Zhang Meng was extremely shocked in his heart, this old man Zhao actually carried dozens of extremely powerful short firearms, which is okay, with his wealth and good relations with foreigners, it is not difficult to do this, and even the people in the government may turn a blind eye to this.

The most rare thing is that this old man Zhao still has more than 300 years of ginseng on his body, and there are more than a dozen in the area, which saved the lives of two people.

Zhang Meng knew in his heart, although American ginseng is cheaper than Guanwai mountain ginseng, but it is also a rare spiritual thing, this kind of wild American ginseng that is more than 300 years old to buy on the market, at least thousands of taels, and many times it is impossible to buy it even if you have money.

Zhang Meng has seen Zhao Dagui spend hundreds of thousands, more than 200,000 silver dollars to buy raw silk, and he has long known that this person's luxury is comparable to the top wealthy, which is really the only one seen in his life, and this kind of person can carry a dozen 300-year-old ginseng by his side at any time for life-saving purposes.

The most rare thing is that this old man Zhao is still willing to give out two American ginseng to prolong his life, but Zhang Meng himself knows that these two American ginseng can be sold for at least five or six thousand taels of silver, and it is the kind that everyone rushes to want.

It's just that Zhang Meng didn't know that Zhao Dagui got so many wild American ginseng and paid an unimaginably low price.

It turns out that the so-called American ginseng is mainly a ginseng plant produced in Oregon and Canada, and has long been used by Indians to treat weakness or women's diseases, but it has not been paid so much attention by Chinese.

More than 100 years ago, after Americans discovered the importance that Chinese attach to ginseng, they were ecstatic, bought it from places such as Oregon and Canada, and brought it to Guangzhou for sale, which gave it the name American ginseng.

According to the classification of traditional Chinese medicine, ginseng is warm and American ginseng is cool, so ginseng is a great tonic, and you can't eat too much, but American ginseng has no such aftermath and can be eaten more.

However, this theory originated from the fact that ginseng grows in the extremely cold northeast, so it must be warm to grow, and because American ginseng comes from Guangzhou, Chinese medicine thinks that growing in a hot place like Guangzhou must be cold, so there is this theory.

In fact, the longitude of the area where American ginseng is actually grown is not much lower than that of the Northeast, and it is also a medicinal herb that grows in extremely cold places.

However, no matter what the theory is, the tonic effect of American ginseng is similar to that of ginseng, it is certain.

In the 18th century, the number of American ginseng imported through Guangzhou reached hundreds, thousands and even 2,000 quintals every year, and in the 19th century, it increased a lot, from more than 2,000 quintals in 1821 to more than 6,000 quintals in 1824, and then basically hovered around 2,000 quintals per year.

Considering that the artificial cultivation of American ginseng only appeared and spread in the late 19th century, it can be speculated that the American ginseng imported before was all wild ginseng, which is basically the same level as the wild ginseng and Korean ginseng outside the Northeast Guan.

At the time of the signing of the Treaty of Nanjing, Pu Dingcha and others negotiated with Qi Ying and other Qing officials at the price and tax rate of British imports, among which the price of high-grade American ginseng was 60 silver dollars per quintal, with a tax rate of 80 percent, and the price of low-grade American ginseng was 10 yuan per quintal, with a tax rate of 50 percent.

Because the trade of ginseng outside the Northeast has always been directly controlled by the Manchu royal family, if the tax rate of American ginseng is too low, it will impact the ginseng market and cause losses to the imperial family, so the British specially stated in their own exchange documents that the tax rate on American ginseng should not be too low.

Of course, according to the degree of discipline of Zhao Dagui and ordinary American and British businessmen, it is almost impossible for American ginseng, which is easy to hide, to go through the normal customs declaration procedures and pay high tariffs.

Moreover, there is another advantage of Westerners buying and selling American ginseng, that is, they only sell it by catty, not how many years it is like in China, and then subdivide it into countless grades according to the quality of the vintage.

Zhao Dagui knew that American ginseng was a good thing, so he bought hundreds of loads of ginseng in private by smuggling, and then found someone to pick out the largest American ginseng from it (mountain ginseng is basically the longer the year), and at least one or two particularly large ones could be selected in a sack of American ginseng, so he easily got a large number of American ginseng that was more than 100 years old and more than 300 years old.

Of course, basically the American ginseng that Zhao Dagui has encountered now is only about 300 years old, and the so-called 500 years or even 1,000 years old mountain ginseng has never been seen at all.

However, with the nature of Zhao Dagui's fear of death, he carried a large number of American ginseng of about three hundred years with him, and his luxury was enough to blind many real rich people, of course, this time he also happened to save himself and Zhang Meng's lives.

The two of them rested for a while, and felt that their physical strength had almost recovered, and because they had eaten more than three American ginseng and made up too much, they had a feeling that they had experienced too much and had nowhere to exert themselves.

Peeking down from the window on the second floor, I saw that the battle on the deck was in a white-hot situation, Li Yingqiong made the sword light Huo Huo, suppressing the Shen Er master who used a strange iron ruler to lose his temper, and at the same time there was room to shoot down the ordinary water bandits who attacked him;

As for the other dart masters, they are all three or five people working together to resist the water bandits, and among them, you can also see several masters whose martial arts far exceed ordinary people, stopping several masters in the water bandits and fighting fiercely.

On the whole, the dart masters of the Fuwei Dart Bureau rely on the geographical advantage, and they are usually well-trained and cooperate better, but the number of water bandits is more than double that of the dart masters, and there are many masters mixed in the ordinary water bandits to sneak attack, and no one can beat anyone for a while, and they are in a stalemate.

"I'll go down to help, but Master Zhao is still hiding upstairs, don't come out. Zhang Meng knew that now was not the time to hide upstairs and watch the Western scenery, so he told Zhao Dagui, then got up, but walked to the side of the third master of the water bandit named Deng Yin.

Then, I saw Zhang Meng raise and drop the knife in his hand, but he cut off the head of the third master with a knife, and then carried the head to a window facing the deck.

"Shen is not injured, Deng Xian, the third master of your Lotus Island, has been slaughtered by me, and you still don't want to retreat and escape, do you still want to wait to be killed by us all?"

Zhang Meng was full of anger, burst out by the window, and took the head in his hand to show everyone, which was majestic for a while, and calmed many people.

"That's the head of the three masters!"

"Damn, how did the three masters get killed!"

Although it was not enough light at night, but with the light of the moonlight and the fire cup, they could still see clearly that Zhang Meng's hand was wrapped with red bandages up and down, and it was the three masters of Lotus Island who had never let people see their faces.

Shen Wushu was suppressed by Li Yingqiong, and originally expected the third master Deng Yin to kill the firecracker upstairs and then pinch Li Yingqiong with him, but his face couldn't help but change greatly at first sight.

"Zhang Meng, if you dare to hurt my third brother, I will crush you in the future and help the third brother avenge this revenge!"

"Haha, you'd better run for your life before you say this. Zhang Meng laughed loudly and threw the head in his hand in the direction of Shen Wuxian, making Shen Wuxian's figure turn around and avoid it.

Zhang Meng didn't care, he raised the knife in his hand, jumped down from the window on the second floor, and as soon as his true anger turned, he slashed at Shen Wushu in mid-air.