To be honest, it had only been twenty years since the founding of the People's Republic of China, and it was hard for Xia Wanchun to believe that the officialdom was hopelessly rotten.
After all, in the early years of Shaowu, the emperor raised his salary while wielding a big stick and constantly sending patrols to various provinces, and countless corrupt officials were captured.
But he also thought about it. Scholars have studied hard for ten years. In addition to cherishing the ideal of helping the world and bringing peace to the people, their greatest ambition is to honor their ancestors.
It is a perfectly normal move to use the expired power in your hands to make money.
Even though the emperor vested all tax collection powers in the Commercial Tax Department, local officials still had many places to make money.
Originally it was plain water tofu, but it was replaced with roasted chicken fat. The officials were used to it, how could they change it?
But what happened in Cangzhou is clear proof.
It would be impossible to resist the imperial envoys in the monolithic officialdom without some important information.
Obviously, there must be a major case in Cangzhou.
"How about your brother-in-law becoming an official?"
"Slightly pedantic, but the friendship is not diminished."
Pan Zhuo said, a trace of respect actually appeared on his face.
He gave an example.
Gao De was an orthodox scholar with a Neo-Confucian background. He studied hard for more than 20 years. He was a Jinshi scholar in high school at the age of 30, and soon became an official.
Although he is a scholar of Zhu Xi, he is definitely not a corrupt scholar who talks about the nature of mind.
When he was appointed as the magistrate of Liaocheng, Shandong Province, he never asserted the authority of his parents.
When the common people filed lawsuits, he did not allow the wolf-like Zaoli to arrest people.
If there is a dispute between clans, go to their clan leader; if there is a dispute in the village, go to the local elders, or ask the original two defendants to make an appointment to come and complain in detail.
His hearings were all based on the purpose of Confucian moral influence and he tried to persuade people with sincerity.
Father and son often turned against each other, brothers hated each other, and got into lawsuits. After his earnest words and repeated persuasion, they would often be persuaded to hug each other and weep for several days, and reconcile as before.
This was completely in line with the Confucian idea of having both virtue and law, so he was highly regarded and became a county magistrate and a sitting official.
There are two important things in being a county magistrate: punishment, money and food.
Chasing money and food is called "bi"; when the competition comes, if you don't finish it, you will be spanked.
Therefore, he read through ancient books and followed what he thought was the old practice, and formulated a "hanging comparison method":
The name of the person who is in arrears will be announced at the end of the period, and the people will have to wait for the people to finish the work, which is limited to one year.
For example, if you owe one stone of food, you can pay it back in monthly installments.
At the same time, people who were short of food were found and advised: "Money and food are a national subject of the imperial court, and they do not go into the pocket of my county magistrate. If you pay attention to official affairs and ask for money and food after all, you will be healthy both physically and mentally, and I will be at ease."
This method of collecting food in installments has alleviated the problems of many people with financial difficulties, and is also a kind of emergency relief for the people.
In just one year, the number of people in Liaocheng who were in food shortages was greatly reduced.
But it caused dissatisfaction among officials.
Because of the instalment of grain taxes, these subordinate officials cannot use their hands to seek huge profits, and loan sharks are also dissatisfied.
Of course, this is the money kept in the county treasury. It is originally the minister's money, and the magistrate has no say in what he wants to do with it.
At the beginning of the 16th year of Shaowu's reign, something happened. A man named Xia owed money and food for two years. He promised to pay it in installments, but again and again, his words were not kept.
Gao De also sent someone to investigate and found out that the man surnamed Xia had suffered a lot of losses due to misfortune in recent years, including the death of relatives one after another, and funeral expenses; in the end, he suffered from illness, which led to the loss of his family.
At the same time, there are no relatively well-off relatives who can help. The situation is indeed very difficult, but if this person is not punished, he will not be able to deal with the people who are fully satisfied.
Gao De was helpless and ordered the staff to be used.
"Master!" The man surnamed Xia begged again, "No matter how you extend my ten-day deadline, I will definitely collect enough money to explain clearly."
"What if you don't pay it by then?"
"I don't dare to deceive Mr. Qingtian. I just ask him for mercy and I will pay him when the time comes. I have already thought of a way, but it will take a few days to do it."
Seeing his sincere expression, Gothe became furious.
If you are an ordinary official, you will certainly be happy when you get results; if you can spare a moment, bring the person named Yu to the court, and say a few warm words of praise, you will be considered a good official who can sympathize with the people's hardships.
But Gaode is not like that. Although he is pedantic, he is not stupid.
"You must be a thief!" Gothe slapped the table angrily:
"We have competed several times, but you don't have any money. I know you are poor and have no relatives or friends to help. Let me ask you, if you are not a thief and stealing, where did you get the money?"
After hearing this question, Xia knelt down and begged for mercy and explained the reason clearly.
