¡°Actually, Drake is just lying. He went to sea this time on the order of the Queen. The queen's secret order was to plunder the Pacific coast of the Spanish Empire and search for the legendary Northwest Passage. It was not the Ming Empire that contacted the Far East at all.
Speaking of which, this matter is also related to Lin Feng¡¯s fleet. Three years ago, the legend of the 'red-haired female pirate' and her 'Flying Dutchman' finally spread from America back to Europe. Even Queen Elizabeth, who is far away in London, heard that the Chinese fleet sailing around the world robbed Spanish treasure ships in the Caribbean, and also looted the undefended west coast of the Americas without any damage, stealing hundreds of tons of gold and silver. and various precious goods worth tens of millions of pesos!
Her Majesty the Queen is so sorry that she should be the one to make this fortune.
To put it simply, the British royal pirates, with her connivance, have been plundering the Americas for more than ten years.
Of course, Her Majesty the Queen is also confident in her actions. At least the entire UK supports her in doing so.
Because her royal sister, Queen Mary I of England, was the wife of King Philip II of Spain. Although the couple had been living apart, Philip II was not polite at all and dragged England into the Spanish-French war in the Netherlands.
This long and cruel war not only drained the British treasury and sacrificed tens of thousands of British soldiers, but also caused Britain to lose its last territory on the European continent-Calais.
??And Spain¡¯s treasure fleets from the Americas transported all the gold and silver treasures back to the Iberian Peninsula, and refused to compensate the British for a single copper penny.
So Britain feels from top to bottom that Spain will never be able to repay what they owe them. Not to mention that Elizabeth restored England to a Protestant country and was at odds with the Catholic fanatic King of Spain.
It was against this background that Queen Elizabeth issued privateering licenses, encouraged and even funded royal pirates to plunder Spanish maritime properties, and Drake was one of the best.
In the past ten years or so, he has traveled to New Spain several times to conduct slave trade, rob ships, and raid Spanish settlements. During a robbery, he landed into the Isthmus of Panama. There, Drake climbed a big tree and looked westward, seeing the legendary Pacific Ocean.
That year was 1571 AD, the fifth year of the Longqing reign of the Ming Dynasty.
Since then, Drake has dreamed of becoming the first British man to sail in the Pacific. However, due to various reasons, mainly the fear of completely messing up the relationship with her brother-in-law, the Queen has been unwilling to agree to his plan to go to the east coast of America.
In the end, Lin Feng took the lead
The huge wealth that was originally at her fingertips, but was greatly annoyed by others who got there first, made Her Majesty the Queen finally make up her mind to fund Drake's voyage to the Pacific at the end of 1577 AD, the year before last.
After his long-cherished wish came true, Drake led a privateering fleet of five sailing ships and rushed to America happily. However, the Spaniards are not mindless NPCs. They will feel pain when they are beaten, and they will learn lessons after suffering losses.
As a result, in the Caribbean, the Drake fleet was beaten to a pulp by the well-prepared Spaniards. It lost two ships as soon as it came up, and could only go south in embarrassment.
They struggled southward in the rough sea and arrived at Falkland Island in June last year, where they spent the winter. Drake originally planned to name it Drake Island, but it turned out that Lin Feng had already named it Majesan Island in Chinese, Spanish and Portuguese
Three months later, after going through a lot of hardships, Drake finally circumnavigated Cape Horn from the Linfeng Strait and realized his Pacific dream. However, the price was also heavy. At this time, he only had his flagship Golden Deer left. Of the other two ships, one sank and the other was missing.
Fortunately, Drake was good at sociability, and with the help of the indigenous friends he had just made, he repaired the ship and resupplied it, and set off again. He went all the way north along the west coast of America and had a good harvest this time. Because the Spaniards did not know the existence of the Linfeng Strait, they naturally did not expect that any British pirates could avoid their heavily fortified Strait of Magellan and reach the west coast of America.
So the Viceroyalty of Peru was plundered again, and Drake even captured a treasure ship bound for Panama. Then in Ecuador, he paid heavily to hire indigenous sailors, and the fleet returned to the size of three ships.
Just when he and his men were morale-boosted and ready to redouble their efforts and continue heading north to rob, they attracted the Pacific Fleet stationed in Acapulco.
Ten Spanish galleons almost blocked them in Veracruz, Panama. Relying on Captain Drake's agility and the tacit cooperation of the sailors, the British escaped from the encirclement with the loss of only one ship.
However, the Spaniards had no intention of letting them go. General Leon vowed to save the face he had lost on the Ming people in the past.??Leike thought it would be strange if he could prove it. He knew that privateer captains like him were of the toilet type. Although the queen is happy to use it, if something goes wrong, it will definitely be wiped out. How could he risk being caught by his brother-in-law and cross the ocean to fish for someone?
"Okay, you go down first." Zhao Hao seemed to have lost his interest in conversation, and served tea to see off the guests: "There will be officials who will ask you for questioning later."
The two guards standing behind Drake immediately extended their hands to ask him to leave.
Drake quickly said loudly: "I have a big secret, which is related to the safety of the Ming Dynasty. If you can guarantee that my ship and crew will leave the country safely, I can tell you the truth!"
After a pause, he threatened: "Otherwise, I will be rotten in my stomach forever!"
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