Chapter 251 The Imperial Envoy Arrives at Ganghwa Island
The British sailing merchant ships weighed more than a thousand tons and were indeed much more comfortable than the small sea-going ships of the Qing Dynasty.
There is a huge gap in shipbuilding technology, which must be acknowledged. There is nothing to fear from falling behind, just catch up.
I'm afraid that even though I'm lagging behind, I still have to brag harshly: It's all leftovers from the ancestors of China.
This mentality is wrong!
This time, due to the emergency, Yuzhu did not ask Kangxi to take the woman to Yaksa.
After all, Nerchinsk is not Guangzhou. On the one hand, it is too cold, and on the other hand, the war is dangerous. If you bring your own woman, it will become a burden.
With Yuzhu's status, if he wanted to solve his physical problems, the worst thing he could do was buy a beautiful yellow-flowered girl.
On the ship, Yuzhu's handsome cabin was full of people.
This time we sent troops to Nerchinsk, the ten Rakshasa interpreters under Rakshasa Zuo played an irreplaceable role.
It's not that they are needed to help fight the war, but they are needed to help interrogate the prisoners of the Rakshasa Kingdom to understand the reality of Nerchinsk and the Rakshasa Far East region.
"Everyone, this is Biluochun from the palace, try it." Yuzhu picked up the teacup and offered the tea with a smile.
Serov is the head of the ten Rakshasa interpreters, so it is natural that he should come forward.
"Thank you, Mr. Yu." Xie Luofu's Chinese is very fluent. However, the pronunciation of some words is a little difficult and weird.
Yuzhu couldn't help but smile slightly. According to the logic of the Qing Dynasty, the bannermen of the Rakshasa tribe were also one of their own.
Serov is an upright sixth-grade riding academy under the leadership of Luo Shazuo, and a serious Eight Banners officer.
"Sir Xie, Yakutsk should be the largest city in Siberia, right?" Yuzhu asked Serov politely.
Serov has lived in Sijiu City for more than 20 years and has long been completely Chineseized.
Seeing Yuzhu asking questions, he quickly raised his hands and said: "To be honest with you, Mr. Yu, the Yakutsk Governor's Mansion is the first big city built by the Rakshasa Kingdom in the whole of Siberia, and it is also the largest city. More than 20 years ago
, there are already more than 5,000 people in Yakutsk, and now, I’m afraid there are 7 or 8,000.”
Yuzhu nodded. When he was in the capital, it was not easy for him to ask about the situation in Yakutsk, so as not to alarm Kangxi.
The Rakshasa troops sent out this time, according to Yuzhu's plan, to take advantage of the severe cold in winter to attack Nerchinsk, was just a pretense.
Yuzhu's real target is actually Yakutsk, which is the home base of the Rakshasa Kingdom's eastward invasion.
To put it bluntly, as long as Yakutsk is destroyed, all the achievements of the Rakshasa Kingdom's century-old eastward invasion will be over.
It will not be able to recover in the next few decades.
According to Serov's introduction, there are actually not many people from the Rakshasa Kingdom in Siberia Province, with a total strength of only a few thousand. Moreover, they are scattered in more than a dozen cities.
These cities are either the Governor's Mansion or the General Manager's Mansion.
After Serov's detailed introduction, Yuzhu finally understood that the Rakshasa Kingdom currently only has eight provinces.
Among them, the jurisdiction of Siberia Province includes all areas east of the Ural Mountains, which is extremely vast.
The Siberian senior official is the highest official in the entire Siberian region, and his status is equivalent to the governor of Siberia.
Under the high-ranking officials, there are a number of military governors' offices such as Yeniseysk, Olek-Minsk, and Irkutsk.
Below the Governor's Mansion is the Governor's Mansion such as Nerchinsk.
According to Serov, the distance from Moscow to Yakutsk is about 5,000 kilometers.
