The actual situation of the Ministry of Household Affairs is very simple to describe. There are only two words - "lack of money".
Both the treasury and the state treasury that Xia and Shang needed to manage were short of money.
As a result, the entire household department is still short of money.
The treasury under the jurisdiction of Xia and Shang had the biggest hole, not only due to lack of money in the books, but also large holes, black accounts, etc. left by previous officials.
While Jia Shangshu briefly explained the situation of the household department to Xia Shang, he personally led Xia Shang to the Tianzihao Bank of the National Treasury.
The Tianzihao Bank was just a hundred meters west of the main part of the household department. Jia Shangjie quickly led Xia Shang to the door of the bank.
Looking at the grand and dusty warehouse in front of him, Xia Shang reached out and wiped the dust accumulated on the door.
Seeing this scene, Jia Shangjie smiled: "Normally, few people come to the warehouse, so it looks a bit dilapidated. The warehouse of the national treasury is divided into three font sizes, 'Tian Di Ren', and each font size has five warehouses.
Throughout the capital, this is Tianzi No. 1. After entering the door, there will be a volume with the location of each warehouse marked. After Mr. Xia took office, the first thing to do was to count the jewelry and silver deposits in each warehouse. I will accompany you first.
Come to the nearest bank and have a look, and I will leave the rest to you."
Xia Shang nodded and opened the door directly to enter.
As soon as he entered the door, a strong smell of dust hit the door, and Xia Shang hurriedly covered his mouth and nose.
The doors and windows inside the warehouse were closed, there was no light, and it looked gloomy.
After Xia Shang waited for the dust inside to disperse for a while, he opened the window on the left hand side. When a ray of light came into the warehouse, the display inside the warehouse became much clearer.
The inside is very simple. Apart from a set of tables and chairs at the entrance, there is only a small bed on the west wall.
The rest of the space is filled with wooden shelves one after another, with large and small boxes stacked on each wooden shelf. Looking at the shape of the boxes, you can tell at a glance that they are the style used by officials to store silver.
The entire warehouse was very large. Xia Shang could see three rooms as far as he could see. He couldn't see any further inside, but just inside the room there were twenty or thirty large wooden boxes, all of which were locked with iron locks.
.
"There are a total of eight rooms inside, and there are countless gold, silver and jewelry. Your Excellency should take a good inventory."
"countless
"Isn't there an accurate number?" Xia Shang walked to a box and looked back at Jia Shangjie, who was still at the door.
Jia Shangjie was a little embarrassed, rubbing his fat belly and responded in a low voice: "Well... isn't it because you asked the people from the Metropolitan Procuratorate to kill the previous chief... The previous chief didn't have time to explain anything?
, so I have no way to verify this."
"So that's it..." Xia Shang also looked a little embarrassed, but he didn't expect that this matter was related to him.
At this time, Jia Shangjie walked in and took out three large bunches of keys from the corner of the room.
Keys these days are not light in weight. Jia Shangjie took out at least hundreds of them. They made a clanging sound when placed on the table. The dusty table almost felt like it could no longer hold up.
"Master Xia, these keys correspond to these boxes, and the order is marked. You can open a few to have a look."
Xia Shang walked over, found the number of a box next to him, took off the key, and successfully opened the first box.
Because it was at the door, the light from outside happened to fall on the box. As soon as the box was opened, it felt like a burst of brilliant silver light was reflected from the inside of the box, which made Xia Shang feel a little dazzled.
There are all ingots of white silver in there, arranged neatly. It is estimated that there are three or four floors, and each floor contains more than thirty ingots of official silver with a face value of fifty taels.
This box of silver alone would cost about five thousand taels on the market.
It is rare to see so much cash in the market.
And the box in front of me is just a drop in the ocean in the entire warehouse in front of me. Counting the other dozen or so warehouses scattered throughout the capital, how much worth of things are stored in total?
So many things are just a national treasury, accounting for less than one-tenth of the structure of the national treasury.
After opening the first box in front of him, Xia Shang realized that running a country was completely different from doing business before.
Xia Shang looked at the silver in the box, while Jia Shangjie looked at Xia Shang, looking a little nervous for some reason.
Xia Shang didn't notice Jia Shangjie's weirdness. After closing the box, he picked a key and opened another box.
The second box opened in the same condition as the first box, it was full of silver.
Xia Shang closed the door again and turned around to ask Jia Shangjie: "Master Shangshu, are these all filled with silver?"
Jia Shangjie nodded: "Well... yes... of course, there is a lot of gold and jewelry. You won't know until you open the box."
"That means my main task now is to count everything and report it to you?"
"Yes, yes...there's no rush, you can take your time."
Xia Shang didn't feel anything before, but now that Jia Shangjie stopped talking, he felt a little strange. He felt that the other party was hesitant in speaking.
After thinking for a while, Xia Shang said: "I just heard that the Ministry of Revenue is short of money, and the national treasury is even more short of money. But judging from the current situation, the inventory is quite full, and there is no such thing as a lack of money. Could it be?
Except for this one, all other warehouses are empty?"
"This... this... I don't know. In short, we will have to wait for your Excellency to personally count everything before I know."
Xia Shang glanced at Jia Shangjie suspiciously, and was about to look at the box full of silver again when a silver light flashed in front of his eyes, and he suddenly felt something was wrong.
Xia Shang took out an ingot of silver from the box and weighed it in his hands. If he didn't feel it carefully, he wouldn't really feel the difference, but if he felt it carefully, he would find that the weight of this ingot of silver seemed to be lighter.
Looking at the surface reflection of the silver, it shows an unusual gloss under the sun, which is obviously not the luster that a piece of official silver should have.
"This silver is fake!" Xia Shang's expression changed and he threw the silver to the ground hard.
The silver made a muffled sound and instantly turned into several pieces.
When Xia Shang saw the blue stone inside the silver, his heart suddenly sank. This was just a stone coated with a layer of silver water!
"How is this going?!"
Xia Shang raised his eyebrows and his eyes fell on Jia Shangjie.
Jia Shangjie's expression also changed, and he took two steps back: "That... that... I don't know either."
"I don't know?!" Xia Shang lost his previous politeness. If he hadn't discovered that he had counted the money as if it were real money and was found out later, wouldn't this huge blame fall on him?
"The dignified Minister of the Ministry of Finance, don't even know about such a big loophole? Are you trying to frame me?!"