Jia Mingke, who was sitting at the card table, had no leisure time and asked directly: "Mr. Carlo, what's the situation?"

"Avaro and Sandro gave up their military adventures. Tomorrow or later, they will meet with His Highness the Prince." Carlo said.

Jia Ming stood up and said to Li Su: "Your Highness, I'll go and arrange to lift my guard."

When Carlo and Avaro had a "secret meeting" with the port warships, the consulate and the port warships were on guard and ready to deal with emergencies at any time. Now they are lifted.

"Okay, you go." Li Su nodded.

Li Yongzhong smiled and said, "So, today's card game has come to this point. I have no money. How can three of them play mahjong?"

Li Su said: "Change cards, Landlord. Mr. Carlo's card skills are very good. Mr. Antonio, where are you? Can you play Landlord?"

"Yes, I just haven't played for a long time."

"how long?"

"Ten years ago, I was captured by His Highness Yu. When I was in Chile, playing cards was a way to get bored," Antonio said with a smile.

Li Su laughed: "It doesn't matter, even if it's been ten years, the gameplay is still the same."

The few people played cards until after two o'clock in the morning, and they left. Carlo and Antonio left side by side, but not long after, Carlo was back. Li Su also knew that Carlo was back, took a shower, and sat in the living room waiting.

"Mr. Carlo, please have tea."

Carlo picked up the teacup and found that he only had tea, but Li Su did not. Li Su said, "I have to rest after talking to you."

Carlo said: "Sorry, it has affected you to rest. I would like to discuss with you in detail about the messengers sent by Philip V, because my current situation is very embarrassing."

"Are you worried about danger?" Li Su knew that Carlo was a little worried about his double-faced spy's identity being exposed.

"That's just a small aspect. Mr. Antonio is here today. I'm worried that this identity will affect my long-term cooperation with your country and the harmonious relationship with the Colonial Gentleman Committee." Carlo showed his sincerity.

"Don't worry about this, your identity is registered in the Military Intelligence Bureau. Even if I return one day, the cooperation between the Empire and you will continue. It is precisely because of the long-term cooperation that you have allowed you to take the initiative to contact the messengers of Philip V as a surrender.

Now I can tell you one thing, although the Spanish colonies did not choose between Charles and Philip, the empire had already made the choice, and that was Philip. After the war ended, the empire would recognize Philip as king."

Carlo's eyes widened, apparently he hadn't thought of this. If the Empire had to support Philip, it would make sense to contact Philip's messengers now.

"Why?"

Li Su thought about it and simply replied: "This is King Yu's decision."

This was naturally not just Li Junwei decided by him. Since the death of Carlos II last year, the empire has been paying attention to the development of the European situation through various channels. At the beginning, France and the Grand Alliance were balanced, but with the second glorious revolution in Britain, the balance of strategy gradually tilted towards the Grand Alliance, and France's strength was really disappointing. In addition, now that the Spanish colonies protect each other, Li Junwei has judged that this war on the succession of the Spanish throne was destined to end in the way that France lost its dominant position.

In the past, the empire did not choose sides because the two sides were evenly matched. It is hard to say who could win. There is a possibility of standing in the wrong team too early. But now it is different. France cannot win a big victory. So in order to maintain the balance of continental power and prevent Austria from dominating Europe, the best way is to support Philip as the king of Spain. As long as France and the West do not merge.

"But Mr. Antonio is a little dissatisfied with my behavior...it seems a little dissatisfied." Carlo expressed his second doubt.

Li Su looked into Carlo's eyes: "Mr. Carlo, I hope you can understand that you are not an Antonio's subordinate, and the Colonial Gentlemen's Committee is not an organization of Antonio. The Empire will not support Antonio as the leader of the Spanish colony. nor do you want to see Antonio integrate the Colonial Gentlemen's Committee. You, Mr. Carlo, not only have real power in Cuba, but also have a place in the Colonial Gentlemen's Committee.

The Empire supports you, and Philip V will support you in the future."

"You founded the Gentleman's Committee."