Yuzhu calculated by himself that the distance from Yaksa to Yakutsk is about 1,500 kilometers.
According to the results of the experiment, the speed of a dozen sled dogs dragging the sled is about 150 kilometers per day.
This speed refers to the speed at which the sled dogs maintain sufficient physical strength and can continue to drag the sled without being exhausted.
In other words, the entire journey takes about eleven days.
Of course, the sneak attack on Yakutsk was just Yuzhu's little plan, and it was definitely impossible to tell anyone.
After the five large four-masted merchant ships went out to sea, they sailed straight towards North Korea on the other side.
From the Qing Dynasty to North Korea, the first stop is Ganghwa Island.
Although Li's Korea was a vassal state of the Qing Dynasty, it had its own internal system.
Therefore, when Yuzhu led his troops through the Korean peninsula, in addition to carrying Kangxi's decree in his arms, he also had a fire ticket from the Qing Ministry of War, as well as a letter from the Ministry of Rites and the Lifan Academy.
In fact, young William has been to Ganghwa Island in North Korea and is relatively familiar with the situation on Ganghwa Island.
"Sir, the officials on Ganghwa Island in North Korea are much more greedy than the officials in Guangzhou in the Qing Dynasty. Alas, the last time I came to North Korea with my father, I had a ship full of goods. Not only did I not make any money, but I lost money.
For a thousand taels of silver." Little William complained angrily.
Yuzhu smiled slightly, shaking the red wine glass in his hand, and said with a smile: "My dear little William, this time is different. I am an angel from the Kingdom of Heaven, and they must maintain absolute respect for you and me."
Little William also smiled and said, "Sir, I am honored to be able to work with you."
The British habit of addressing men of high status is to call them Mr. without a surname. For men of equal rank or equal status, they are called Mr. XX, with a surname.
According to William Jr., the highest official in North Korea on Ganghwa Island was left behind in Ganghwafu.
Lao Wu was in charge of the vassal administration, and Yuzhu heard him say that the local officials in Korea were divided into two levels. The first level was the eight roads, and the second level was the prefecture, pastoral, commandery, and county under the jurisdiction of the eight roads.
What is strange is that the prefectures, pastoral, commanderies, and counties under the Tao are only related to their grades and the size of their territory, but do not belong to each other.
In other words, the county magistrates in North Korea are not under the jurisdiction of the county guards, but directly take orders from the highest official of the Tao, that is, the observer.
What is even more surprising is that the county magistrate of North Korea is actually from the fifth rank.
The sea ship traveled very fast, and five days later, it reached the outer sea of Ganghwa Island.
At this time, the North Korean naval camp stationed on Ganghwa Island sent several ships over to check the situation.
You can clearly see the jade pillar standing on the bow of the ship. The largest warship sent by the Koreans, compared with the large British merchant ship, is just like the difference between a minesweeper and a 10,000-ton destroyer. It is completely incomparable.
After the ship stopped, the Korean warship approached, and someone climbed up along the rope ladder.
After contact, among the Koreans who climbed up, the leader was Cui Song, the military judge of Jianghuafu Navy Camp.
"Cui Song, who is the sixth-rank military judge, is here to pay homage to the imperial envoy of the angel Jade." Cui Song came up to Yuzhu and took the initiative to kneel down. His attitude was not to mention flattering.
Yuzhu secretly found it funny. This Cui Song deliberately reported his official rank. Is this because he was afraid of being looked down upon by him?
According to the rules, Yuzhu ordered Wu Jiang to fetch the fire tickets and other items from the Ministry of War and handed them over to Cui Song.
After Cui Song inspected it carefully, his attitude became more respectful, his waist lowered, and he asked servilely: "I dare to ask Master Yu's surname, is it Tong Jia from Manchuria with a yellow flag?"
"Of course." Yuzhu felt a little strange that Cui Song actually spoke fluent Chinese.
