Now it's not like you call adults when you're old, but those who call adults are all court officials now!

Thinking of this, Qin Chuan couldn't help but feel excited, he couldn't say anything after saying half of it, and looked at the old man in a daze. Pen & Fun & Pavilion www.biquge.info

Li Mingfang, who had just been pulled by Qin Chuan to sit down, saw that Qin Chuan came to his senses, and hurriedly stood up and said to Qin Chuan in a hurried tone: "Dongjia, this person in front of you is Lord Zhou Fu, he is the owner of Xinhua Weaving Factory, but Lord Zhou is still our direct envoy. ”

"And the adult next to Lord Zhou is Sheng Xuanhuaisheng, the general office of our Tianjin Wei Customs Road and Tianjin Customs Superintendent, Shanghai Steamship China Merchants Bureau and Tianjin and Shanghai Telegraph Bureau."

Li Mingfang finished speaking to Qin Chuan in a hurried tone, and hurriedly knelt down at Zhou Fu with a "poof", and carefully excused Qin Chuan with a smile in fear.

"Lord Zhou, Lord Shan, don't blame, our owner has just returned from abroad, don't say that you can't figure out who our lords are, that is, I am afraid that we can't even say the official position of our Qing Dynasty, and please don't blame the two adults."

After Li Mingfang finished speaking, he turned his head and said anxiously to Qin Chuan: "Boss, don't you hurry up and apologize to Lord Zhou and Master Shan." ”

In the Qing Dynasty, the inspector was an official in charge of criminal prisons, the evaluation of officials, and the armed forces of a province, also known as the Governor and the Western Division. It's just that the political envoy is from the second grade, and the envoy is the third grade.

Although this Zhou Fu is rarely mentioned in later generations, Qin Chuan, who has made up for the history of the Qing Dynasty in the concession, knows this Zhou Fu.

Zhou Fu, the word Yushan, No. Lanxi, Anhui people. In his early years, because he failed to take the exam many times, he threw his pen into Rong and ran a copywriter in Li Hongzhang's Huai Army, which was deeply appreciated by Li Hongzhang.

Since Li Hongzhang founded the Huai Army, Zhou Fu has been following Li Hongzhang for more than 30 years, many praise paintings, deeply relied on, not only Li Hongzhang created the Beiyang Navy when Zhou Fu was mostly planning, the first military academy in the Qing Dynasty, that is, the Tianjin military academy was also founded by him. In addition, Zhou Fu also made great achievements in the establishment of the Tianjin Telegraph Bureau and the Kaiping Coal Mine, and his official position was also promoted all the way from the alternate county, and he did the Tianjin Customs Road and the Tianjin Bingbei Road, and now he is a member of the Sanpin. It can be said that this Zhou Fu is now the actual operator of Li Hongzhang's promotion of foreign affairs in Zhili.

As for this Sheng Xuanhuai, he is even more of a remarkable figure, and his fame in later generations is much greater than that of Zhou Fu.

Sheng Xuanhuai, a native of Jiangsu, the word Xingsun, the number of the building, Xiucai was born. Sheng Xuanhuai's father, Sheng Kang, was an official in his early years and had a good relationship with Li Hongzhang. In the ninth year of Tongzhi, Sheng Xuanhuai was recruited into the shogunate by Li Hongzhang, and was very appreciated by Li Hongzhang, and was promoted to the prefect in the second year. Later generations crowned Sheng Xuanhuai with many names, including official businessmen, compradors, representatives of the Westernization faction, famous politicians, entrepreneurs, philanthropists, fathers of Chinese industry, Chinese businessmen and so on.

It is no wonder that Sheng Xuanhuai is famous in later generations, Sheng Xuanhuai is indeed extraordinary, he created eleven Chinese firsts in his life: the first private joint-stock enterprise, China Merchants Steamship; the first telegraph office; the first small river steamer company; The first bank, China Merchants Bank; the first railway trunk line, Jinghan Railway; the first iron and steel conglomerate, Hanyeping Company; The first Higher Normal School, Nanyang College, which is now Shanghai Jiaotong University; the first exploration company; the first public library; The first modern university, Peiyang University, now Tianjin University; In addition, he also participated in the establishment of the first Red Cross Society in China.

