Empress Zhou thought for a while and said: "Now that the imperial court is financially strapped and has no way to reward him, why not give Yang Fan a promotion?"
"I think so too. The command of Zunhua Guard makes him old and fatuous, and he is afraid of enemies. I want to replace him, but Yang Fan is too young and has insufficient qualifications. It is not a good thing to be promoted too quickly. I plan to promote his Qianhu official to As an officer guarding a thousand households, he can take charge of three thousand households, but his rank is not too high, and he can also serve as the command officer of the Zunhua Guard. This can be considered as a two-level promotion."
In the Ming Dynasty, there was a Guard Command and Envoy Department under the Capital Command and Envoy Department (one of the three departments in the province, responsible for the military affairs of a province). The chief officer was a commander and envoy, the third rank, and the deputy chief was two commanders and commanders, who were the third rank; The subordinates include 4 commanders and ministers, the fourth rank; 2 Zhenfu and Zhenfu (respectively in charge of justice and military discipline), from the fourth rank, experience and experience, from the seventh rank, governor, from the eighth rank, official head, from the ninth rank, warehouse One ambassador and one deputy ambassador each.
The rank of Qianhu is the fifth rank, and the command of Qianshi is the fourth rank. Yang Fan was promoted to guard Qianhu, commanding 3,500 troops, and his rank was promoted from the fifth rank to the fourth rank.
It was a quick promotion.
Considering that Yang Fan was still at Baihu two months ago, Baihu was at the sixth rank. Being promoted to Qianhu is already two levels up, surpassing Deputy Qianhu from the fifth level.
Guard Qianhu Office, referred to as Yu. A special establishment in the Ming Dynasty's guard system. Not affiliated with the guards, but directly under the command of the envoys. Not common. In other words, the Zunhua Guards cannot control Yang Fan, only the Commander and Envoy of Beizhili City can control Yang Fan.
For example, at this time, Yunnan Province had 14,000 households and three imperial offices.
Reducing the command level will also make it easier to issue orders when Chongzhen has arrangements in the future. In the future, when the emperor comes to Yang Fan, he can directly issue orders to the Commander-in-Chief of Northern Zhili through the Fifth Army Commander-in-Chief, and then the Commander-in-Chief will pass the order to Yang Fan.
These edicts were issued in special circumstances and were mainly kept confidential. Otherwise, a sixth-grade official would not be qualified to receive imperial edicts. For those below the fourth rank, battalions are ordered by the Ministry of War. It is enough for the guardsmen to be ordered by the Governor-General of the Fifth Army.
Although Qianhu was given by the emperor to compensate Yang Fan for his military exploits in the Battle of Rock Beach and to be promoted later, in such a short period of time. Yang Fan actually rose to four levels, from Baihu - Deputy Qianhu - Qianhu - Guarding Qianhu - Commanding Qianshi. It has only been more than two months since he was promoted from the sixth grade to the fourth grade. This is already appalling.
Queen Zhou nodded, this was very appropriate. Otherwise, Yang Fan would be promoted too quickly, which would not be a good thing for Yang Fan. If someone is as good as Lin Feng, he would be destroyed. This would be flattering.
Guarding a thousand households is also a thousand households, inconspicuous. Moreover, he was under the direct jurisdiction of the provincial capital, which allowed him to be relatively free and avoid a lot of trouble. After all, the Zunhua Guard could not control him. At the same time, he had a command post in the Zunhua Guard, which also made it easier for him to work in Zunhua and prevent his colleagues from being arrested. Exclude.
Chongzhen was completely in control of the situation at this time, and he was in a good mood. He said with some regret: "Yang Fan's actions are very in line with my wishes. He is decisive in killing and does not mess around. I feel relieved to leave the matter to him. He has prepared many things in front of me." , I didn’t expect that he was prepared in advance, but his qualifications are too junior, and he is also a bit too conservative.”
Queen Zhou was a little surprised and asked: "I think he is very courageous. He didn't show any fear when he confronted Madam Feng Sheng. He didn't show any fear when he went against Wei Wei. Those people sent to destroy Donglin before The three thousand bandits are also showing no mercy."
Chongzhen explained: "Yang Fan has the courage to do things without procrastination. This is an advantage, but I can see that if you push him, if he moves, if you don't arrange something for him, he will simply I'm dawdling around. And you are very cautious when talking to me. Usually you only say 30% when you are 70% sure."
Empress Zhou thought for a moment, and it turned out that Yang Fan was like this, as she learned from Tu Shanyue, but he said that it could be done, and he was generally very reliable.
"I once asked him how many years he would be able to pacify Liaodong with his talent if he was made governor of Jiliao. Guess what he answered."
Queen Zhou smiled and said: "Your Majesty is just joking with him. He was still a hundred households two months ago. Although he can fight, train troops, and is good at running businesses and making money. But if you say this, he must be frightened. In one sentence I don’t dare to say it anymore.”
"Hahaha, I thought it was very funny that he had to keep a straight face all day long at such a young age, pretending to be old-fashioned. It was really a joke at the time." Chongzhen said with a smile: "He had grown up then. He covered his mouth and covered his face directly. Hahaha."
