Standing on the moral high ground, the ministers had a natural sense of superiority over Zheng Zhilong, who was born as a pirate, and had a sense of superiority in his practice of "thieves and Taoists" back then, so they laughed.

Hongyi also laughed along, but he was laughing at their self-esteem.

"Xuan Ye said that Zheng Zhilong has only been a pirate for two or three years, and he also has a provenance. Two years after becoming a pirate, that is, in March of the sixth year of the Apocalypse (1626), Zheng Zhilong led a ship to Zhangpu and entered Jinxia and Xiamen. In April, Haicheng was again committed, and the officers and men could not resist wherever they went. Zhu Qinxiang, who was the governor of Fujian in the late Ming Dynasty at that time, participated in the politics of Cai Shanji [1] as the political envoy of Fujian, and was kind to Zheng Zhilong, and specially ordered him to patrol the sea road in Quanzhou, so that Cai Jishan wrote a letter to recruit Zheng Zhilong. Hongyi spoke eloquently, ready to instill his ideas to everyone step by step.

"How can this Cai Shanji be kind to Zheng Zhilong?" The young emperor always thought that he was the most benevolent to King Tong'an, and at first glance he heard that there were other people who were interested.

Haha, there is an allusion that Tan Qian did not tell me, but I might as well tell you about it - Hongyi was not annoyed by the interruption of his speech, but was very satisfied with the emperor's concentration.

"Huang Ama, this Cai Shanji served as the prefect of Quanzhou Prefecture during the Wanli period of the former Ming Dynasty. From time to time, the son of a treasurer, who was ten years old, threw stones into the yamen for fun, and mistakenly hit the forehead of Shanji. Shanji wanted to whip him, but when he saw his strange appearance, he warned him and released him. This young son is Zheng Zhilong, the king of Tong'an. Hongyi quoted a passage from the "Wucheng County Chronicles" compiled by Guangxu Nian, which was conclusive, and he didn't care about the authenticity of the evidence.

"Haha, King Tong'an was so naughty when he was young. haha, no wonder he will be able to cross the sea in the future, and dare to 'beat' the Ming Dynasty officials at a young age, haha...... "Fu Lin made a self-righteous joke, but he didn't expect this attitude to be used by Hu Shi'an to prove his judgment of Zheng Zhilong, and thought that he had been acquiesced by the emperor.

"Your Majesty! Zheng Zhilong can see that he has long been inferior! Hu Shi'an was anxious to add.

"Uh...... Be quiet for a while, don't be impatient, and listen to Xuan Ye's words. Fu Lin knew that he was bored with himself, and he was very embarrassed to bring out his little son, who was stable and not in a hurry.

"Huh! In fact, Zhilong had long wanted to get an official and a half-job, so that he could sail freely and promote maritime trade as an official, and he went to Quanzhou to surrender to Cheng after receiving the letter. His accomplices, Chen Xinji, and others were reluctant to surrender. He still led the ship back to Taiwan. Because Cai Shanji treats Zhilong quite well. and urged him to surrender the warships and weapons, Zheng Zhilong's brother Zheng Zhihu believed: 'Daoxian [the honorific title of Daotai, referring to Cai Shanji of the Patrol Sea] just wants to disperse my party's subordinates, and hope that it will be extraordinarily gracious?' So the two brothers rode the tide overnight and drove away. ”

"To the pirates. Why be polite? Cai Shanji has great righteousness! Hu Shi'an was busy commenting again. Hongyi nodded at him. but the mouth is not entangled. Go on.

