquished his position as governor due to illness.

In the past, the position of Governor of Goa, the supreme ruler of Portuguese India, was occupied by the great nobles of the country, except for the first governor who conquered Goa. For these shabby settlements who came to the East to adventure, this is an unattainable throne.

However, with the help of the general dissatisfaction of the Portuguese in Goa with the King of Spain, and the help of the Macau Restoration Committee and the Ming Kingdom, Antony finally succeeded in taking the position he dreamed of.

However, the Dutch refused to recognize Princess Isabella as the heir to the Portuguese throne, and naturally denied the princess and her husband the right to protect the colony of Goa.

The aristocrats living in Goa, although they supported the Portuguese independence movement, did not intend to join the merchants in supporting Princess Isabella. Unlike the Portuguese merchants, who hoped to rely on the protection of the Ming Dynasty and be able to safely operate the Southeast Asia-China-Japan route, these Portuguese nobles were more concerned with land and family honor at home, and if they lost these, they would also lose the foundation of power in the colonies.

Therefore, the Portuguese merchants thought that if things did not work out, they would have to live in China, and their business activities were all in the area of Asia. But for the nobles, once they fail, they will lose their status in front of the commoners, and they are naturally unwilling to gamble everything in an uncertain situation.

Named after Goa Judge Felipe. Morality. The aristocracy, led by Mascalé, believed that they supported the pursuit of national independence, but as long as Princess Isabella did not wear the Portuguese crown in Lisbon's cathedral for a day, they could not swear allegiance to her as subjects.

The justice's remarks were echoed by many Portuguese Indian colonial officials, and some aristocrats who were unhappy with Isabella's grandfather, Abbot Antonio, openly declared that the Portuguese independence movement could not be led by a descendant of a royal family who had betrayed the country. Otherwise, wouldn't it be business as usual for the Portuguese people to have worked so hard to wrest the freedom of the country from the Spaniards, only to have the country in the hands of another foreign monarch?

Of course, Antony knew that although these people were talking about the fact that in order to regain the throne, Abbot Antonio went to England and France to lobby for support and betrayed the overseas colonial interests of the Kingdom of Portugal. But in fact, Princess Isabella has now become a concubine of the Ming Emperor, and her descendants are also foreign princes to Portugal. For those Portuguese who have been deceived by the Spaniards for decades, they obviously prefer a member of the Portuguese royal family of pure blood to sit on the throne.

For the acting governor of Goa, who had to deal with the war waged by the Dutch and feared that the king would send troops to Goa to quell the rebellion after the return of the former governor, Anthony clearly needed to maintain internal unity.

In addition, the power of the Ming Dynasty was so weak in the Indian Ocean, so in the end, Anthony still chose to compromise and did not declare the allegiance of the Portuguese Indian colonies to Princess Isabella for the time being, but only played the slogan of the independence of the Kingdom of Portugal.

Anthony originally thought that this was just a temporary stopgap measure, as long as the Chinese gained a foothold in the Indian Ocean, then they could first form an alliance with China against the Dutch, and then slowly clean up the internal forces that refused to be loyal to Princess Isabella, and finally let the Restoration Committee control the official positions in Portuguese India, and then declare allegiance to Her Royal Highness.

But what Anthony and the others did not think about was that the patience of all classes in the country for the Spaniards had reached the limit, and before he could start planning, there was already news of an uprising in the country. This news confirmed the people in the Portuguese Indian colonies who did not support Princess Isabella, who believed that it would be difficult for Princess Isabella in China to rush back to China to participate in the uprising in a short time, and naturally the Portuguese people would not be able to know the contender for the throne.

Moreover, compared to Princess Isabella, who is difficult to prove as the granddaughter of the abbess of Antonio, the high-ranking Duke of Bragança is obviously easy for the domestic people to accept, as the king who ruled Portugal after the kingdom's independence.

As a result, many parliamentarians and aristocrats proposed that Portuguese India should pledge allegiance to the new king as soon as news of the country's independence reached Goa.

For this kind of suggestion, Anthony is obviously difficult to accept. This not only meant that his previous investment in Princess Isabella and the Restoration Committee had been lost, but also made it difficult for him to gain the trust of the new king. At the moment, this ass is not sitting on the hot governor's throne, and it is obvious that he will soon be replaced, how can this make him willing?

