Now, five years have passed since the thirteenth year of Tongzhi's "Dingguo is Edict", and there are still no obvious changes in the entire Middle Earth!

“…… The lady will insult herself and then others will insult her, and things will first rot and then worms. Where the reason is, it is imperative. There are foreign countries in Middle-earth, and Jews have diseases, and the sick must be treated with medicine, and the cultivation of vitality is especially important. Foreign countries do not observe the direction of our people's will every day, and China will seek nothing to be comfortable with the rights and wrongs of the people's will. The establishment of the upper house and the lower house of foreign countries is difficult to implement, but righteousness can be taken. Where I employ people to administer, every move, the reason, the people's feelings, not the people's hearts, then stop in a hurry; If the matter is the common happiness of the people, the business will be completed. Advocating thrift to meet the needs of surplus money, being able to be prepared in case of trouble, accepting advice to open the way, and passing through the above. When the foreign countries are around, and there is no one to take advantage of, the other can not succeed immediately, and I can stand on my own. This is a plan that is still within reach at present, and it is also a plan that cannot be slowed down at this time. If you wait for the time to be opened, and want to mediate and make up for the law, then you cannot be afraid of war. Even if you can still be safe, and the overall situation is unbearable, how can you prevent it from happening! ……”

The "Gou An situation" that Wen Bochuan was worried about has not changed much!

And the various undertakings promoted by himself and many people who are worried about the country: telegraph, railway, coastal defense, etc., can only be called a small success!

Li Shaoquan recalled the hard work he had made to set up these Western-style undertakings, and since the death of his master and apprentice, the Western-style faction had lost the most powerful person against the stubborn old faction, and he couldn't help but sigh again and again.

In modern times, there were frequent external troubles and civil strife in Middle-earth, and the military situation was always urgent. Building a telegraph transmission system that can spread by 10,000 miles is undoubtedly an urgent task of the Qianguo Government, which has always been in a dangerous situation. In fact. As early as the ninth year of Tongzhi (9070 in the Western calendar). Great Eastern Company of the United Kingdom and Great Northern Company of Denmark have laid telegraph cables in Middle-earth. The Great Eastern Company obtained the right to set up submarine cables in Haikou, a treaty port south of Shanghai, and built a line from India to the southern coast of China and Turkey to Hong Kong via Singapore, while the Danish Great Northern Company, whose major shareholder was the Russian royal family, set up submarine cables from Vladivostok to Shanghai and Hong Kong. By June of the 10th year of Tongzhi, Middle-earth had been effectively incorporated into the world telegraph network. In this way, foreign countries can transmit information and issue orders in an instant in various matters such as business and negotiation in Middle-earth, while Middle-earth is still the same, and it is not allowed to erect telegraph lines, and it still relies on horses and postroads to send messages and orders. In this "information war". The comparison between the good and the bad is too great.

The telegraph business was boycotted, and the biggest reason of the opposition was to "destroy Feng Shui". After the officials of the DPRK and China put forward a proposal to set up a telegraph, Chen Yi immediately decided in a compromise that "the establishment of electric wires will go deep into the ground, run through and go in all directions, and the earth's veins will be extinct, and the wind will invade and irrigate the water, and it is inevitable." How can the hearts of those who are for their children and grandchildren be at ease? It is said: 'Seeking loyalty and ministers will be at the gate of filial piety'. Even if the people of Middle-earth are willing to ignore the ancestral tombs and let them set up copper wires. Shang An wants to respect the monarch? Once the gossip official who has mastered the moral system moves out the word "loyalty and filial piety", no one will dare to defend it.

At that time, the New York Times of the United States recorded: "The people of the Celestial Empire could not understand how the telegraph worked, and they believed that the foreigners had hired clever and invisible ghosts and gods to shuttle back and forth in the line to transmit information." If something unfortunate happened near the telegraph line, there would immediately be a rumor that one of the evil gods who was carrying the message had neglected his duty, had escaped from the wire, had lost his way, and had caused a misfortune, and so on. Such rumors usually cause riots, and the thugs will not hesitate to rush over and smash the machine. On one occasion, a mile-long telegraph line was destroyed overnight due to the illness of someone near the telegraph line. "The controversy over the telegram can be said to have been arguing until now.

