At noon, the steamboat steamed upstream with billowing black smoke, astonishing all the ships passing by along the way.
On this canal, there are flags and flags of the Jinyi Guards commanding Qianshi, Zunhua Guards commanding Tongzhi, and Hexi Guards Qianhu Station Controlling Officers.
Under the awning on the bow of the ship, Yang Fan and his wives and concubines were sitting, surrounded by guards with their hands on the hilts of their swords. It was really majestic, but it was actually a bear.
Most of the merchant ships along the way moved aside to let Yang Fan pass.
There were two powerful figures from the East Factory on the ship who did not display flags, otherwise they would scare these merchants to death.
Speaking of which, at the local level, Yang Fan's official position among the military attachés is almost over. Even higher is the provincial commander-in-chief.
At this time, there were several scholars in Qingyi on a merchant ship that was sheltering aside. They frowned a little as they watched Yang Fan's canal boat sailing upstream menacingly.
"Gandu, a martial artist, is so domineering in the local area. The Ming Dynasty really has no rules." A tall and thin scholar waved his sleeves and cursed.
The people on this boat were Zhang Pu, Zhang Cai, Yang Yi, Gu Menglin and others who were the founders of Jiangnan Yingshe.
Yingshe was the predecessor of Fushe.
Founded in Changshu (now part of Jiangsu) in the fourth year of Tianqi (1624), the first batch of members was only eleven. Later, members from various places joined, making Yingshe famous all over the world, so there were Jiangnan Yingshe and Jiangbei Yingshe. , known as Guangyingshe.
In the second year of Chongzhen (1629), Zhang Pu and others used Yingshe as the basis, merged other literary societies, and established Fushe. At its peak, Fushe had more than 2,000 members, all of whom were talented people in the Jiangnan area at that time, and represented the gentry class behind them. The strength is very strong.
Yingshe and Fushe are known as Xiao Donglin. It is generally believed that these two groups belong to the youth group and second echelon of the Donglin Party.
This time Zhang Pu and others came to Beijing at the invitation of Qian Longxi and other Donglin elders.
They first took a sea ship and inspected the shipping situation in the northern sea. After Donglin monopolized the overseas trade in the south, he had been eyeing the overseas trade in the north.
After disembarking from Beitangkou, we followed the Ji Canal all the way, first to Zunhua, then to Jizhou to change ships and enter the Grand Canal, and finally ended at Zhangjiawan, Tongzhou.
They came here with the mission of reorganizing the Zhangjiawan stronghold. At the same time, the Jiangnan gentry forces represented by Yingshe also had different bases from Donglin, and they also had some demands that they wanted to discuss with Donglin.
Zhang Pu glanced at Gu Menglin and said nothing.
It is not a wise move to provoke Jin Yiwei's people.
Moreover, this leader of the Jinyi Guards has soldiers in his own hands, so he is not an ordinary person.
What's more, they still have a feud with him. At this time, it's best not to let him notice that our group is here. After all, they are coming to Beijing in secret at this time. Don't make things extraneous.
At the local level, perhaps the commander of a guard station is nothing. After all, in this era of the Ming Dynasty, the warriors were as cheap as dogs. The third-level commanders and deputy commanders had to kneel down when they saw the military preparations.
However, the commander of Jinyiwei is still very valuable, and his deterrence is enough to stop children from crying at night.
Zhang Pu knew who this person was. Last year, Yang Fan led troops to Beijing and helped the emperor overthrow Duke Wei, which made him famous throughout the world.
When discussing merit and rewards, he was secretly stabbed by the gentlemen of Donglin. As a result, he saw that his title was gone. He didn't even get the land, so he used the large wasteland east of Zunhua.
This matter is extremely secretive and very few people know about it. Zhang Pu estimates that Yang Fan himself does not know the inside story.
This was an insider transaction between Donglin and the emperor. They only knew about it because they were involved in the core affairs of the Jiangnan Gentry Group due to people like her.
Although there were hints from the emperor behind the Yangliuqing incident, Yang Fan was the active and executor after all. After this incident, he and Donglin's Liangzi were completely forged.
Later, he actually risked the disapproval of the world and took the adopted daughter of Duke Wei as his concubine. He completely stood on the opposite side of the gentlemen of Donglin.
In fact, Zhang Pu had some admiration for Yang Fan in the early days. After all, a hero comes from a young age, and he also has a powerful private soldier in his hand. His fighting methods are also clever. It is worth winning over.
It's a pity that this man is just a martial artist who doesn't care about country and beauty, so he actually took Lin Yueru as his concubine, which really ruined his future.
There are so many beauties in the world, and Dong Lin has too many Yangzhou thin horses, so why should he get involved with the eunuchs? It is really unwise.