It turns out that because the canal extends in all directions, connecting the north and the south, many water bandits in Shandong are entrenched in the canal.
During the day they worked as boatmen, moving goods around.
At night, he turns into a thief and steals everywhere.
He had a cousin who happened to be in this line of work, so he thought that if he waited a few days and went to work along the canal, he would be able to split the money.
Gothe, as always, talked about the truth, directly persuaded him, and based on his report, he took down a group of water bandits.
Immediately, he distributed a lot of his money to pay off his debts, and took him into the Yamen as an official, so as not to suffer the revenge of those remnants.
This arrangement won a lot of applause.
Merchants praise you and the people applaud, so your official fortune will naturally be good.
"It seems that your brother-in-law is a good official."
Xia Wanchun shook his head: "It's just that good officials are more likely to block people's way of getting rich."
Hearing this, Pan Zhuo frowned and thought for a moment, then said: "The land of Cangzhou, one is called the canal, and the other is the salt field. These two places are like a cornucopia. There are more than tens of thousands, and I don't know how much money and food have been accumulated."
"My brother-in-law is afraid that he has offended someone."
Xia Wanchun nodded, this is right!
"Let's go to Gaofu to have a look."
Accompanied by Pan Zhuo, several people arrived at Gaofu in a big way.
But found nothing.
The study room was clean and tidy, as if it had never been used.
Pan Zhuo searched for a moment, then spread his hands and said, "Hey, there's no evidence, not even letters or anything."
"There is no evidence, it is the best evidence."
Xia Wanchun looked around and said solemnly: "It seems that your brother-in-law was really murdered."
Panzhuo was shocked.
A dignified fourth-rank official, second only to the prefect, was actually murdered.
The two looked at each other speechlessly.
For a moment, there was a hint of coolness in the study.
…
At this time, in the Hejian government office, the prefect was running around anxiously, unable to sit still.
The magistrate, county magistrate and other officials were sitting together, speechless one after another.
"Tell me, what should I do with this?"
The prefect sat down and sighed: "Xia Wanchun went to Gaofu. It seems that he was suspected to have been murdered, rather than manslaughter of the couple. This is a disaster rather than a blessing for us in Cangzhou."
"Master Fu, we are not involved at this time." Cangzhou Magistrate couldn't help but said: "It's so bold and reckless, we are just negligent."
"Yes, assassinations are not tolerated in official circles..."
Everyone was escaping the relationship, but the prefect's face became increasingly ugly.
As the chief official of the entire Hejian Mansion, he must be the first to fall upon him.
"Okay, starting today, no one should get involved in this matter. Doesn't the imperial envoy want to investigate? Then let him investigate."
Soon, Xia Wanchun felt like he had suddenly pulled half of his foot out of the mud. Although it was still difficult, it was still the same in the end.
However, he still has no clue.
Obviously those people had already known this for a long time and were not afraid of his investigation. All the evidence had been destroyed.
Within two days, news came from prison that Gao Pan committed suicide in shame.
This made Xia Wanchun furious.
This method is too cruel.
When Pan Zhuo heard that his sister had died, he only felt sad for a while and then regained his composure.
After suffering the infamy of parricide, his sister had no place in Cangzhou. Even if the stigma was washed away, she would have no place for the rest of her life.
However, these days he followed Xia Wanchun and was impressed by his seriousness. He was willing to listen to his orders and work hard without complaint.
"Go check the canal."
Since there was no clue to the case, Xia Wanchun naturally changed direction and set his sights on the canal:
"Go and spread the news that Gothe was murdered for offending the water bandits, or was killed by private salt dealers."
"Ah?" Pan Zhuo was stunned. How dare these ordinary people have so much courage?
"This is called alerting the snake." Xia Wanchun said calmly.
Within a few days, the canal became much quieter. A large number of boatmen left Cangzhou, leaving the dock nearly half empty.
Pan Zhuo sighed: "It seems that these boatmen really have something up their sleeves."
"The car and boat shop's legs and teeth should be killed even if they are not guilty."
Xia Wanchun recalled the situation when he was betrayed by the boatman when he first came to Cangzhou, and said casually: "I don't know how many criminal thieves and water bandits have used the identity of the boatman to do evil."
“It’s something boatmen often do by taking people into empty waters to directly seek wealth and death.”
“The corpses are fed to the fish, and no one knows about it, so they get away with it.”
Pan Zhuo's face was calm.
After being tortured and tortured, this scholar has been transformed into a new man.
"A monk who can run away can't run away from the temple."
Xia Wanchun sneered: "Let's go to Changlu Saltworks."
The reason why Hejianfu and Cangzhou developed rapidly was the extraordinary role of the salt field.
Although the profits from the salt farm were controlled by the imperial court, Cangzhou made huge profits from being close to the salt farm.
