Begging in late Ming Dynasty

Chapter 561 Malacca

Song Qingshu's face is big enough. For his conditions, the 17-member board of directors of the Dutch East India Company in Asia urgently gathered five people and held a temporary emergency meeting to discuss this matter. It took about fifteen days to assemble the manpower and hold the meeting. In the end, the board of directors finally delegated the authority back to Governor Vanderbilt again, and asked him to take out an evaluation team to comprehensively evaluate the newly emerging West India Company in front of the colonial countries of the world.

However, the disease in Batavia these days has killed quite a few expatriates. Vanderbilt simply has no patience to wait for a group of guys to walk around Songjiang, Fuzhou, and Yingtian to assess whether Song Qingshu is bragging, just in the new building After going around the city of Manila, I met with the representative of the Zheng family, and immediately signed the agreement.

At the end of January in the 16th year of Chongzhen, Song Qingshu also boarded the Strait of Malacca as he wished.

The entire Strait of Malacca is quite long and narrow, spanning more than 1000 kilometers from north to south, occupying a small half of the length of the Malay Peninsula and Sumatra Island. At first, the Portuguese came here, occupied the Malacca Kingdom, and used it as a base to trade with the East. Later, The rising Dutch expelled the Portuguese, seized here, here and Batavia, cut off the passage into Asia one after the other, and imposed heavy taxes on the passing merchant ships of various countries, which also reduced the number of American galleons coming to China. The reason is that the slowdown of silver inflow had a great impact on the emerging bourgeoisie in Daming.

But now the surname here is Song, with a white flag, the 500 defenders of the Dutch Fort Lombard retreated in a row. Immediately after, the army of the Fifth Fengyang Division carried the flag, slowly entered the fort, and took over the defense.

In fact, the sovereignty here belongs to Srivijaya, but now, who will take care of him?
Batavia's receiving work is even slower. The armies of the two countries are not willing to withdraw their troops. After the Dutch fleet returns, they have to find a way to expel them. It's the Dutch expatriate in Batavia. In order to do business with Daming in an all-round way, the Dutch don't dare to break the contract. Besides, the trade agreement between the two countries, tariffs, and the list of prohibited trade are still being negotiated. To add to " In the Ming-Dutch Business and Friendship Agreement, in order to obtain some better terms, the Dutch did not dare to complain.

Standing on the castle, Song Qingshu looked at the sea as far as the eye could see. Under the flag of Ming Dynasty, dozens of warships were rushing to the west. The Marquis of Buenos was finally on his way back to the west. He and his fleet were also captured It was written in the additional terms of the contract that holding the pass of the Seventeen Gentlemen's Shareholders' Meeting, many colonies in the Netherlands were not allowed to attack along the way.

This old guy wants to return to the country in a hurry. On the one hand, he will provide valuable military expenses, and on the other hand, he must quickly report the great changes in the east to Spain. A certain oriental dragon has woken up!

"Is there that much value here?"

These days, the two sides of the Strait of Malacca are quite barren. It took such a high price to win this place. Seeing that the two sides of the Strait are nothing but rocks, Hong Chengchou, who came back from Batavia, couldn't help it, shaking his head and said with emotion , but Song Qingshu, who heard this, couldn't help laughing, and didn't answer, but pulled out a map from his sleeve.

"One battalion of troops from Manjaka is enough. After all, this is the territory of Srivijaya. Try not to conflict with them too much. I have already thought about the station of our Daming guarding this strait. Here!"

"Another island!"

Looking at Song Qingshu's fingertips, Hong Chengchou couldn't help sighing. He has never traveled to the island with Song Qingshu for more than a year. As an old gentleman, he was a little dizzy when he saw the island.

"Don't worry, this island company has to invest at least 500 million taels of silver, immigrate at least 10 people, and build it into a super big city, and Lao Hong, the right to name this city is entrusted to you!"

What is Song Qingshu's finger pointing at?The future Singapore, the Lion City!According to its excellent geographical location, here are the four Asian tigers of later generations. After a series of wars, the main conflicts of the colonists in Southeast Asia were basically settled by Song Qingshu. In addition to Macau, there is also Portugal, and in the Indochina Peninsula, there are also the Netherlands and the United Kingdom. Outside of a few small areas, the main force is only Daming.

This kind of unification will not weaken the original trade. After the route is assigned to the previous colonial wars, this golden route will be much safer. There will be more European and American trade ships passing here. The Lion City at the narrowest part of the Strait of Malacca is hard to imagine not being prosperous.

Song Qingshu's promise finally lifted Hong Chengchou's spirits. What do scholars pursue?Famous through the ages!In case Song Qingshu really made this deserted island popular, people will never forget him as the namer when they mentioned this place a hundred years later, and Lao Hong reluctantly bowed while holding his fists.

"Don't worry, Commander! Leave this to Hong..."

