"Long live Lord, what are you talking about...recruiting troops?" asked a green-robed official with a fat head and big ears who had never asked for food.
"This is..." Zhu Cixiang turned to look at Bi Ziyan. He did not remember seeing this person during the palace examination in the fourth year of Chongzhen.
Bi Ziyan immediately said: "Your Majesty, this is Zhang Haogu, the magistrate of Suide. He was a Jinshi in the first year of Chongzhen and is from Qimen County, Huizhou Prefecture, South Zhili."
The fat man saluted Zhu Youjian with a smile on his face, "Long live my Lord, I am the 108th Jinshi of Wuchen Branch in the first year of Chongzhen. I have been an official in Shaanxi for more than three years."
"Have you been an official in Shaanxi for more than three years?" Zhu Youjian took a look at Zhang Haogu, who was fat and big-eared. He looked like a wealthy man. It seemed that he was not poor in Shaanxi!
Zhang Haogu replied: "Yes, I have been an official in this poor and remote area of Shaanxi for more than three years."
"You should be an official who is good at making money...you look much richer than other officials," Zhu Youjian said half-jokingly, "What? Can you make a fortune in Suidezhou where it doesn't rain?"
After hearing this, Zhang Haogu quickly shook his head and said: "Long live my lord, how can I make money? Since I was a child, I have regarded gold and silver as dirt, and I only seek the knowledge of saints. After becoming an official, I have become a breeze, and I have never been greedy for money. !”
"Treat gold and silver like dirt?" Zhu Youjian looked at Zhang Haogu for a while, "Then what does your father do?"
"My father is a scholar," Zhang Haogu said. "He is still studying hard in his hometown."
"Do you have any fame?" Zhu Youjian asked again.
"He has no fame yet," Zhang Haogu replied, "but he is determined to take the imperial examination. He is still studying hard when he is over sixty years old. He has taken the exam 20 times and failed to pass the exam, but he is not discouraged. I believe he will be successful in his career. What you have built!”
This Zhang Haogu was only twenty-five or six at most, and he was only twenty-two or three years old when he was admitted as a Jinshi more than three years ago... But he, his father, had been in the exams all his life and could not even become a scholar.
This whole life has been wasted like this! But here in the Ming Dynasty, there are still quite a lot of scholars who can't become a scholar after taking exams all their lives.
But without the reputation of being a scholar, there are no privileges or exemptions.
"What about your grandfather?" Zhu Youjian broke the casserole and asked, "Is he also a scholar?"
"My father-in-law is a Confucian businessman, doing business in Yangzhou," Zhang Haogu said with a smile, "he has quite a bit of assets..."
His family turned out to be a big salt merchant, so no wonder he "treats gold and silver like dirt." I'm afraid it would be more appropriate to spend money like dirt, right? In the southeast, there should be many wealthy people spending money like this, right? Just refuse to pay taxes! Zhu Youjian sighed and said to himself: Fortunately, these rich people in the southeast are both businessmen and Confucian scholars, and they know their shame! When hundreds of thousands of hungry people from Shaanxi arrive in the southeast, escorted by tens of thousands of Shaanxi soldiers, they will surely rush to provide food relief.
After all, reading the books of sages is not in vain! These people still know their shame!
Zhu Youjian smiled and waved his hand and said: "Zhang Haogu, I remember you... Do a good job and recruit soldiers from Suide refugees for me! This trip is thousands of miles southeast, and there are no soldiers to escort you. Those starving people in Suidezhou have nowhere to go.”
Naturally, Zhang Haogu could only accept the order and left with dozens of Shaanxi prefecture and county officials, but in his heart he took Zhu Youjian's words as a joke - walking from Shaanxi to the southeast? What a journey! There are at least hundreds of thousands of people around Xi'an. How much food do they have to eat along the way? A poor family has a road to prosperity. How can they get to the southeast without spending two to three million?
...
"Long live my lord, this is the military report sent from Guyuan by the Trilateral Commander-in-Chief Zheng Chongjian."
As soon as dozens of Shaanxi prefecture and county officials left, the newly appointed military chief counselor Gao Hongtu sent Zhu Youjian a military report from the Trilateral General Assembly on the war in Gansu.
The current tripartite general system is the former governor of Ningxia, Zheng Chongjian, who took office in Guyuan after the Gansu uprising. The task assigned to him by Zhu Youjian was to suppress the Gansu mutiny and hunt down the two bandits Gao Yingxiang and Luo Rucai.
