Chapter 53 Snakes and Scorpions
In this chapter, we talk about the death of Eunuch Liu.
Death from snakes and scorpions.
Liu Jin was killed by a group of civilian officials, a group of generals, and a group of eunuchs. The person who stabbed Eunuch Liu first was named Zhang Yong. This man was not only an eunuch, but also one of the former "Eight Tigers".
The Anhua King of Ningxia, Zhu Zhi (a pseudonym for "Zhi") Xiu (pronounced "Fan", meaning shovel), was named just like his name - a shovel placed by the old Zhu family in Ningxia - he was a fool.
There are two types of princes in the Ming Dynasty. One is the one-character prince, often using the name of the country in the Spring and Autumn Period and the Warring States Period, such as King of Qin, King of Chu, King of Zhou, etc. The next best thing is the two-character prince, who uses the name of the county. For example, Zheng Chenggong is called the prince of Yanping. This Zhu Zhixiu is a second-class prince, a prince who is always mentally unbalanced: Why can others be granted a land of plenty, but he is brought to this place where he eats sand and drinks wind and does not shit?
Fools all like others to praise them, and they will give money to them if they praise them well, so people from all walks of life will do what they want. There was a goddess named Wang Jiuer who praised her the most: "You look like an emperor"! Wang Jiuer specially raised a parrot and taught him a sentence: "Old emperor, old emperor!" When he saw Zhu Zhixiu, he opened the bird's cage, and the parrot shouted, and the fool burst into laughter: "Bonus!"
Idiots all love to be lively, and they like to invite a group of people to the house to entertain guests and put on a show to pretend to be the boss. Civil servants of some status looked down upon this fool, and no one cared to talk to him, so they always took a group of illiterate military generals to drink and brag. On the one hand, the rough people are depressed because they are looked down upon by the civil servants all day long and are not allowed to play. On the other hand, the free wine and meat in the palace are free of charge. Come here, eat and take it, it is so enjoyable. As time went by, the relationship seemed to be very good.
Originally, there was nothing wrong with him just having fun, but it happened that Liu Jin sent someone to measure the acres of military garrison land, and found out that many military generals had privately occupied the land. Seeing that they were about to vomit out what they had eaten, everyone was very angry. In particular, An Weixue, the right deputy governor of Shaanxi Province, was very resolute in implementing Liu Eunuch's policy. "He made an agreement with the general of the army to issue a strict ban, collect grain and replenish the horses that had been owed to the army for many years, and many of the people who were beaten were severely injured." "——If you can't make up for the shortfall, you'll be slapped with a big slap in the butt. (By the way, in the report of the civil servants who later criticized Liu Jin, it was said that An Weixue repeatedly insulted the soldiers' wives. Deputy ministerial-level cadre, inspection team leader and provincial Secretary of the Communist Party of China, go insult the beggar’s wife? Haha. Of course, the best indicator of character is the issue of style. This trick is a traditional program, understand!)! Everyone got together to drink and curse, and while drinking and cursing, the fool got a little carried away: "How about we just rebel? Didn't the sacred bird say that Gu is the emperor? That unlucky boy in the palace and Emperor Jianwen They are about the same age, Gu and Grandpa Cheng are also about the same age, so cutting off the big one and the small one is an excellent tradition of our old Zhu family, we can’t throw it away!”
So it was the opposite.
As the saying goes, it takes three years for a scholar to rebel. What about fools rebelling? Just do it!
The faster you react, the faster you die. Eighteen days later, the farce ended. The process is ridiculous and has little to do with the topic of this article, so I won’t say more.
The slogan of the rebellion was: "Kill Liu Jin, Qingjun side." It was quite uncreative. The distant ones were Liu Bi of the Han Dynasty, and the nearest one was Zhu Di, the founder of the Han Dynasty. The slogans they shouted were all the Qing Dynasty side. What’s more interesting is that after the rebellion’s proclamation was sent out, all the towns in the border areas directly ignored it after receiving it - no one took the fool seriously, most of them pretended not to see it! Only the town of Yansui was able to report the proclamation to the imperial court.
