While Prince Yang was acting as a money-splitting boy in his own territory, trying to win over the people's hearts and minds, making people in the surrounding provinces yearn for Fujian and Zhejiang, Guangxu in Beijing and his reformers were so worried that they were almost turning gray.
There is no money, the Ministry of Revenue and the inner treasury of the palace are so empty that even a mouse will cry. Now the emperor cannot even raise the money for meals for the maids and eunuchs in the palace, let alone the salary of the officials. This does not count, Yang Fengli
When he left, he dug a lot of traps for him, such as hospitals to treat wounded soldiers for free, nursing homes and orphanages to support the families of the Eight Banners soldiers who died in the battle. These were all managed by Tiantian Rice and Steamed Buns when King Zhennan was in charge of Beijing.
He was full and could still eat fish every now and then. Now that the King of Zhennan has left, all of them have been taken care of by the emperor.
Damn it, how can the emperor have any money? All the money was taken away by King Zhennan when he left, but no one believes your explanation? Besides, King Zhennan is in Fujian, and we can't travel thousands of miles hungry.
Are you looking for him? These days, the orphans and widows who have no food and clothing, the old coffins half buried in the ground, the wounded soldiers who are mummified on crutches, are blocking the outside of the palace every day, crying, crying for the spirit of the old Buddha in the sky, and there are actually
Those who cried and begged the King of Zhennan to come back attracted the attention of the foreign envoys who had just returned to Beijing, and even appeared in foreign newspapers.
But Guangxu really couldn't help it. He was not a smart emperor to begin with, let alone the gang of caterpillars under him. They were just a bunch of talkers. The only ministers with some ability now are Zhang Yinhuan and Yikuang. Zhang Yinhuan
Think of a way for him to sell the real estate of those ministers who had their homes confiscated and their families destroyed. In theory, this is indeed a good idea. Unfortunately, no one buys it.
Beijing has been opened twice in the past two years. Who knows how many days it will take for the third visit? Who dares to live here? Even if the rich go to Baoding to live, they can't stay here. Even if they can buy it, the price is so low that it's shocking.
Weeping, not only to feed the idle people in and outside the palace, but also to repair the city of Beijing, all in all, this little money is definitely a drop in the bucket. Yikuang had to sell his official position to help him, and now so many official positions were suddenly vacated.
You might be able to make some money by selling them. After all, officials are the most sought-after commodity, and there might be some less flexible country rich people who would take the bait. Unfortunately, this has caused a conflict with the reformers, who are now in the market.
Thousands of people follow the emperor, isn't it just for those official positions? What will we do if you sell it?
Kang Youwei, who had been appointed Minister of Military Affairs, righteously reprimanded Yi Kuang for his greedy nature and for deceiving the sage king into injustice, which made Yi Kuang blush. After returning, he immediately asked his son to arrange thousands of soldiers to block the palace.
There was a quarrel outside, and now Kang Youwei and his gang were dumbfounded. After all, there were no soldiers in hand, so it was all in vain. Finally, Guangxu hesitated and began to imitate Cixi and sell his official position.
Of course, this is just to meet an urgent need. You can't rely on selling officials to maintain finances in the future, right? The three provinces of Fujian, Zhejiang, and Taiwan were granted to Yang Feng as a fief. The tax revenue from these three provinces was gone.
He has completely lost his illusions. The latest batch of taxes due to the capital was withheld by him for any reason. The Ministry of Revenue even urged him several times with no result.
These five provinces, especially Guangdong and Zhejiang, can be said to be the main source of the imperial court's tax revenue. Without these, it would have been reduced by one-third under normal circumstances. What's more, if this continues, Liu Kunyi and Zhang Zhidong will also be very unhappy.
It's easy to say. Iketang'a in the northeast was extremely angry after Cixi's death. Now he doesn't care about the court at all, and he is completely discouraged. He even teamed up with other two generals and Rehe Dutong Guixiang to publicly
A statement was published in the newspaper, saying that the Northeast is a close and powerful neighbor, and each will serve as a minister of the country, only guarding the country's gates. What happens inside the customs is unheard of, which means that he and the generals outside the customs will no longer participate in the struggle for power within the customs.
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This actually went further than Liu Kunyi and others, but Guangxu had nothing to do about it. He didn't expect that killing Cixi would cause him so much trouble. After all, he didn't have any provinces that were still obedient.
There are several, and most of them are so poor that they need subsidies from the court, but now he is really short of money. If he wants to reform and realize his beautiful ideal as an emperor, he needs to expand the army, he needs to set up factories, and he needs to set up schools.
, each of these requires continuous investment. In this case, borrowing money from the great powers seems to be his only option.
"Looking for a loan from you?" Yang Feng said with a surprised look on his face.
"Yes, Your Highness King Zhennan, your emperor hopes that our government can provide him with a loan of 50 million pounds. Your Excellency, the Prime Minister, would like to consult your opinion." Baokele said.
"What about your additional conditions? Don't tell me there are no additional conditions." Yang Feng said with a sneer.
"It's just the road construction rights of the Lu-Han Railway, which of course includes some privileges attached to this railway, as well as the right to operate it for a period of time. In addition, it is the matter of deepening political and military cooperation between the two parties." Baokele said casually.
