"Emperor Xianfeng" encouraged senior ministers to visit Europe, but this time only Guo Songtao was willing to visit. Shortly after the wedding, Tang Ning returned to Milan and personally took Guo Songtao to visit the Milan Automobile Factory. This is the third car factory set up by Downing, and according to his plan, it is more advanced than the first, and the Milan car factory is the factory standing on the top of the world.

Its product will be the latest generation of cars, long-distance tourers using methanol fuel reformers, named Continental GT, GT is the meaning of GT. The ability to travel is focused on speed and long-distance capability, and it can travel 1,000 kilometers at a speed of 100 kilometers per hour with a full charge of methanol fuel, making it the most fully highway-friendly car in the current three product lines.

Today, the countries friendly to the Windsor consortium are almost united, from England to Belgium and Luxembourg to Bavaria, Switzerland, Italy, and the two small German states of Baden and Württemberg in between. Or the region of Alsace and Lorraine, which originally belonged to the Roman Empire of the Holy Spirit but was later taken away by France. Because these states are within the German Customs Union, the goods of the Windsor consortium prefer to be transported by the route of Baden and Württemberg. Not to mention the fact that now NATO member France has poor relations with the Windsor consortium.

There is nothing to say about the advanced automobile factory, but more importantly, Tang Ning took him to see the downstream suppliers of the surrounding automobile factories and explained to him how a large factory drives the development of an industry. And instilled in Guo Songtao that the prosperity of private enterprise is the only way to prevent corruption. The more the government manages, the lower the efficiency, if China wants to develop industry and commerce, the most taboo is the government-run enterprises, human nature determines that only when everyone is responsible for their own profits can they produce efficiently.

The article on the big production of the machine in the Daqing News newspaper appeared twice in three days, so the whole Qing Dynasty now knows the reason for the development of the West, so the Westernization movement has already appeared, which is a good thing, but most officials are still on the surface of the production of the machine, thinking that the government-run enterprises are the king. If it continues to develop according to their understanding, China's modernization will only achieve extremely limited successes.

Japan's reform movement understood it quite well, and even if it was a government-run enterprise, it was quickly sold to private individuals to run it, and they would rather support large conglomerates than resolutely refrain from engaging in state-run enterprises. Moreover, they have the Windsor Foundation, which has led a large number of industries with giant corporations, and it is now developing at a much faster rate than the Meiji Restoration in history.

However, according to the current trend, Greater Shanghai will definitely develop much faster than Tokyo, the economic scale of the entire Qing Dynasty is there, and the imperial court implements a liberal economic policy towards Su Songtai, even if the Japanese have a better understanding of the modern economic system, there is no way to surpass the development speed of the Qing Dynasty centered on Shanghai in terms of economic development. Take Daqing Steel Mill as an example, in the face of such a large market, the scale is ten times larger than that of Japanese steel mills. A Daqing Railway Bureau has a budget of 22 million taels of silver for the Beijing-Shanghai line alone, and if there are no special circumstances, the train network of Daqing is dozens of times that of Japan.

Of course, economic development was not Tang Ning's expectation for the Qing Dynasty, as long as a good legal system was established, the hard-working nation would naturally make progress on its own. Now the tariffs of the Qing Dynasty are extremely low, and the great powers think that they have earned it, but they do not know that once China's industry is set up, it will also be very terrifying, and if the 400 million labor force matures, it can turn the European free traders into tariff protectionists like the United States.

Guo Songtao was very envious of the large factories in Milan, and finally understood the improvement in production efficiency brought by the production of large machines mentioned in the Daqing news. However, when it comes to corruption, he sighed, and even said that the Qing Dynasty is now unancient, the world is like this, no officials are not greedy, even if it is not a government-run enterprise, they will find a way to seek rent for power.

Downing told him about the story of the British South Sea Company. That is, the South China Sea Company, which was established by the British when the Mississippi River was developed, and the company (now in the hands of a collector of an ancient company) took advantage of the lack of information brought by the sea moats from Europe to North America, colluded with the government, and concealed the company's troubled financial situation for a long time. Later, Congress used third-party audits to expose the truth about the South China Sea Company to the public, leading to the bursting of the economic bubble that shook across Europe.

There are two modern anti-corruption lessons in the case of Nanhai Company, the first is information transparency. Second, third-party audits. If the officials of the Great Qing Dynasty want to be honest, they should declare their assets to the local officials, and they are not allowed to hide gold and silver privately, and they must be exchanged for deposits and deposited in the Hubu Bank. After depositing in the bank, the real-name system must be obtained, and those who have a huge amount of property must explain the source.

Third-party auditing is of great benefit to the integration of the accounting work of merchants in the Qing Dynasty with the world's accounting system. Guo Songtao doesn't know much about the accounting system, but he thinks that private gold and silver can't be investigated, because no one can go to the official's house to search it, right? So they must be secretly hiding, these bad guys, they are more daring than you think.

