"To His Majesty the Greatest and Most Invincible King, Charles I, King of England:

William André, a faithful subject of our country, hereby submits this letter, and has our permission to travel to various parts of your country.

He was able to do this difficult thing because he had full faith in His Majesty's magnanimity and mercy...

I believe that the benefit of the trade which the kings of our western kingdoms have obtained from each other is available to your Majesty and to all those who are subordinate to your Majesty...

If Your Majesty can facilitate this, and grant safe passage,... And when Your Majesty's kindness extends to us and our neighbors, we will seek to repay Your Majesty. May Heaven bless Your Majesty.

In 1628, after the birth of Jesus, in the third year of the reign of our king, it was conferred on Greenwich Palace. ”

In the daylight banquet hall of the Siyi Pavilion, illuminated by dozens of bright whale oil candles, a young man was stammering the English letters in his hand, and at the head of him sat Chongzhen, while on the left and right sides of the banquet sat Captain André and the interpreter who accompanied him.

This young man, Zhou Baiyong, was one of the best students in the Tongwen Museum to learn foreign languages, and it took only a year for him to be able to read and write Latin and French preliminarily.

The reason why he was asked to translate this letter of state, rather than to have a learned Jesuit priest come, was that Chongzhen hoped that his conversation with the British would not be circulated. Although the Society of Jesus was a transcendent missionary organization, it nevertheless traveled around the world under the patronage of the Spaniards.

Zhu Youzhen didn't want to, he hadn't reached anything with the British, and the Spaniards had already gotten the news. If the Spanish colonizers in the Philippines had made the wrong judgment that the Ming had formed an alliance with the Protestant countries and refused to restore peace with the Ming, it would only have cheapened the Dutch.

Andre also clasped his hands and listened carefully, although the Chinese official's translation of the letter was fake, but the contents were genuine, and they were jointly elected by the British Merchant House in Pattani, and the most urgent hope was to obtain the privilege of trading with China.

Although Andre could not understand Chinese, the Chinese captain sitting next to him re-translated the contents of the national letter to him without reservation. Except for a few words that didn't make sense, André thought the young man had already learned Latin.

After Zhou Baiyong finished reading the national letter, he stepped aside under Chongzhen's nod. Next, Andre ordered his retinue to present Chongzhen with the gifts he had brought to the king.

Due to the suddenness of the incident, the British merchants of the Pattani Merchant House did not prepare a national gift in line with the status of the British king. Therefore, we had to cobble together some rare items from the merchants as gifts from the King of England to the Emperor of China.

These gifts include, among them, a pair of large, superbly fine African ivory; dozens of ruby sapphires from the island of Ceylon; Two strings of beads as big as little fingers and as colored as pale gold; Finally, a pair of richly decorated muskets.

When his entourage brought out the gifts, Andrei kept his eyes on Chongzhen, who was sitting at the top, to see what the young Chinese emperor liked.

However, from ivory to pearls, the young Chinese emperor was not in good spirits, which made Andrei's heart sink. Fortunately, however, when the Chinese emperor saw the pair of muskets, which were supposed to be given to a certain earth king, he finally became interested.

"Bring those muskets and show them to me." When Zhu Youzhen saw the pair of muskets that obviously didn't look like arquebuses, he finally said with some urgency.

Wang Chengen, who was checking the gift below, quickly took the brocade box containing two strange-looking muskets, and trotted to Chongzhen.

Zhu Youzhen took out the musket in the brocade box, looked at it carefully, and finally determined that this was obviously not an arquebus, but it didn't look like a flintlock musket.

After gesturing for a while, he asked Andre curiously, "What is the name of the pair of muskets you brought?" How is it used? ”

Andre hurriedly got up and saluted Chongzhen and replied: "This is a wheel musket, it is the same as winding an alarm clock, it is much simpler than an arquebus..."

In Andrei's explanation, this musket, which originated from the invention of the German Nuremberg watchmaker, was mainly used by fast-moving cavalry, in order to solve the problem that cavalry could not use arquebuses to attack.

The firing mechanism of this revolver is divided into serrated steel wheels, chains, springs and *. A tunnel stone is fixed on the *head, and after *, the fine teeth on the surface of the drum rub against the tunnel stone to ignite* the firing bullet.

Before shooting, the chain needs to be rolled by hand with a small hand, and in the process of winding the chain, the spring is compressed, and the spring opens to drive the steel wheel to rotate, so the whole process is like the clockwork of an alarm clock.

But once equipped, the musket can be safely on standby for a long time until the shooter fires. Compared to the arquebus, which has to pay attention to the burning speed of the arquebus, I don't know how many times safer. And the biggest advantage of this musket is that it can fight in wind and rain, and you don't have to worry about not being able to shoot because the arquebus is extinguished.

