The missionaries also wanted to give Cui Xie something, begging him to say a few good words in front of the emperor. Cui Xie shook his head slightly and said with a smile, "If you only have these things, it won't be enough to get you the chance to stay in China."
These words seemed to be openly asking for bribes. Mr. Liu couldn't help staring at him. Those missionaries felt the joy of the missionary hope, and happily asked the translator to pass the message: "What do you want? Our business not only brought Books that spread the Gospel of God, as well as various Western glassware, oil paintings, Central Asian jewelry, woolen fabrics, Indian gems and spices... We came on a Portuguese merchant ship. If the adults need anything, they can also ask the merchants to bring them back. ."
Cui Xie pointed to a clear prism among the many glasses and plates and said, "The glass is good, the plant with red fruit in that pot is something that China has never seen before, and this kind of mathematics book is also very good, these are your Italians. What kind of ship are you coming to China on? How can you bypass the Wanli Sea Road to Guangdong? What weapons are on the ship to guard against pirates?”
The eldest missionary said cautiously: "We are on a sea merchant's ship, and we don't know much about the structure of the ship. If adults like books, we have brought more books on mathematics, logical arguments, and astronomical calendars. It's just that there aren't too many glassware and peppers. Can your lord ask your emperor to allow more merchants to come to the port and trade with your country?"
Mr. Liu said solemnly: "I have had a ban on the sea since the time of Taizu. The major event of the sea ban should not be acted rashly. I hope that Mr. Cui will not be greedy for a temporary advantage."
Cui Xie replied in a low voice, "I didn't mean that. I just heard from these missionaries that their merchant ships can withstand overseas storms, and they can sail to China with treasures full of treasures from thousands of miles away. They have extremely powerful weapons. My Daming navy has been quite weak in recent years, and even the small Japanese pirates cannot sail for a hundred miles and break the root cause. I think they are a good ship, and I am really happy."
Director Liu was stunned, and wanted to ask him if he was fascinated by comic books. But Cui Xie only asked that question, and then he left the ship. He also asked if any of these missionaries could burn glass or know the formula of colorless transparent glass. He couldn't say anything else.
Cui Xie told the missionaries that if they could burn such glass, or build a strong boat and a cannon for Daming, he could also praise "capable" in front of the sage and bring them in as talents. If they can only preach a few doctrines and make people believe in their Lord—sorry, they can only be treated the same as ordinary maritime merchants. Goods can enter the port, but people cannot.
The missionary realized that he didn't want to play with beautiful instruments, just their advanced technology in Europe. The hateful thing is that the Chinese people clearly want this technology, but they still refuse to ask them. Instead, they put the sugar on the tip of their noses and force them to offer everything on their own initiative.
But for the Jesuits, science was just a way of interpreting theology. It is also worthwhile to spread science and send more advanced technology and weapons in exchange for the opportunity to preach in this vast country.
In addition to the Jesuits, there are also Franciscans, Dominicans, and Augustinian priests who also traveled on Portuguese or Spanish ships to preach in India, Manciga, Japan and other places. They were the first to open the door to China, and they must firmly hold on to this vast country that once refused all communication with Europe and looked like an independent world.
The senior missionary who led the team lowered his head slightly.
They hoped to officially stay in Beijing, build a church to worship the gods, and translate the books they brought. In exchange, they could get the glass technology and weapons that Cui Xie wanted from Europe and sell them to China.
Cui Xie shook his head slightly, put down the original Euclid, and turned to leave.
The missionaries hurriedly brought gifts such as peppers, glass tea sets, and maps to him. Cui Xie himself also drew a bunch of high-definition world maps in the 21st century. He was not interested in this ancient version, so he waved his hand and refused. He just asked if Europeans now regard peppers as edible things.
can eat.
At least it wasn't treated as a poison like a tomato.
The Chinese translator only said that it was stinging on the nose and tongue, and tasted bad, and the missionaries refused to eat it. The translator is also from the southeastern coastal area. The taste is light, and he does not like this spicy taste.
Then he can cook with chili with confidence!
Cui Xie left the hall with satisfaction, and each signed a stamp with Director Liu.
Mr. Liu did not have a good impression of these missionaries. In the memorial, he directly accused them of being cunning and ignorant of etiquette and law. The book that he wanted to offer to the emperor actually contained a picture like a double-cultivation diagram of Tantra. When he was writing the memorial, he felt ashamed when he remembered the scene, and waited until the sects of lust would not allow them to preach in China.
The seal of Cui Xie affirms that among them there are talents who are good at arithmetic. The books such as "Euclide Origins" brought with the ship are all classics obtained by talents in other countries. The prism is also a tool for checking objects. You can ask these people to stay in the capital, send someone to teach them to learn Chinese, and assign the interpreter of the Siyi Hall to learn the Thai and Western languages, in case more Thai and Western talents will come to China to serve the purpose of the emperor Hongzhi's call for talents in the future.
However, these missionaries cannot be allowed to preach in China, and they should be circled to translate foreign scriptures and meanings for our Confucian scholars to figure out.
Then there is the fact that the ships that the missionaries traveled on can travel far to China, and the ships must have something special, which can make the craftsmen of Guangdong shipyard try to imitate them. In particular, it is necessary to find out what nails, wood, and cables on the ship are made of, and where the crops are grown. In the future, I will think about introducing it to Daming, so that the Daming Navy can build its own ships.