"In the autumn of the sixth year of the Apocalypse, Zheng Zhilong docked in Tongshan [now Dongshan County, Zhangzhou City, Fujian Province], and the new governor of Fujian, Zhu Yi Feng Feng. Dispatch the capital Si Hong Xianchun to lead the general Xu Xinsu and others to suppress, and the two sides fought in Tseung Kwan O. Hong Xianchun was defeated and fled back to Kinmen. Zheng Zhilong wins but does not chase. In the winter, Zhu Yifeng ordered the Kinmen guerrilla Lu Yuying and Hong Xianchun to join forces, and the two sides fought in Lu Ge, and Lu Yuying was defeated and captured. Zheng Zhilong treated him politely, saying, 'If you dare not resist the official army, you have no choice but to hear; If you have to add up to one of them, you should serve the court to death. Lu Yuying was recommended and was released. After Lu Yuying returned to Xiamen, he asked the governor Yu Zhigao [Yu Dayou's son, but unfortunately it's not a tiger's son!] Zheng Zhilong once commented on it: Consult Gao's son, read his father's book as an apprentice, and know the soldiers? reported what Zheng Zhilong said, but Yu Zhigao took the initiative and ordered Lu Yuying to return to the province to wait for treatment. Then he sent thousands of households Ma Sheng and hundreds of households Yang Shijue to lead the ship out of the port to arrest, and both of them died in battle. He also sent the deputy chief soldier Chen Xifan to suppress him, but he was also defeated, and Chen Xifan fled first. In June of the seventh year of the Apocalypse (1627), Yu Zhigao personally supervised the Zhoushi to crusade, and was defeated in Lu Ge, Zheng Zhilong chased to Xiamen, ordered the troops not to land on the shore to disturb and plunder, and immediately collected troops back to Tongshan. In October of the same year, Zheng Zhilong defeated the Dutch fleet at Tongshan, which had been lured by Yu Zhigao to attack, and captured one of his galleons and some other ships. ”

In fact, Hongyi's wise choice here is to hide a small piece of historical information - in order to ensure the smooth flow of maritime trade routes, Zheng Zhilong quickly compromised with the Dutch and returned the "Sicapel" speedboat he had obtained. A maritime merchant is a maritime merchant, and the nature of a businessman to pursue profit maximization determines that it is impossible for Zheng Zhilong to completely break with any useful shili! At this point, it is completely inconsistent with the "concept of etiquette and righteousness" of scholars and doctors.

"It can be seen that Hu Shangshu said that Zheng Zhilong was 'intimidated by the prestige of Chongzhen's soldiers' and surrendered, Xuan Ye wanted to ask, so Ming Dynasty returned after several expeditions, where did the prestige of the soldiers come from? If King Tong'an didn't want to serve the court at that time, why not make a desperate bet and kill them all? In fact, at this time, the king of Tong'an had already had the intention to surrender before he knew it, so he defeated the enemy and did not use the method of killing them all. It's just a gate that doesn't come down and can't return. From this point of view, the real robbery of the house and the time of robbing the red hair, from the fourth to the seventh year of the Apocalypse, that is, only three years. After that, Zheng Zhilong was the court official of the former Ming Dynasty. ”

Hongyi wisely added his own comment, so that Hu Shi'an did not have a chance to interject again.

In July of the first year of Chongzhen (1628), Wang You, the prefect of Quanzhou, said to the new governor Xiong Wencan: Zheng Zhilong twice defeated Hongdu Si without chasing, won Lu guerrilla but did not kill, defeated Yu Du Governor to Haimen, restrained his people, and was not allowed to land, which is really a mote of guilt. If you don't send someone to give an edict, you will still be promised to make meritorious service and atone for your sins. Xiong Wencan took Wang You's suggestion and sent Lu Yuying to appease him. At the same time, there are finally people in the Ming Dynasty Hall who realize Zheng Zhilong's intentions. Yan Jizu, a native of Zhangzhou, was in charge of engineering at the time, and Shangshu said to Ming Chongzhen: "Zheng Zhilong grew up in Quanzhou, and all the emptiness and reality in my mainland cannot be in my chest." Coupled with the years of recruitment, the bait of money, hundreds of ships, tens of thousands of apprentices, the fox squirrels of the city and society, willing to be minions, the knife and pen of the county, all belong to the heart, the squire occasionally has an order, and the opportunity is leaked first. Only then did the government use a notice, A slandered and B falsely spoken, and then used a small favor to help his big traitor, and the virtuous and virtuous corporal robbed the rich and the poor. A thief, a family is happy, a surname is a thief, a township can be safe. ’”