"Your Excellency, Minister, I must give you a piece of advice. Neither I nor the other governors will agree to this loan." Yang Feng said. You can imagine the uproar this news will cause when it spreads. For foreigners,
The public has always been very sensitive to the construction of railways in China, especially the Lu-Han Railway, which is a major artery connecting the Yangtze River and Beijing. Zhang Zhidong has been thinking about building this railway for more than a day. This has been the purpose since the Hanyang Iron and Steel Plant was built.
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In the past two years, driven by the steel factory, the industry around Wuhan has developed rapidly. In fact, as long as there are basic things in industry, you don’t care about the rest, and it will develop on its own. Zhang Zhidong accepted it from his son
Knowing that foreign countries are practicing free economics, he doesn't understand industry anyway, so he simply adopts a do-nothing approach, which has greatly promoted industrial development. Even wealthy businessmen from the two lakes are already considering raising funds to build this railway.
Well, after all, with such a railway, Wuhan suddenly became the core of land and water transportation in China. Now if Guangxu exchanges it for loans, it will be a big blow to Lao Zhangtou and those businessmen who are looking forward to repairing the railway and making big money.
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Not to mention other things that strengthen cooperation, they are nothing more than strengthening control over China and transforming China in the way they want. Although this does not seem to touch Yang Feng's interests, judging from his cunning,
I understand that this is the British trying to add traps to themselves.
This is not surprising. His development speed is too fast. No one knows what kind of freak he will get if he continues to indulge him. However, he publicly restricted Yang Feng, but he was afraid of his revenge, especially since this guy recently had an affair with Germany.
The Russians are trying their best to win over him, and the Russian Empress even openly invites him to Moscow to reminisce about the past. If Yang Feng completely falls in love with these people, needless to say, as long as he stops supplying diesel engines to Britain, he will
And if we fully support Germany, in less than five years, the German navy will be able to challenge Britain's maritime hegemony, so we can only adopt this most obscure method, and we have to come to see his reaction first.
"Your Excellency, Minister, handing over a country's most important railway line to foreigners, I think this cannot be considered reasonable in any country, right?" Yang Feng said lightly.
Baokele shrugged and said: "I really don't think there is anything wrong with this. Of course, this is just an intention. Your emperor will definitely seek the opinions of the governors first. It is too early to talk about the results."
It's still early. As soon as the news was made public, Zhang Zhidong was immediately anxious. He had made all preparations for this railway. Businessmen from the two lakes had raised 15 million taels of silver for him. Sichuan Governor Tan Zhonglin was there.
Sichuan raised another 10 million taels for him, and then the two jointly established a railway company. In addition, he received another 10 million taels of low-interest loans from the People's Bank of China. The Shanghai Banking Group also gave him a loan of 10 million taels, and according to his employment
According to the budget made by Swedish railway engineers, this amount of money is enough to build the railway to the Marco Polo Bridge. It can be said that everything is ready and waiting to be officially started. However, at this time, the court is preparing to hand over the right of road to the British. Aren't you bullying others?
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Because the news was revealed by Tomorrow's Daily, he, Tan Zhonglin, Tan Jixun, and Hunan Governor Chen Baozhen jointly wrote a letter to inquire. Guangxu was in a bad mood at this time, and naturally he didn't have a good attitude towards these old people. Besides, I want to lend you a loan.
They are all chattering, what do you want to do? Are you ready to starve me to death?
He unceremoniously replied to Zhang Zhidong and others with an edict, telling them that the government's finances were tight now, and this was a helpless move. It would be impossible to survive without borrowing money, so just shut up!
Now Zhang Zhidong, who had been extremely disappointed with him because of Cixi's death, was completely angered by him. He repeatedly asked to stop loan negotiations, otherwise he and the people of Lianghu and Sichuan would not allow the British to build the railway, and
He also went directly to Baokele and told him that even if the court signed a loan agreement, the people of the two lakes would not agree. At this point, he was qualified to speak like this. Anyway, he was in the inland, and neither Yang Feng nor Liu Kunyi would agree.
Allow the British to enter the Yangtze River and go upstream to beat them.
Moreover, this old guy also used the personal friendship between his son and the Grand Duke of Hesse to exaggerate this matter in European newspapers. In addition, Tomorrow Daily and Germany and France, who couldn't eat grapes, added fuel to the fire, causing the British domestic consortium to
I also started to hesitate.
At this time, the King of Zhennan who had been silent finally spoke amidst the unanimous appeal of the people across the country. It is very simple. He is the Prime Minister and the Minister of Foreign Affairs. This kind of matter is under his control. It is wrong for your court to do this. I want to ask this minister.
attitude, then this minister definitely disagrees. Even if the court signs this agreement without the seal of the Prime Minister, this agreement will not have legal effect.
Regardless of whether his fallacy is correct or not, since he has publicly stated his attitude, London needs to think carefully. Even if the British government agrees, it will be useless if the consortium does not agree. If the British government wants to spend money, these consortiums must be willing to pay.
Well, these people didn't want to anger a Tyrannosaurus rex for a business with uncertain prospects. In the end, the British had to reject Guangxu's loan request, but this incident completely caused Guangxu's image among the people to slip into the dark side.