Before he finished speaking, the sound of hurried footsteps suddenly came from the narrow corridor of Malacca Castle. After a while, Xiaobao ran up basically, panting heavily and clenched his fists heavily.

"Marshal, the Dutch sent an envoy, and I have an urgent matter to meet with you!"

"Dutch?"

Frowning tightly, Song Qingshu said to himself in surprise: "Is there something wrong with Batavia?"

…………

Rather than relying on guesswork, it is better to take a trip by yourself, seize the time to arrange the old city of Manga and the plan to develop the Lion City, and order the upper management of the West India Company to do it. It took two days to delay it, and bring Song Qingshu from Southeast Asia in the future. Hong Chengchou, the biggest official who stayed behind, and the two went directly to Batavia by boat.

The so-called Batavia is Jakarta, the later capital of Indonesia, but at this time, it is just a colonial city that can only accommodate a hundred thousand people.

The armies of the two countries outside the city have been dispersed long ago, the barking dog does not bite, this barking Huan, what a deadly battle and never retreats, the bloody shame of World War I, as soon as the Ming delegation withdrew, the Dutch fleet came back again On the same day, the Three Buddha Qi and the two countries retreated, leaving only a dilapidated wooden fork house.

However, the returning Dutch fleet also suffered disasters. The black plague followed the fleas and flooded the Dutch ships again. When Song Qingshu's ship arrived, he could see the black smoke rising from the furnace where the corpses were burned, transporting the dead bodies There was an endless stream of cars coming out of the city.

This time the major shareholders, Cao Sanxi and Zhang Mingxing, also rushed over. The shareholders' meeting, as an authority, participated in the rule of Southeast Asia to restrict Hong Chengchou, the governor. Song Qingshu was more and more conscious of letting these major shareholders participate in major decisions. However, they didn't even dare to enter the city, so they stayed in a resort hotel on the nearby Bekov Mountain. This time, not only the Dutch Governor Vanderburg, but also two important members of the East India Company's Seventeen Gentlemen's Shareholders' Meeting, The major shareholder from Amsterdam, Mr. Basten mentioned by Vanderbilt last time, a tall and thin nobleman in a tuxedo, with an elegant beard, and the same name as the great painter, a little short and fat, wearing a single Van Gogh with one eye and a cane.

"Hehe, I haven't seen you in a month. How is Mr. Vanderbilt?"

The atmosphere this time was much more relaxed than the last negotiation. There was French Bordeaux wine on the table, and Batavia didn't have any problems, so Song Qingshu only greeted him relaxedly. Unfortunately, when he heard the rigid Vanderbilt In his ear, he shook his head seriously.

"Mr. Song, thanks to you, life is not good. Batavia doesn't need the army to protect it. Some Dutch lads are going back to the country, and many old subordinates who have been with me for many years are also disbanded. These days, it is very difficult. sad!"

In the agreement, Song Qingshu made concessions, Batavia will be expanded, and the original Dutch community will be governed by them, so Vanderbilt is still the governor, but his mercenary group is useless, and a large part of the fleet is directly converted into a caravan. , the newly installed Dutch coastal defense cannons were replaced with small Fran cannons to defend against pirates, and a full [-] Dutch mercenaries were about to be disbanded. The East India Company is a company after all, and will not pay for unnecessary expenses. And spend money.

Among these people, only two or three thousand are Dutch, and a large part of the rest are mercenaries from Central Europe, Northern Europe, and local aboriginals, mainly from Sax, Prussia, and Bohemia, the Netherlands People can go home, and the war with the Spaniards is still waiting for them, but once these people leave the army, they really have no way to live.

Song Qingshu's heart skipped a beat when he heard this. It takes three months to train new recruits, but it takes a lifetime for veterans of hundreds of battles. After hesitating for a while, he whispered something to Zhang Mingxing and others, and Song Qingshu nodded generously.

"Our West India Company also needs to expand its army. Your Excellency can simply introduce some old subordinates to Mr. Zhang, and the company can accept them!"

"That's it, thank you General Song!" Vanderbilt still had a rigid face and nodded seriously.

"Isn't it because of the mercenaries that I came this time? If Mr. Basten and Mr. Van Gogh need to control the epidemic in Batavia, Song has a few good ideas!"

After recruiting a group of veterans, Song Qingshu took the opportunity to sell his own sulfur soap. Listening to him, the two Dutch major shareholders were impressed. The black plague is not the only problem facing Batavia. These days, the whole of Europe Port cities all need to face this god of death, but they put the matter aside just by seeing it, with a stern face, Basten's pair of curly beards trembled and spoke hurriedly in Dutch.

"How is your relationship in Japan, Your Excellency?"

"Waguo? What happened to Waguo?"

Really surprised, Song Qingshu asked in astonishment.

(End of this chapter)