"This does not mean that the interests of gentlemen are exactly the same as those of the empire," Li Su said.

The interests of Spanish colonial squire were roughly the same as those of the empire. The empire wanted to have economic and political rights locally, while the colonial squire needed the empire to develop the economy and strengthen its influence in the local area.

The colonial gentlemen had already felt that it was the arrival of the empire that allowed the great Spanish nobles to slap people unscrupulously, and also allowed goods from the New World to be sold around the world rather than just Spain.

But the problem is that in some things, colonial gentlemen also have conflicts with the empire, and this kind of conflict will only increase.

After the end of the American War, the Empire broke Spain's monopoly over its colonies and cracked down on smuggling and piracy on a large scale, which actually created a double monopoly between the Empire and Spain over the colonies. The Spanish were in charge of politics and the Chinese were in charge of the economy, which seemed to be impeccable.

But the problem is that some things are something that neither Spain nor China combined can satisfy. The most prominent example is the black slave trade.

In Central and South America, the problem of black slaves is not prominent. After all, there are still many Indians in the area. However, in the Caribbean, the rapid development of plantation economy such as tobacco, sugar, cotton, etc. requires a large number of black slaves.

In 1600, the Americas only needed 5,000 black slaves to meet the demand each year. Before the American War, the number was 25,000. Today, after the end of the American War, at least 40,000 black slaves were needed every year to meet the rapidly expanding plantation economy. But in fact, last year, the number of black slaves entering the Spanish colonies did not exceed 34,000.

You should know that except for African development companies, all individuals and organizations of the empire no longer allow the sale of black slaves. The African development companies themselves have a large number of plantations in Africa, and their colonies are mainly in the eastern African continent, while the black slaves needed in the Americas mainly come from the west coast of Africa.

Surrounding the Gulf of Guinea is a colony reserved by the Empire for European countries. In the case of the Empire, only African development companies participated in the competition. In fact, many European countries have colonies locally, and black slaves are also the main commodity of West Africa. However, just Spanish and African development companies cannot meet the needs of American colonies.

Therefore, during the thirty-five years of the empire, Spanish colonial squire required Dutch and French ships to enter the port of Havana through the Indy House.

In the seventeenth century, the main participants in the Dutch slave trade, which had colonies in the West Indies, legally exported to Portugal, and smuggled to the Americas. France imposed trade restrictions on China and French ships arrived at the port, which allowed New World goods to open up a huge market of 20 million people in France.

The market decided that blindly blocking it was useless. Therefore, after discussing with the Empire, Spain decided to open the two ports of Havana and Cartagena to the Netherlands and France, completely exempting the black slaves they brought, and imposing tariffs on other commodities, especially products that compete with Chinese commodities.

That time was just the beginning, and after that, the Spanish colonies made more and more demands. Li Su organized a colonial gentleman's committee in Panama, intending to unite and ask for prices on the Spanish mainland. As a result, the first thing the group of Spaniards united was to make various demands on the empire.

It was precisely because of his courage to face Li Su that Antonio became the first chairman of the committee.

In Li Su's view, the empire can accept reasonable requirements. After all, the better the colony develops, the greater the demand for imperial goods. Not to mention anything else, there are more black slaves in Mexico, the greater the cotton production, and the greater the consumption of cotton cloth, which can better play the role of raw materials and the place where the goods are dumped.

However, the appetites of these gentlemen are not so easy to satisfy, and some requirements cannot be agreed. For example, coffee plantations have begun to exist in Central America, which directly impacted the Chinese coffee planting industry in Yizhou (Rio de Janeiro), Luzon and East Africa. In Panama, several coffee planters proposed that the empire reduce tariffs on Spanish colonial coffee. Obviously, Li Su could not agree to such a requirement.

When we arrived in Havana, when we heard that Queen Anne of the UK had ascended the throne and replaced James II, the colonial gentleman proposed that British merchant ships could also dock in Havana and Cartagena.

