Feng Quan always thought Cui Wensheng was following the path of Wei Zhongxian, but he didn't expect that he was actually Li Xianzhong's man.
It seems that the Duke of Liao is not as aloof as he seems.
Feng Quan knew through Tian Ergeng that the famous "Heaven and Earth" in the capital was actually Li Xianzhong's property, but he did not expect that the hand of the Duke of Liao had already reached the south of the Yangtze River.
Not only is there heaven and earth in Nanjing, but even the eunuchs who guard Nanjing are his.
Nowadays, Cui Chengxiu is the most popular person around "Nine Thousand Years Old" Wei Zhongxian. Whether Cui Chengxiu can leave Jiangnan alive after offending him is a question.
Even if Cui Chengxiu doesn't attack him, he has arrested so many Donglin Party members in Jiangnan, and I am afraid that these Donglin Party members will not let him go easily.
The world is so big that there is actually no place for oneself.
He said: "Feng no longer has any official position. How can the Duke of Liao still think highly of him?"
Cui Wensheng said with a smile: "The Duke of Liao is interested in the talent of Grand Scholar Feng, not your identity."
"Han Rizuan, the Minister of Rites in Nanjing, has returned to his hometown Dingyou. Our family will recommend Grand Scholar Feng to Eunuch Wei to take over!"
It is true that Feng Quan was talented, otherwise he would not have been able to serve as a bachelor in the Ming and Qing dynasties in the future.
After the Manchus entered the country, Feng Quan gained the trust of Dorgon. As the leader of the "Northern Party", Feng Quan even started the "North-South Party Struggle" in the Shunzhi Dynasty.
But what Li Xianzhong is interested in now is his identity.
The main reason is that Li Xianzhong really has no one available in the court. Although Xiong Tingbi is also a cabinet bachelor, with his "Xiong Manzi" temperament, it is difficult to push him to the position of chief minister.
Moreover, Xiong Tingbi was not born in the Imperial Academy, so being able to join the cabinet was already an exception. It was simply impossible to go further.
Relatively speaking, this Feng Quan has a "good foundation and a strong career". Now he is at a low point in his life. In the future, Li Xianzhong can fully support him to the position of chief minister of the cabinet.
To be honest, Feng Quan still has a lot of concerns about staying in Jiangnan. After all, he has offended so many people in Jiangnan.
However, now that he has the support of the dignified Nanjing garrison eunuch Cui Wensheng and the "leg" of Liao Duke Li Xianzhong, he no longer has so many worries.
Of course, what excited him the most was the official position of Minister of Rites in Nanjing.
Because there is an unwritten rule in the Ming Dynasty, the chief minister of the cabinet must have served as the main hall of the Ministry of Rites.
One of the reasons why he could not win the position of chief minister of the cabinet before was because Cui Chengxiu and others spread rumors that he relied on "male sex" to get to the position.
Another big reason is that he has never served as a principal or deputy official in the Ministry of Rites.
Now Liao Guogong's move is undoubtedly telling Feng Quan that one day he will return to the cabinet and even become the chief minister.
He was really disappointed with the "9,000-year-old" Eunuch Wei.
So Feng Quan said: "Then I would like to thank Eunuch Cui and Duke Liao for their cultivation!"
Cui Chengxiu did not expect that Feng Quan actually launched a raid on Chongming Island in the past few days.
And they also successfully attacked Chongming Island, but the army actually suffered a disastrous defeat.
I thought that after this defeat, Feng Quan would never be able to stand up again.
Unexpectedly, Feng Quan was recommended by Cui Wensheng, the eunuch guarding Nanjing.
Tian Ergeng, the commander of Jinyiwei, also actively interceded for Feng Quan after returning to the capital.
The relationship between Tian Ergen and Wei Liangqing was also extraordinary. Wei Zhongxian thought of Feng Quan's previous efforts in attacking the Donglin Party, so he approved him as the Minister of Rites in Nanjing.
This made Cui Chengxiu feel very unhappy. Now that he had completely broken up with Feng Quan, he would easily suffer retaliation from the other party if he didn't kill him.
But now that the deal is done, we can only let Feng Quan retire in Nanjing.
He is now the Minister of the Ministry of Personnel and the Yushi of the Zuodu, and has been promoted to the cabinet. How can he still be afraid of Feng Quan, the Minister of the Ministry of Rites in Nanjing?
The most difficult thing now is to solve the problem of Suzhou businessmen's strike as soon as possible.
Before that, when he was the governor of Huaiyang, he had some friendship with the businessmen from Jiangnan. Now in the situation in Suzhou, it is impossible to make some inappropriate concessions.