Emperor Wuzong Zhengde was a little scared when he received the news. It needs to be suppressed, send troops!
Who should be sent to lead the army?
Yang Yiqing.
Yang Yiqing's previous position was called the Trilateral General System, and when he heard it, he knew that he had great power. In addition to controlling trilateral military affairs, his main job is to preside over Ningxia's horse administration and build the Great Wall. This kind of construction project is a big and expensive project today with excavators. In ancient times, when it relied entirely on people pulling and carrying it, it was even more of a gold-eating beast. Liu Jin found out about the problems in the accounts, so he first arrested Yang Yiqing and sent him to prison. After the intercession of the bachelor Li Dongyang (note that he was not Li Mengyang) and others, he allowed him to retire and go home.
King Anhua rebelled and needed someone who was familiar with the local situation and had military experience to lead the army to put down the rebellion, so Zhang Cai, the Minister of Civil Affairs, recommended Yang Yiqing to Liu Jin.
This Zhang Cai can be said to be the real elite of the Ming Dynasty - everyone knows Zhang Juzheng's whipping method and the examination method, which forcibly extended the life of the Ming Dynasty for decades - and the prototype of the examination method came from Zhang Caizhi's hand!
Liu Jin recommended Yang Yiqing to Zhengde without saying a word - Eunuch Liu felt in his heart that you embezzled public funds, I caught you, someone interceded, and I let you go. You should be grateful for this, right?
Unfortunately, Yang Yiqing didn't think so. What Mr. Yang thinks is: cutting off someone's financial path is like killing one's parents, and the hatred is irreconcilable!
In addition to Yang Yiqing, Zhengde also sent an eunuch to supervise the army: Zhang Yong.
Zhang Yong was once one of the "Eight Tigers" alongside Liu Jin. But times have changed, and at this moment, she has quite a personal grudge with Liu Jin. The reason may be that Eunuch Liu was jealous - because Eunuch Zhang was good at riding and shooting, and was very brave, so he was very popular with Emperor Wu. Wu Zong loved the military the most. Not only did he personally go into battle to fight against the little Mongolian prince, but he also once "killed an enemy with my own hands"! This kind of emperor is definitely second to none among the emperors who defended the throne in history. He liked Zhang Yongshun and called Zhang Yong "the strong man Zhang" - so Eunuch Liu was a little unhappy. One time, he wanted to send Zhang Yong to Nanjing. Eunuch Zhang ran to Zhengde and cried. The little emperor is a soft-hearted person. Seeing Eunuch Zhang crying with runny nose and tears, he felt a little embarrassed: It's not that I don't love you, it was Liu Jin who suggested it. Why don't you call Liu Jin to make it clear. Even though Eunuch Zhang has a woman-like body, he has a very manly personality. When enemies meet, he will grab him and beat him without saying a word. Eunuch Liu had a strong mouth and was weak with his fists and kicks. Eunuch Zhang pinned him to the ground and beat him violently... The little emperor quickly broke up the fight and called Lai Gu Dayong to be the peacemaker. After everyone had a peaceful drink together, the matter was over. .
Eunuch Liu thought that the matter should be forgotten, but Eunuch Zhang did not think so and took a grudge.
Zhang Yong, the eunuch who supervises the army, is very different from the other father-in-laws who supervise the army. Because it was a prince of the clan who openly rebelled, his nature was far beyond that of other ordinary rebels or bandits. Zhengde personally awarded him the title of "Governor-General Military Eunuch", and also gave him a golden melon, ax and ax to represent his authority, and he was also engraved with a gold seal (previously, it was given to a copper seal) ), personally put on a military uniform and went to Donghua Gate to see him off in a grand manner!
The use of eunuchs to supervise the army in the Ming Dynasty is an old tradition left by Zhu Di.
At that time, the Yunnan ethnic minorities rebelled and were suppressed by Zhu Yuanzhang. All adult men were beheaded, and women were either divided up among the sergeants or sold together with the babies. The smart ones among the dolls were castrated and sent to the palace to be successors to the eunuch business. The palace could not use so many, so they were distributed twice to the various palaces.
