New Shun 1730

The Western envoys stepped forward and followed the court etiquette of Dashun. When Duke Qi visited Europe, he followed the local customs and saluted the other side according to the local court etiquette.

This matter has become a fixed rule. Either accept it or get out. No more nonsense.

After all, the crown of the Chinese Empire is still standing firm and ringing. Although Britain's annual income is close to two-thirds of Dashun's without India, it is still a little behind. The rest are even further behind.

As for the so-called etiquette, Westerners also understand what the hierarchy is, and they are also very good at it.

The crown on the head of the Statue of Liberty given by France to the United States is seven-pointed. And the portrait of the Statue of Liberty of France itself, in the picture albums and propaganda posters in the 19th century, is a standard nine-pointed. As the designer, the French themselves did not know that the seven-pointed also had a metaphor for the seven continents. After all, the original author would never get a perfect score for reading comprehension.

In fact, it is quite similar to the Dashun Emperor himself wearing twelve tassels, while the Korean prince can only wear nine tassels according to the prince's etiquette, which is a metaphor for the father-son relationship. This kind of feudal society's etiquette system and logic are similar in the core of the world. Kneeling on one leg or two legs is just a formality.

The envoys present are all from the aristocratic circle. Everyone does not understand the connotation of superiors and subordinates, so there is no need to entangle in etiquette.

Liu Yu was originally twisting his neck to see the excitement and listen to what the emperor wanted to say to these people, but he didn't expect the emperor to call his name.

"Marquis Jing, come to me. In the past, the letter to the Luosha country was largely due to your help, so that it would not damage the state. Today's matter is big, and there must be no mistakes in the translation."

"Yes, I accept the order."

After kneeling and saluting, he stood beside the emperor with small steps, and the Guanglu Temple Minister who presided over the banquet, music, and dance was on the left and right.

In terms of translation skills, Liu Yu's skills are pretty good, thanks to Dai Jinxian who taught him Latin for many years. Dai Jinxian was originally a missionary, and he also taught Liu Yu a lot of Confucian terms.

In recent years, he has been dealing with Westerners and can speak some Russian and French, but there should be no envoys from various countries who do not know Latin.

"I have recently observed the systems of your countries, and I have heard that you have talked about 'colonies'. In my opinion, there are only three or five types of so-called colonies."

"Some are like the feudal system of Zhou, and the Xia emperor ruled the country. If it is like the Netherlands in Southeast Asia, the people in the city are all Dutch, and the people outside the city are still local natives. The Dutch in the city are Chinese, and the natives outside the city are savages. It's basically like this. This is the wisdom of the ancient kings. Given time, most of them can be assimilated, have the same customs, and have the same pronunciation."

"Or like the immigration of our dynasty to Liaodong and Jinghai. The population of our country is migrated there, and officials are set up, just like the system of our country. The same language and race, and a governor is set up. France in America is roughly like this."

"Or like the Han and Tang Dynasties The Protectorate of the Western Regions, using the barbarians to control the barbarians, the Protectorate has some garrisons, instigating internal strife among the barbarians, and supporting the barbarians who are pro-Han and pro-Tang. These methods are also very useful. "

"Except for these three, the other methods can also be used as a lesson in history. There is nothing special about them."

"The Celestial Empire's vassal system is different from the colony. The Celestial Empire has its own system. If you can't understand it, you can understand it as 'family clan law'."

"The Celestial Empire is the father, and the rest are the sons. The son is the father's leader. When the son is in trouble, it is natural for the father to save him; when the son marries, he must ask for the permission of his parents; when the son wants to do something, he must tell his parents. "

After listening to the emperor's words, Liu Yu pondered for a while and organized his words.

In the emperor's view, the vassal system is not a colonial system. But in terms of ethics, the vassal cannot have its own diplomatic rights. In terms of internal affairs, the Celestial Empire generally does not interfere.

However, even if it does not interfere in the internal affairs of the vassal, there is a bottom line. For example, the secret exchanges between Korea and Japan before were theoretically wrong in the patriarchal system of the Celestial Empire.

The emperor was obviously worried that Westerners would not understand or find it difficult to comprehend, so he caught Liu Yu to translate and hoped to explain it clearly.

But in Liu Yu's opinion, the emperor was worrying too much.

This thing is a change of soup but not of medicine. Sooner or later, the colonial system will have to go through a process similar to the vassal system.

Westerners may not understand the classics, history, and collections of Dashun, and may not understand the logic of Dashun's handling of things, but in the concept of suzerain and colony, the Western set can also be applied to the feudal patriarchal system.

Father, children, and family.

They are all similar concepts.

Moreover, relatively speaking, the feudal patriarchal system is still a relatively "advanced" system in the colonial system.

During World War I, the British had a classic propaganda poster, which was a big lion with a group of little lions, symbolizing that the Commonwealth is a family, the father is the leader of the son, and under the leadership of the father, the children should unite.

When the Japanese were promoting the puppet Manchukuo and Sino-Japanese "friendship", the metaphor with profound meaning was a set of standard Chinese-style house main halls, with a couplet saying: Loyalty and filial piety are passed down from generation to generation. Japan is the husband, and the puppet Manchukuo is the wife; Japan is the father, and the puppet Manchukuo is the son. The Three Bonds and Five Constant Virtues, the husband is the bond of the wife, and loyalty and filial piety must be the same as the family and the country.

This is the inevitable trend after the gradual awakening of nationalism after the French Reform. The old system can no longer hold up, so it has to change and adapt to the more advanced "feudal patriarchal system".