Li Hongzhang praised Sheng Xuanhuai as "an official seal in one hand, an abacus in the other, an official and a businessman, and the left and right." It can be said that most of the major modern Western-style industrial, mining, transportation and financial enterprises created in the first stage of China's modern era were established through the hands of Sheng Xuanhuai.

Sheng Xuanhuai has another thing that few people know, and he never talks about it himself, that is, he is known as a red-top businessman, manipulates the commerce of Jiangsu and Zhejiang, relies on Zuo Zongtang, the governor of Liangjiang, and has Li Hongzhang as a backer, Sheng Xuanhuai, who has been fighting for power, power, and wealth for more than ten years, and finally fell into Sheng Xuanhuai's trap and withdrew from the shopping mall politics in defeat.

Zhou Fu and Sheng Xuanhuai are now both famous figures not only in Zhili, but also in the entire Qing Dynasty.

Qin Chuan, who came to his senses, was hesitating whether he wanted to kneel down for Zhou Fu, Zhou Fu had already gotten up and pulled Li Mingfang to get up, while smiling to stop Qin Chuan, who was hesitating.

"You don't want to be like this, the old man and the grand man are not wearing official clothes today, they are coming in micro clothes, and it is a private matter, you must not do this big gift, just a flat courtesy. Come, come, sit down. ”

Zhou Fu said that Qin Chuan had already sat down, but Li Mingfang was forced by Zhou Fu to sit on the sofa.

Seeing that Qin Chuan and Li Mingfang were still a little cramped, Sheng Xuanhuai asked Qin Chuan with a smile: "Hearing Mr. Li talk about the word Qin shopkeeper, I will also call Ming Hong." ”

Qin Chuan looked humble and nodded in agreement.

Sheng Xuanhuai asked curiously: "Ming Hong, you just promised to buy grey cloth from the Japanese, and said that you also want to buy all the grey fabrics from Zhou Daren's Xinhua Weaving Factory, and I also understood this afternoon, the scale of your current dyeing factory can dye 13,000 or 4,000 pieces of grey cloth at most in a month." But if you want to buy grey cloth from both houses, that is, you have to buy 26,700 horses of grey cloth every month, and half of these grey fabrics will be piled up in the warehouse if you can't dye the car-colored cloth that month. In the next few months, no matter how big your warehouse is and how much money you have, I am afraid that there will be nowhere to put it and no money to use. ”

"In my opinion, either you will only buy grey cloth from the Japanese East Asian dyeing factory, and Kondo will buy you with silver, so that you can promise not to expand your production capacity and give him a way out; The other is nothing more than that you are unmoved, insisting on buying grey cloth from Zhou Daren's Xinhua Weaving Factory, and then you and Zhou Daren expand production capacity at the same time, and finally squeeze the Japanese East Asian dyeing factory. But according to you, I don't know a little. ”

Qin Chuan was afraid that his appearance of kneeling and not kneeling was too contrived, and he was seen through by Zhou Fu and Sheng Xuanhuai, and he was worried in his heart, seeing Sheng Xuanhuai asking about this, he finally found a place to cover up, and hurriedly arched his hand to give Zhou Fu and Sheng Xuanhuai a gift, and then explained.

"Lord Zhou, Lord Shan, that's the case."

"The Japanese are making it clear that they want to give us money, as the saying goes, officials don't give gifts, since they send it, we have to accept it."

Li Mingfang hurriedly said: "But Lord Zhou, this Xinhua weaving factory 。。。。。。 ”

Qin Chuan smiled bitterly and said to Li Mingfang: "Old Li, the two adults have cold tea, hurry up and make a new one." ”

With Zhou Fu and Sheng Xuanhuai present, Li Mingfang couldn't say anything, but he just reminded Qin Chuan with his eyes while getting up, don't brush Zhou Fu's face.