"Father, this is Tagawa Shichizaemon whom I mentioned to you. He is the second son of Lord Izumi and a young genius who is good at naval battles!"
Zhu Cihong ceremoniously introduced Tagawa Nanaemon to Emperor Chongzhen. The emperor looked unhappy - why did Kou Baimen leave? So beautiful and versatile, but now the oiran of the Jiaofang Division finally came to Xuanhu Palace and played just a few pieces of music, which was not enough!
After hearing his son talk about Tagawa Nanzaemon, Emperor Chongzhen turned his mind away from Kou Baimen and took a look at the young man who came with Zheng Zhilong and Zheng Sen. He looked quite talented, but he was a little darker (tanned). ), and also has a bitter face.
"Isn't Duke Quan's surname Zheng?" Emperor Chongzhen was a little surprised. "Why is his son's surname Tian? What's going on? Is he his biological son?"
Zheng Zhilong felt a little confused after hearing this question - how could he not be his biological child? How similar they look! All so dark...
"Father, his surname is Tian Chuan," Zhu Cixiang explained, "This is the mother's surname."
"Why do you take your mother's surname?" Emperor Chongzhen asked again, "Do all children in Japan have their maiden name?"
"No," Zheng Zhilong explained, "Because my father-in-law, Emperor Tianchuan Yu, had no children, I asked my second son to change his surname to Tianchuan and inherit the family line."
"Oh." Emperor Chongzhen nodded, "What should we do now? Change our surname back to Zheng?"
Zhu Cixiang took over the topic and said: "Of course I have to change my surname back to Zheng, otherwise I sound like a Japanese, how can I marry Princess Kunxing?"
What? Marry a princess?
As soon as Emperor Hongxing's words came out, Chongzhen, Zheng Zhilong, Zheng Sen, and Tagawa Shichizaemon were all stunned.
How is this going?
Why is this kid Nanizaemon so lucky that he just picked up a princess for nothing as soon as he returned home?
Zhu Cixiang smiled and said to Chongzhen: "I am already nineteen years old. The marriage cannot be postponed no matter what, but a good match is hard to find... I think the second son of Quanguo Mansion is good, talented and proficient." Naval warfare is the backbone of the country!"
Chongzhen said in his heart: This Zheng Er looks very ordinary! Where is the talent? You traitor wants to sell your sister because the Zheng family has a lot of money... No, because the Zheng family has a lot of money, you should buy a few more girls from the Zheng family. The betrothal gift is not as big as the dowry! Moreover, Nizi is very rich now, and there is no need to sell his sister for money.
It turns out that after Emperor Hongxing ascended the throne, the work of clearing land and clearing land was intensified on all the sites firmly controlled by the Nanming court. By the end of March of the 20th year of Chongzhen, the number of registered military lands exceeded 70 million acres. , doubled from the 35 million acres before the Huguang War.
Moreover, the work of land clearing and land inspection is still ongoing in each province. When the land in the eight directly governed provinces of Jiangbei, Jiangnan, Jiangxi, Hubei, Hunan, Zhejiang, Fujian, and Guangdong is completely sorted out, it is entirely possible that the number of military fields will exceed 100 million!
One hundred million acres of military land! The land rent that can be stored in the treasury alone is probably more than 30 to 40 million shibai rice.
Of course, the land rent that Chongzhen could collect in twenty years was not that much, but now that the 70 million acres of registered land have not been lost, there are still 25 million stone white rice (in storage).
In addition, Hubei's land redemption rice can reach the warehouse at least 15 million dan, and the military land rent is 40 million dan! And the income from commercial taxes and customs duties will never be less than 12 to 3 million taels of silver plus 2 to 3 million shiguan of grain and rice.
I think that when Zhu Yuanzhang became emperor, he could only receive 33 million shi (of course, at that time, there were more than 300 guards in the world who were responsible for exterminating the country and killing the tribe), and the commercial taxes and customs duties were extremely small. Worth mentioning,
Now Emperor Zhu Cixiang, the Hongxing Emperor, has surpassed Emperor Hongwu in terms of making money!
However, Emperor Chongzhen didn't know that the filial son Emperor Hongxing's spending skills were unmatched by his ancestor Emperor Hongwu. He was really spending money like water!
