Speaking of the Dutch West India Company, the relationship with the East Coast has also experienced ups and downs over the years.

In the early days of the East Coast, the Dutch colonial trading company played a crucial role. Their trade with the East Coast was crucial to the Republic of the East Coast's rough early years, and the company was also making a lot of money for itself, making the relationship a win-win situation.

Later, as the strength of the East Coast Republic grew, the Dutch West India Company's dependence on the East Coast also increased, and gradually changed from the original equal cooperative relationship to a trade relationship between the main and the strong and the weak, which led to the fact that the East Coast trade objects became more and more extensive, and the dependence on the Dutch West India Company became less and less. But the company's plantations in the wild regions of Brazil and the slave trade in West Africa were still very helpful to the East Coast.

In the last decade or so, the relationship between the West India Company and the East Coast has experienced some twists and turns, as the United Province and the East Coast have cooled down rapidly. This is reflected in the fact that there has been no new investment for many years, and the number of Dutch businessmen who were originally ubiquitous in Hue Port has also been greatly reduced, replaced by Portuguese, French and even Italian businessmen, which shows the change in the company's policy. After all, the shareholders of the West India Company, which was based in the province of Zeeland, did not have the same energy as the bigwigs behind the East India Company, and they were not very able to withstand the pressure in the face of the cold gaze of the Prince of Orange.

The return of members of the Cornelis family, representing the bosses behind the West India Company, to the East Coast today is an icebreaker not seen in many years, which may indicate a change in attitude at the company's top brassiers.

“…… Mr. Ma, as I said earlier, our company is willing to increase its investment in your country's Brazil region and expand more plantations. After drinking two cups of coffee, Hugo, a new member of the Cornelius family, looked at Ma Van Qiang, chairman of the East Coast Executive Committee, who was sitting on the sofa opposite, and said with a smile: "Over the years, the company's plantation investment in Hue has been providing stable profits, and the company's shareholders are very happy about this and have been asking for more investment." ”

Ma Wenqiang smiled after hearing this. The plantations that the West India Company had developed around the port of Hue had indeed provided them with large quantities of sugar, tobacco and coffee for many years, and they had indeed made a lot of money. The problem is, this has been a stable profit for ten or twenty years, haven't you thought about additional investment? Yes, when the previous Chairman Liao was on the stage, he really didn't like the fact that a large number of plantations were opened in the country, which corroded the domestic atmosphere, so that local enterprises began to transform, but this is not the reason why your West India Company suddenly did not invest! If Brazil is gone, can't New Huaxia Island be invested? The people of the East Coast were open to any merchant who would invest in the island, and as a result, the Dutch, as if they had never heard of it, sat back and watched the Italians make a fortune there, so much so that they robbed them of many markets in the Mediterranean.

Now that time has passed, the Dutch seem to have finally "woken up" and want to invest in the fertile land of the East Coast, and if there is nothing wrong with this, I am afraid that none of you here will believe it. In the 17th century, the environment for doing business overseas was hostile, and if there was no political force behind it, and purely commercial power was relied on, it would only be eaten and wiped out. Business investment is definitely not just a business in this day and age!

Ma Wenqiang is not a fool, and after thinking about the meaning of it a little, he understands the three points. In the final analysis, this matter has to do with the current situation in Europe. More precisely, in connection with the increasingly aggressive attitude of the French!

Let's start with the cultural aspect. As the prestige of the Kingdom of France reached supremacy in Europe: in 1680 the Parliament of Paris publicly proclaimed Louis XIV the "Great", to which both the Pope and the Holy Roman Emperor acquiesced and said nothing; Many artists, including foreign painters, worked to paint Louis XIV as a god of heaven and reigned at the Palace of Versailles, which shows that there are more and more "spiritual Frenchmen" in Europe; There are theologians who argue that Louis XIV's achievements prove the existence of God, which shows the extent of the boasting.

In other words, there was now a very strong force in Europe touting France, and Louis XIV became "a great king, the recognized glory of our time, and the rare of posterity" in the words of many influential figures. From the north of the Pyrenees and the Alps, to the west of the Vistula River, the intellectual class of the whole continent began to speak the French language, to imitate the court of Paris, to imitate French art and everything!

In such an environment of cultural fanaticism, how is it impossible not to feel creepy in the United Provinces, which have always been very wary of the Kingdom of France?

Let's talk about religion. The most sensational thing in the European religious circles in recent times is undoubtedly the naked and undisguised hostility of King Louis XIV of France towards the Protestants! It is well known that there are about 1.5 million Huguenots, i.e. Protestants, in France, and from Richelieu to Mazarin, the highest authorities in France have confirmed the validity of the Edict of Nantes issued in 1598, which protects the religious freedom of Huguenots as long as they submit to the central government politically.

In 1652 Louis XIV also confirmed the validity of the Edict of Nantes issued by his grandfather Henry IV, and in 1660 he publicly praised the loyalty of the Huguenots in the event of the Faldes rebellion, and his henchman Colbert marveled at the Huguenots' contributions to industry, commerce and the arts.

Everything seems to be normal! Although the French Church never recognized the Edict of Nantes, under the majesty of the royal power, they could not independently challenge this political correctness, so they could only pretend not to see it.

But in the end, the problem lay with Louis XIV's own attitude. Yes, having secured his seat of power, Louis XIV began to stop hiding his religious tendencies. Thus, with his acquiescence, the French Catholic Church became active again: in 1660 the synod asked the king to close the Huguenots' colleges and hospitals, not allowing them to join the public office; The Synod of 1670 recommended that the children of Huguenots, who had reached the age of seven, should be separated from their parents in order to accept the true faith; The Synod of 1675 demanded that all intermarriages between Catholics and Huguenots be declared null and void and that children resulting from such marriages should be considered illegitimate children.