Just as Japan invaded Moss Bay under the pretext of crusading against Shengfan, the Daqian Imperial Court in Beijing only learned the news seven days later and reacted immediately by relying on Lin Yizhe's high-speed notification ship to carry out "ship delivery." And the normal report on Taiwan's military situation took a month to arrive in Beijing after the traditional "post delivery"! Emperor Tongzhi and Empress Dowager Renxi were furious and decided to erect their own telegraph lines in Middle-earth, and not long after some officials put forward a proposal to erect telegraph lines in a timely manner, the Qingliu still wrote against it, and once again sacrificed the magic weapon of the word "filial piety", so that the erection of the telegraph in Middle-earth made waves again!

In addition to the telegraph, the railway was even more obstructive.

Of the many new technologies facing Middle-earth in modern times, railways are arguably the most intractable. And its trickiness is not because of how advanced the technology is and how difficult it is to lay, but because of the ideological "big right and wrong"!

Since the sixth year of Tongzhi, the court has been arguing about whether to build a railway. After some officials put forward the proposal of building a railway "for the benefit of the whole world," Li Futai, the governor of Fujian, vehemently wrote a letter to oppose it, accusing the electric wires and railways of being harmful things that "disturb the people and disturb the people and disturb customs." Moreover, the construction of railways to open roads in the mountains and build bridges in the face of water is a bad thing that alarms the mountain gods and dragon kings, and will anger the gods and invite great disasters. He also believed that as long as both foreign merchants and Chinese merchants built railways would make "the small people miserable and forced to hang upside down", the result would be "to seize the benefits of the poor with their arrogance", so not only could not agree to foreigners to build railways, but also forbade Chinese merchants to build railways. Even the relatively open Minister of Commerce, Chonghou, said, "The railroad does nothing in Middle-earth, but does infinite harm." Liu Kunyi, the governor of Jiangxi, also believed that "the trade of China and the earth was used to move the post", and there was no need for railways at all.

At that time, the New York Times quoted a man named Albert? Bickmer's American observer, in his words, put it to the point, "The greatest obstacle to the implementation of such a great project can only be the hostility of the people of Middle-earth towards all foreigners, and their own superstitious thoughts." ”

"Many Middle-earthers thought that railways would disrupt the harmony between man and nature, that they would cut through the earth for a long time, that they would break the normal rhythm and divert the benevolent power of the earth, that they would also unwork the workers of the roads and canals, and that they would change the market patterns that had been formed."

In other words, the controversy over whether to build a railway occurs in two aspects: one is whether the construction of the railway will alarm the ancestors, and the other is whether it will destroy the thousand-year-old agricultural economic model.

But Li Shaoquan, who is the leader of the Westernization faction, knows. These are all appearances. For railways. In fact, the common people and the local gentry did not contradict it. Because if the traffic is smooth. It is convenient for the circulation of goods and materials, and only benefits and convenience are brought to them.

The biggest obstacle to the construction of railways in China and Turkey actually comes from the stubborn insistence of traditional scholars and doctors on "traditional ideology"!

At that time, when all the Western-style officials were helpless, Lin Yizhe solved this problem in one fell swoop! The method he adopted is really incredible!

Lin Yizhe's method is a gardener!

Regarding Lin Yizhe's statement that he mobilized overseas Chinese businessmen to repay the service and donate funds to repair the garden, the Qing rumor officials have always hated it very much, thinking that this is "seducing the monarch's father". The "traitorous move" of "harming the people and inviting favors", but because of the prestige of the Empress Dowager Renxi and the several officials who had previously written against it, they were all very miserable, and they did not dare to openly oppose it with great fanfare, but as long as there was a suitable opportunity, they would jump out and make an article with it.

But they didn't expect that the reason why Lin Yizhe was willing to take the risk of "being pointed out by a thousand people" to promote the gardener was not to invite pets from above, but for another purpose!

Lin Yizhe said, "The gardeners need a lot of wood, all of which have to be mined from Taiwan's Fandi, and now the wood is collected by the people." The shipyard is transshipped by the seaway, which is very appropriate. However, the land transshipment between Beijing and Tianjin is not very convenient and takes a lot of time", if there is a railway, it will "not only save time, but also reduce people's manpower." ”

And in order to block the mouth of the "Qing Discussion", Lin Yizhe also prepared a speech for the Queen Mother of the Two Palaces in advance. In response to the rumor-clearing official's claim that the railway destroys feng shui, Lin Yizhe said, "When scholars discuss the harm of the railway, one is to destroy feng shui, and the other is to damage farmland." In fact, both of these two arguments are false. ”