Among them, there was a Hui boy named Ma He who was assigned to Prince Yan's Mansion in Peiping and followed Zhu Di.
Time passed by, and the boy grew up into a young man. Zhu Di also shouted to Qingjun and turned against him.
Once in Zhending, Hebei, Zhu Di and his group were blocked by a hundred thousand troops loyal to Zhu Yunwen. The leader was Li Jinglong, the son of the famous Li Wenzhong. There was a huge disparity in strength between the two sides. Seeing that it was impossible to escape the fate of the entire army being annihilated, Chengzu made a cruel move, which was called "I have to trap the wolf even if I have to give it up": use himself as bait!
At that time, the military formations set up by both sides were linear square formations. The two sides faced each other first, then shouted, and rushed to kill each other - generally speaking, the one with more people would definitely win, there was no suspense.
The two sides had just arranged their formations. Zhu Di took a few followers and rode to the opposite side. He stopped his mount at a distance of more than ten steps and greeted the opposing soldiers one by one:
"Hi, I'm Judy. How are you?"
"My nephew said he offered a reward of 10,000 taels for catching me. Don't listen to him. That kid is talking nonsense! Surrender to me and I'll give you five taels in cash! How about it?"
"Damn it, why are you so ugly..."
I walked all the way and kept my mouth occupied. Originally, there were no photos at that time and no one knew what Judy looked like. But now, everyone knows that the person in front of them is the real owner! When everyone looked at King Yan who was just a stone's throw away, it was like looking at a walking 500,000 yuan! As long as you stretch out your hand, you can grab endless glory and wealth for a lifetime. How can you, the beggars of the Ming soldiers, endure it?
Finally, someone shouted loudly and rushed out of the team to catch Uncle Five Hundred Wan... The uncle turned the horse's head and ran away - but Uncle Five Hundred Wan didn't turn around and run back, but seemed to be dizzy, lying sideways. , run along the opponent's military formation!
None of the sergeants could watch the golden mountain within their reach being caught by others before their eyes. They all rushed to catch up without waiting for orders!
Li Jinglong, who is under the command of the Chinese Army, is so happy: Do you think you are stupid? If you don't run into your own military formation, you run diagonally. Where can you run? Hahaha.
When the fun is over, look left and right: Oh, let me go! Where are my people? !
Zhu Di used his body as a bait to stir up the lines of Li Jinglong's army. The army was in chaos and everyone was chasing him. Only General Li Jinglong and his few Chinese troops were left alone on the battlefield!
The drums beat passionately.
Zhu Di's army had been waiting for this moment, and pressed forward in a daze!
Li Jinglong ran away, and King Yan's troops chopped down the generals' flags. The army chasing Zhu Di was already in a chaotic mess. He turned around and saw that the generals and flags of the Chinese army had fallen down. He shouted "defeat" and ran away!
This is a battle, a great victory for King Yan!
Chasing the Ming Army (yes, it was called the Ming Army, Zhu Di's own army was called the Yan Army at the time) for more than twenty miles!
Zhu Di was pursued not only by soldiers on foot, but also by generals on horseback.
However, they encountered an evil star: Ma He.
Ma He Cima followed closely behind King Zhu Di of Yan and killed more than ten enemy generals at close range!
The place where the battle took place is called Zhengcunba.
After the war, Zhu Di laughed loudly. Looking at Ma He who was covered in blood, he solemnly declared: "Ma He! Today, I refer to the land as my surname and give it to you. From now on, whenever I call your name, I will remember you today! From now on! , you will be called Zheng He!"
Zheng He!
The Three Treasures Eunuch, Zheng He who went to the West!
To this day, we are still talking about this name.
! ! !
Knowing this period of history, when we look at the history of the Ming Dynasty, it is not surprising that eunuchs were everywhere.
It is said that Yang Yiqing and Zhang Yonggang had not gone far before they got the news that King Anhua had been captured alive by a local guerrilla general (well, almost at the level of a regiment and battalion commander) led by more than a hundred people. To put it simply, since Zhu Tuantuan rebelled, he first killed several local officials, and then...then he didn't know what to do! He huddled in the city and did nothing, waiting for the imperial court to send troops to beat him. He also put a guerrilla named Qiu Yue under house arrest. I heard that Cao Xiong, the commander-in-chief of Shaanxi Province, was the first to lead troops to suppress the attack, so he sent only a few thousand people to resist. Qiu Yue took the opportunity to lead his servants into the palace, and caught the fool with three strikes, and the farce ended.
