At the end of the twelfth lunar month in the twelfth year of Chongzhen, in the capital.
The routine inspection work of the bureaucracy is coming to an end, and there is an endless stream of people sending money and contacts to and from various yamen, and no one will feel embarrassed.
Millions of taels of silver flowed between the various forces, turning into pieces of paper for promotions and transfers, or letters of pardon to cover up incompetence and unnecessary embellishments.
Those who should be promoted, those who should be protected, those who should escape from the fiery pit of the war zone should escape quickly, everyone is happy.
The Ming Dynasty has been corrupted to the point of hopelessness.
Regarding all this, Emperor Chongzhen Zhu Youjian actually knew more or less in his heart, otherwise he would not have issued the edict to sin against himself twice.
He just doesn't want to accept this reality.
…
On this day, it was already late at night, and Zhu Youjian was reviewing memorials in the Qianqing Palace as usual. He was only twenty-nine years old, and his hair on the temples was already somewhat gray.
I have to admit that regardless of his political skills, Zhu Youjian still has a very good working attitude and is very diligent.
During this year, the political issue he was most concerned about was of course the military situation surrounding Zhang Xianzhong.
In the twelfth year of Chongzhen, it was considered a year when Li Zicheng and the Qing army were relatively quiet. The main contradiction in the country was precisely Zhang Xianzhong——
After Li Zicheng's defeat in the 11th year of Chongzhen's reign, he went on the defensive in Henan and Shaanxi, breaking up into pieces and retreating to various mountainous areas. Although he was actively recruiting troops to expand his power, he did not yet dare to turn to a strong offensive.
The Tatar army outside the pass broke through the pass and entered the Hebei Plain last year and killed Lu Xiangsheng in the river, causing heavy losses to the Ming army.
However, after Lu Xiangsheng's death, Hong Chengchou and Sun Chuanting were removed from the battlefield to suppress Li Zicheng and transferred to Jimen, Xuanda, and Liaoxi to block the entrance. The Qing army could not benefit for the time being.
Therefore, throughout the twelve years of Chongzhen, the northern region was in a brief delicate balance. Neither Li Zicheng nor the Qing army wanted to bite a hard nut, and both hoped that the Ming court would focus its main energy on dealing with the other side.
But everyone can predict that once there is a problem with either Hong Chengchou or Sun Chuanting, the Qing soldiers and Li Zicheng will definitely jump out to grab their heads immediately.
Compared with the delicate balance in the north, two or three provinces in the south have been destroyed since Zhang Xianzhong's rebellion in May.
Yang Sichang tried his best to stabilize the situation and prevent more people and places from being hijacked. In terms of counterattack and suppression, he is still unable to do so.
"Zhang Ni, the dog thief, I swear that I will cut your body into thousands of pieces, smash your bones and spread your ashes, to avenge Fengyang Ancestral Mausoleum!"
Zhu Youjian looked at the battle reports one by one and cursed secretly, but did not dare to speak loudly.
He was afraid that he would be heard by the palace maids and eunuchs nearby, and that he would lose the dignity of the emperor and let others see through his inner helplessness.
When Zhang Xianzhong attacked Fengyang Prefecture four years ago, he destroyed the ancestral tombs of the old Zhu family. Zhu Youjian had to issue the first self-indictment in his life, confess to his ancestors, and also killed many ministers and generals who were unfavorable in the encirclement and suppression of Zhang Xianzhong. Vent anger.
He originally thought that he was magnanimous last year, and when Xiong Wencan recruited Zhang Xianzhong to surrender, he promised to pardon him for the crime of destroying the ancestral mausoleum. Zhang Xianzhong should be grateful, but who would have thought that this guy would rebel again!
After reading a lot of memorials that ruined his mood, Zhu Youjian felt a tightness in his chest, like a fish out of water, looking for some good news to calm his nerves.
After flipping through it, I finally found a memorial written by Shi Kefa, the governor of Anlu. At first glance, it seemed pretty good.
Although Shi Kefa did not have to face Zhang Xianzhong directly, he still faced the Fifth Battalion of Ge Zuo who was coerced by Zhang Xianzhong and rebelled. The memorial reported several recent small victories, which were fought by Lin Cheng and Liu Xiyao, and thousands of thieves were wiped out. Army, no matter how small a mosquito is, it is still meat.