Now, in order to deal with the Spanish government, the Colonial Gentleman Committee must be united, but when this matter is over, the organization must be divided and dissolved, otherwise it will cause great losses to the interests of the empire.

Two days later, Li Su and Duke Avaro held a friendly talk at the Governor's Office. After frank exchanges, Duke Avaro received Li Su's assurance that as long as Philip V agreed to the two requests, the empire would support Philip V's Spanish regime to be supported in the colonies and exclude Austria's Grand Duke Charles.

The first requirement was that Philip V was not allowed to engage in any form of war or forced action in the Spanish colonies. Second, it was not allowed to force the colonial gentlemen to express allegiance to Philip V before the end of the war.

After discussing with Count Sandro, Duke Avaro chose to agree. Afterwards, accompanied by Li Su, Duke Avaro personally went to the camp where the Colonial Gentlemen's Committee was located, and in front of all the gentlemen, he had an open exchange with several executive committee members led by Antonio. Antonio once again expressed his loyalty to the Kingdom of Spain and his responsibilities to the Spanish nation.

In the following days, the two sides held fierce negotiations, and in the end Avaro achieved a lot of results.

First, the Colonial Gentlemen's Committee, the two Governor's Offices and the General Administration of Customs of the Colonial to form a National Debt Committee, established in the City of Ceuta. This National Debt Committee assumed the obligation to repay all the national debts that the Kingdom of Spain had before the death of Carlos II.

In other words, the repayment of the national debt, which accounts for more than half of the annual fiscal revenue of the Kingdom of Spain, is borne by the colonies. This means that all Spain's income in the European territory can be used by Philip V as a war without worrying about the financial bankruptcy of the Kingdom of Spain.

Secondly, the colonial politics maintained the existing pattern. The Peruvian Governor's District was restored to the Lima Incident before the war. During the war, the colonial officials were not replaced, and all the expenses needed were borne by the colonies.

In terms of military affairs, all the military expenses required by Spanish troops in the colony were borne by the Colonial Gentlemen Committee. However, if the local army was dispatched to Europe for combat, the committee would neither bear the military expenses nor participate in it. The local army could recruit soldiers freely in the colony.

Fourth, the colonial government and the church were not allowed to force the colonial squire to provide donations during wars, but the Indy House and the church could carry out public fundraising in various places.

The last one is that no belligerent state is allowed to engage in piracy in the waters of the New World, and the waters of the New World colonial areas are defined as neutral waters.

These achievements made by Avaro were actually very beneficial to Philip V. Except for not being recognized by the colonies, Philip V was not only unable to exploit the colonies by tough means, but also obtained some of the previous ones, such as the neutral water clause. You should know that in the past, every time Spain joined the war, the enemy countries would pirate Spain, and the losses were huge.

Some colonies took on national debts, and not only could the resources of European territories be used for war, but they could also continue to borrow money. The local rebellion caused by the Lima Incident was also resolved.

After basically reaching an agreement, Avaro stayed in Havana. Count Sandro took a communication ship from the Imperial Navy to Madrid to report to Philip V. When he left, he also brought a donation of 270,000 pesos raised by the Colonial Gentleman Committee for the Spanish government. In just one month, Sandro rushed back to Havana and only modified some of the words in the text.

"A perfect solution so that the Spanish colonies will be far away from war." After sending off the Spanish envoy, Li Su said with emotion.

Just shortly after Duke Avaro's ship left, troops drove out from the plantations in southern Havana and boarded the Imperial Navy's warships and merchant ships hired in the port. The army had a size of two thousand people. Before the arrival of the Colonial Gentleman Committee, it had already been ambushed in some plantations in southern Havana. The reason why it was not discovered was that this army was provided by the African Development Company, many of which were black or mixed-race.

Now, this Yi army was about to board the ship and cross the sea to the American continent.

Three months ago, the government's government's government's government's government's government's government's government's government's government's government's government's government's government's government sent financial officials to Ceuta to discuss with King Yu Li Junwei, who wanted to extend the repayment date again and borrow new debts to repay old debts, but Li Junwei directly refused.
Chapter completed!