"Go home! Go home! Go home! Go home..."
The entire Yifengmen Street was flooded with slogans of going home!
All the people who came to welcome the triumphant army were crying and shouting to go home! Not to go back to their home in Nanjing, but to go back to the north, to the hometown that has haunted them for more than ten years...
The call to go home quickly infected the soldiers who followed Emperor Zhu back to Nanjing - most of them were veterans who had been in the army for more than ten years, and were all veterans who were born and grew up in the North... Although they did not shout together with the common people, tears filled their eyes on everyone's face, as if they had heard the call of their hometown!
The smile on Zhu Cixiang's face slowly stiffened!
He had already suppressed the calls in the court to return the capital to Beijing, but now the calls from the people to return the capital suddenly arose, and they were louder than the calls in the court to return the capital... Oh, the calls from the people were not complete. Not to return to Dudu, but to go home!
But for Zhu Cixiang, who relied on northerners to rule the southeast, if all the northerners in the southeast went home, who could he rely on?
Moreover, there is nothing wrong with these northerners who want to go home. They are the basis of Emperor Zhu's own rule, so it is not easy for him to suppress their desire to return home.
This seems to be a bit troublesome!
The Zhujie military parade ended with cheers and calls home, and Emperor Zhu returned to the Forbidden City in Nanjing after a long absence.
According to the previously drawn up plan, tomorrow, the morning of the second day of April, he will attend the Fengtian Gate in the Forbidden City in Nanjing in front of the envoys and cabinets of various countries, the Generalissimo's Office, the Political Council, the Metropolitan Procuratorate, Dali Temple, the Imperial College and other government offices. In front of all the officials of the Ming Dynasty, he accepted the letter of surrender submitted by Emperor Kangxi of the Qing Dynasty and personally announced the complete destruction of the Qing Dynasty. This was not for the officials and people of the Ming Dynasty, but for the envoys of various countries stationed in Nanjing. .
Now Daming has become an important member of the international community!
In Zhu Cixi's Celestial Empire system, there is the concept of "foreign country"!
As long as a country that has not signed a "vassal treaty" with the Ming Dynasty, no matter how big or small, strong or weak, it is a foreign country.
And foreign countries are divided into world empires that are equal to the Ming Dynasty, large independent countries that are the first level lower than the Ming Dynasty, small independent countries that are the second level lower than the Ming Dynasty, and foreign vassals that are the third level lower than the Ming Dynasty.
This kind of foreign policy that divides countries according to their size, strength, and weakness is obviously contrary to the diplomatic line that all countries are equal regardless of their size, strength, wealth, or poverty... But in the 17th century, a Sesame Big How can a small country be on an equal footing with the Celestial Empire? Nothing! Small countries themselves don’t dare!
In the current world, the six countries that can stand on an equal footing with the Ming Dynasty are Spain, the Ottomans, France, the Netherlands, England, and the Holy Roman Empire.
Now these six countries have established embassies in Nanjing (the original embassies were all located in Shanghai, and they were all moved to Nanjing in the sixth year of Hongxing), and Ming Dynasty also sent missions to these six countries.
In the official certificate of credence given by the Ming Dynasty to these six countries, as long as these six countries request it, their monarchs (heads of state) can be called His Majesty the Great Emperor! In other words, he is on an equal footing with Zhu Cixiang!
In addition to these six countries, there are six independent countries such as Portugal, Sweden, Denmark, Japan, India, Mongolia, and the Rakshasa Kingdom. They also sent envoys to Nanjing, and Ming Dynasty also sent envoys to them.
However, the size of the missions sent by both sides is not large, basically just setting up an office.
In the letters of credence submitted by the Ming Dynasty to these six countries, the highest monarch (head of state) of the six countries can only be His Majesty the King, and cannot be called the Great Emperor.
Therefore, the credentials submitted by Ming Dynasty to Japan were not to the emperor, but to General Zhengyi - the emperor could not recognize it, Zhu Cixi was only the emperor, and the Japanese emperor was older than him. How could this be possible? Where to put the face of the Chinese Empire? So the Ming Dynasty and Japan have been feuding for a long time, so let’s just have an emperor versus a general!
Anyway, after the Ming Dynasty established diplomatic relations with Western countries, it also saw non-monarchies. Now the Ming Dynasty calls the top leader of the British Kingdom "Guo Guozhu" and the top leader of the Dutch Kingdom "Ling Yi Zheng". It doesn't matter if you have one more General. As for the Emperor, he doesn't exist...