At the end of the memorial, he also thanked some of his colleagues, saying that the department that provided military supplies and logistics to the Anlu front line had done a good job and allowed him to have no worries. I heard that it also saved a lot of expenses.
It was a rare piece of good news. Zhu Youjian immediately read on attentively, and then noticed a few names and a string of data.
"How much money was spent on transporting grain and grain to the imperial court in the past years? For every stone meter crossing a river or a lake, one has to count money to load and unload silver? This year, with the implementation of a new law, it can be reduced to nine cents per stone? This is a figure that cannot be measured in history.
Wrong?"
Zhu Youjian was suspicious by nature. He couldn't believe it when he saw this, so he coughed.
Immediately, a eunuch Wang Chengen with a good look came over to listen: "What are your orders, Your Majesty?"
"Go to the Ministry of Household Affairs to find someone. I have something to ask - let them prepare. It's about water transportation." Chongzhen didn't want to make it too clear, and wanted to make a surprise inspection.
But when he thought about the incompetence of the people in the household department, he became a little discouraged, so he decided to make a clear decision.
Cheng Guoxiang, the Secretary of the Ministry of Revenue, was a peacemaker who could hide when he could. He did not take power and did not want to do anything. After Chongzhen appointed him last year, after using him for a while, he felt that this person was not good enough.
Historically, Cheng Guoxiang did not work for long, and he will successfully retire and return to his hometown next year, escaping the capital. He is probably the one who saw that the Ming Dynasty building was about to collapse, and he wanted to run away as soon as possible.
After a while, the slightly old Cheng Guoxiang came slowly from the attic where he was on duty, with a somewhat reluctant expression on his face, as if he was resenting why the emperor didn't work during the day.
In order to avoid unclear answers, he even brought a few assistants with him, but they were not qualified to enter the palace, so they just waited outside the corridor.
Zhu Youjian got straight to the point: "Cheng Qing, in the past years, in addition to the positive figures for transporting military rations by water, did various places also collect levies from crossing the river and crossing the lake? How come I haven't seen it in the accounts of the household department?"
Cheng Guoxiang breathed a sigh of relief. It turned out to be such a simple question. He quickly cheered up:
"Your Majesty, the freight charges for each section of the Huaibei Canal are clearly stated expenditures by the imperial court and are levied in advance, and are finally used uniformly by the Governor of Water Transport.
However, in various places in the south, the distance to Huai'an is different, and the difficulty of the road is different, so they need to raise their own funds. The imperial court only needs to ensure that the grain is delivered to the water transport yamen in Huai'an, and the rest will not be checked."
Zhu Youjian listened and recalled it for a moment. He seemed to have heard similar interpretations of these remarks before.
After thinking for a long time, he remembered that Shen Tingyang, who was sent to the south by him in the middle of the year to experiment with water transportation and sea transportation, had mentioned this drawback.
Zhu Youjian immediately asked: "I think about it, did a person named Shen Tingyang from your household department also complain to me about this? He said that the control in various places is too extensive now, and it is a waste of people's money and money?"
Cheng Guoxiang responded: "Your Majesty is knowledgeable and knowledgeable, which puts my ministers to shame. Shen Tingyang is indeed a director of the Transportation Department of our Ministry of Household Affairs, and is currently on business in Suzhou."
Zhu Youjian: "Then tell me, how much cross-river silver and cross-lake silver were nominally collected by various places in previous years?"
Cheng Guoxiang was a little unable to answer, so he had to ask the assistant waiting outside the hall to bring him the accounts, and then explained everything.
Zhu Youjian was very distressed when he heard that it was really necessary to collect several more coins per stone:
"The imperial court will increase training salary this year, but it will only earn more than 7 million taels of revenue. And the capital needs more than 4 million shi of grain from the south every year. Now it seems that just the freight of crossing the river silver, crossing the lake silver, etc.
There are millions of taels. If the local government can save half of this money, it will be equivalent to 20 to 30% of the total training salary!
It would be great if all this money could be used as training salary for the imperial court! It’s true that you don’t know how expensive firewood and rice are, but your Ministry of Household Affairs and the Governor’s Office of Water Transport have never thought about getting rid of these bad policies? Think of ways to save some money!"
"Your Majesty, "Sun Tzu's Art of War" says that if you eat the enemy for one minute, you will be worthy of twenty. The cost of transporting food has been extremely huge since ancient times. Although canal navigation is frugal, the water level in each section of the canal is different, so it is necessary to change ships section by section.