Empress Zhou smiled and said: "Your Majesty is really making fun of honest people."
"But after being dazed for a while, he still answered my question."
Queen Zhou became interested and asked, "What did he say?"
"Five years of gathering, five years of military training, five years of campaigning, and five years of peace." Chongzhen said.
Queen Zhou recited it several times and said slowly: "Although twenty years is a long time, it is still a mature word for seeking a country. Yang Fan is an honest man. He would rather talk more than not be able to fulfill it by then. This is also in line with His cautious nature.”
Chongzhen sighed and said slowly: "The Ming Dynasty is now suffering from internal and external troubles. The situation is getting worse every day. I am very anxious. I just want to put down the foreign troubles as soon as possible so that I can concentrate on solving domestic problems. I really can't wait twenty years." ah."
Queen Zhou also sighed and said: "I took over the inner treasury and found out that there were only 390,000 taels of silver left in the inner treasury, 700,000 pieces of cloth of various colors, 150,000 pieces of silk, shipping warehouse, Beixin There are only more than 1.8 million tons of grain and rice in the seven warehouses of Nanxincang, Jiudaicang, Xingpingcang, Fuxincang and Lumicang. This grain is enough to pay salaries to officials, soldiers and civilians, and to feed the people. We still have to rely on private grain merchants. If grain prices continue to rise this year, there will be no grain to stabilize grain prices. This time Yang Fan bought land for 200,000 taels of silver, which is the largest internal treasury income this year."
Two hundred thousand taels of silver can solve a big problem, which is equivalent to increasing the internal silver inventory by half.
"However, the silver that Yang Fan sent to the palace is of very special quality." Queen Zhou said.
"If the quality is poor, don't worry about it. After all, it is not easy for him to come up with so much silver. Don't chill the hearts of loyal ministers." Chongzhen persuaded him, thinking that the quality of the silver was not very good.
"It's not bad, it's great. When the silver coins came, I saw they were one or two silver coins each. I don't know how they were made. They were very delicate and each one weighed the same. I used a scale to pick them out immediately. I bought a hundred coins, and they are all accurate. And the silver is shining like a mirror." As she said that, the queen took out a silver coin and handed it to Chongzhen.
Chongzhen was also surprised by the exquisiteness of this Xinghe silver coin. I don’t know how it was minted, but this silver coin is probably less than an inch in diameter, round, and has serrated edges.
Seeing Chongzhen touching the serrations of the silver coin with his fingers, Queen Zhou said: "Tu Shanyue said this to prevent someone from using a knife to scrape the silver powder. She said the purity of this silver coin is three nines, which means ninety-nine percent. What is it called Qianzu? Silver. I don’t know how it is purified. How much firepower does it cost?”
Chongzhen looked carefully and saw that the outer ring on the front of the silver coin was a little higher. The writing and patterns inside were all engraved. He didn't know how they were cast. A circle of small characters on the outside read the words Xinghe Bank Foundry in Zunhua County, North Zhili, Ming Dynasty.
In the middle is a peony flower relief with the word "One Yuan" written underneath. Behind in turn are reliefs of a sun and a moon. The small characters on the outer circle read: The silver content is 99% pure silver. There are four horizontal characters below: the first year of Chongzhen.
Queen Zhou said: "This silver coin can also prevent counterfeiting. You can hold it between your fingernails, take a breath, and then put it to your ear to try."
Chongzhen's curiosity was aroused and he thought it was funny, so he held it between his nails and blew on it, then put it to his ear. He heard it clearly, the buzzing sound.
"It's so strange, how is this done?" Chongzhen asked curiously after testing it several times.
"I don't know, I asked the manufacturing office to make a copy, but there is no such buzzing sound."
Chongzhen was very busy, and in his free time today, the two of them had a rare conversation. Then he began to review the memorials.
I even read several memorials, all of which were about rising food prices and insufficient stocks.
Chongzhen was also worried. Now that the canal was frozen, food could not be transported in. He was so worried that his hair fell out.
This is why Yang Fan immediately approved the idea of opening a supermarket to sell grain at low prices. No matter who was willing to transport the grain to the capital to sell it, he would support it.
Judging from the current storage of grain, it won’t take too long to be consumed, and there will be a grain shortage in the beginning of this spring.
When the emperor was worried that there was not enough food in the capital, General Manager Zhao Fu of Zunhua was buying food.
According to the instructions in Yang Fan's letter, Miss Yaoguang presided over the opening of three new grain stores in Zunhua, Dongcheng Xinghe Grain Store, Xicheng Xinghe Grain Store, and Beicheng Xinghe Grain Store, one in each area.
These three Xingheliang stores purchased millet at high prices. At the same time, old grain shipped from modern times is sold at low prices.
Zhao Fu didn't know what kind of mystery the master was up to, but the master's troubles proved to be profitable in the end, and everyone was convinced by this.
So this time it was handled according to the master's wishes without any persuasion from anyone.