Lin Yizhe said vigorously: "The study of feng shui focuses on finding the dragon potential, there are returning to the dragon, going out of the ocean, descending the dragon, giving birth to the dragon, the giant dragon, the needle dragon, the soaring dragon, and the leading group of dragons. The dragon vein of auspicious land is created by thousands of years, and the dragon vein of the railway is artificially built. In addition to its natural dragon veins, the 'golden dragon' built by itself is also a great help. He also said, "In addition, in the study of Feng Shui, there is a theory of 'calling for images', and from this point of view, this railway is also a dragon's potential, and it can be built to prosper and be harmless." ”

Lin Yizhe's seemingly well-founded and seemingly apocryphal theory can be described as "using the spear of the other side and attacking the shield of the other", which suddenly broke the objection of the Qingliu people to "the railway destroys feng shui".

Lin Yizhe also unceremoniously refuted the Qingliu's claim that the railway harmed farmland, saying that "the railway did not damage the farmland, and the so-called locomotive rumbling and damaging the seedlings was nonsense", and in response to the people's fear of this, Lin Yizhe also gave a solution: "For the sake of not disturbing the people, when building the roadbed, all farmland, graves, mountains and rivers, etc., can be bypassed", and pointed out that "when Japan first built the railway, the voice of domestic opposition was no different from that of China, and in order to avoid civil discussions, the Japanese government did not hesitate to detour to build a sea dam, The railroad was finally completed. After that, the railways were of great benefit to the people, and the Japanese people not only no longer opposed the construction of new railways, but advocated more construction." The Empress Dowager of the Two Palaces listened to his explanation, thought it was reasonable, agreed to overhaul the railway, and wrote the construction of the railway into the "Dingguo is the edict", so that the obstacle to the construction of the railway was broken.

But even so, to this day, the railway built by Middle-earth is only one from Tianjin to Beijing, not to mention the Taixi countries, even compared with Japan across the sea, it is too far behind!

And now, Lin Yizhe is no longer there......

Li Shaoquan recalled the days when he and Lin Yizhe worked together to run foreign affairs, and he was sad for a while.

His eyes fell back on those black and white photos, and he couldn't help but think of Lin Yiqing.

These photos are the foreigners of Tianjin Customs, the German Ernst? Olmer was taken when he watched the war in Japan, when he served in Xiamen Customs, he had opened a photo studio, using the latest camera, this time his curiosity was attacked, he took the opportunity to go to Japan, wanted to experience the war, he used the camera to shoot in detail the details of the largest civil war in Japan's history, many photos were published by the British "Times", when he returned to Tianjin, Li Shaoquan was anxious to understand Lin Yiqing's situation, specially invited Olmo to come to the supervision office as a guest, and asked him about the situation, The generous Olmer gave Li Shaoquan these photos after giving him a detailed description.

Seeing these photos, Li Shaoquan really understood that the war directed by Lin Yiqing weakened Japan. To what extent.

Even with his ability and courage when Li Shaoquan pacified the bandits. It is impossible to reach such an extent!

He can't even imagine it now. How will Lin Yiqing end.

Born and died in the rain of bullets, will he return safely?

After Lin Yiqing comes back, will he be like Lin Yizhe, solve the problems given by the stubborn old school one by one, and bring the Westernization career to a new level?

And Lin Yiqing's reaction to Qingliu's attack will be the same as Lin Yizhe's?

Or will it ......

Thinking of Lin Yiqing's means of killing Huang Shulan's family, Li Shaoquan couldn't help but fight a cold war.

"Hanpeng, you need to know that Middle-earth is not Japan. The battle between the open and the dark in the officialdom is still very dangerous than the battlefield! That Qingliu is a man who talks about people and doesn't do things, your martial artist's temperament, falling into their hands, I'm afraid of ......," Li Shaoquan said to himself.

When Li Shaoquan was worried about himself, his confidant Li Sheng walked in quickly and presented a telegram to Li Shaoquan.

"Master Taiwan, Master Lou's telegram from Master Lou in Beijing." Li Sheng bowed and said.

Li Shaoquan nodded and took the telegram. I opened the envelope, took out the newspaper and read it. Li Sheng saluted and walked out quickly.

The message was not long. Li Shaoquan only glanced at it, and his face changed slightly.

