The cabinet can no longer be as unscrupulous as before to exclude Zhang Zhou as an alien.
Even the first assistant Liu Jian had to consider how to get along with Zhang Zhou in the court.
If it is too hard, it will only attract the alienation of the emperor; if it is too soft, it is even worse. The hard bones of Confucian officials are still needed... This requires a degree that is neither soft nor hard.
Liu Jian's expectation for Li Dongyang is that you will take up the banner of confronting Zhang Zhou in the future, and you should not overly present this confrontation on the surface.
I'm probably saying, in fact, I don't have any countermeasures, and all the discretion is up to you.
Next two days.
Zhu Houxuan's condition gradually recovered. Except for some mild symptoms of wind and cold, he was basically fine. Even several people from Tai Hospital were allowed to go in to visit his condition, but people stared at him every time, as if they were afraid that they would happen again. Treat those who are not sick into dying ones.
Zhu Youtang himself also had some leisurely thoughts. When he walked out of the palace, he had to do one thing, which was to choose a place for his beloved concubine to build a palace.
Mou Bin, the commander of the Jinyi Guards, and Li Rong, the eunuch who was responsible for the ceremony, accompanied him out of the palace. It happened that Zhu Youtang also wanted to relax.
"The capital is quite lively. I haven't seen so many people in the world for a long time!"
When Zhu Youtang saw the bustling crowd in the market, he seemed very emotional, remembering that he had not left the palace for a long time.
Li Rong smiled and said: "Your Majesty, good news has been reported frequently in the border areas this year. The Tatars, Jurchens and other barbarians have all returned in defeat. Now that it is after the autumn harvest, the people are naturally out and about. The two cities in the capital are very lively in the morning and evening."
"Um."
Zhu Youtang just nodded.
After walking forward for a while, he remembered something, stopped and said, "But this year there are disasters everywhere."
Li Rong was a little embarrassed for a moment.
After the eleventh year of Hongzhi in the Ming Dynasty, there was a situation of floods in the south and drought in the north. The situation was relatively good in the twelfth year of Hongzhi, but it obviously worsened in the thirteenth year of Hongzhi.
However, Li Rong is an "old Jianghu" after all. He quickly clarified his thoughts and said: "Originally, the imperial court was mostly constrained by the expenses of border areas in disaster relief due to disasters over the years. However, this year, Cai Guogong coordinated the transportation in various areas of the border areas, and Yu Xuan The merchant villages were reopened in Da and other places, and the Qin Dynasty opened up wasteland and opened up villages on three sides. The most important thing is the frugality advocated by Your Majesty, so that the Ministry of Revenue and the government warehouses in various places have more food to help the victims, so that the world is stable and the people live and work in peace and contentment. This has created the prosperity of the capital today."
"Yeah?"
Only then did Zhu Youtang have a smile on his face.
He is not the kind of emperor who is easily fooled. After all, he personally handled most of the memorials in the Ming Dynasty, especially those involving disaster relief. Even if the reports from various places were handled by the ceremonial supervisor and the cabinet, all major matters were It is up to Zhu Youtang to ask.
It cannot be said that while Ming Dynasty is suffering from disasters, you are bragging about a peaceful and prosperous era in front of him, and he does not believe it.
But after what Li Rong said, it was mainly due to your majesty and Zhang Bingkuan that the northwest was suppressed. Ming Dynasty's expenditure could be spent more on people's livelihood, and then peace was achieved.
When Zhu Youtang heard this, he felt light on his face and felt it was reasonable.
…
…
Zhu Youtang's complexion improved, and he became more interested in walking around the capital.
He called Mou Bin over and asked, "What unusual things have happened among the people in the capital recently?"
As the commander of the Jinyi Guards, Mou Bin is not actually responsible for inquiring about people in the market. However, since Yang Peng, the admiral of Dongchang, is not around, he still pays attention to many things. He said: "The "Yang Family General" is being performed in the capital recently. "The Romance" is said to have been compiled based on the Yang family's resistance to the Khitan foreigners in the early Song Dynasty. There are narrative versions and play scripts at the same time, and it was started by Cai Guogong's theater."