Tang Ning smiled mysteriously and said, "Why not?" Science and technology can solve this problem. Ten years ago, the French physicist Foucault discovered an interesting phenomenon that could be applied to metal detection. Belch...... Have you ever heard of wireless telegraphy that transmits through invisible light such as electromagnetic waves? ”

Guo Songtao shook his head: "It's really not, we all think it's witchcraft Chinese, no one can explain it clearly, it turns out to be invisible light...... When I say that, I have a bit of a score in my heart. ”

Downing: "Hehe, electromagnetic waves are like oars, and metal is like the surface of water, oars hitting the surface of the water may form a whirlpool, and the whirlpool will in turn have an impact on the boat, this is the relationship between electromagnetic waves and metal." Using this, metal detectors can be invented. Iron, silver, and gold can all be detected.

After receiving the report, the clean government agencies of the Qing Dynasty could use this method to efficiently search the homes of officials, as long as the efficiency was high enough, it would not affect the lives of officials, and officials who were reported would be willing to be inspected for the sake of their innocence. Corrupt officials will definitely refuse to admit it, and the anti-corruption agency can only forcibly search the official's residence after it has a certain amount of evidence. ”

Guo Songtao laughed and said, "Interesting! However, this method is too mysterious, and as I said, there are almost no officials and no one is greedy in the Qing Dynasty, and no one is willing to use such a technique in anti-corruption, even if the emperor is willing, he can't withstand the pressure of all officials, it's still no fun! ”

Tang Ning smiled faintly: "Who said that your emperor can't stand it?" Go ahead, and he'll say yes. ”

Guo Songtao seemed to smell some danger signal, and the tiger's body was shocked: "This ...... How do you know? ”

Tang Ning: "Looking at your appearance, I must have thought of some key, have you heard about the attack on your emperor's imperial guards?" ”

Guo Songtao: "Uh...... Have you heard of it? ”

Tang Ning: "It seems that the entire Qing Dynasty almost knows about it, so I'll just find out, it's my own army that attacked the holy car." Now, the life and death of your emperor are all under my control, and all his holy decrees can only be issued with the consent of my people, and my orders, your emperor must be issued to the entire Qing Dynasty as his own holy decrees. ”

Guo Songtao was taken aback, as if struck by lightning, he took several steps back, his eyes were like owls, the other party is also the emperor, and it is the emperor of a country that is not small, according to Guo Songtao's recent international intelligence, Italy's population is 25 million, which is about the same as the 29 million in the United Kingdom. Such an emperor, of course, has no jokes. So Lao Guo was shocked.

Tang Ning smiled softly and said: "I can forgive and reuse the thieves of the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom, Master Guo don't have to be afraid, at most you refuse to accept the direction I guided for the Qing Dynasty and resign, and I won't embarrass anyone." The title of Emperor of Italy is not as loud as the name of the Windsor Consortium, and I care about the safety of capital, and I want the Qing Dynasty to become a modern civilized country that guards the property of all the people, not to turn it into a colony like India. ”

After staying for a long time, Guo Songtao said in anticipation: "For ...... Cough...... Why did you tell me such a confidential matter? ”

Tang Ning: "Yes, you are the first person to officially know this secret, because I instructed the emperor of the Great Qing Dynasty to encourage high-ranking officials to visit Europe, and you were the only one who responded. You can go back and think about whether it is better to turn the Qing Dynasty into a constitutional monarchy, or to stick to the thousand-year-old Confucian tradition, with monarchs, ministers, fathers, and sons. ”

Guo Songtao smiled bitterly: "You really have a vision, after I arrived in Europe, the braid behind me was noticed by everyone, I was impulsive, and I twisted it, this is among the ministers, I am afraid it is also the only one, in the capital, only the boys in the Shenji Battalion dare to twist the braids." ”

Tang Ning laughed, stepped forward and patted Lao Guo on the shoulder, and said, "I think you have the potential to become the first prime minister under the constitution of the Qing Dynasty!" ”

Lao Guo's eyes lit up, this is a position above 10,000 people and under no one, creating an unprecedented feat in China.

The two passed the initial period of distrust and began to talk about the bright future of the Qing Dynasty, Lao Guo was particularly excited that he would open a new era of the rule of the Qing Dynasty, he had communicated with Zeng Guofan for a long time in this regard, they were all looking forward to the foreign sigh, there was no way to corrupt officials, and the technocratic anti-corruption gave a new opportunity to the aspiring scholar class. （http：//.）。

At this time, many of the young people trained by the International Academy had entered the British society as judges' assistants for a year or two, and Downing was preparing to establish a circuit appellate court for the Qing Dynasty, with these young people serving as judges to review the judiciary of guilds and local officials, that is, the court of appeal. At present, there are too few talents to establish a regular intermediate trial court, so they can only travel around the provinces and go to a certain province at a fixed time every year to receive appeal cases.

The Chinese nation is different from the Indians, Malays, and Arabs, and is particularly diligent and has a strong sense of self-esteem, which will cause great harm to the progress of its own nation when used for xenophobia, but once it is used for progress, it is quite powerful. The role of establishing a perfect market economy on a certain country depends on its national character, and Tang Ning was very optimistic about the vigorous force of the Han people under the improvement of the legal system.

When the two talked more and more speculatively these days, bad news came from the side of Rehe that Emperor Xianfeng was critically ill.