"Sure enough, as I expected, his people haven't come back yet, and someone in the capital has already smelled something wrong, so they're going to attack him!" Li Shaoquan finished reading the telegram and sneered.

Lou Chunfan told Li Shaoquan in a telegram that because Yanagihara Maemitsu, the Japanese minister in Beijing, had repeatedly gone to the Prime Minister's Yamen to make representations, saying that some Qianguo people had violated neutrality and were helping the Japanese rebels in the southwest, and demanded that the Qianguo side recall them, Prime Minister Yamen tried to prevaricate at first because he was "unaware," but later urged Yanagihara Maemitsu to be in a hurry, saying that "it may have been done by overseas people, and this generation is in a foreign country, and the Celestial Empire does not care about it." Yanagihara Maemitsu was unwilling to have anything to do with Prime Minister Yamen, so he simply bribed some officials and went directly to the imperial court to call Lin Yiqing He joined the Japanese rebels, made enemies of the Japanese government, provoked wars, and suffered many overseas Chinese in Japan, and caused the countries to misunderstand that the Celestial Empire secretly aided the Japanese rebels, so that the reputation of the Celestial Empire was greatly damaged", and demanded that the imperial court "rush to Japan to quickly capture this madman and quell the rebellion", so that "the Wei Debu of the Celestial Empire will be in the east, and the nations will look up to him". Now that a number of officials have made a performance, Prince Jing is very worried, and he is to reveal the news so that Li Shaoquan and other Western-style officials can make it known so that they can take countermeasures.

"It seems that this time, I have to ask Zhang Yunqiao to make a move." Li Shaoquan put down the telegram and said to himself, "It just so happens that the day of debriefing is approaching, so I will take advantage of this time to hand over the sign to meet and ask the Queen Mother to help me!" …… Ding Yisheng and Shen Hanyu have to hurry up and inform them that they will also be compromised! ”

Li Shaoquan had a certain idea, so he immediately took a pen and paper and drafted a telegram, and after a short time, he drafted the telegram drafts to Prince Jing, Zhang Peilun, Ding Yusheng, and Shen Youdan, and he pulled the bell, called Li Sheng, and told him to go to the telegram room immediately and send out all the telegrams.

Fuzhou, Mawei Port.

A young man dressed in cloth walked briskly along the street, and soon they came to Ding Yusheng's mansion not far from the Harbour Master's Office, and after informing the porter, they entered the gate and came straight to the back hall.

After receiving the report, Ding Yusheng hurriedly came over, and when the visitor saw Ding Yusheng, he immediately saluted and submitted the telegram.

Seeing that it was a telegram from the Tianjin Zhili Governor's Office, Ding Yusheng nodded quietly, and left in a hurry after saluting.

Ding Yusheng planned to go to the shipmaster's gun station, but somehow, the telegram in front of him dispelled this thought, he returned to his room, immediately opened the telegram, and read it.

The content of the telegram was not long, and after Ding Yusheng read it, he was a little distracted for a while, and Xu Rui didn't notice it when he came in.

"My lord......" Looking at Ding Yusheng with a cloudy face and a constantly changing expression, Xu Rui couldn't help but shout worriedly, seeing that Ding Yusheng didn't react, he repeated again: "My lord?!" ”

"Oh," Ding Yusheng finally came back to his senses, "Mr. Xu." He looked at Xu Rui, who was worried, and immediately smiled apologetically: "I'm distracted for a while, so Mr. will laugh." ”

"My lord has been working too hard for a while, so you should pay attention to rest and recuperate." Xu Rui has always been a sensible person, seeing that Ding Yusheng was so unrelenting, he said with concern.

"If this hard work can bear fruit, it will be worth it, I'm afraid of ......," Ding Yusheng sighed.

"Could it be that there is another excerpt of the impeachment of the adult? Don't let this generation disturb your mind. Thinking of what happened recently, Xu Rui suppressed the anger in his heart, "This so-called 'clear stream', there are things inside and outside, and there is no real plan!" And the military is decided, then the people in power will obstruct each other when they create a thing, and the group will ridicule and spend money on making a weapon, which is really a mediocre and misleading country! ”

"It's nothing, even if the shipmaster is not hindered by these small things, it is just a temporary embellishment, a little framing." Ding Yusheng had completely regained his usual calm at this time, and he continued: "As far as my big cadres are concerned, the shipyard is just a whitewash, even if there are occasional small successes, it can hardly be regarded as a way to self-improvement!" (To be continued......)

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