The two sent the large troops from the Beijing camp back to the capital and led several hundred personal guards to the local area to deal with the aftermath. Yang Yiqing came to Zhang Yong to discuss: Do you hate Liu Jin? I hate it too. It can kill you!
The reason is ready: Didn’t King Anhua’s rebellion call for the death of Liu Jin? Are rebels bad? Bad! Look, even such a bad rebel hates him, which shows that he is the worst! It's him who is causing trouble, causing the Chao Gang to be weak and the border to be uneasy!
When Zhang Yong returned to the court, Emperor Wu gave him a banquet, and everyone drank together as before.
It was almost dawn, Liu Jin was a little sleepy, so she went back to the house and fell asleep. Zhang Yong immediately "sobered up" and kowtowed on the ground: "I want to join Liu Jin!" Yang Yiqing recited the crimes he listed. The other eunuchs who had been dealt with by Liu Jin fell to the ground to respond.
Wu Zong, who was drunk and confused, listened to everyone's accusations and sighed: "Liu Jin has failed me."
Zhang Yong immediately caught the conversation: "What do you think we should do?"
The drunken Wu Zong responded casually: "You can do whatever you want."
Zhang Yong immediately led people to break in, arrested Eunuch Liu, and threw him into prison.
Then came the house raids.
Of course I copied a lot of things. We know that Liu Jin is a father-in-law, not a saint. However, I would not believe the amounts recorded in the book - "240,000 gold ingots, another 57,000 taels, five million silver ingots, and another 1,580,000 taels..." …”
hehe.
Let’s not talk about gold, let’s just talk about the five million ingots of silver ingots. We don’t count the large ingots of fifty taels. Even if Eunuch Liu’s hobby is counting steel ingots, let’s replace them all with small ingots of five taels – that’s 25 million taels!
The three major campaigns of Wanli included the Battle of Ningxia, which cost two million taels, the Battle of Bozhou, which also cost more than two million taels, and the seven-year campaign to resist Japanese aggression and aid Korea, which cost more than seven million taels—a total of one thousand taels of silver. Just one million taels! What was the total national income of the Zhengde Dynasty and the Ming Dynasty?
Liu Jin, who was in prison, asked someone to cry to Wu Zong: "The old slave was taken naked from the bed and put into the prison. It's cold. Can you give the old slave one or two pieces of clothing to cover his body?"
Wu Zong was a kind-hearted and kind-hearted boy, so he immediately asked someone to pick out a hundred old clothes and send them to Liu Jin. Then he gave advice on how to deal with it: he was demoted to Fengyu (low-level eunuch) and sent to Fengyang to live idle.
How does this work? Liu Jin must die! Otherwise, Wu Zong was kind, if one day Liu Jin found an opportunity to cry in front of him, everything would be in vain - Zhang Yongke knew this kind of thing firsthand.
Zhang Yong went to the cabinet with Wu Zong's order to discuss countermeasures together.
Immediately, memorials from the outer court civil servant group to Liu Jin came in like snow, and were delivered to Wuzong's desk through the hands of the eunuchs in the inner court.
This is far from enough.
Everyone unanimously decided to search the house for the second time.
Well, what was "copied" this time was no longer gold and silver.
Not to mention standard rebel equipment such as crossbows and armors, fake jade seals and fake dragon robes are all available.
Moreover, there is something powerful: a folding fan with two sharp blades hidden in the fan ribs!
This is not only a rebellion, Liu Jin also wants to directly assassinate the emperor!
Dead! Punishment.
Seeing that many people firmly believe in this and speak plausibly, I just want to ask: Is that thing wrapped in the skulls of these people brains or brains?