Soon he was negotiating with local gentry businessmen in Suzhou through the help of Huizhou merchants.
Cui Chengxiu knows the essence of negotiation. In fact, negotiation is not an art of asking. On the contrary, it is an art of compromise.
Feng Quan is young and energetic and pursues perfection too much, so it is easy to intensify conflicts.
Cui Chengxiu agreed to halve the industrial tax, gate tax, dam crossing tax, ship tax and other taxes at Xushuguan.
In addition, for large merchants that support tax collection, if the tax paid in the current year exceeds 10,000 taels, the tax will be directly reduced by 10% in the second year.
It also agreed to re-evaluate store stall taxes. The Suzhou Chamber of Commerce can send representatives to negotiate with the tax supervisor on the annual taxes of each store.
As expected, Cui Chengxiu often dealt with these businessmen, and these measures were quickly accepted by Suzhou businessmen.
Merchants in Suzhou have also begun to resume business.
But the biggest headache right now is the problem of Chongming water bandits.
According to Yuan Keli's report, there were a large number of water bandits on the island, and the 2,500 officers and soldiers who landed on the island were wiped out by the water bandits in just a few hours.
It is estimated that there are at least thousands of bandits on the island, definitely not the hundreds of water bandits originally mentioned.
Moreover, the water bandits not only owned three large Western sailing ships, but also had forts on the island. The water bandits also owned many muskets.
If we want to attack Chongming by force, we will probably have to prepare at least tens of thousands of troops and a large number of naval warships.
He suggested recruiting water pirates, which would not only quickly solve the problem of the blockade of the Yangtze River Estuary, but also save a lot of military expenses and reduce the casualties of officers and soldiers.
Although Yuan Keli said it very tactfully, Cui Chengxiu could hear his implication, which meant that even if he went to suppress the bandits, he might not be able to win.
If it hadn't been for Feng Quan's last landing on the island, he might have had the intention to completely wipe out this group of water pirates.
Under this current situation, it is obviously inappropriate to suppress bandits.
For him, both extermination and recruitment were equally great achievements, and there was no need to choose extermination, which was riskier.
Of course, it was impossible for Cui Chengxiu to go to Chongming to negotiate such a dangerous matter, but he was worried about the local officials in Suzhou, so Ruan Dacheng, who had just taken refuge in him, took on this arduous task.
Ruan Dacheng was a Jinshi in the 44th year of Wanli.
He is a disciple of Donglin boss Gao Panlong and a fellow villager of Zuo Guangdou. With these connections, Ruan Dacheng quickly rose to prominence in the Donglin Party.
Later, he played a leading role in the "struggle" to overthrow the non-Donglin Pavilion veteran Shi Jikai and others introduced by Fang Congzhe. Therefore, he was listed as the backbone of Donglin and was nicknamed "No Zhazhan" in "Donglin Point General Record".
However, since Zuo Guangdou was killed and Gao Panlong was dismissed from office, he has been marginalized by the Donglin Party members.
Ruan Dacheng was so angry that he defected to the eunuch party.
Going to Chongming to recruit people this time was a good opportunity to make meritorious deeds, so Ruan Dacheng was naturally particularly concerned about it.
Soon he, accompanied by Suzhou wealthy businessman Liu Ziguang, rushed to Chongming to recruit these Taihu water bandits.
Ruan Dacheng was also shocked when he saw the water pirates' warships and forts, as well as thousands of brightly-clad water pirates at Chongming Pier. He originally thought that Yuan Keli deliberately "released water", but now it seems that these water pirates are real. Not easy to deal with.
According to Cui Chengxiu's original intention, he would recruit these water bandits and give them an official position to garrison elsewhere, and the court would send someone else to take over Chongming County.
But now "Langli Fei" insisted on stationing themselves in Chongming, but they agreed to the imperial court sending officials to take over Chongming County.
Ruan Dacheng did not dare to make the decision without authorization, so he had to take the water bandits' request back to Suzhou Mansion and let Cui Chengxiu make the decision.
Cui Chengxiu was not willing to delay in Jiangnan. After all, the tax collection in Suzhou had been resumed, and it would be easy for him to get into trouble if he was absent from the capital for a long time.
Feng Quan is a good example.
Finally, after accepting some "filial piety" from the businessmen, Cui Chengxiu completed the recruitment.
The water bandit "Langli Fei" was appointed as the Chongming General, and his navy and 3,000 troops were recruited into the Ming army.
As Chongming Island was controlled by these Ming troops, it also became the purchasing place for the East Ryukyu Company.
Merchants in Suzhou sent a large amount of goods to Chongming, and Zheng Zhilong purchased them at a price 20% higher than the market price.
