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After all the hardships, the stars are dimmed all around. The mountains and rivers are broken, the wind blows the catkins, and my life is up and down.
I was afraid at Huangfeng Beach, and I sighed at my loneliness in the ocean. Since ancient times, who has not died? I will leave my loyalty to shine in history.
Zhang Mingzhen, the deputy minister, stood at the bow and sang softly, the sea breeze blowing in his face, gently ruffling his long beard. Wen Tianxiang's poem "Crossing the Lingding Ocean" is well known to people all over the world, but not many people know where the Lingding Ocean is.
Lingdingyang refers to an area of sea at the mouth of the Pearl River, starting from Humen in the north, with a width of about 8 miles, and reaching Hong Kong and Macao in the south, with a width of about 130 miles.
Of course, there was no Hong Kong in this era, but there was Macau. Macau was originally called Haojing, and after the Portuguese leased Haojing, it has been called Macau.
The East China Sea Fleet returned with a full load this time, with a large number of Luzon specialties to be sold at the Guangzhou Maritime Customs. The reason why they did not take them to Hangzhou or Nanjing was that they wanted to use Guangdong to publicize the fact that Daqin had opened up Luzon.
During the war at the end of the Ming Dynasty, Fujian and Guangdong provinces were basically not destroyed by the war, and their population not only did not decrease. When the Qing army marched south, a large number of people fled to Fujian and Guangdong, and some even stayed in the two provinces, so the population of the two provinces was even larger than before the war. However, both provinces have many mountains and little land, and land conflicts are very acute.
Qin Mu had a plan for the development of Luzon this time, and was ready to guide the people of the two provinces to move to Luzon. In the past, the Chinese who went to Southeast Asia were basically from Fujian and Guangdong. They already had a tradition of going to Southeast Asia.
The East China Sea Fleet wanted to take the opportunity to promote itself in Guangdong, but this frightened the Portuguese in Macau. Seeing two or three hundred warships sailing into the Lingdingyang, including a dozen captured Spanish warships, gave the Portuguese a great shock.
They had just been ambushed by the Spanish a while ago, resulting in heavy casualties. It would be disastrous if the East China Sea warships took advantage of their victory to attack Macau.
The Governor of Macau, Vahiki, even came out in person by boat to reiterate to Gu Rong the alliance between Portugal and Daqin, and stressed that once a response was received from the country, Macau would be returned immediately.
Gu Rong was also very decisive. He opened the cabin and let Vashiki see Andrei and others who were trapped in the bottom of the cabin. The subtext clearly said: Have you seen your role model
Although Vahiki hated the Spaniards, he was not happy when he saw their miserable appearance. He felt even more uneasy, fearing that one day he would end up like them.
What made Vahiki even more uneasy was that there was a British ship accompanying the East China Sea Fleet. The British on the ship were wearing neat formal clothes and were obviously not prisoners. It was very intriguing that the British were with the East China Sea Fleet.
***
The discussion about currency in Nanjing was not the first. It was discussed repeatedly when the Qin government tried to issue one million Daqin treasure notes. The Qin government and its ministers had already reached a basic consensus on the necessity and urgency of a unified currency.
Therefore, the silver coin minting was approved in just one day after Xu Yingjie, the assistant minister of the Ministry of Revenue, submitted the implementation details to the court.
Xu Yingjie worked overtime and spent three days to cast the sample coins. There are four types of silver coins: one yuan, five jiao, two jiao, and one jiao.
There are three kinds of copper coins: five cents, two cents, and one cent.
According to the court's decision, the main currency for this issue will be the one-yuan silver coin, with a total weight of 7.2 yuan in Kuping, including 6.48 yuan of pure silver. It is made of 90% silver and 1% copper. The front is engraved with the emperor's profile and the year of issue, and the back is engraved with Jiahe patterns and the coin value.
One of the main reasons why it was passed so quickly in the court this time was that there was no need to worry about depreciation. The people would definitely be happy to accept it, and another reason was that it could bring in some income for the court.
A silver coin of one yuan weighed seven cents and two cents, of which 90% was silver. In this way, after deducting the cost of fire and labor in casting, the court still had a small profit. It could earn about one yuan by casting about 500 coins.
This can prevent counterfeiting among the people, because if the mintage is small, there is basically no profit. For a private workshop to mint one million coins is already a fairly large scale, and the profit earned is only 2,000 yuan, and there is also the risk of having the property confiscated and the family exterminated. Few people are willing to do such a business.
However, if the court minted a large number of coins, for example, 50 million, it would still earn 100,000 yuan. Although it was not much, at least it would not be a loss.
Xu Yingjie took the sample coin to the court and presented it to the emperor, and the ministers each received one.