And the countries around Dashun basically have already had a simple national consciousness. As the suzerain in East Asia, they can't play with the current Western colonial system.

The tributary system before this was a bit like the Commonwealth system. The internal and foreign affairs of the vassal states were independent, as long as they recognized the emperor as the common emperor.

But now, Dashun has taken a step back. Requesting to take back the diplomatic rights of vassal countries will not impose too much control on internal affairs, but they will definitely tighten control on trade.

On the one hand, it is necessary to absolutely prohibit private diplomacy between Korea and Japan. On the other hand, it is also necessary to delineate its own sphere of influence and not allow Westerners to get involved, nor allow vassals and Westerners to get together.

The emperor did not want the tributary vassal system to be named after the Western colonial system, because the emperor was worried that "the vassals would be surprised" and thought that Dashun would treat the vassals the same way Western countries treated their colonies, and even set up a governor to take charge of everything.

Even if Li Gan wanted to control the counties of North Korea and northern Annan, he left it to future generations. Although he is impatient, he also knows that it is too hasty to do it now, so he should continue to deepen his influence first, and use his previous experience in business control to gradually deepen his control.

But the emperor also hoped that Westerners would understand the vassal-vassal system according to the colonial system. This could be regarded as telling Westerners that you should not interfere with matters within the boundaries of the Celestial Empire. If you don’t understand what a vassal system is, just understand it as a special kind of colony, but it cannot be called a colony.

After Liu Yu explained as much as possible, in the end he tried his best to take care of these people's understanding, and explained from the perspective of feudal enfeoffment, which made it easier to explain clearly.

The vassal system is not the Holy Ra Kingdom after the Treaty of Westphalia, and the vassal states have no independent diplomatic rights.

Just as Liu Yu expected, Westerners have a clear understanding of this feudal system. They themselves have played with feudalism and know what it means to be ennobled by a king. As long as it is made clear that the sect-vassal system is not the HRE after the Westphalian system, it will be enough.

The vassals did not have the right to choose their own religion.

The vassals did not have the power to conduct independent diplomacy.

After the explanation was almost finished, the emperor saw that these Western envoys all indicated that they understood, and said: "The Duke of Qi also said before, you have your saints, and we have our morals. We will not go to your place to spread the words of saints, You should not spread your teachings within the Celestial Empire."

"I am happy to trade and exchange what I have. However, if we preach, since our dynasty takes the protection of the world as its righteousness, we must cut off all exchanges and even go to war."

"Please keep this in mind and don't say it was unforeseen."

After the translation, the Dutch took the lead in finding a loophole that could be exploited in this theory and asked: "If your tribute system is not a colony and a suzerainty, then diplomacy and the choice of religion are also controlled, but trade should not be Controlled, isn’t it?”

Obviously, the Dutch wanted to take advantage of Dashun's failure to recognize the tributary countries as colonies, and asked them about the trade issue that concerned them most.

After Liu Yu translated, the emperor smiled and said: "This is an internal matter. The Customs Department has submitted a memorial, please implement new policies."

"All goods coming from outside China must report tariffs at five trading ports. If there are no tariffs at five ports, they will be regarded as smuggling. Once discovered, they will be confiscated immediately."

"Second, foreign goods other than those reported for customs duty can be sold in China."

"Third, if goods from China to Korea, Japan, Ryukyu, and Annan are transported by ship, they must be shipped by ships manufactured by Chinese shipyards; their captains must be Chinese citizens; more than 90% of their sailors must be Chinese citizens; The ship must be registered with the Customs Department and obtain permission from the Customs Department, otherwise it will not work.”

"This is an internal matter, not a foreign matter."

In fact, there are theoretical loopholes in this. For example, if you declare customs duties in Songjiang and go to North Korea by land... But besides the Customs Department, Dashun has other regulations. Westerners are not allowed to wander around the inland at will. They can only Squatting in the area designated by the port, they can steal intelligence, surveying maps, preaching, or steal porcelain silk and other technologies.

Theoretically, it would be fine if you use a ship built by a Chinese shipyard, hire Chinese captains and sailors, and report to the Customs Department. But just like before, even though the people in the Customs Department were greedy for money, they did not have the guts to let war horses, firearms, and military books go to Japan. This is still about the sentence above.

If it were somewhere else, even if this set of things were proposed, they would not be implemented. Japan is surrounded by sea, and smuggling cannot be prevented by Dashun patrols.

But Japan is originally closed to the country. If the shogunate wants to continue to maintain its rule, it can only continue to be in a state of "locking the country but trading", just like the previous Nagasaki trade, except that the Netherlands was excluded and only open Gave it to Dashun.

Secondly, since we have to smuggle anyway, why not just outsource the tariffs and formulate a monopoly group to do it? The imperial court only needs to supervise the sale of weapons, and the rest of the investigation of smuggling and catching pirates all depends on the ability of the monopoly trading company.

As for Annan, it's just a matter of paddling in first and then turning a blind eye. Anyway, it can't be controlled for the time being.

Therefore, this is indeed just an internal matter and an internal decree of the Celestial Empire. There is nothing the Ministry of Foreign Affairs can do to change internal decrees.

Or, send gunboats to force Dashun to change the law.

After saying this, the British envoy smiled inwardly and thought, isn't this the Eastern version of the "Navigation Regulations"? He glanced at the Dutchman secretly and smiled maliciously, thinking that he would use his skills to fight against the "Navigation Regulations" in Europe and start a war with Dashun!