Everything that happened in the dream was strange yet familiar to Hitotsubashi Keiki:

It's unfamiliar because there was no rise of the reformists at all, so Fuso was in a difficult situation. Not only was it almost helpless to deal with the great turbulence caused by the opening of the port, but it was also helpless to face the pressing pressure of the Western countries.

But in the dream, he couldn't remember any of this, he just felt that something was wrong everywhere.

The reason why it feels familiar is that I identify with these things in my heart.

For Qingxi, such a result and such a change are in line with his understanding of Fusang.

At this time, Qingxi in the dream also felt that something was wrong, but he was haunted by the nightmare and could only wait and see the development of the situation:

In September of the first year of Qingying (1865), the joint war fleets of the four countries came to Osaka and asked for three things: "Open Hyogo and Osaka in advance", "Fuso imitates China and change taxes", and "the imperial court

The imperial edict promised the founding of the country and the opening of ports."

The excuse the foreigners got on the surface was "mutual friendliness" - "In view of the difficulty in raising funds for Fuso, the four countries gave up two-thirds of the compensation for the Shimonoseki Incident. In exchange, Fuso should completely give up resisting the foreigners and further opening up.

Port trade".

This happened because of two factors:

First of all, after the Shikoku bombardment of Shimonoseki last year, the foreigners tasted the benefits of using force, so they repeated the same trick this time;

Secondly, after three years of taking charge of the Shogun Iemoge, he finally began to be unwilling to be lonely.

After Iemo went to Luo for the first time in the third year of Wenjiu (1863), the combination of public and military forces was officially formed.

Originally, the shogunate hoped to rely on the reputation of the court to suppress the opposition voices of the government and the opposition. However, in the first year of Qingying (1865), the shogunate was shocked to discover that people seek evil and evil, and each family, especially the foreign lords,

They actually used the name of public-military unity to suppress the shogunate.

For example, the delay in issuing the second expedition order brought disgrace to the shogunate.

Similarly, the Qingxi "Ichikai-san" forces usurped the interests of the Kinki imperial family, which also greatly caused unrest within the shogunate.

It has to be said that in the first year of Yuanji (1864), the Tengu Party launched an uprising, which greatly reduced the prestige of the Qingxi faction among the ministers.

At this time, the results of the mission to Europe headed by Nagaha Ikeda were finally noticed:

The Ikeda mission went to Europe in December of the third year of Bunjiu and returned to Fuso in the first year of Yuanji (1864).

Its mission was mainly to do three things: to persuade Western countries to accept the "Yokohama Lockdown", to deal with the aftermath of the Shimonoseki bombardment of foreign ships that occurred in Bunkyu 3, and to discuss how to compensate the French officers and soldiers who were assassinated in the Idodani incident.

However, Ikeda and his party received a cold reception in Europe, the "Yokohama port lock" was severely rejected, and Shimonoseki's bombardment of foreign ships could not be forgiven. The solution to the Idoya incident was to pay a large sum of money and solemnly apologize.

Therefore, Ikeda and his party, who had accomplished almost nothing, were severely punished by the shogunate after they returned to Fuso.

But Ikeda and others did not really gain nothing.

He made an agreement with France, "In order to better punish the Choshu Mori family who were the main culprits of the Shimonoseki incident, the Buddhists will assist the shogunate in terms of ordnance and other aspects."

Moreover, shocked by the wealth and power of Europa, Ikeda Nagara and others boldly exceeded their authority and reached an industrial cooperation intention with the French.

After Ikeda and others were severely punished, these matters should have been ignored.

But as for the matter, the more I wanted to put it aside, the harder it was to put it aside. The Buddhist minister Rosius never forgot about the matter. After he repeatedly expressed his goodwill to support the shogunate, someone in the shogunate finally became interested in it.

In February of the first year of Keio (1865), the shogunate and France signed a cooperation agreement for the Yokosuka Iron Works.

After that, the expansion of Yokohama Steel Works was also put on the agenda of dual-engine cooperation.

In fact, this is not difficult to understand. The Western countries have always joined forces to press forward step by step against the shogunate. Now that they finally have the opportunity to divide their opponents, the shogunate must not give up.

And what Rosius and the Buddha said is "reasonable":

The Tang people were so powerful that they had to open up the country for trade, so how could Fusang be spared?

In addition to doing business, France had great goodwill towards the shogunate. In other words, as long as the shogunate supported the continued founding of the country, the Buddhists would help the shogunate in all aspects.

It happened that at this time, after the Battle of Saying and the four-nation bombardment of Shimonoseki, the whole of Fuso felt that it was no longer realistic to use force to resist the invaders.

Now, there are only two paths before the shogunate:

Either continue to fight the foreigners in a roundabout way, or open a port and do business honestly.

But if you think about it carefully, in fact, these two roads are basically the same, but they are just faster or slower on the road to the founding of the country.

Since the founding of the country is to continue, the first thing the shogunate should consider is how to preserve and strengthen itself.

Therefore, before the four-nation joint war fleet arrived at Osaka in September, Edo had begun to waver internally. Although it was not directly exposed to the outside world, it not only completely gave up the lock on the Yokohama port, but also stopped resolutely resisting the opening of the port.

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Therefore, in the face of the "opening of Hyogo and Osaka ports in advance", "tax changes", and "the imperial decree to open ports" proposed by the ministers of the four countries in Osaka, General Iemo and others did not resist tenaciously, and directly transferred this trouble to

The Kyoto imperial court and the celebration series.

He couldn't help but sigh at the joy in his dream.

Although he was the "Governor of the Forbidden City Guards" appointed by the imperial court, since his monthly salary of 7,500 taels was provided by the shogunate, he was actually a bridge between the public and military forces.