Zhu Youtang nodded and said: "General Yang? I have heard it before. Is this "The Romance" any different from the past?"
Mou Bin said: "There have been some in the past, but not in such detail. I have never read history books, so I don't know what the difference is."
Mou Bin is not lying.
He doesn't know, he really doesn't know.
Historically, the story of the Yang family generals has been circulating from the Song Dynasty to the Yuan Dynasty and the early Ming Dynasty, but the story basically followed a direction close to historical facts. Until the middle and late Ming Dynasty, after the rise of the Jurchens, the people of the Ming Dynasty had a great understanding of the conquest culture. It was only during the Wanli period that relatively complete stories about the generals of the Yang family were compiled, such as Ji Zhenlun's "The Romance of the Yang Family" and Xiong Damu's "Zhi Zhuan of the Northern Song Dynasty".
At this point, some Yang family figures who did not exist in history, such as Mu Guiying and Yang Zongbao, as well as non-existent events, were presented to the common people in the form of novels.
In general.
It’s just a commendable spirit.
All stories, whether true or false, are designed to highlight this spirit of self-sacrifice for the imperial court, and the historical facts develop in a dramatic way.
Zhang Zhou probably advanced this spirit by sixty or seventy years.
Li Rong said with a smile: "Your Majesty, since it is a romance, it will not all follow the history books. The people admire it, because it is the current war between the Ming Dynasty and the Tatar foreign enemies. Everything is consistent. If your Majesty is free, you can go and listen to it yourself."
Zhu Youtang nodded and said: "Whether it's the opera or the obedient book, I like them all, but they are all written by Bingkuan. Without Bingkuan to accompany me, I always feel that something is missing. So I will leave some thoughts first and wait for Bingkuan. After Kuan comes back, just go with him."
"yes."
Li Rongxin said.
They even went to the theater together, it was true that the emperor and his ministers were of the same mind.
"Let's go and take a look outside Dong'an Gate. Over there is Bingkuan's old house, and then there is Bingkuan's new house in the north. Look around to see if there is any suitable place."
Zhu Youtang came out to choose a location for the palace.
Now Li Rong, Mou Bin and others also understood.
The address the emperor wanted must be close to Zhang Zhou's residence, so that the emperor could visit Zhang Zhou's residence while leaving the palace to visit the concubine Xian and her son.
Is this for the virtuous concubine?
Isn't it possible that Bingkuan, who often visits the palace in the future to look for him, has a more reasonable reason?
…
…
Ministry of War.
Ma Wensheng, the Minister of the Ministry of War, was transferred to the Ministry of Personnel as Minister of Civil Affairs by a transfer order, directly vacating the seat of the Minister of the Ministry of War.
The emperor probably felt that it was not important whether there was a minister sitting in the high hall of the Ministry of War. Instead, it was more important to let the court know as soon as possible that Zhang Zhou was the best candidate to be the next minister of the Ministry of War.
Therefore, the affairs of the Ministry of War are now handled by two ministers.
In the past year or so, the ministers of the Ministry of War of the Ming Dynasty changed frequently. Wang Zongyi, Yang Mi, Xiong Chong, Zhang Zhou, Li Jie, and Xu Jin successively served. Except for Zhang Zhou, each term seemed to be short.
Today, the left minister of the Ministry of War is Xiong Chong, while the right minister is a local governor, serving Xiong Xiu who has just returned to the court.
Historically, the duo of the Two Bears was an iron-clad combination of the assistant ministers of the Ministry of War from the 13th year of Hongzhi to the 17th year of Hongzhi. Their own strength is still good, but the two of them are not as good as the six ministers of the capital, and only Xiong Chong served as the minister for less than a year. Xiong Xiu, the Minister of Hubu in Nanjing, did not even get a chancellor, and only received the Minister of Punishment as a posthumous gift.
At this time, the Ministry of War belonged to the period when Shangshu opened the sky window.
There is no minister, and there are no major events, but there are many miscellaneous things.
But there was another incident that happened in the southeast, and the two had to sit down and discuss it... Before it was officially announced in the court that the new minister was Zhang Zhou, the two of them did not have to be responsible to others for anything. They could basically represent the Ministry of War. .