As for the merchants on the ship, don't be too polite to them. These people carry heavy artillery on their ships and buy and sell goods and people in various countries. They are called sea merchants, but they are actually pirates. Wherever their ships are, they must be monitored by the local navy to prevent them from harming the coastal areas by relying on their strong ships and cannons.
He wrote more than a thousand words eloquently, until the end of the article before he mentioned his own selfishness: "The missionary brought a kind of pepper from overseas. It can also be judged by the medical officer of the Taiyuan Hospital.”
Emperor Hongzhi pondered on the two memorials for a long time, and finally felt that no matter how bad the teachings of these missionaries were, they still knew something about the calendar. Just treat them as horse bones in the bones of a thousand dollars, keep these few, and in the future, you will be able to recruit talents with real talents and real learning.
The emperor clearly issued a decree, so he asked these people to live in the Huitong Hall. He chose the translation students from the Siyi Hall to teach them Chinese, and also learned their Latin. He also chose the Tianjian Tianjian students to learn foreign calendars and arithmetic methods with them.
In addition, regarding the iron cannon mentioned in Cui Xie's memorial, he ordered the head of the Ministry of War to go to Guangzhou to conduct a field inspection together with the imperial censor and the internal supervisor. The ships were not in a hurry to build for a while, but if you had good guns, you could buy some from the Italians and use them in the northern expedition to Tartar in the future.
The court considered these people to be accepted, and soon, the East Palace dispatched a chamberlain who specialized in researching crops to ask for a few pots of peppers to bring into the palace for the prince to study.
Because Cui Xie's letter mentioned that chili peppers can "touch the nose and sting the tongue", the waiters tasted a little bit of it themselves, and they all felt that it was spicy and bitter, which might be poisonous.
The prince's status is noble, and he can't touch this kind of thing easily, so he just asks the servants to slice and observe it, and watch it by himself. The little eunuchs first drew the shape of pepper branches, leaves, fruits, and calyx, and then arranged the microscope, sliced, dripped water, twisted the lens tube, carefully observed the pepper skin and leaves, and also drew the cells. Structure diagram.
Looking at the cells, it was not different from the plants and leaves they usually observed. It's just that the fruit tastes spicy, and even the fingers are spicy after touching it. If you touch the eyelids by mistake, you can sting the eyes and make them red, swollen, and painful.
The little maid, who accidentally touched his eyes, couldn't help crying. He didn't dare to disrespect in front of the prince, so he hurried down. Looking at his embarrassed image, the prince deeply felt that this thing was probably poisonous, and he dared not touch it, so he ordered two pots to be given to Mr. Cui, and the rest was thrown into the flower shed and raised casually.
Cui Xie did not wait for the Son of Heaven to approve the memorial, but waited for two pots of chili peppers, which was a pleasant surprise.
The eunuch who passed the decree said politely: "Your Highness, when he was looking at this thing earlier, found that its spicy gas could stain the skin and flesh. If you touch it and then touch the delicate parts of the eyes, it will be so hot that you will cry. Your lord, go back. Be careful when you study it, don't let the spicy gas sting."
Cui Xie thanked the eunuch for his kindness and moved to Xiangyang's window with the pepper in his hand, admiring it happily. The bachelors in the same duty room also gathered around to watch and asked him what it was. It was pointed and small, but it was delicate.
Cui Xie had met Italians and asked a few questions about chili peppers. When he came back, he could just blow it in the Hanlin Academy. He immediately named the unnamed chili pepper, and told everyone that the chili pepper was unusually spicy, but the taste was pure and free of bitterness. When deep-frying it, the resulting chili oil would definitely taste better than the chili oil made from cornel.
The two bachelors in the same room as him are from Zhejiang and don't like spicy food, but Jie Yuan, a tip from Jiangxi, was quite interested when he heard about it.
It's a pity that the two pots of chili peppers are too few, and they have to keep them for seeding, and Cui Xie is also reluctant to eat them.
After he had endured until the harvest, he dried the peppers, cut out the seeds, and the dry skin on the outside was fried into chili oil by the cook, mixed with red oil, white meat, red oil pig ears, etc. The remaining red oil was mixed with sesame oil and crushed peanuts, and poured on the tenderly cooked chicken to make a not-so-authentic saliva chicken.
In total, I made such a little chili dish, and it is not enough to distribute it to others. He had no choice but to hold a banquet at home, invited Mr. Li from Hunan and Fu Jieyuan from Jiangxi, and then invited his neighbor Xie Tongzhi over to gather a table for the banquet.
The earliest Xie Ying went to the Cui family for a banquet, and he rescued the brothers Li Dongyang and Yang Yiqing halfway, and was invited to the Cui family by them.
Now that the two of them are sitting together again, Li Dongyang recalled what happened back then, looking at Xie Ying as handsome as before, but with a sharp face, he sighed: "I still remember when my junior brother and I were rescued by Lord Xie, and then I came to Cui's house and accepted the good apprentice Hezhong. This time I come to Cui's house and I have to sit at the same table with Xie Zhenfu again, but it's a pity that my younger brother is in Nanjing and has no fate to eat this foreign chili."
He took a chopstick of pork ear with red oil, chewed it crunchly, his eyes suddenly lit up, and he said in surprise: "How can the oil for frying this chili taste so good! There is no sour gas of cornel, nor red oil soaked in lime. The bitter taste, spicy and fragrant, I have never tasted such a positive spicy taste!"
He was so happy that he personally took a few chopsticks for the juniors on the table, and instructed Cui Xie: "Next year, we will have more chili peppers, and when Junior Brother Yang returns to Beijing after completing his examinations, we will have a table of chili dishes together!"