Of course, this musket also has great flaws, the structure is complex, it is difficult to make, and the cost is 2-3 times that of ordinary arquebuses. In addition, it is troublesome to reload after shooting, and it is necessary to pay attention to the maintenance of the steel wheel, once it is contaminated by mud, it will not be able to ignite. The most criticized point is that once there is a failure, it must be handed over to professionals for maintenance and repair, and ordinary craftsmen cannot repair it at all.

Because of the shortcomings of the revolver, this musket could only be popular among noble knights, and could not replace ordinary arquebuses. However, it is precisely because of this feature that each revolver is made into a work of art by the gunsmith.

The pair of wheeled muskets in Zhu Youjian's hand were made of ivory* and beautifully carved with unicorns and human portraits, which is why Andre gave him such a pair of muskets as a gift.

Zhu Youzhen took the musket and watched it several times in the candlelight, and he was very happy. He carefully put the musket in his hand back into the brocade box held by Wang Chengen, and then raised his head and said to Andre with a smile: "I like the gift that King Charles asked you to send. In return, I will prepare a considerable gift for you to bring to King Charles on my behalf. ”

Having understood what the Chinese emperor said to him, Andrei finally put his mind at ease. Now that he has the approval of the Chinese emperor, his identity as the envoy of the British king is truly confirmed, and the most difficult hurdle has finally passed.

Andre hurriedly saluted Chongzhen, saying that he would definitely bring back to England the gift and goodwill that Chongzhen gave to King Charles, so as to achieve friendship between the two countries.

Zhu Youzhen motioned to Wang Chengen to remove the remnants of the table in front of everyone, and said to Andre: "The king of your country wants to establish a mutually beneficial trade relationship with the Ming Dynasty, which is naturally no problem.

For all equal and reciprocal trade, Daming will not refuse. We allow British merchant ships to trade in the ports of China, but all British ships and personnel entering the ports of China must obey the laws of the Ming Dynasty, can you do that? ”

Andre nodded without hesitation and agreed with Chongzhen's opinion, with the current British power in Asia, they can't challenge China's power at all, even if they want to disagree, they can't resist China's force in the coastal seas. André felt that there was really no need to oppose such a request.

Zhu Youzhen then continued: "Since Britain and China have an equal and reciprocal trade relationship, British merchant ships can enter Chinese ports for trade and accept our protection. So in the future, Chinese merchant ships can also go to the British ports for trade and get the protection of the British king, is King Charles willing to accept it? ”

After a moment's pause, Andre said humbly and tactfully: "I am very willing to bring your terms back to my king, but it is inconvenient for me to make a decision for my king. Of course, in my personal opinion, I do not think there is anything wrong with His Majesty's request.

However, the Kingdom of Britain has always advocated free trade, and has never refused to allow merchant ships from other countries to enter British ports for trade, except for the merchant ships of some hostile countries. Even if His Majesty did not make this request, it would not prevent Chinese merchant ships from entering British ports for trade. ”

Listening to Andrei's words, Zhu Youzhen looked quite disappointed, and he couldn't help but say: "It turns out that you are just a messenger of the king of your country, not a plenipotentiary ambassador." In that case, there are some things that I can't say more about with you.

Then when you go back to England, in addition to bringing my goodwill, I also hope that you will tell King Charles on my behalf, and I hope that Britain can become a friend of the Ming Dynasty in the West.

If he can help the Ming merchants to trade freely in Europe, then I can also help the British merchants to gain the right to trade freely in Asia.

If he wished, I hoped that the Ming and the British would send diplomatic envoys to each other, so that on the one hand, they could enhance mutual understanding between the two countries, and on the other hand, they could also agree on certain world affairs. ”

Chongzhen's words suddenly made Andre a little overwhelmed. As an English squire, he pretended to be an envoy of the British crown to present his credentials, just to establish normal trade relations with China.

China, which has always been regarded as difficult to deal with by Europeans, should have such a young emperor who is interested in the Western world, and he does not know if this is a good thing for Europe.

However, André found that if he did not deal with the matter of disguising the envoy of the British king this time, he was afraid that he would get himself into great trouble.

He could not grasp the point of Chongzhen's proposal at all, and the diplomatic relations between Britain and China were not something that he, a mere squire, could grasp.

He had to bite the bullet and answer a few words vaguely, but he didn't dare to promise any conditions to Chongzhen at all.

Looking at Andre's flushed face, Zhu Youzhen finally determined that this was really not the official representative of the British king.