Some of these suggestions were accepted by Louis and some were not, but he and his government were in fact gradually abolishing the Edict of Nantes: in 1661 he first tested the waters and outlawed the Protestant cult of the city of Gerkes, arguing that it had been incorporated into France only after the Edict of Nantes had been issued. There were 17,000 Protestants and 400 Protestants, in 1665 boys and girls over the age of 14 were authorized to convert to Catholicism and leave their Huguenot parents, who had to pay an annuity to support them, in 1666 Huguenots were forbidden to build any new colleges or educational institutions, in 1669 Huguenots were forbidden to immigrate and those who assisted them were sentenced, and in 1677 Louis XIV personally contributed to the establishment of a repentance fund in which each Huguenot converted would receive six livres.

If the above policies were only a more "gentle" temptation, in recent years Louis XIV's methods have become much more drastic. From 1682 to this year, more than 570 of the more than 800 Huguenot churches in France were closed, many were demolished, and when the congregants tried to rebuild them, all of them were arrested and punished and declared traitors to the state.

These policies are often heard of even by people on the East Coast in the New World. Even Ma Wenqiang, who had just returned from the Far East not long ago, fully understood what the French were doing after making up some knowledge: to be honest, he didn't feel much about it, because he believed in Taoism, but he could also feel the impact of Louis XIV's crazy behavior on the surrounding Protestant countries, and the United Provinces, England, Sweden and a large number of German states must have been afraid that Louis XIV would come and seize their land and property one day, and at the same time take their souls.

And if the cultural strength of the Kingdom of France has alarmed the other countries, led by the United Provinces, and the policy of persecution of the Protestants, they have been frightened by the small moves and expansions that the French have made on the border in recent years, taking advantage of the Austro-Turkish war!

Two years ago, when the Austro-Turkish War was in full swing, King Louis XIV of France instructed his subordinates to set up a "reintegration committee" to demand the recovery of some border areas that originally belonged to Franche-Comté and Alsace, and it succeeded. After receiving this sweetness, Louis XIV seemed to be encouraged, and then made some small means to make some small towns that originally belonged to Strasbourg also declare their annexation to the Free City of Strasbourg, and declare their allegiance to the French king. Subsequently, the Duchy of Milan, which was under the jurisdiction of the Kingdom of Spain, was also forced to cede to the French the Château de Marcel, a fortress on the road from Savoy to the Duchy of Milan.

All of the above is a small measure, and the French have less than ten towns, with a total population of 10,000. But the problem was that because of the Austro-Turkish War, the king of Austria, as the co-lord of the German princes, turned a blind eye and did not want to stand up for his younger brother, and the king of Spain also tolerated it in every possible way, fearing that he would fall into a difficult war. As for the United Provinces, they also sat back and watched in the midst of entanglements and contradictions, acquiescing in the aggression of the French.

There is no doubt that all these policies of appeasement fueled the aggressive ambitions of the French. Discovering that Louis XIV, who no one seemed to be able to restrain himself, was a fatal delusion, finally reaching out to the lowlands that had been coveted for years. In the second half of 1684, he sent troops into the South Netherlands, occupied parts of the Spanish Duchy of Brabant, and annexed the Duchy of Luxembourg. The courts of Vienna and Madrid, fearing that Louis's appetite would not be satisfied, led it to expand the war, and finally agreed to the occupation of these regions by the Kingdom of France, swallowing a bitter fruit.

The Spaniards and Austrians can not care much about the expansion of the Kingdom of France in the South Netherlands, in fact, this is also untrue, but one of them has no heart and no time to take care of it, but the Dutch can't, they have already reached the doorstep, and this day is not going to live!

Therefore, although the French appeased Dutch goods with a very low tariff rate, the Dutch did not buy it at all! When it comes to the life and death of the country, this is not a matter of money! Moreover, this Louis XIV was too domineering, and various policies, including those in the Dutch occupation zone, also showed his extreme hostility to the Protestants and the Protestant state, and the Dutch pushed others to themselves, of course, fearing to be ruled by people like Louis XIV. What's more, they now vaguely heard that this person had actually hooked up with the Elector of the Holy Roman Empire, Archbishop Cologne, to form an alliance, and the ambition of expansion really shocked everyone.

Therefore, the Dutch, after thinking about it and learning from the pain, felt that they still had to find a way to unite the majority in order to curb the ambitions of the French. And because the East Coast Republic has become more and more powerful in recent years and has a unique geopolitical advantage that controls the Cape of Good Hope, they are also worried that this country will be co-opted by the French, and they do not doubt the possibility of the French forming an alliance with the infidel countries. Therefore, after struggling for a long time, they finally decided to send an envoy across the ocean to the east coast to make contact with the leadership of the east coast to see if there was any possibility of cooperation.

Don't blame the Dutch for being so cautious, it's really that the relationship between the two countries was too stiff a few years ago, and the people on the east coast are still supporting the republican political forces in the United Province to block the Prince of Orange, and it is quite good that the Dutch can finally wipe their faces and send people over, and there is indeed a certain sincerity.

Of course, Ma Wenqiang also knew that the Dutch came from afar not to continue to invest in Brazil, and the drunkards did not care about alcohol, and they were always only concerned about the attitude of the East Coast in the European war that might break out in the future. It's great to be able to win them over, but if you can't, then it's a good outcome to settle for the next best thing and keep the East Coasters neutral. This is the wishful thinking of the Dutch, and Ma Wenqiang, as the supreme leader of the East Coast, is clear about this.

However, he was not prepared to say yes to the Dutch. More precisely, he did not intend to accede to the demands of the Dutch so easily, unless they were willing to meet some of the demands of the East Bankers, both political and commercial.