But as more and more news came from home, and the Portuguese in Goa realized that the chances of success in this independence were increasing, the number of people who supported the Duke of Joao to the throne grew.

Anthony realized that without outside help, he and the members of the Goa Restoration Committee might soon be swept away from the beautifully decorated mansion. Therefore, he quietly sent a letter to the Ming Viceroy of India on the island of Ceylon through the Restoration Committee, suggesting that the other party simply send troops to Goa and bring Portuguese India under the jurisdiction of the Ming Viceroy of India.

Antony did not think that his suggestion was a betrayal of the interests of the Kingdom of Portugal, for firstly, the Kingdom of Portugal was not yet independent, so he was at most betraying the interests of the Kingdom of Spain; The second Dutch excuse for waging war on Goa was that Goa was a territory ruled by the Spanish king. Now that Goa was occupied by the Ming people, the excuse for the Dutch to start a war was gone.

Although Anthony knew that it was just a lie to make himself feel better, he had nothing to regret. Because the people of Goa were tired of the war with the Dutch, they wanted to see some change. Anthony felt that instead of expecting the independent kingdom to send troops to help Goa, it would be better to expect the Ming to rescue them, after all, the Ming was much closer to India and the country was stronger.

From 1629 to the present day, Portuguese India has lost 7 to 8,000 Portuguese soldiers in the war with the Dutch, which is almost a third of the Portuguese male population in Goa City. Nearly 200 ocean-going sailing ships were lost, and the loot looted by the Dutch was worth more than 7 million silver coins, equivalent to the total customs revenue of Goa in four years in a normal year.

The Dutch were but one of the enemies of Portuguese India, because of the damned missionaries and greedy merchants, the indigenous people around the Portuguese Indian colonies had always hated the Portuguese, especially the Mughal Empire, which was on the verge of unifying the entire Indian continent.

How much power could the country that had won its independence from the Kingdom of Spain have to help Portuguese India deal with these enemies? Antony felt that it was good that the people at home could keep their independence from the retaliation of the Spanish kingdom, and that it might be more reliable for everyone to pray to God for the safety of the overseas colonies.

Therefore, it is more practical to expect the country to send troops to rescue Portuguese India after independence, and it is better to use the name of Princess Isabella to take refuge under the wing of the Ming Emperor. It's just that what is annoying is that the Ming Indian Governor's Office has not responded for a long time, which makes him a little dilemma for a while.

While Anthony was standing at the window on the second floor of the mansion and watching the rain pouring outside, his close secretary quietly walked into his office and whispered beside him: "Lord Anthony, I have just received a report from the dock tax officer that a Chinese ship has entered the port. ”

Anthony withdrew his gaze from the window, turned to his secretary and asked, "What kind of Chinese ship is it?" Were there any Chinese from Colombo on board? ”

The secretary cautiously replied: "It is said that it is an ordinary Chinese junk ship, which is equivalent to our 400-500 ton merchant ship. According to the ship's voyage registration, the ship did call at Colombo, but no one on board claimed to be a representative of the Ming Viceroy of India. When they disembarked, they hired an intermediary on the dock and left. ”

Anthony thought for a moment and then continued to command: "Find where they live, and then inform Noretti that he will come to the door and identify them, and see if they are ordinary merchants or some other person." Now, as long as it is a ship trading in the Indian Ocean, who does not know the news of the blockade of Goa, how dare a few civilian businessmen come to Goa, could it be that their ships are loaded with weapons and gunpowder? ”

"No, no, they have checked it, and it's just ordinary Chinese cargo," the secretary quickly explained.

With Anthony bowing slightly, standing with his hands behind his back, the secretary quietly exited the room again, as if he had never entered.

In a building diagonally opposite the Governor's residence, Noretti, who was sitting in the midst of Sarmento and others attending a council meeting, received a message from the Governor's secretary. He crept up and squeezed his way out of the crowd, and saw the Governor's secretary in a room where the councillors were resting.

After hearing what the other party had told him, Noretti immediately got up and said, "Then I'll take a look at it now, and if there really is a messenger of the Ming people among them, then I will come back and report it to the governor immediately..."

When Noreti ran to the hotel rented by Li You and others, he was almost drenched in soup by the torrential rain of the rainy season in Goa. However, he did not feel any discomfort at all when he met the owner of the ship. Just ask the owner of the hotel to get him a set of dry clothes so that he can change into talking to these Chinese.

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