Now that Shogun Iemo and others are using the help of foreigners to force the palace, the most uncomfortable thing is not the imperial court, but the family who has been criticized on both sides!

Sure enough, after the imperial court refused the invitation of foreigners for the first time, the internal divisions in the shogunate were made public:

On October 3rd of the first year of Keio (1865), General Iemo resigned from the imperial court and expressed that he would hand over the general to conquer the barbarians. Iemo then resolutely embarked on the journey east to Edo.

But this is not so much a resignation as a break - although the shogunate is weak, it is still the best in the world, so the resignation is false, and it is real to take the opportunity to force the court and himself to submit.

The little baby who was kidnapped by powerful ministers has now become a British master.

Form is stronger than people. If the public-military union officially breaks down, the joy of celebrating himself will lose the basis of existence, so he has to make up for it in two ways:

First, he stopped the general Iemo who was returning eastward and told him that the court would definitely give in and would not put the shogunate on the fire again this time;

Then, he returned to Kyoto and persuaded Emperor Fuso to be patient, saying that after the incident, the shogunate would definitely give an explanation.

The final result was that everyone gave in in early October:

The imperial court issued an edict, recognizing all foreign treaties signed by the past shogunate, and acquiescing to tax changes, but firmly disagreeing with the early opening of the port;

As for the shogunate, they also punished the two veterans Abe Masaigai and Matsumae Takahiro, and gave an explanation for intimidating the imperial court.

As for the foreigners, although the new British Minister Pacus was extremely dissatisfied and very angry at not being able to open the port in advance, under the persuasion of the Buddhist Minister Rosius, the four-nation coalition finally withdrew its troops.

Hey, Qingxi suddenly realized in his dream that he seemed to have discovered something vaguely.

During this period, there were changes in the Satsuma Shimazu family.

His retainers Saigo and Okubo actually teamed up with some ministers and secretly convened a meeting in Kyoto. At the meeting, it was proposed to establish an alliance of male and feudal lords to replace the shogunate in governing the country. As for Ichikikaisang, of course, it must be banned as soon as possible.

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At this time, the furious Qingxi suddenly fell into a trance and realized that he had also arrived in the second year of Qingying (1866).

At this time, the grain famine had begun to take shape, and riots in various places began to become more frequent.

But the first priority for the shogunate and itself was the second expedition against Changzhou.

It turns out that after the Gongshan Temple Incident in December of the first year of Yuanzhi (1864), the rebel party began to rule Changzhou.

Afterwards, although Changzhou appeared to be submissive, secretly it actively contacted foreigners and reformed the Western military system. In fact, it was for the purpose of separatist rule by force.

Just say that Xiaguan indemnity has been paid. By April this year, the shogunate had advanced the third installment of US$500,000, but Changzhou continued to cry for poverty and refused to pay even a cent.

It's tolerable, but it's intolerable.

But few people know what’s going on behind the scenes:

In fact, after the Four-Nation Allied Forces threatened Osaka last year, Edo's attitude towards the Second March has softened much.

Because the price of rice began to soar at that time, riots began to increase in various places. After investigation, the shogunate believed that there was a high possibility of fierce resistance from Choshu, and the princes were also sad to see the death of Choshu, so they demanded leniency for Choshu.

In this case, the shogunate, which had already gained the upper hand in the public-military union by obtaining the imperial edict to found the country, was actually quite satisfied - Fuso was in such decline that it would be better to live in peace and stability rather than go to war.

But for Qingxi himself, last year when the Four Nations Allied Forces threatened Osaka, the public-military alliance almost broke up. At that time, he worked hard to repair the problems, which caused many consequences:

First, both the imperial court and the shogunate were dissatisfied with their respective concessions, which caused them to begin to be marginalized by both parties.

Secondly, my biggest reliance is the huge reputation left by my father Qi Zhao against the foreigners.

However, after the imperial edict was issued to found the country, the original anti-barbarian faction believed that they had betrayed everyone by promoting this incident, so the overwhelming response to the Forbidden Gate incident began to fade away forever.

Therefore, I pushed for the edict to be passed in the first month of this year, hoping that by severely punishing Changzhou, I could not only re-establish my prestige, but also win over the hard-line princes and ministers.

But what happened next was really unbelievable:

First, the negotiations with Changzhou failed in May, and then in the battle that began on June 7, the Zhengchang army actually fell behind.

An army of 100,000 people divided into four groups to attack several thousand people, but the outcome of the battle was unfavorable. How did this happen?

In a daze, Qingxi saw that there was someone behind the scenes from the Satsuma clan:

In the first year of Qingying (1865), Satsuma began to help Changzhou purchase new Western ordnance.

In the first month of this year, the two families even privately formed a secret alliance with the Sa Changs, and have been helping each other since then.

No wonder the Shimazu family not only refused to send troops to help the military as they did during the first expedition, but also loudly expressed their opposition. It turned out that they had already rebelled.

What made Qingxi anxious in the dream was that he had discovered this all along.

Next, due to the unfavorable outcome of the Second March, more and more troubles were caused:

In order to raise military resources, the shogunate and various families increased taxes.

In the previous May, there had been a major rice riot in Hyogo and Nishinomiya, and because the shogunate required merchants everywhere to provide huge donations, a serious rice riot also occurred in Osaka that month.

June was even more serious, with Wushu and Shangshu Daiichi breaking out in Kanto. During the same period, Shinda Yikui also broke out in Northeastern Oshu.

Finally, before the results of the second expedition could be announced, General Iemoji, who was in charge of the rear, died of a sudden illness in Osaka on July 20.

Although he concealed the information and insisted on continuing the conquest, Changzhou's attacks became more and more fierce and he actually started to counterattack.
Chapter completed!