Later, Yuan Chonghuan stopped by to meet Yang Fan. In fact, there was Zhang Pu's mediation behind the scenes.
He persuaded the elders of Donglin that Yang Fan was not in the same group with the eunuchs after all. As long as Yang Fan was willing to hand over his more than 3,000 elite soldiers, Yang Liuqing's matter was not something that couldn't be let go.
It is not impossible to give him a place as a commander. After all, he deserves that official position and territory. He also contributed a lot to the defeat of Nine Thousand Years Old.
Unexpectedly, this kid had quite a bad temper and even Yuandu walked away in anger.
This time, several key members of the Ying Society came to Beijing. One of them was to discuss with Qian Longxi the issue of trade control rights in the northern sea and to fight for the interests of the Jiangnan gentry.
The other is to investigate the inside story of the Japanese pirates' attack on Zhangjiawan. This incident is so weird.
The gentry in the south of the Yangtze River had a large sum of money stored in the Li Mansion, but all of it was robbed by the Japanese pirates and they lost all their money. The gentry in the south of the Yangtze River would not swallow their anger.
"Why is this ship still emitting black smoke? It's not on fire, right?" Zhang Cai couldn't help laughing. In fact, they all knew who it was, and they were just gloating about it.
"Hey, that's not right. There is no one rowing the boat, and there is no one pulling the fiber. It actually goes upstream by itself." Yang Yi said in surprise.
At this time, the steamer was already approaching and was passing by their ship.
Yang Fan and his beautiful wives and concubines were sitting on the Grand Master's chair at the bow of the ship, drinking tea, talking and laughing, and did not pay attention to the ships on both sides that were avoiding the ship and the people on them.
The four boilers at the back of the ship were burning vigorously. Eight big men were sweating profusely and shoveling coal into the furnaces. The coal in the boiler was burning red. Under the scorching flames, every worker seemed to be fished out of the water.
When I came out, my clothes were soaked all over.
This chapter is not finished yet, please click on the next page to continue reading the exciting content! The cylinder on the boiler is constantly expanding and contracting, and the connecting rod pushes the crankshaft, driving the four steel wheels behind it, rotating at high speed, setting off white flowers.
There were huge waves. A mist even appeared at the stern of the boat, and a rainbow appeared in the mist.
This ship, which was obviously the hull of a large tanker, sailed through the middle of the river at high speed. It seemed that the speed was much faster than that of a sea-going ship with a tailwind.
In the blink of an eye, this large cannon has rushed past. Its rear part raised a sailing wake, and the waves rolled, shaking the ships on both sides and almost capsized.
Zhang Pu and the other four were no longer in the mood to joke.
The water stirred up by the paddle wheel drenched them like drowned rats, and each one of them quickly grabbed hold of the surrounding masts and boat awnings to prevent being thrown into the water.
After a while, the rocking boat slowly returned to calm. The boats on both sides of the river breathed a sigh of relief and started talking among themselves.
The four people's faces turned pale and they were in shock. They had never seen this kind of steel monster that could push such a large boat upstream.
Zhang Pu's palms were sweaty, although he didn't know what Yang Fan was doing here.
But he had a premonition that this strange monster that breathed fire and steam would change the order of the world. An inexplicable fear spread throughout his body.
Qianqing Palace, Xinuang Pavilion.
The young emperor put down the memorial and looked at Wang Chengen and Luo Yangxing, who were bowing in solemnity below. He asked slowly and logically: "Where has Governor Yuan been lately?"
Wang Chengen didn't react, he knew that these words were addressed to Luo Yangxing.
After Luo Yangxing squeezed out Yang Fan and took charge of Jinyiwei alone, his work was not very good, and the emperor was still inspecting him.
Luo Yangxing's work performance was far different from that of Yang Fan. Wang Chengen glanced at Luo Yangxing calmly. They were enemies in the same industry, and now Dongchang, led by Wang Chengen, and Jinyiwei, led by Luo Yangxing, were in a competitive relationship.
There was basically nothing that Yang Fan couldn't handle that the emperor entrusted to Yang Fan.
Even what the emperor didn't expect, Yang Fan thought of it in advance and took care of it.
Luo Yangxing is no longer good.
Many of the things the emperor told him could not be implemented.
Luo Yangxing's back was sweating.
The emperor glanced at him seemingly casually, and he could tell in his peripheral vision that the emperor was not very satisfied with his current job.
"Well, to answer your Majesty's question. Governor Yuan recently visited a temple and wrote a poem."
"Oh, write poetry. Well, let's talk about it and listen to it."
"Forty years have passed,
There are only trees in my vision separated from the world of mortals.
Now I have reached the King of Empty Land,
It’s better to learn how to kill people.”
Chongzhen paused while correcting the memorials, raised his head, and said to himself: "Who is this Nanbarbarian going to kill?"
This chapter has been completed!