Qin Mu took it in his hand and looked at it carefully. The newly minted silver coin had a soft luster and a smooth white color. Generally speaking, the higher the purity of the silver, the whiter its luster. This brand new silver coin was as white as snow.
In addition, due to the low hardness of the silver coin, when two silver coins are stacked and rubbed together, they feel oily and no metal knocking sound can be heard. The cast patterns are also very delicate, and the number of beads in the twelve jades of the emperor on the silver coin and even the number of eyelashes can be clearly counted.
Xu Yingjie also held a silver coin and introduced it in class: "Your Majesty, this kind of silver coin will not deform or change tone when burned. If aluminum tin is added to make the embryo, its color will be dark and dull. If it is burned, it will break, deform, and disperse. It is ugly. After using it for a period of time, it will still turn yellow, green, and black after washing.
Your Majesty, please place the tips of your thumb and index finger against the center of the silver coin, or hold the middle of the silver coin with your middle finger and hit it with another silver coin, and you will hear a clear and gentle sound.
Qin Mu and his ministers did as they were told, and after the collision, they indeed heard a soft and clear sound.
Xu Yingjie continued, "It is only when there is enough pure silver that such a will can be produced. If the sound is high-pitched, it is a fake coin made of steel; if the sound is hoarse, it is a fake coin made of copper-tin alloy; if the sound is dull, it is a fake coin with silver wrapped in copper and stuffing.
In addition, you can pinch the center of the silver coin with the tips of your thumb and index finger and blow hard to hear a slight rhyme. If you can't hear the slight rhyme, it must be adulterated.
In short, if it is not cast according to the silver-copper ratio of the court, it is impossible to produce such a rhythm. In this way, it is difficult for the people to imitate, which can ensure the credibility of the silver dollar. "
Qin Mu asked, "What do you think, ministers?"
After appreciating it, the ministers in the palace all expressed that it was excellent.
Since everyone agreed, it was decided that the imperial mint would increase its efforts to mint coins, and at the same time, a decree was prepared to be issued, stipulating that after the issuance of the silver dollar, all public and private payments, contracts and all transactions would be replaced with silver coins or Daqin Baochao, and silver taels would no longer be used. Those who originally intended to receive and pay in silver taels should go to the Huitong Bank account to receive and pay in silver coins at the standard of 7 qian 2 fen of silver taels to 1 yuan of silver coin.
Qin Mu knew very well that the silver standard was not a long-term solution, but in order to unify the currency as soon as possible, it could only be used as a temporary transition. Fortunately, the Western world was not yet able to impact the financial stability of the Qin Dynasty.
In the future, when the credit of paper money is established and we mine gold overseas on a large scale and accumulate enough gold, we can then switch to the gold standard.
Qin Mu was even more excited about the Baguio gold mine in Luzon. As far as he knew, Japan also had many gold mines, and they were developed very early.
Then there is the Rand gold mine in South Africa. The navy must advance into the Indian Ocean as quickly as possible. Once the influence extends to South Africa, we must immediately go looking for the Rand gold mine.
The Rand gold mine is amazing. It is the largest gold mine in the world. It was discovered in 1866 and quickly put into mining. The total reserves exceed 50,000 tons.
No matter what, this gold mine must be occupied.
After the silver dollar issue was settled, Gannan came out and reported: "Your Majesty, after the British envoy arrived at Lingdingyang with the East China Sea Fleet, the fleet sent two ships to escort them northward and they will arrive in Nanjing soon."
"Okay, then Gan Qing will make the first contact."
"Yes, Your Majesty."
The British were contacted by Qin Muzhu. Currently, the British's focus is still on North America, and their tentacles have just reached the Indian Ocean. Among all the major maritime powers in Europe, their interests conflict the least with those of the Qin Dynasty.
In order to prevent several European countries from uniting to fight against Daqin, Qin Mu decided to use one faction to fight another in Europe in order to achieve a divisive effect. Portugal is too weak and currently has a huge conflict of interest with Daqin, so it is unreliable.
After careful analysis, Qin Mu believed that the British were a more ideal partner. They were on the rise and intended to replace the Dutch, the coachman of the sea, to compete for maritime hegemony. They were also very powerful and would not turn against Portugal as soon as they came under pressure from other countries.
Although the British are not good people, the Qin Dynasty cannot be enemies with all European countries. This is not in the interests of the Qin Dynasty. Not to mention the increased resistance to military expansion, the main loss in trade will be huge.
In terms of purchasing power, the whole of Europe combined is not much weaker than Daqin.
If the European market is lost, it will be a huge blow to the rise of Daqin industry.
In order to ensure that Daqin's goods can continue to be sold to Europe, it is necessary to form an alliance with one or two European countries.
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.(To be continued..)
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