Businessmen in Suzhou also invested in the expansion of the docks at the port.
As for the previous incident in which people in Suzhou rioted and killed Jin Yiwei, Cui Chengxiu still needs to give Tian Ergen an explanation.
So Suzhou businessmen paid money to find five people, Yan Peiwei, Yang Nianru, Shen Yang, Ma Jie, and Zhou Wenyuan, to come and take the blame.
In the end, these five people were directly beheaded by Cui Chengxiu in Suzhou.
However, as a typical example of Suzhou people's resistance to the eunuchs, the gentry and wealthy businessmen in Jiangnan spoke highly of these people.
The businessmen not only paid for the construction of tombstones for these five people.
Zhang Pu, the leader of Fushe, even wrote an article "Tombstones of Five People" for them, describing and praising the heroic deeds of Suzhou people who dared to fight against the evil forces, and enthusiastically praising the heroic behavior of the five martyrs who would not surrender until death.
Zhang Pu spoke highly of their spirit of "dying for justice", affirmed the great significance and immortal achievements of the struggle, and then revealed the theme of "the importance of life and death is greater, and the importance of an individual is more important than the state of the country".
Cui Chengxiu's concessions on Suzhou's commercial taxes and the recruitment of "Lang Lifei" and others were regarded as a major victory for the Fushe to lead the Suzhou people against the eunuch party.
And this "Tombstone Story of Five People" also made Zhang Putong Fushe's reputation gradually increase, and it has a tendency to replace the Donglin Party in Jiangnan.
Zhang Pu and others also realized the importance of armed struggle, otherwise they would have to be slaughtered obediently in the face of the eunuch's butcher's knife.
Shen Zhengzong, a wealthy businessman from Wujiang who spent all his wealth to recruit rebels, also became one of the core figures in the restoration of society.
These businessmen accumulated wealth through smuggling in Chongming and continued to recruit private armed forces, which caused a surge in the number of regiments in Suzhou.
When Feng Quan heard the news, he even cursed: "Cui Chengxiu's move has harmed the country. On the surface, he has temporarily quelled the riots in Suzhou, but it has left huge hidden dangers."
"Especially the elite water bandits in Chongming, if they are not eradicated, there may be big trouble in the future."
When Cui Wensheng saw Feng Quan's angry look, he knew that he still hadn't let go of his resentment, but now he had to make him understand his mission.
Cui Wensheng said: "It doesn't matter if the world is a little chaotic. If the world is really peaceful, where will we be able to get rich?"
"I'm afraid that the Duke of Liao will be recalled to the capital by His Majesty to become a wealthy and noble Duke!"
Cui Wensheng obviously meant something in his words. He was right. There are indeed too many people who don't want the world to be peaceful.
Feng Quan said: "Don't worry, Eunuch Cui, Feng will never forget Duke Liao's help. One day when I return to the court, I will definitely clear the obstacles in the court for Duke Liao!"
Cui Chengxiu's trip to the south of the Yangtze River was said to have resolved the market strike in Suzhou, resumed tax collection and water transportation, and also recruited water pirates from Chongming.
However, the tax revenue in Suzhou has been reduced a lot, making Tianqi's fiscal deficit destined to become larger and larger in the next three years.
The severe drought in the north has not yet ended, and the Yangtze River has entered the flood season again. The water levels of Poyang Lake and Dongting Lake have skyrocketed, and the Han River and Gan River have also burst their banks.
Floods in the Jianghan Plain and Jiangxi completely overwhelmed Li Ruhua, the Minister of Household Affairs. At nearly seventy years old, he was seriously ill and his time was running out.
Emperor Wanli originally gave Prince Fu a total of 40,000 hectares of farmland, but Li Ruhua could not collect it despite repeated petitions. In the end, Emperor Wanli agreed to reduce the amount by 20,000 hectares.
But now faced with the imperial court's deficit, the Minister of Revenue was at a loss and had to rely on Emperor Tianqi's internal funds to survive.
Now the Secretary of the Ministry of Revenue is a hot potato. Although Eunuch Wei levied commercial taxes aggressively, Taicang is still empty today!
Otherwise, Li Ruhua would not have been allowed to serve as Minister of Household Affairs.
In line with the idea that wealth should not flow to outsiders, Wei Zhongxian quickly appointed his adopted son Tian Ji as the Minister of Household Affairs.
Tian Ji was originally just a county magistrate. After being ingratiated with "Nine Thousand Years Old", he was promoted to Taichang Qing, and now he has become the Minister of Household Affairs.
Tian Ji also knew that it was not easy to be the Minister of Household Affairs nowadays.