There is really no way to save this money.”
Cheng Guoxiang was so confused by the scolding that he had no choice but to respond in this way. He also secretly wondered whether the emperor had taken the wrong medicine today?
Moreover, although the losses in water transport were huge, they still fed so many people.
Which of the hub loading and unloading nodes of each section of the Beijing-Hangzhou Grand Canal is not a big city with a population of one million?
Let's take Linqing, a county in Shandong Province. Just because it is at the hub where the Grand Canal crosses the Yellow River, it has a population of two million. Perhaps one million of them are old and weak women and children with supporting families, but there are at least five or six million dock workers in Caoding.
.
The other three major canal nodes, Tongzhou, Huai'an, and Yangzhou, all have similar concessions, but they are not as simple in industrial structure as Linqing.
However, Zhu Youjian would not let Cheng Guoxiang's impatience go. Seeing that the old Shangshu of the Ministry of Revenue had no awareness, he directly threw Shi Kefa's memorial in front of him:
"Don't talk about impossibility. The records written by Anlu Governor Shi Kefa are very clear. The Susong River is used to transport food to the front of the Luzhou Army. The silver crossing across the river only costs nine cents! You, the Ministry of Household Affairs, should go back and check carefully. If it is true,
, if you can learn, learn!”
Cheng Guoxiang was startled and quickly picked it up and looked at it carefully. He secretly regretted his recent neglect in politics.
As the new year approached, he really didn't want to work much, and left many things to his subordinates. Ever since the emperor appointed him as the Minister of Household Affairs, he didn't pay much attention to him. At most, he didn't call him for four or five months in a row, and he just didn't do it.
Numb and careless.
Who would have thought that the emperor would suddenly have a whim today and ask him such detailed questions.
Cheng Guoxiang had no choice but to plead guilty and said he would investigate immediately.
…
Cheng Guoxiang didn't care about this investigation, and immediately gave Jiang Dejing, a deputy minister in the Ministry of Household Affairs, an opportunity to perform.
Jiang Dejing was usually more diligent than the old minister. When he got the news that night, regardless of the fact that he was not on duty, he rushed to the palace to ask for an audience, help the emperor clear up his doubts, and submitted another local report document that was kept on file.
Seeing that Jiang Dejing was diligent, Zhu Youjian finally felt better. Wen Yan asked, "What does the document submitted by Jiang Qing say?"
Jiang Dejing: "Back to Your Majesty, this is the summary of this year's expenditure reported by Suzhou Prefect Zhang Xuezeng. It was originally filed with the Ministry of Household Affairs to emphasize the financial achievements of Suzhou Prefecture this year.
Among them, it was mentioned that Suzhou Prefecture has implemented new regulations to manage water transportation and has also improved construction methods, which has greatly reduced the cost of water transportation, loading, unloading and transshipment. It is hoped that this can be promoted to all prefectures in southern Zhili.
What Zhang Xuezeng said was much more detailed than Shi Kefa's memorial. I checked it carefully and asked the Ministry of Industry to experiment according to the method described, and found that it is indeed feasible. However, this memorial came in a hurry, and I had just finished verifying the effect, so I did not report it."
Shi Kefa's memorial was to report the military situation to the emperor, and mentioned some logistical matters incidentally. Naturally, it was impossible to mention technical and management details in the main text, as that would definitely make readers impatient.
The document reported by Zhang Xuezeng was not for the emperor, but specifically for the relevant authorities, and the content was much more detailed.
After Zhu Youjian listened, he immediately became energetic and took a high look at Jiang Dejing. He felt that this minister seemed to be more diligent than the old minister.
He quickly took Zhang Xuezeng's document and read it carefully.
When I finally saw the name "Susonghe Road Yamen Shenlin" for which Zhang Xuezeng expressed his merit, I couldn't help but ask:
"I remember that Shen Tingyang of your shipping department is from Suzhou, right? Here comes another Suzhou native named Shen, who is also in charge of water transportation and food transportation. Is there some connection between the two Shens?"
Jiang Dejing was relatively familiar with his colleagues in the department, so he immediately replied: "Your Majesty, as far as I know, the Secretary of Transportation Shen Tingyang has a son, it seems, his name is Shen Lin. However, Shen Lin is still young, maybe he just became a son this year. To serve the imperial court."
Zhu Youjian sighed: "Go and verify this new method carefully. If it can indeed save a lot of money, young talents like this should be reused."