Those salt merchants and boatmen from the Northern King of the South China Sea were not allowed to rest in Cangzhou. In order to avoid empty ships, they could only bring back some local specialties.
Over and over again, Cangzhou Prefecture's Cangjiu became popular thanks to this group of boatmen.
After leaving Cangzhou City, a huge imperial honor guard came out, blowing and beating dozens of people in a majestic manner.
When he arrived at the Changlu Salt Field, he was personally greeted by the Salt Patrol Censor and the Salt Transport Envoy from the capital.
Although Emperor Shaowu went through reforms and changed the Gang Salt Law into the Piao Salt Law, the imperial court's control over the salt fields continued unabated.
There are ten major salt fields in the country, and the coastal areas are Liaodong Salt Fields, Changlu Salt Fields, Shandong Salt Fields, Lianghuai Salt Fields, Liangzhe Salt Fields, Fujian Salt Fields, and Liangguang Salt Fields.
In the inland areas, there are Sichuan salt field (well salt), Shanxi Jiechi salt field, and northwest salt field.
Although the northwest salt field is small in scale, it involves the four provinces of Gansu, Suiyuan, Ningxia, and Anxi, and is basically lake salt.
The Changlu Salt Field is located near the capital, stretching from Shanhaiguan to Hejian Prefecture. It covers hundreds of miles and supplies salt to most of the north, especially the capital.
Therefore, they all transferred salt envoys to the third rank, which was half a level higher than the prefect. There were dozens of large and small salt farms, more than 10,000 kitchen households, and more than 1,000 soldiers under their command.
Because they often have to fight with private salt dealers, their elite level is even stronger than that of local patrol battalions.
The salt inspection censors, who are in the thirteen supervisory censorship of the Metropolitan Procuratorate, are specifically responsible for inspecting salt affairs, and are also called salt inspection censors.
Although he is only a seventh-rank official, he is a first-rate official, above the salt transport envoy from the capital.
To put it bluntly, the Salt Transport Envoy was responsible for general affairs and daily management, while the Salt Patrol Censor was responsible for making decisions and supervising, and belonged to the Supreme Emperor.
The summary is that less weight is given to things.
This is an extremely noble assignment and is the favorite of civil servants.
Even if there is no corruption, just some favors from salt merchants, you can make a fortune.
Many officials even tried to make a fortune by being salt transport envoys.
Looking at the table of delicacies from the mountains and seas in front of him, Xia Wanchun sighed: "Puffer fish, tongue, whale liver, and sea cucumber are just ordinary dishes on the table."
Under such circumstances, how many people can stick to their hearts?
It seems that there are still many problems with the salt farm.
"Aren't the angels inspecting the case? Why do you have time to come to our salt field?"
The Yanyan Yushi asked softly, with a hint of drunkenness on his face, but he asked without hesitation. There was no suddenness in eating well.
"I suspect that the salt owl killed him." Xia Wanchun said casually, observing the expressions of the two people: "As we all know, the salt farm often deals with those salt owl. I'm looking for it, you must have an impression."
The Salt Patrol Censor smiled awkwardly, slapped the table and said angrily: "Those salt lords are lawless and dare to murder the imperial officials. They really deserve to be killed."
Xia Wanchun was noncommittal and began to inspect the salt field.
Although the salt households were exempted from low status, they were still subject to stricter supervision because of the importance of producing salt.
You are not allowed to leave the salt field without permission, and you are not allowed to sell illegal salt...
In order to prevent the peddling of illegal salt, the imperial court required all remaining salt to be purchased by the government.
In other words, salt farmers boiled salt for free, handed most of it to the court, and kept the rest for themselves.
The remaining ones were not allowed to be sold privately and could only be sold to the court at a low price.
As for salary? The court doesn't have that much money.
In addition to being affected by the weather, the lives of salt households are relatively stable. The implementation of the Salt Voting Law has led to the sale of official salt, and their living conditions are better than before.
Xia Wanchun was very interested in the salt field. He stayed there for three to five days a year and was reluctant to leave. He seemed to have forgotten about his task of investigating the case.
This makes the salt farm miserable.
"Salt patrol, this batch of salt is waiting for you!"
The salt transport envoy gritted his teeth and said.
"How do I not know?" The Salt Patrol Censor said solemnly: "The imperial envoy is in the salt field and cannot act recklessly."
"It's been delayed for several days, and this is all money!"
"Okay, find a remote trail and transport it out in the middle of the night." The Salt Patrol Censor whispered: "Don't let him find out."
At night, dozens of salt soldiers carried salt and silently came to the earth wall. This is the salt wall, the wall of the salt field, which is more than two feet high.
There are people to communicate with, and the soldiers send bags of salt out of the dog hole, and the rest is none of their business.
(End of chapter)
