The Baigou River is about twenty to thirty feet wide. It was a boundary river in the Song Dynasty. Around this river, many epic or indignant battles took place between the Song and Liao Dynasties, and between the Song and Jin Dynasties.
However, the Song and Jin people would never have imagined that one day the descendants of the Song people would unite with a group of Manchus who took the name of Jin and claimed to be after the Jurchens to deal with the domestic uprising army.
This sounds really incredible, but if you think about it carefully, Du Chong, the man who dug the Yellow River to block the Jin cavalry in the late Northern Song Dynasty, finally surrendered to the Jin Kingdom.
Characters like this existed in the Northern Song Dynasty, and they would naturally exist in the Ming Dynasty as well.
These people probably all have a similar thinking mode. Du Chong thought this way and did the same thing. Hundreds of years later, Huang Shu thought this way and did the same thing. There are other such people in history.
One thing they have in common is that when they asked the people of Huangfan District to make sacrifices with the righteousness of their monarchs and ministers, they quickly threw their righteousness to the ground and quickly surrendered to the new foreign masters.
And it seems to be a coincidence. History often proves that digging the Yellow River has no effect at all. It can only make the people hate you even more.
Three hundred years after digging the river in Kaifeng, another person would do the same thing, and ultimately bring about the downfall of his dynasty.
Wu Sangui did not expect that the rebel cavalry would move so fast. If he had listened to Ma Shaoyu's advice earlier and paid more attention to the combat effectiveness of some of the rebel troops, he would never have made the mistake of letting Ma Shiyao run away by the Baigou River.
Although this battle was just a small confrontation between the vanguards of both sides, Guan Ning's soldiers, as the main force of the alliance against thieves, used more than 3,000 cavalry to chase down Ma Shiyao's 2,000 cavalry, and actually allowed him to escape unscathed. It can be said that it was a surprise.
In front of the Qing army, the Ming army lost some confidence in negotiations.
Since Ma Shaoyu's successful peace talks in the first month of the year, it is said that all the officials and gentry in the capital were delighted, and only a few people spoke out against it. For example, Guang Shiheng, who was in charge of military affairs at the time, directly accused Chen Xinjia of "leading prisoners into the pass, and the situation became a sea."
"Alliance", accusing Chen Xinjia of being the Qin Hui of the dynasty, who led captives into the Pass.
Guang Shiheng was conceited as a gentleman of Donglin and had no integrity at all. He angrily accused Chen Xinjia of being secretly instigated by his chief minister Zhou Yanru.
The reason why Zhou Yanru assigned these Donglin gentlemen to criticize Chen Xinjia's strategy of allying with the captives was mainly because Chongzhen and Chen Xinjia had secret negotiations with the Qing army. He actually didn't know anything about such a big thing in advance!
What does this mean? It means that my holy family has come to an end.
What's more, Chen Xinjia presided over the peace talks with the Donglu. As long as the alliance with the Lu was not defeated, Chen Xinjia's position would not be shaken at all. Wouldn't it be easy for him to seize Zhou Yanru's position as chief minister?
If Zhou Yanru really opposed the alliance with the imperialists out of national justice, he might still be able to win the support of some decent officials in the imperial court. Unfortunately, he could not think of this and would still compete with Chen Xinjia for power at this time.
In order to be on guard against the possibility of the Qin cavalry using deceitful tactics to attack Beijing after the alliance, the capital has now been under full martial law. Those soldiers from the Beijing camp who had always only existed on the roster finally took a few steps. This is thanks to
Sun Chuanting had previously stationed his army in Changping and retrained a group of Beijing camp officers and soldiers.
The weather in the capital was as cold as in Baoding and other places. Guang Shiheng had just come out of Zhou Yanru's house. He urgently tied the mink fur collar sewn on the plain brocade around his neck and couldn't help but shudder.
He got on the carriage and whispered to the driver: "Let's go directly to the Ministry of War."
Just now at the Zhou Mansion, Zhou Yanru had doubts about deposing Chen because the emperor refuted Guang Shiheng's statement that Chen Xinjia was a "contemporary Qin Hui" during the court meeting this morning.
The emperor was so obviously biased towards Chen Xinjia, which made the matter very difficult. However, after a secret discussion with Guang Shiheng, Zhou Yanru decided to give it another try, determined to mobilize his officials tomorrow to attack Chen Xinjia An and Donglu with all his strength, and also damage the Ming Dynasty.
and the emperor’s reputation.
Zhou Yanru knew that the most important thing for Emperor Chongzhen was "fame", so he thought that as long as Chen Xinjia and the Lianlu strategy could be completely scolded, the emperor would definitely kick Chen Xinjia out as a scapegoat.
But Guang Shiheng didn't think so. After so many years, who still doesn't understand Chongzhen's little thoughts? After completely scolding Chen Xinjia, the emperor will definitely find trouble to vent his anger on himself.
After seeing Chongzhen's insistent defense of Chen Xinjia in the court today, Guang Shiheng, who had a keen sense of standing in line, knew that Zhou Yanru was doomed. But he did not see the situation clearly in time, and actually acted as Zhou Yanru's sword, humiliating Chen Xinjia like that.
When Zhou Yanru is finished, won’t he be finished too?
So as soon as Guang Shiheng left Zhou Mansion, he immediately drove to the Ministry of War to find Chen Xinjia.
Chen Xinjia was not surprised that Guang Shiheng took the initiative to come to the door. Instead, he praised: "Yusheng is upright. I knew you were not a Jade Rope Party member. Zhou Yixing knew that the strategy of joining forces with the captives was the only way to save him at the moment, but because of
Selfishly, he would rather destroy public objects than interfere with the Emperor's great cause of resurgence."