Among them, the largest expenditure is the resettlement and relief of refugees in the North and disaster relief in the eight southern provinces. There are now more than 10 million Northland refugees living in the southeast, and about three to four million of them need relief and resettlement from the Ming Dynasty. This is what the sixteen generals' mansions do! A lot was spent in the 19th year of Chongzhen, and the expenditure in this area was even greater in the 20th year of Chongzhen! After all, I can no longer go to big restaurants!
In addition, many places in the eight southern provinces have been hit by disasters in the past two years, mostly caused by floods and droughts. In the 17th, 18th, and 19th years, we held on without any help, suppressing the trouble wherever it happened... This year, the finances are finally a little more relaxed, so naturally we have to release some money and food for relief.
Another expense is the big work everywhere!
One of the most important tasks is to control the river engineering of the Yellow River (the lower reaches of the Yellow River and the Huaihe River) - the Yellow River has been diverted to take over the Huaihe River for hundreds of years. Due to sedimentation, river uplift and other reasons, the lower reaches of the Yellow River (the Xuzhou-Haizhou section) and the middle and lower reaches of the Huaihe River have become There are rivers hanging on the ground. As long as there is no drought, there will probably be some floods. If it's small it's called flooding, if it's big it's a flood...
Since the early years of Chongzhen, due to the country's internal and external troubles and lack of money to manage it, the risk of Huanghuai flooding has been increasing day by day. By the 20th year of Chongzhen, the imperial court was finally a little more comfortable, so it was natural to arrange a budget for flood control.
Another important issue is the cost of building cities everywhere. These cities are roughly divided into two categories. One is the garrison city, which is used to resettle northern refugees and the family members of the Beifu army; the other is defensive bastions, which are mainly built on both sides of the Huaihe River to prevent the Qing army from moving south again.
And the third largest expenditure is, of course, military spending! The Ming Dynasty has more and more troops now. Not counting the feudal armies, the troops under the jurisdiction of the Generalissimo's Mansion and the Ministry of War alone are about to reach 400,000!
The cost of military pay and rations is staggering, and equipment and training are also required! We also need to prepare for a massive Northern Expedition...
Therefore, according to the budget made by Wei Zaode, Chen Rui, and Wu Xiang, the income of more than 40 million stone meters and 12 to 3 million taels of silver has probably already gone somewhere... .However, there was no deficit in the end, and there was indeed no need to exchange Zhu Aona for silver.
Zhu Cihong then said: "I will give Shichizaemon another name, let's call it meritorious service... Please give me some praise, and in the future, I will do more meritorious deeds on the sea for my Ming Dynasty!"
Zheng Chenggong has already been tricked! Therefore, Tagawa Shichizaemon can only be regarded as another "gong". Now Zhu Cihong has many warriors called "degong", so he gave "Tagawa" the name "jiangong" and expected him to go to the ocean to make contributions. !
Although "Tian Qi" lost in the first battle, it's ugly, but it doesn't matter. Failure is the mother of success!
Besides, the failure of "Tian Qi" was actually arranged by his good brother Zheng Sen... The Toyotomi loyalists on Jeju Island are still of great use! But it can't be wiped out in a daze.
"I thank Your Majesty for the name!" Tagawa Nanzaemon, oh, it should be called Zheng Jiangong now. Of course he was excited and quickly kowtowed to Zhu Cihong to thank him.
"There is also a marriage!" Zhu Cixiang smiled, "Jiangong, you will soon be my consort of the Ming Dynasty and the husband of Princess Kunxing! Why don't you thank me quickly?"
Zheng Jiangong glanced at me, Zheng Zhilong, with the corner of his eye. When he saw his shocked face, he knew that the old man was very happy. He kowtowed quickly and said, "Kowtow, thank you!"
Zheng Zhilong had no choice but to kowtow to Emperor Zhu. Zhu Cihong waved his hand and signaled him to get up quickly, and then said with a smile: "This time, it's a kiss... Jiangong is a prodigy in naval warfare. He is also my brother-in-law and the consort of the Ming Dynasty. From now on, he will stay in Jiangnan and serve as the director of the Shanghai Naval Academy! Jiangong, you must work hard, the navy of the Ming Dynasty depends entirely on you! "
Zheng Jiangong's face turned red. He didn't know anything about water fighting! The war against Jeju Island's Toyotomi Yichu was a disgrace. If he hadn't known that the warriors of the Ming Dynasty were brave enough to endure defeat, and would not think about it no matter how much they lost, he would have committed seppuku... That's it. It's really shameful that he is regarded as a naval combat prodigy for his level!