So, the Ming court finally made up its mind to surrender Zheng Zhilong. In September, Zheng Zhilong went to Quanzhou to surrender. The Ming Dynasty granted him the post of coastal defense guerrilla. Since then, Zheng Zhilong has been a Ming general for 17 years, crusading against pirates and mountain bandits, and his footprints have traveled all over Fujian and Guangdong: from April to June of the second year of Chongzhen (1629), he successively killed the pirates Li Kuiqi, Yang Liu, and Yang Qi in Kinmen, and annexed them; In the spring of the fourth year of Chongzhen (1631), the pirate Zhong Bin was annihilated in the ocean; In September, Zhong Lingxiu captured the mountain and was promoted to general in Pingyuan, Guangdong. In April of the eighth year (1635), Yu Tianwei burned the pirate Liu Xiang. Collect them all. Yes. King Tong'an continued to grow and finally controlled the entire Min Ocean surface. ”

"Recruit pirates, even if they sit big, how can Chongzhen of the former Ming Dynasty be immortal?" Hu Shi'an commented as usual.

“haha。 What Master Hu said, Xuan Ye did not dare to agree. If I wish. If Chongzhen's monarchs trust Zhilong. Entrust it with the heavy task of letting go of its hands and feet, perhaps the southeast sea has long been calmed. There will be no wanton behavior of those who come from the west. The Battle of Koro Bay that Tang Lao Marfa just mentioned is proof of this! In front of King Tong'an, the power of the Westerners' ships and cannons is insignificant! ”

Hu Shi'an was dumbfounded for a moment when he was refuted, but he was still racking his brains. Taking advantage of this effort, Hongyi himself was a little distracted-

In fact, Little Belle is really embarrassed to go one level deeper into his words: if he is good at using shipping to open up government-run trade, the Ming government will be able to make a windfall, maybe the "silver crisis" at the end of the Ming Dynasty will be alleviated to a certain extent, and the country will have more abundant funds to deal with natural and man-made disasters in the country, not to mention what the outcome of Liaodong's war against Jin will be rewritten! If so, it is doubtful whether the Manchus can enter the customs!

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Of course, the silver crisis at the end of the Ming Dynasty cannot be completely blamed on the Ming Dynasty's own inability to run overseas trade and rely solely on silver imports. There is a question of international political and economic relations:

During the Wanli period of the Ming Dynasty, the sea ban had been opened, so the imperial court had enough overseas silver to import into the country. At that time, there were two main sources of silver in circulation: Iwami Ginzan in Japan and Mexican silver dollars in Manila [occupied by Spain]. Due to the strong domestic demand, the annual import of silver in the Ming Dynasty accounted for 60%-80% of the total shijie production at that time. Because the supply of silver eased, and the inflation problem at that time was eased, business flourished, real estate transactions were booming, land prices were rising, and house prices were outrageous...... A whip law was also pushed to be implemented at this time.

However, at the turn of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, many tragic events that happened in Spain in Europe were a heavy stab to the economy of the Ming Dynasty at that time.

Around 1600, Spain's "Armada" was completely defeated by England and lost its maritime supremacy; Exhausted by the "Eighty Years' War" with the Netherlands, he was finally forced to recognize the independence of the United Provinces of the Netherlands; The Holy Roman Empire detonated the "Thirty Years' War" in which all of Europe participated, and as a result, Spain lost both land and naval battles, and lost its status as a first-class European power...... This made it necessary for Spain, the main source of silver for the Ming Dynasty, to repatriate Mexican silver dollars to the country to pay for military expenses. At the same time, around 1600 Spain had extremely high inflation and bankruptcies, making the purchasing power of the Spanish silver dollar in Europe far less than that in the Ming Dynasty. As a result, Spain had to use more silver dollars to cover the costs he needed at the time. The Ming Dynasty also reflected this problem, and after 1607, silver dollars from Manila came to an abrupt halt, leaving only Iwami Ginzan's silver coins to be imported.

After that, the inflation problem in the Ming Dynasty began to become serious again, coupled with a series of natural disasters and military disasters, which made the Wanli government, which was already stretched thin on precious metals, even worse. How much did the sudden decline in silver affect the economy of the Ming Dynasty? In the 10 years of Chongzhen, the price of rice has risen 10 times, and the price of silver has increased 5 times. Given that food prices are the basic index of Chinese prices, even if war and famine are taken into account, they are more serious than the three to four times higher prices in Europe at the same time, especially the change in the ratio of silver to copper coins. The fact that the ratio of silver to copper money fluctuated so much in just a few years could not have been related to the sudden decline in imported silver at that time.