When Guang Shiheng saw that even Chen Yan, the deputy minister of the cabinet, was actually at the Ministry of War, he was obviously stunned. He did not expect that Chen Yan changed ships so quickly. It seemed that Zhou Yanru was indeed doomed. Fortunately, he knew the current affairs.
ah……
"There are kings who are responsible for Su Dynasty and Zhongxing Dynasty, and there are ministers who are responsible for Su Dynasty and Zhongxing Dynasty. This wonderful strategy of the Great Sima will be enough to shine in the history of the country, and future generations will look forward to it, no less than Guo Fenyang. Mr. Zhou is obsessed with his own selfishness, so he can't understand it."
The truth is here."
Chen Yan, the second assistant, looked at Guang Shiheng's performance and said with a smile: "Yu Sheng came to the military department, you must have a trump card?"
Guang Shiheng hummed twice, then took out a letter from his arms and said, "This is a letter written by Mr. Zhou personally. It contains the words insulting the Grand Sima as Qin Hui."
Chen Xinjia immediately took the letter, dismantled it and read it. When he saw Zhou Yanruzhen calling him Qin Hui in black and white on the paper, he was overjoyed and said: "Zhou Yusheng is not guaranteed at the end of the festival! With this letter, there will be no holy family!"
Chen Xinjia certainly felt like he had obtained this letter as if he had obtained a treasure. Zhou Yanru called him Qin Hui. Wasn't this referring to the mulberry tree and scolding the locust tree?
Is Chongzhen who re-employed Qin Hui's minister Zhao Gou?
He actually left evidence in black and white and secretly mocked the emperor as Zhao Gou!
Chen Xinjia and Chen Yan both laughed at the news. Seeing this, Guang Siheng finally breathed a sigh of relief, knowing that he would not be doomed because he took the wrong side.
He asked carefully: "Da Sima, after this incident, who will be in charge of the Ministry of War?"
Now the Minister of War is Chen Xinjia. When Guang Shiheng asked this question, he actually acquiesced that after Zhou Yanru's collapse, Chen Xinjia was bound to take a step further and sit in a higher position.
Chen Xinjia put the letter on the table and said: "Zhou Yixing will definitely die this time, and the first assistant will definitely be responsible for making a saint. I will just do the job of the second assistant. Now that the war is fierce and dangerous, the Ministry of War should not make any big moves for the time being.
.”
"Fasheng" is Chen Yan's nickname. It seems that Chen Xinjia's plan is to overthrow Zhou Yanru and let Chen Yan be the first assistant for a while, and then he will take over as the first assistant when the time is right.
And when he said that the Ministry of War was going to be shaken up, it seemed to be a hint that Guang Siheng would not be promoted for the time being. Guang Siheng felt a little disappointed, but he also felt that he was on the wrong team and it was not easy to jump off the ship in time.
, as long as you hold on to the thighs of "Qin Hui"... No, as long as you hold on to the thighs of "Guo Ziyi", you don't have to worry about having no future.
That same night, Chen Xinjia personally delivered Zhou Yanru's letter to the palace. Emperor Chongzhen opened it and read it. Sure enough, he was furious. The emperor was originally worried about the disgraceful strategy of joining forces with the bandits, and was always worried about what his courtiers would do.
I won't have any bad opinion of him because of this matter.
Guang Shiheng scolded Chen Xinjia this morning, which already made Chongzhen feel angry. Unexpectedly, Guang Shiheng was actually ordered by Zhou Yanru!
"Zhou Yusheng! I elected you as my prime minister twice. It's a small thing to ridicule me as Emperor Gaozong of the Song Dynasty, but you actually formed a clique secretly! What I hate most is that Zhou Yanru played tricks and deceived me!"
That night, Chongzhen ordered Luo Yangxing, the commander of the Jinyi Guards, to pass on an edict, ordering Zhou Yanru to commit suicide and destroy his family.
When Zhou Yanru was still trying his best to figure out how to scold the stinky Lian Lu and ping the bandits, his door was suddenly knocked by the Jin Yiwei...
"Zhou Yanru mechanically deceived, concealed and tolerated private interests, abused bandits, and sealed the territory in the wrong way... Gu Nian is the first minister of the first rank..."
As the chief minister, Zhou Yanru certainly knew Luo Yangxing and had some friendship with him, so he was very familiar with him. He couldn't believe it. He never thought that he had not taken action against Chen Xinjia, so why would he be punished by the Jin Yiwei?
It wasn't until Zhou Yanru heard the words "Gu Nian is the first minister of the first rank" that a glimmer of hope arose in his heart. He thought that maybe Chongzhen was angry because of what happened to Guang Shiheng in the court today, so he had to find someone first.
Let’s just vent my anger personally.
Zhou Yanru felt that he understood Chongzhen's temperament best, so he accepted the punishment now, punished Xi Hao, and asked to be exiled to Xubian. After the emperor's anger became less angry, he would mobilize the ministers and ask everyone to intercede for him, and he would definitely be able to get Chongzhen to withdraw the edict.
Dead.
But he did not expect that the eunuch brought by Luo Yangxing continued to read: "The first-grade minister of Gu Nian's first assistant, the guards in royal robes, together with the judicial officer, ordered him to commit suicide at his residence, and allowed him to be buried in his coffin and return home."
Zhou Yanru originally thought that he was going to be lenient and was thinking of a way out, but he heard the words "order to commit suicide" again. He couldn't control himself for a moment and even ran away. Luo Yangxing sent the guards to spend a lot of effort.
Then he was escorted back to his room, leaving him with the dignity of "committing suicide".
It was not until the guards forcibly put a rope on him and hung him on the rafter that Zhou Yanru seemed to suddenly wake up. He desperately grabbed the rope around his neck and shouted with the last breath of his life: