Harry Potter Morning Light

Compared with the dazzling array of commodities in the 20th century, the commodities exported by ancient China remained in the minority for a long time, namely silk, porcelain, tea and paper.

Paper was exported for a relatively short period of time, and the quantity was relatively small. Tea only began to be exported in the Song Dynasty, and after the West, mainly the United Kingdom, began to drink tea, tea became a major export item.

After paper and tea are removed, only porcelain and silk are left as bulk commodity exports. The status of these two materials on the Maritime Silk Road and the Land Silk Road is different. The main means of transportation in the Western Regions are camels and horses, so light silk is more popular than porcelain, and the weight requirements at sea are not strict, because in the Tang and Song Dynasties, large ships with four masts, large keels, and amazing drafts could already be produced .

At the same time, ships needed a certain amount of ballast at sea, and porcelain happened to meet the requirements of being popular and durable, so porcelain became the best product for maritime trade.

People in the Tang Dynasty did not have a good grasp of enamel, but it improved significantly in the Song Dynasty. There will be "official kiln" porcelain that will sell for sky-high prices in auctions in the future. hometown".

However, the porcelain shipped from JDZ to Guangzhou is often plain, and the aesthetics of China is very different from that of Westerners. Items used by newlyweds often have patterns such as butterflies, lotus flowers, and magpies in pairs, while Westerners like flowers, plants, figures, and insects.

Guangdong has the habit of copying calligraphy and painting. Ceramic factories transport a large amount of pure porcelain to Guangdong. European buyers can ask porcelain workers to color according to their favorite styles. However, the plants painted by these ceramic craftsmen are often not anatomically complete. Proportion, and sometimes mistake the stamens and pistils, draw more and less leaves, and draw birds unsatisfactorily, so some people came to Lin Gua to learn Western painting.

Castiglione planned to set up an Academy of Fine Arts in the capital, but neither the emperor nor the ministers agreed. On the contrary, Lin Gua's studio, which is not considered an "academy", has admitted many students. Their purpose of learning painting is not to innovate, but to copy as much as possible to meet the needs of customers. They are also indifferent to the changes in the studio, and the studio becomes messy again within a few days.

During this period of time, Nick was busy with "clearing customs documents". In the Ming Dynasty, Matteo Ricci was able to travel freely in Guangdong, Jiangxi, Nanjing and BJ. Except for the period in the early Qing Dynasty, the missionaries had almost no freedom of movement. None of them can move freely, let alone Nick.

Those who study painting know anatomy, just like the Academy of Fine Arts that Georgiana met in Rouen. Becoming the priest's assistant, but this identity still cannot be unimpeded in the land of China. Fortunately, Nick saved the admiral's daughter, and the admiral is considered a powerful man among the Manchus. With his protection, Nick can get a "passport" to continue traveling .

Regardless of whether the priest accepts the gift or not, the "ceremony" still has to be reached. The thirteen merchants who came to the hospital last time hosted a banquet on the ship. There was not only Jinhua ham, but also Bordeaux red wine. big table.

Although Nick doesn't understand Chinese very well, the people at the wine table exchanged glasses and said repetitive words, such as "dare not dare" to "offend" and "how dare, how dare" when others are too flattering. Knowing which presumptuous French writer said that "damn" is the foundation of the French language, anyway, Nick has learned what is "polite" in a daze, and it is estimated that the next time he meets the admiral, he will not be as wrong as the last time.

Nick will stay in Guangzhou for a while before completing the formalities. He is going to take advantage of this time to find a boat to Xiamen and take the opportunity to take a look around Macau.

But before that he had to spend "tonight" because the boatman moored their ship beside a gorgeous flower boat, and through the half-open porthole, he could see the boat banquet in another banquet hall. There are also delicious dishes, but the difference is that the people eating at the table are surrounded by seven or eight beautifully dressed women with roses and orange blossoms in their black hair. Nick had also been traveling around, and he understood what they were doing, but their peeping still aroused the displeasure of the diners inside, and they lowered the curtain.

The boat that Nick was on quickly approached another flower boat, and the whole process went smoothly. The owner of the flower boat walked over with several other women with heavy makeup, but they were not as big as the people I saw through the porthole just now. Unfettered.

Nick was very reserved. He knew what those women were doing, but it didn't mean he had been to that kind of place. Anyway, his appearance made the girl who accompanied him laugh.

Then he ran into Lin Gua by chance, who was "having a good time" with some other "talented" friends, and Nick took the opportunity to leave the occasion.

From the first contact, Lin Gua was a warm and polite painter. He had many friends. One of these people had heard the news that the admiral's daughter's eyes had recovered, and then they chatted about who The most likely to become the admiral's "east bed son-in-law", they mentioned a man named Cao Xi, a Han Chinese who also worked in the navy, and he was regarded as the admiral's right-hand man. This person is likely to become the admiral's prospective son-in-law.

