Sir, you have to pay more

Chapter 961 I'm going to celebrate my birthday

Of course, Queenie had to keep up with Devil Six, and it was not like he didn't know that Devil Four was emptying the toilet in Changping.

This will be a foolish brain to want to burn the cold stove of the fourth devil.

In order to show that her unshakable loyalty to actively follow His Majesty the Emperor, Queenie offered to accompany His Majesty to Tianjin to pick up trade delegations from various countries.

But this job was snatched by Lao Ah.

Queenie couldn't get away either, because he, the prime minister and deputy minister in charge of the Ministry of Rites and the Li Fanyuan, had to hold a series of talks with the vassal states in Beijing and China.

The first is to formally distribute the report on the denial of the legitimacy of the four dynasties since Shunzhi made by the Xiangyang Hundred Officials and Clans Conference to all countries, and listen to the opinions of all countries on this report;

The second is to determine whether countries recognize the Restoration Emperor as the only legal emperor of the Qing Dynasty.

This series of work is not only tiring, but also complicated.

At present, the Qing Dynasty has nineteen vassal states including Korea, Annan, Siam, Bhutan, Ryukyu, Sulu, Kokand, Sikkim, Luang Prabang, Boror, and Andijan.

They are basically left over from the previous Ming Dynasty.

Most of the vassal states have staff stationed in the capital, and they are under the jurisdiction of the Li Fan Academy.

In fact, it is the meaning of diplomatic agencies in later generations.

Whether the Restoration Court could become the only legal court in the Qing Dynasty, in addition to the support of the domestic provinces and border regions, it also needed the recognition of these vassal states.

Otherwise, the vassal states will collectively jump back and refuse to recognize the Six Emperors of the Reformation. Although the Six Emperors cannot be touched, the face is definitely not good-looking.

Queenie can't leave, but in fact, the trade has nothing to do with Lao Ah, the prime minister and deputy minister in charge of the Ministry of War and the Department of General Affairs. If he wants to go, he should also be in charge of the household department, Imperial Academy, Taichang Temple, and Taipu Temple. The president of the organization, Lao Li, is the one.

It's just that Lao Li refused to go, because he couldn't bear the shame of going with the Sixth Emperor.

No matter which dynasty or generation, there is no reason for the emperor to pick up foreign businessmen!
Now it's all right, Lao Ah once again seized the opportunity and leaned on the next emperor.

As the only cabinet minister and deputy minister who accompanied His Majesty to Tianjin, after His Majesty finished his speech, Lao Ah immediately added an explanation: "Your Majesty means that you can do whatever you want, as long as you can make money, you can make money from the treasury and the people." When the bag is bulging, you don’t have to care about what the outside world thinks when you are an official, and the common people drink spicy food, and you don’t have to worry about someone in the court writing a letter to impeach you.”

It's over, after thinking about it, I used the four words "policy bottom-up" to describe the high importance that His Majesty the Emperor attaches to maritime trade.

That is, on the basis of equal trade, the customs officials in Tianjin, where the customs is located, must open their minds, hands and feet, and spare no effort to support the trade between their own merchants and Western countries, so that Tianjin, currently the only trading port in the north, can quickly grow into an Asian port. At the same time, through trade with Western countries, they continued to absorb the wealth they acquired from foreign colonization, providing strong financial support for the industrialization of the Qing Dynasty.

"That's what it means."

Jia Liu nodded in satisfaction. The more than 20 officials he personally interviewed were all carefully selected, and what he assumed was not only the expectations of his majesty the emperor, but also the future destiny of the Qing Dynasty.

Therefore, it is necessary to steer the helm and give advice in person, so as to support and give a hand.

"In the past, merchants from Western countries came to our Qing Dynasty to do business, either through our own merchants in the Qing Dynasty, or to form a community of interests with some local officials. This time Tianjin is open for business. I hope that the Tianjin Governor's Yamen, the Tianjin Prefect Yamen, and the Tianjin Customs Yamen can do business. Be a good agent and deal directly with foreign businessmen."

Jia Liu emphasized this point because he did not want Beiyang to follow the old Nanyang path.

That is to say, the tens of millions of taels of sea trade profits per year are used by comprador groups like the Thirteen Banks and local bureaucratic groups in Guangdong. The Ministry of Households can obtain more than 140 million taels of tax relief from the Guangdong Customs every year.

This number is increasing with a decreasing trend every year.

On the one hand, there are tens of millions of taels of annual profit, and on the other hand, the treasury revenue of more than one million taels, this is no longer a direct or inverse ratio, but a complete disaster!