In order to perform well, he can only start by increasing revenue and reducing expenditure.
The "Open Source" eunuch party has also tried its best, even triggering a civil uprising in Jiangnan in order to collect commercial taxes.
As for land tax, the vassals of the Ming Dynasty occupied a large number of acres of land.
Emperor Wanli's younger brother King Lu occupied 40,000 hectares of land, and King Fu occupied another 20,000 hectares. There were countless vassal kings with more than 1,000 hectares of land.
Of course, Emperor Tianqi himself was the real big landowner. He owned about 200,000 hectares in Shuntian Mansion in the capital and Huangzhuang near Beizhili, accounting for almost one-third of all cultivated land.
Noble bureaucrats also occupied a large amount of land. The Mu family of the Duke of Guizhou occupied 9,000 hectares of farmland in Yunnan, which was almost half of the cultivated land in Yunnan.
In the sixth year of Wanli, Zhang Juzheng calculated that the cultivated land in the Ming Dynasty was about 7 million hectares, and now more than half of it does not need to pay taxes.
From the remaining half of the taxed acres, the tax has not been fully collected due to various natural and man-made disasters.
Therefore, Tian Ji can only make a fuss about reducing expenditure.
Since Eunuch Wei controlled the harem, it was impossible for Tian Ji to ask for the abolition of eunuchs and maids.
After thinking about it, there are not many wars in Ming Dynasty now, so we can consider dismantling some of the troops.
After all, military spending is a big expense.
Even a tenth of the reduction can save a lot of money.
Tian Ji's idea of disarmament aroused unanimous opposition from the court.
Once the army is reduced, the corresponding equipment and supplies will be reduced, which will affect the livelihood of many people.
But he got the support of Emperor Tianqi Zhu Youxiao.
The main objects of disarmament are the towns in Jiubian and the three major battalions of the capital.
On the eighth day of October in the third year of Apocalypse, Emperor Zhu Youxiao of Apocalypse ordered all towns in Jiubian and the capital camp to proactively report the number of personnel that could be laid off based on their own circumstances.
It can be said that one stone stirs up a thousand waves.
Both the generals and governors of the towns in Jiubian and the dignitaries in the capital camp were eager to skin Tian Ji and cramp him.
Where is this disarmament? It is clearly about cutting off their money?
The biggest headaches are naturally the Duke of Cheng, Zhu Chunchen, and the British Duke, Zhang Weixian.
Because almost two-thirds of the people in the Beijing camp were on empty pay, which was much higher than the 30% of the ordinary frontier troops.
Moreover, Jiubian is far away, so it is relatively easy for them to fool the people sent by the court.
But the capital camp is right at the feet of the emperor, so why is it so easy to fool him?
Nowadays, Li Xianzhong's Liaodong Town has the largest number of troops among the towns. Although it has experienced several reductions, the Ming army under the jurisdiction of Liaodong Town and Nurgan Dusi still has 95,000 people, ranking first among the nine.
Since the Ming troops stationed in North Korea were not paid by the court, they were not included in the scope of this dismantling.
Zhu Chunchen, Duke of Chengguo, quickly ran to heaven and earth to ask Mao Yuanyi and Li Xianzhong's thoughts.
He said anxiously: "I don't know what your Majesty means this time, but I only follow the leader of the Liao Kingdom."
Mao Yuanyi said with a smile: "The situation in each town is different, and the situation in Jingying and Liaodong is naturally different. Duke Cheng Guo should repay His Majesty according to his own situation!"
"The Duke of Liao is naturally considerate of His Majesty's difficulties, so this time Liaodong will lay off another five thousand sergeants!"
Zhu Chunchen originally wanted Li Xianzhong to declare that he would not surrender. After all, among all the towns, he was the only one with a full Liaodong Army that was not afraid of court inspection.
However, it was obvious that Li Xianzhong did not want to be the "first person", and he was still quite disappointed.
Soon Li Xianzhong, the Duke of Liao, was the first to reply. Li Xianzhong said that Liaodong Town was a vast area and Nurgandusi also had to garrison troops. However, in order to save money for the court, he took the initiative to lay off 5,000 people. He also gave Emperor Tianqi the number of troops deployed in various places in Liaodong.
After Li Xianzhong expressed his stance, towns such as Jizhou, Xuanfu, Datong, Taiyuan, Yulin, Guyuan, Ningxia and Gansu also appeared on the list.
However, their military strength was not as good as that of Liaodong, so they did not withdraw many troops. The largest city in Taiyuan has 1,500 people, while the smallest city in Datong has only 500 people.