Regardless of the lack of important military weapons such as crossbows and armors, which are not useful and cannot be hidden, nor the social consensus that people with physical disabilities in the superstitious era cannot be "emperors" (sons of heaven), let's just talk about plotting to assassinate the emperor - —To kill the emperor, wouldn’t it be better to just use a ready-made genuine one for the dragon robe and jade seal? How deep a hole must be in your mind to make yourself unhappy by making a bunch of fake things in advance! What's more, a single dragon robe requires hundreds of thousands of laborers and takes more than half a year to complete - who can hide this? However, the rules of the Ming Dynasty's game are that just listing the crimes is enough, no evidence is needed, and no logical thinking is required.
Finally, a few small things.
One. When Wu Zong was still the prince, just six months later, the Ministry of Rites issued a memorial to his father, Emperor Xiaozong: According to the etiquette and law convention, a copy of the official documents and memorials of the world should be given to the prince, so that the prince can be familiar with military and state affairs from an early age!
Don't laugh. This is not pedantic, this is a chicken thief at home! This is called "the merit of support"! In the future, when the prince ascends the throne and becomes the emperor... "When you were still an infant, it was the old ministers who stood up and spoke uprightly for you to inherit the great rule today."
The subtext is - even if Xiaozong only loves Empress Zhang now (by the way, among the ancient emperors, the only one who had only one wife was Xiaozong), if the guarantee is not enough, he will suppress the flower and give birth to a little kid, and Aiwujiwu may want to change the prince. . This is a bet for a rainy day.
Understand?
Second. Kang Hai saved Li Mengyang - "Save me from the mountain", remember? From then on, he was marked as an eunuch. Liu Jin fell, and Kang Hai was of course implicated and imprisoned. And Li Mengyang was very popular at this time. Then what?
We said it before: don’t say a word, be silent.
Fortunately, no problem was found in Kang Hai, so he reduced his position to serve the people and returned home. Kang Hai saw through those guys who were full of benevolence, righteousness and morality. From then on, he paid attention to the mountains and rivers and stopped paying attention to those hypocrites.
Third. The mastermind behind the overthrow of Liu Jin was Yang Yiqing. Well, Liu Jin ruined Yang Yiqing's job, and he holds a grudge.
So, who recommended Yang Yiqing to be revived?
Zhang Cai. Zhang Cai, the Minister of Civil Service, who had a good relationship with Liu Jin, and Zhang Cai, the original inventor of the imperial examination method in the Ming Dynasty.
Hey, you have a good relationship with Liu Jin? Eunuch!
Grasp!
The crime was to assist Liu Jin in his rebellion.
During the trial, Zhang Cai asked the judge: "I have already reached the position of Minister of the Ministry of Personnel. Is this position considered the official's leader? He said that I helped Liu Jin rebel, can he reward me as a deputy emperor? The emperor, the empress, the earth, Taizu and Taizong can learn from my heart! You are all scholars, so you must be conscientious!"
What was Yang Yiqing's reaction?
silence. Haha, what is conscience? How much does it cost per pound?
Zhang Cai died tragically in prison (some say he was poisoned). Mother, wife and children were sent to Lingnan and never returned to the Central Plains until their death!
Fourth. King Anhua rebelled, and the first general to raise troops to quell the rebellion was Cao Xiong, who was the commander-in-chief of Shaanxi at the time. In terms of merit, he should be second only to Qiu Yue, the guerrilla who captured Zhu Zhixiu alive. However, unfortunately, he is Liu Jin's in-law! Therefore, the end result is exile as a border guard! The dignified commander of the military region who was the first to raise troops to put down the rebellion went to be a leading soldier. What's more, the so-called official history "Wuzong Shilu" compiled by civil servants directly tampered with the fact that he was the first to raise an army to put down the rebellion - this historical truth was discovered in Yang Yiqing's private diary!
The so-called gentlemen are just the side they use to show others. The other side, their true selves, are snakes and scorpions!
Knowledge points in this article: Steal, robber, and thief have similar meanings today, but there was a big difference in ancient times.
Steal: thief, thief.
Robber: A robber who robs on the road (just robs on the road, not with the goal of rebelling against the imperial court).
Thief: A large group of bandits who openly rebel.