Based on Zhu Youjian's understanding of the trilateral commander-in-chief Zheng Chongjian, the commander-in-chief Yang Lin of Guyuan, the commander-in-chief Yang Jiamo of Gansu, and the governor of Gansu Mei Zhihuan, he knew that they would be able to suppress the Gansu mutiny - it was suppressed in history. , it just took a little effort. But it’s hard to say whether we can catch Gao Yingxiang and Luo Rucai!
Zhu Youjian took the military newspaper handed over by Gao Hongtu and asked, "Have all the orders to You Shilu, Hou Shizhong, Jiang Rang and others been sent out?"
"They have been sent out," Bi Ziyan replied. "Those people are at home now and will definitely be called upon soon."
Zhu Youjian nodded and slowly looked through the military newspaper. The more he read, the more he frowned. What Zheng Chongjian sent was more of a complaint than a military newspaper.
All kinds of suffering...it doesn't rain, the ground doesn't grow grass, the people don't have a living, the soldiers don't have food and pay!
This Zheng Chongjian is good at everything, but he likes to complain too much, otherwise he would never have had his head cut off in his previous life!
"How are the dams in Guanzhong, Ningxia, and Hanzhong being repaired?" Zhu Youjian frowned and asked, "If there is a flood next year, can these three places be saved?"
In fact, Zheng Chongjian doesn’t need to complain about the drought, because there will be floods in Shaanxi and Henan tomorrow!
Ten years before Chongzhen, God would still come up with disasters in different ways. How boring was drought? Therefore, there will be floods in the fourth year of Chongzhen, and the weather will be good for most of the five years. Just as the autumn harvest is coming, there will be locusts, and then there will be a great famine that really starves many people to death! The plague began in the sixth year of Chongzhen, first in Shanxi, then in Shaanxi and the Mongolian grasslands!
At the same time, drought began again in August of the sixth year of Chongzhen...
Well, it looks scary, but compared with Chongzhen ten years later, the next few years are still good years!
In order to survive the "long disaster" from the tenth to the seventeenth year of Chongzhen, Zhu Youjian must make preparations now, and the most critical preparation is to make the majority of scholar-bureaucrats realize their shame!
"Your Majesty," Bi Ziyan patted his chest and said, "I can assure you that if there is a flood next year, the Guanzhong Plain and the Ningxia Plain will definitely be able to survive it! If there is a flood, then Shaanxi will be able to harvest something... ...I wonder if God can give the people of Shaanxi some way to survive!"
Zhu Youjian said: "The livelihood of Shaanxi people is in Huguang, Lianghuai, Jiangdong, and Sichuan! Sichuan is known as Tianfu, but it only has more than 13 million acres of land, and the tax and grain quota is only 1.08 million shi! I have to go and have a look. .....So this time we have to divide our troops into two groups.
Bi Futai, take the main force out of Wuguan and take the Shangluo Road to Nanyang. I have stored a lot of food there so that your troops can spend the winter in Nanyang. Next spring, we will march in Huguang! "
In the land of abundance in Sichuan, the tax and grain quota is only 1.08 million shi... The scholar-bureaucrats in Sichuan will definitely feel ashamed of this number, so Zhu Youjian plans to go there in person to give them a good opportunity to contribute more to the great future. , and by the way, the She'an Rebellion that had been dragged on for many years was also resolved.
In the future catastrophe, Sichuan, this heaven, must play its role well!
"Long live my lord," Gao Hongtu took out a stack of memorials sent from Beijing at this time, "Huang Taiji seems to have divided his troops into two groups, attacking Ningyuan along the way and Fuzhou along the way."
"They are all feints!" Zhu Youjian reached out, took the memorial, and began to look through it, "Huang Taiji's real moves are either Yanshan, Daning, or Jinlianchuan grassland, or go straight to Xuanfu to attract our army to a decisive battle. ...Everywhere else is empty!”
"But the cabinet ministers thought it was true," Gao Hongtu said, "and also decided on the strategy of 50,000 households and the Yanning army to separately attack and harass the enemy. Among them, the 50,000 household army would attack the north of Dashawo, while the Yanning army would attack along the March towards Gaozhou along the Old Hamlin River."
"That's it..." Zhu Youjian frowned a little when he heard this, "Hong Chengchou's troops were strong and cautious. They just built the city along the old Hamlin River and couldn't make any mistakes. But the noble concubine Wu Liangha If you are too impatient, you may be fooled by Huang Taiji!"
"Long live my lord, should I ask Mangui to send troops from Datong?" Zhu Youjian shook his head, "It's too late... Mangui's army is still mainly infantry, and the imperial concubine's army is all cavalry and camel soldiers. And she is impatient, maybe she has already set off, how can she catch up with her?"