Xiong Chong was older and was also Zuo Shilang, but he was also completely confused when faced with Wei Guogong Xu Chu's memorial.
Xiong Chong said with emotion: "Zhejiang Haining Guard is just a guard station in Jinghai. Why did it use sea ships to carry many artillery and soldiers to Nanyang? Those Javanese vassal states, if they knew that the Ming Dynasty sent sea ships and soldiers , they will definitely think that I, the Ming Dynasty, intend to annex their islands and lands, but what are the plans for those overseas lands? This will be very troublesome!"
Xu Yan was just performing a routine performance.
As mentioned, the Jiangnan Shipyard was just established, and even before the factory building was built, it renovated an old Ming Dynasty ship and set out to sea with 200 soldiers and more than 100 sailors with sailing experience. There was no second boat, which gave Lao Xu a headache.
Because this ship went to sea according to the route given by Zhang Zhou, it didn't look like it was for defense, but it seemed like it was going to fight.
Even though the two hundred soldiers seemed to be a little short, Xu Yan was also afraid that the ship would encounter any accident after it went to sea.
Xiong Xiu asked: "Brother Tengxiao, I don't know much about the affairs of the Ministry of War. I'm new here... Do you think that Zhang Zhou was so eclectic in his work before?"
Although Xiong Xiu is younger, he was a Jinshi in the second year of Chenghua, three years earlier than Xiong Chong. But Jinshi is also about quality, and not many top three Jinshi can get ahead. After being around for so many years, he was able to return to the court as a minister right after the end of the rule... It wasn't because of how powerful he was, but because others thought he was "harmless to humans and animals."
The traditional faction believes that finding an incompetent assistant to Zhang Zhou will make Zhang Zhou unable to deal with the affairs of the Ministry of War... Who told you that even if you have been the left minister of the Ministry of War, you have never done anything in the ministry?
Do you still want us to find someone very experienced to help you?
For the emperor, people like Xiong Xiu who did not belong to the traditional faction were just taken over by Zhang Zhou for his own use.
Then Xiong Xiu was so confused. He was a local official before his mother's funeral, and immediately became a minister when he came back... But the things at hand seemed more and more wrong.
Xiong Chong sighed: "If he does everything according to the rules, do you think a new Jinshi who has not completed the exam for three years can achieve his current position?"
"Alas! That makes sense." Xiong Xiu had no choice but to accept it.
Although Zhang Zhou was an example of a "sycophant" in the court, he was a very good sycophant. There was probably a family that had a close relationship with the emperor, but he conquered the emperor's heart with his ability and was promoted by the emperor who had a discerning eye for talents. .
"But how to determine this?" Xiong Xiu asked again, "The ship is equipped with twenty-four mighty cannons, six mighty long-range cannons, and one mighty heavy cannon at a time. If it goes to sea and cannot come back, such a huge loss will not be avoided by then. So I can explain it to everyone in the court."
The cannons invented by Zhang Zhou are all called "mighty cannons". Without any redundant words, they are light cannons, long-range cannons are parent-child cannons, and heavy cannons are basically enhanced versions of Hongyi cannons.
A dilapidated ship took out 200 soldiers and more than 30 cannons at a time. In the eyes of traditional military and political people, this was simply crazy.
It is also because the Ming Dynasty has never fought a decent water battle since the founding of the country, and even the water battles at the founding of the country were not sea-ship battles. Traditional civil servants could not understand that the trend of future naval battles would be to use cannons to bombard them, so when they found out that Zhang Zhou So many new cannons originally used to defend the north against the Tatars were used in an inconspicuous sea operation. The Ministry of War felt that Zhang Zhou was acting indiscriminately.
Xiong Chong said: "This copy is sent to the Ministry of War. In fact, a copy has already been sent to the bank. We only need to respond when your majesty or cabinet ministers ask. I don't think your majesty will take it." Go to the court and tell the truth. After all, it was that person who did it, and His Majesty must have tacitly approved it. We just need to deal with the cabinet ministers."
Xiong Chong still has "experience".