Afterwards, Yuzhu learned that Li's Korea also respected Chinese Confucianism, and that the classics and historical documents and documents were all written in Chinese characters.
It is no exaggeration to say that everyone in North Korea’s intellectual class is proud to speak Chinese and write Chinese characters.
"Sir Yu, I will send someone to inform the left-behind master right now and ask him to come in person to greet the imperial envoy." After Cui Song found out the details of Yu Zhu, he no longer dared to call him a lower official, but changed it to a lower rank.
Wu Jiang on the side noticed Cui Song's change and couldn't help but secretly laugh. He didn't expect that Tong Banchao's fame would spread to North Korea?
In fact, although the Li family in Korea was conquered by Dorgon, the style of official uniforms has always been the system of the pre-Ming Dynasty, and they neither shaved their heads nor changed their uniforms.
As the saying goes, the reputation of hiding one's ears and stealing the bell is not reduced in reality!
While Cui Song sent someone to inform Jianghua to stay behind Zheng Mingding, he invited Yuzhu to the dock.
Soon, Zheng Mingding, who was left behind by Jianghua, came over. When he saw Yuzhu, he knelt down on one knee and said humbly: "I, Zheng Mingding, would like to bow down to the imperial envoy, and respectfully ask the envoy to be safe."
After seeing Zheng Mingding's attitude, Yuzhu immediately understood that everyone in North Korea, big and small, feared the Qing Dynasty like a tiger!
Historically, the Lee Dynasty of Korea was indeed respectful to the Qing Dynasty, obeyed its advice, and did not dare to disobey even a little bit.
On the other hand, whether it was the Ming Dynasty or the Qing Dynasty, Li's North Korea was not treated lightly.
In the pre-Ming Dynasty, there were three major campaigns in Wanli, and the Ming army helped North Korea defeat Toyotomi Hideyoshi.
During the Tatar Qing Dynasty, there were records of the Qing Dynasty sending envoys or troops to assist in the internal strife in Korea that could not be resolved.
According to the requirements of the Joseon Dynasty's "Ritual of Welcoming the Metropolitan Government Office", since Yuzhu was a passing angel envoy, the Joseon monarch did not need to lead all civil and military officials to personally greet him in the outer suburbs of the "Ying'en Gate".
However, the king of Korea must ceremoniously receive Yuzhu in front of the palace gate with the courtesy of a minister.
A ritual person must have a sense of ritual!
As an imperial envoy with orders, Yuzhu also went to Seoul according to etiquette to meet with the Korean King Li Yin (Yutun).
After some pleasantries, Yuzhu was welcomed into the hall specially used to welcome the imperial envoy angels.
After washing up, Yuzhu had just changed his clothes, sat down and drank half a cup of tea, and then received the report that Li Yuandu, the envoy sent by the King of Korea and the judge of the court, and Zheng Qingquan, the official of the court and the judge of the court, had arrived.
Arrive in front of the Huitong Hall.
Yuzhu put on his official uniform and met Li Yuandu and Zheng Qingquan in the main hall.
"Your Majesty, Li Yuandu, respectfully greets the Emperor of China."
"Your Majesty Zheng Qingquan, I respectfully greet the Emperor of China."
Li Yuandu and Zheng Qingquan knelt down and saluted politely.
The jade pillar is facing north and south, and it is raised high to the left, cupping its hands and saying: "Saint Gong!"
Emperor of China? Yuzhu is not an official of the Ministry of Rites after all, so he is somewhat strange.
Later, according to Li Yuandu's explanation, Yuzhu suddenly realized.
North Korea is a remote and small state that regards the Qing Dynasty as its suzerainty. The official name of the Qing Dynasty in North Korea has been China since the Ming Dynasty.
In fact, the Qing Dynasty always referred to itself as China when referring to foreign countries (vassals).
For example, the Treaty of Nerchinsk is the "Treaty of Nerchinsk", not the "Treaty of Nerchinsk".