Therefore, Tianjin has to adopt a government-run monopoly to carry out import and export trade, and it cannot use the thirteen banks to "specialize the market" like Guangdong.

"The world is big, and we are not the only ones in Qing Dynasty. You are personally selected by me to be placed here in Tianjin, so I hope you will live up to my expectations."

Just as Jia Liu was talking, Zhu Dawen, who was to be appointed as the deputy supervisor of Tianjin Customs, suddenly mustered up the courage to raise his hand to report.

"Da Wen has something to say?"

With a smile on his face, Jia Liu signaled that the hero who attracted investment to Macau should speak out boldly.

Earlier in Xiangyang, he promulgated the decree to completely lift the speech ban, hoping that the subjects in the country can speak enthusiastically and everyone will govern.

"Reporting to Your Majesty, this time I went to Macau not only actively attracting investment according to Your Majesty's wishes, but also hired Western experts and purchased books on new Western studies. I also specially investigated the situation of Guangdong Customs."

While speaking, Zhu Dawen got up and presented the "Guangdong International Trade Investigation Report" which he had written for more than half a year.

"Oh?"

Jia Liu hurriedly took the report and opened it. Just looking at the table of contents, he felt very excited, because Zhu Dawen's opening words were very spiritual -- "Teach barbarians with good skills to control barbarians, and only those who are good at teaching the four barbarians can control the barbarians. Those who are not good at teaching foreign barbarians will be controlled by foreign barbarians."

With this particularly spiritual opening line, Jia Liu will feel elated without even reading it later.

"Okay, okay, very good! Dawen put his heart into this report. If all the officials in my court were as realistic as Dawen, why would I worry that the Qing Dynasty would not perish? Why should I worry that the Qing Dynasty would not prosper!"

In addition to being happy, Jia Liu handed the report to Shuan Zhu and ordered him to hand it over to the attendant's office to print [-] copies. All officials above the eighth rank must have one copy, and officials above the fourth rank must also submit a copy of no less than one to the cabinet. Five thousand words after reading.Grade four and below are submitted to their respective superiors.

In order to make officials, big and small, realize the importance of this report and the signal it conveys, Jia Liu even requested that the impression after reading it be used as an indicator for the year-end assessment of officials.

"Dawen, I really am No. 1 in the world with my eyes open. I am not as good as you, not as good as you."

His Majesty's praise made Zhu Dawen dizzy with happiness, and also made Tianjin governor Xu Ji, who was sitting on a small stool in front, envious.

However, Mr. Xu doesn't care about progress. Anyway, he is going to retire, and after retirement, he can still receive 30 taels of special preferential treatment every year.

Rijie doesn't have this kind of treatment to be flattered.

"Only when I went to Macau this time did I realize how big the world is, and only then did I know the wonders of everything in the world."

Zhu Dawen told a few stories about what he had seen and heard in Macau, and the officials present were all shocked, especially when Zhu Dawen said that the Westerners had built a jani loom, which could last a day once it was put into production. The output of dozens of weavers a day is not only scary, but also makes the price of cloth drop rapidly.

If the Qing Dynasty doesn't keep up, it won't be long before Westerners' cloth will occupy the domestic market, because our weavers in the Qing Dynasty simply don't have that output.

"It's the Jenny Loom."

Jia Liu looked solemn, got up and walked slowly to the window sill, gently opened the window and took a deep breath of fresh air outside, then took out the gold slip to respect his pocket watch, opened it and said to the Tianjin officials present:

"In the past, our scholar-bureaucrats always thought that foreign things were not good. For example, the pocket watch in my hand was regarded as a strange skill, but with this pocket watch, I can know the time accurately at any time, which is very special. no.

In war, time is life; in business, time is money."

Jia Liu's tone was very passionate, emphasizing and emphasizing again.

"So, I hope you don't have the old thoughts of the past, don't be arrogant, and put down your body to face new things seriously, accept new things, and work hard to use new things for the national economy and people's livelihood of our Qing Dynasty.

I can affirm here that the world of the future will be a world of extraordinary skills and ingenuity, not a world of superstitions.

The old way of doing things is no longer good, it needs to be changed, it needs to be completely changed!

Whoever does not change his mind, I will change his life! "

With a sound of "click", Jia Liu closed his pocket watch that did not move, and looked at the crowd expectantly: "I believe that as long as you can understand and implement the spirit of what I said in place, within ten years, our Qing Dynasty will definitely be prosperous." Open, wisdom sunrise.
When I celebrate my thirtieth birthday in a few years, you guys should try to get all the diplomatic corps from various Western countries to come to celebrate my birthday, and I will sing Galileo of the Tribunal for them. "

(End of this chapter)