Silver also led to an unprecedented food crisis at the end of the Ming Dynasty, and the pursuit of silver and the export-oriented economy greatly promoted the development of the economy and production activities in the Ming Dynasty in the direction of specialization, commercialization, transnational and cross-regional. Especially in the Jiangnan region, such as the Songjiang area, with the increase in demand for cotton cloth at home and abroad, more and more people are switching to full-time textile and cotton cloth trade. This was a good thing, but it had a major impact on the country's grain production, and the grain production in Jiangnan, which was known as "Suzhou and Hangzhou are ripe, and the world was full", became a problem. In the 40s of the 17th century, even in the bumper years, people in the southern Zhili and Zhejiang regions had to rely on the sale of raw silk, raw cotton, cotton yarn and cotton cloth to buy grain. However, in the era when the means of transportation are relatively backward, the regionalization and marketization of grain production can easily lead to a food crisis. As a result, the problem of food shortages caused by natural disasters has been greatly magnified by the marketization of food, and the rich regions with the most thorough marketization are simply unable to resist the food crisis, because these areas do not produce food and have to buy food across regions. As a result, the wealthy Jiangnan region was hit the hardest: around 1640, the price of rice per catty in Suzhou rose to 100 copper coins, large numbers of people starved to death, and many mansions were sold at low prices without anyone caring.

[It is inconvenient to expand here, you can refer to the "Appendix 27 - Silver Crisis at the End of the Ming Dynasty" of the "Supplementary Provisions" of this article]

If the big overseas banks trade to earn silver, so as to reduce the tax pressure of the domestic people, can we avoid all kinds of nonsense in the late Ming Dynasty...... Hongyi fell into endless imagination.

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"Pirates have a bad temperament and don't know etiquette, and it's natural that Chongzhen doesn't trust them!" Finally, in the process of Xuan Ye's "polite" waiting and actually getting distracted, Hu Shi'an gave his own rebuttal.

"Oh?" Hongyi turned around and said with a smile:

"Master Hu is ridiculous! How did King Tong'an not know the etiquette? ”

Shouldn't you laugh when I say that pirates are also "knowledgeable"? Well, look!

[1] Cai Shanji, the word Boda, is a native of Wucheng, Zhejiang. The year of birth and death is unknown, and he was alive around the forty-third year of Wanli. In the twenty-ninth year of Wanli (16O year AD), he was appointed as the magistrate of Putian County, Fujian, and later transferred to Xiangshan County, Guangdong. In the forty-third year of Wanli, Cai Shan succeeded as the prefect of Quanzhou. Later, he was promoted to deputy envoy of the Department of Investigation and Inspection, and was assigned to patrol Zhangnan. Because of Ding Wei's resignation, after the funeral, he made up for Funing. In the fourth year of the Apocalypse (1624), Cai Shanji was promoted to the political envoy to participate in politics and prepare troops in Luoding. Relocate and build the Temple of Literature, build a stone bridge, open up a release pond, and rejuvenate all kinds of wastes. He was promoted to Huguang as an envoy, turned to the right as a political envoy, and patrolled Xiangyang. In the first year of Chongzhen (1628), Cai Shanji was transferred to Fujian Zuobu political envoy.

During his tenure as the magistrate of Xiangshan County, in 1608 (the 36th year of Wanli in the Ming Dynasty), the Portuguese authorities in Macao sentenced a first offender, causing some Portuguese to disagree and make trouble, and Macao fell into chaos and could not control the situation. After learning of the incident, Cai Shanji "drove his bicycle to Macao" and personally came forward to deal with the case and quell the riots. Later, the "Ten Rules for Macao" was formulated, warning the Portuguese not to buy property or build houses in Macao; The idea of strict control of the Portuguese in Macao was adopted by the Governor of Liangguang, Zhang Minggang. Cai Shanji was honest and strict in enforcing the law, so that the Portuguese had no chance to take advantage of it, and enjoyed a high prestige among the Portuguese people in Macao, and his affairs of controlling Macao were also widely spread among the people of Xiangshan County. (To be continued......)