In the end, the other eight towns proposed to lay off a total of 8,000 people, and including the towns in Jiubian, Liaodong, a total of 13,000 people were laid off.
These people can actually save more than 200,000 taels of silver a year, but at least they gave Emperor Tianqi a clear attitude! Nine sides support the court’s decision!
Now the Beijing camp had to take a stand. In the end, Zhu Chunchen and Zhang Weixian proposed the layoff of 15,000 people.
Emperor Tianqi did not reply to each town's attitude. He only said that he would send imperial envoys to confirm on the spot whether the troops in each town could meet their defense needs after the reduction.
Obviously this is a fat official, and the generals and officers in each town are not allowed to flatter the imperial envoy.
Wei Zhongxian did not avoid relatives when promoting talents, and recommended his nephew Wei Liangqing.
As soon as Wei Liangqing appeared, Cui Chengxiu and others who were eager to try had to give up!
However, Emperor Tianqi did not use Wei Liangqing. Instead, he asked his teacher Sun Chengzong, as the left minister of the Ministry of War and the bachelor of Wenyuan Pavilion, as an imperial envoy to inspect the Jingying and Jiubian towns with Shangfang sword.
Sun Chengzong's first stop was naturally Jingying.
There are 170,000 officers and soldiers in the three major battalions of the capital. Even after the 15,000 troops they declared themselves to be laid off, there are still 155,000 troops.
Currently, there are only 60,000 people including the old and the weak in the camp.
Where can these 95,000 people gather together for a while?
Even if we could spend money to hire so many people, there wouldn't be so many vacant military uniforms.
So Zhang Weixian and Zhu Chunchen took the initiative to entertain Sun Chengzong in heaven and earth.
It is not a secret in the court that the Beijing camp is on empty pay. Except for Liaodong Town, the entire Ming army is not fully staffed.
It's just that no one has come to check before.
Sun Chengzong was the first to say: "The empty pay in the Beijing camp is also a problem left over from history. It must have been in such a mess when the two of them took over!"
Sun Chengzong's words quickly eased the tense atmosphere, making the two of them feel that this matter could be discussed.
Zhu Chunchen said: "It's Mr. Sun Ge who understands the situation. To tell you the truth, when Zhu took over the Shenji Battalion, it was really a mess. Not to mention the lack of personnel, these soldiers cannot be used for fighting at all. I and the British I have been working hard over the years to train the Beijing camp to the point where it can fight."
Sun Chengzong said: "Although the shortage of wages is a historical issue, there must be a moderation in everything. Now the national situation is difficult, I hope the two of you can share your Majesty's worries!"
"His Majesty hopes that the actual number of people in the Beijing Camp will not be less than 50%."
Zhu Chunchen, who was smiling just now, immediately turned into a bitter face. Are you kidding me?
This is equivalent to laying off 85,000 people, which is more than 1.5 million taels of silver every year, although the money does not just fall into their pockets.
But the loss is too great!
In the end, after some bargaining, the operation laid off 30,000 people, from the original 170,000 to 140,000.
However, Sun Chengzong requested that these 30,000 people must be purely reduced staffing, and the actual number of people was not allowed to be any lower.
After that, Sun Chengzong spent more than two months walking all the way from Jizhou to Jiayuguan.
During this period, he carefully reviewed the establishment and defense of each town on the nine sides.
He was very aware of the current situation of the Ming army, so he did not make it too difficult for the towns in terms of organization. He just asked them to train their troops well.
The actual number of soldiers cannot be less than 70% of the current number. This is his bottom line.
Except for Datong Town, where he increased the number of layoffs from 500 to 1,000, all other towns carried out layoffs according to the numbers they submitted.
In the end, Sun Chengzong finally arrived at Shanhaiguan in the first month of the fourth year of Tianqi.
Sun Chengzong's whereabouts have long been under Li Xianzhong's control.
Li Xianzhong said: "Although Mr. Sun Ge has been wandering around for several months and visited all the towns in Jiubian, in fact, they have only two real goals. One is naturally the Beijing Camp, and the other is probably our Liaodong. They have arranged Ok?"
Li Sanshun said: "Don't worry, Lord Liao, all the Western-style warships have left the port. The caravans in the areas where Mr. Sun Ge passed have been restricted. He will never see anything he shouldn't see."
"It's just that the prosperity of Kaiyuan City cannot be concealed. Besides, if he goes to Pinglu Castle, the secret may be exposed!"
Li Xianzhong said: "It doesn't matter. Pinglu Fort is not in the Liaodong Army's establishment. Sun Ge Lao probably won't go. Even if he goes, just ask Fan Wencheng to give each workshop a holiday."
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(End of chapter)