Later, Nick spent the night full of fat and powder in a completely casual manner, and started to prepare to leave Guangzhou the next day.

He found a captain surnamed Yao at the pier. If possible, he planned to go to Xiamen next week. Nick asked him what the conditions were, and Captain Yao told him that Zheng and his group had gone to sea.

Zheng Yi is a well-known pirate in Fujian. It is said that when Kangxi recovered Taiwan, some of Zheng Chenggong’s remnants flowed to the Pearl River Estuary as pirates. They were divided into six gangs: red, yellow, blue, white, black, and purple. Zheng Yi was the leader of the Red Flag Gang. He has been committed to unifying the various groups in the Pearl River Estuary into a big pirate alliance with him as the leader, and the Qing army has been encircling and suppressing them.

The term of office of the admiral Nick met before was about to expire, and the new governor hadn't arrived yet. It was the time when the appointment was not available, and Zheng Yicai planned to find this opportunity to do a big job.

Nick and Captain Yao agreed on an approximate time and price, and then planned to find an interpreter. In the evening, when he was walking alone in the bustling streets of Guangzhou, an Englishman suddenly found him, and the man handed over his business card to nick.

He is an employee of the East India Company. He represents the British Admiralty and hopes that Nick can draw a map of the Chinese coast for him.

At this time, the maps used by Europeans relied on the British geographer Alexander Dorrymple. The latitude and longitude marked by him were not accurate, and the place names were also spelled incorrectly, which could not be seen in the books written by missionaries. to the exact place name.

Nick was not so much worried that the British Navy had something to do with the map, but rather that he was worried that the employee of the East India Company was a liar, and he did not immediately agree to the passer-by's request.

After returning to the hospital, he asked the priest for help. He needed an interpreter. About two days later, a northerner in his fifties, dressed in rags, was brought to Nick's room by servants. The man looked at Nick critically for a long time, then handed a dirty old piece of paper to Nick.

This thing is called "Bai Tie". If it can be a little newer and tidier, it will have his name and ancestral home written on it. This "juren" was originally from Fujian, and his father used to be a county magistrate. He went to Beijing to take the exam three times, trying to get a Jinshi, but failed repeatedly. He spent all the money left by his ancestors in Beijing to rush for the exam. A fourth attempt was made, but he was penniless except for a few friends who promised to help.

He didn't want to be a coolie, because he was a scholar anyway, and he usually made a living by copying people on the street, but he fell ill a while ago, so he went to the priest's free hospital to see a doctor.

He could speak English, but not as well as the interpreter, but at that time Nick didn't have a better choice. After deliberating for a while, the old man asked Nick to provide him with a decent summer suit in line with his status. This request was not too much. Nick gave him three Mexican falcons, and then he walked out, and he came back an hour later, with the armpits There was a package between them, which was the clothes he bought with three eagles. He spent 2.25 silver dollars on this set of clothes. He wanted to return the rest of the money to Nick, but Nick asked him to keep it for himself.

Since then, "Juren" has often come to the hospital, and Nick can get a lot of news from him for a few small bucks, which many Chinese people don't know, including the ghost case 30 years ago.

At that time, he was preparing for the exam in Zhili, but before he explained in detail, he wanted to talk to Nick about the customs of China. He vowed to change Nick and become a member of the "Scholar".

"Confucianism" does not believe in things that are strange and chaotic. Lao Juren has a critical spirit, and even denounced the absurd practice of some compatriots, "Can it really drive away evil spirits by hanging wormwood and calamus in front of the door on Lunar New Year's Eve? You can't move the broom on the first day of the new year, or you will sweep away your luck?"

But this literati talked about "ghosts" to Nick in a serious tone. Ghosts are different from the "skills" boasted by quacks and fortune tellers, nor are they Bodhisattvas enshrined in temples, nor are they boasted by monks and Taoists. It is to mix in the crowd, use the human body, get into the human body, and make the whole world restless. The tyrants and women who have brought disaster to the country and the people listed in the history books are all the incarnations of ghosts.

"Ghost", ghost, I have done nothing wrong, and I am not surprised when I knock on the door in the middle of the night. Not only is the old Juren not afraid of the ghost knocking on the door, but he also lives in the home of a hanged ghost, not for anything else, but because the rent is cheap.

Nick thought that Lao Juren was like those who hunted witches in the Middle Ages, but Lao Juren was drinking tea with Nick and wrote two words on the table, "witch" and "voodoo", and then Lao Juren asked Nick "you Have you ever heard of voodoo?"