In addition to the above twelve countries, there are the tribute envoys sent to the Ming Dynasty by six foreign vassals such as Annam, Siam, Laos, Chenla, Korea, Chahar, and Tumote. The envoys sent by the vassal states to the Celestial Dynasty are all called tribute envoys. They are Come to pay tribute!
The envoys sent by the Celestial Dynasty to the vassal state are called supervisory envoys, and they are nominally to supervise the vassal state!
In addition to the envoys from these eighteen countries, three candidate vassal states also sent envoys, namely the Ryukyu Kingdom, the Boni Kingdom, and the Sulu Kingdom.
These three countries have submitted applications to conclude the "Treaty of Suzerains and Vassals" and become vassal states of the Ming Dynasty. However, due to some controversial issues, Emperor Zhu did not approve it.
And the official annihilation of the Qing Dynasty (Great Mongolia) is now also a major international event - the Qing Mongolia has also gone global!
Therefore, Emperor Zhu must give an explanation to the international community, and then he has to wipe the butt of the Qing Dynasty...
However, after returning to the Forbidden City, Emperor Zhu was in no mood to prepare for his surrender tomorrow. Instead, he ordered people to summon Zheng Zhilong and Shen Tingyang, who had just arrived in Nanjing, to the Western Building in the Forbidden City.
Zheng Zhilong, the richest man in the Ming Dynasty, Shen Tingyang, the second richest man, and Zhu Cixiang, the richest man, just closed the door and discussed how to pretend to be poor and how to raise money to develop the north.
Of course, pretending to be poor was to delay the move north.
The development of the north was, on the one hand, to digest the results of victory, and on the other hand, to give an explanation to the northern refugees who supported Emperor Zhu's rule.
"Marquis Chongming, let me tell you the truth. Although the prime minister of the Ming Dynasty is Wei Zaode, the one who really holds the power is Duke Quan! What does Wei Prime Minister know? He doesn't even know how much money the court has! The court's budget for spending money He is not responsible for the final accounts of the matter. The audit of the finances of various provinces and governments is not something that he, the prime minister, can handle... He can’t even understand the audit report! So the real prime minister of the cabinet is actually in charge of Duke Quan, who has great financial power!
And the task I want to entrust to you is to serve as the Minister of the Ministry of Hubu and the Minister of the Ministry of Industry. This is one more minister than the Minister of Hubu of Duke Quan! Moreover, the Ministry of Personnel, the Ministry of War, and the Ministry of Rites in the capital were all fictitious, and the ministers left behind by the Duke of Yu did not have much real power. The real ones in charge were the Ministry of Husbandry and the Ministry of Work in the capital. Among them, the general manager of the Ministry of Household Affairs in Henan, Shandong, Shanxi, Hebei, and Beijing is responsible for clearing fields, inspecting land, and mining in these places. After the inspection is completed, he is also responsible for disposal and distribution. What a great responsibility!
The Ministry of Industry in the capital has even more things to do. First, it is to manage the river engineering in Henan, Shandong, Shanxi, Hebei, and Beijing. The Yellow River needs to be overhauled and the canals need to be repaired as much as possible; second, the official roads in various places must be renovated; third, Manage ports and commercial ports; fourth, repair important cities and passes.
These four major matters entrusted to the Ministry of Industry in the capital are extremely important, and they are costly and laborious. I have thought about it, except for you, Marquis Chongming, who else in the world has such management capabilities? Marquis Chongming, are you willing to be my prime minister of the Northern Kingdom? "
Prime Minister of the Northern Kingdom!
Zhu Cixiang really wants to reuse Shen Tingyang this time!
Shen Tingyang was a little confused. He never expected that Zhu Cihong would throw so many things at him - he almost left the restoration and reconstruction of the north to himself!
"Your Majesty," Shen Tingyang thought for a moment, "does the imperial court really have so much money to do so many big projects in the north? We can't recruit laborers now. If we have to hire laborers, the labor costs will be expensive."
Zhu Cihong glanced at Zheng Zhilong, the God of Wealth, who said: "There are so many big projects in the north, and it is impossible for the court to squeeze them out of the fiscal surplus. However, the court can borrow money, raise money through the sale of properties, and use government-run businesses to The way of doing business... and some big projects can simply be left to businessmen.
In short, there are many ways to raise money, and we can all try them. "