Zhang Zhou used ships to carry artillery to the sea. He didn't have to worry about the emperor's criticism. He only had to worry about how the traditional civil servants would give us problems.
It seems that those who serve as ministers deal with all the big and small things in the court, but in fact most of the things are done by the people below. They have to deal with people more than things.
"Then..." Xiong Xiu asked, "What should I say?"
Xiong Chong said: "If asked, it cannot be said that the Ministry of War did not know in advance. After all, doing so would offend that person and may even make His Majesty dissatisfied. When that person did this, he was still the Minister of the Ministry of War in Nanjing. He wanted to mobilize several cannons. There is no need to say hello to us in Beijing."
"So?" Xiong Xiu obviously doesn't know how to play.
Xiong Chong sighed: "Think about it, who was in charge of the Ministry of War when this happened? Were you here at that time? When you were asked, you said you would go back and check the list of official letters sent from various places to see if they were involved. This content. If you are really anxious about the question, please mention it again and say that the affairs of Jinghai are always handled by the Southern War Department first, and can be directly reported to Your Majesty by the Southern War Department..."
When Xiong Xiu heard this, he already roughly understood.
We can neither refute nor confirm, so we have to say some ambiguous words to appease the cabinet ministers on the grounds that we have just arrived at the Ministry of War and have not yet seen all the official documents.
The affairs of the Ministry of War itself did not need to be responsible to any ministers in the court. However, there were many things during the Hongzhi period. The emperor asked the cabinet to inform the six ministries in advance when drafting the votes. This allowed the cabinet to gradually have a "prime minister" who was superior to the six ministries. "right.
…
…
When the cabinet saw Xu Er's report about sending ships to sea, bringing soldiers, artillery, and even firecrackers, they probably realized that Zhang Zhou was preparing to use troops against the southeastern seaboard.
Xie Qian took Xu Er's memorial and opened the door directly to ask Liu Jian for his opinion.
Li Dongyang is not here at this time.
After Liu Jian took it over and looked at it, he put it aside and said very calmly: "Zhang Bingkuan built ships in the name of Jinghai and built ships to patrol the sea with artillery. Is there anything wrong?"
When Xie Qian heard this, he immediately felt something was wrong and asked, "Is it because the wind in our cabinet has been blowing wrong these days?"
Liu Jian rolled his eyes at him and said, "What do you want to say?"
Xie Qian sat on a chair nearby, pondered for a while, shook his head and said: "Liu Zhongtang, you should know that Zhang Bingkuan's intention was never to stabilize the Ming Dynasty's maritime territory. Even Wei Guogong said that this time he sent a ship to sea, maybe to A batch of goods designated by Zhang Bingkuan were shipped back from Nanyang. Could it be that Zhang Bingkuan had already prepared it, and if he couldn't buy it, he just grabbed it? Or was he not prepared to buy it at all? "
Merchant ships go to Southeast Asia to do business.
When Zhang Zhou sent a ship to Nanyang, he didn't intend to spend any money, so he just resorted to violence.
Liu Jian's tone was still calm and he said: "There may not be many people on an island in Nanyang, so it would be just right to send two to three hundred people there."
As he spoke, the pen was still flying in his hand.
Xie Qian asked: "What is this?"
"Please resign."
Liu Jian didn't hide it either.
Xie Qian was speechless upon hearing this.
Feeling: Li Dongyang is not here today, you are busy writing your resignation inside, and I am the only one worrying about the ticket drafting? Unfortunately, I still think that I am just a supporter of the cabinet. Now I, the one who started the relationship, am taking the lead?
"Then should I go back and write one?" Xie Qian asked.
"Whatever." Liu Jian's answer was still not painful or itchy.
Xie Qian thought for a while and gave up this idea.
If the emperor really wants them to leave, he will give various hints. Now the emperor has not expressed this intention at all. It will be useless to write it back, and the emperor will not agree.
Xie Qian said: "Should this matter be taken to the court?"
Liu Jian raised his head, glanced at Xie Qian and said, "Yu Qiao, I hope that if something happens in the future, it would be best if both the government and the public know about it, but it should not be known in the court."
"This is..." Xie Qian frowned.
"Things can be publicized, but don't mention them in court, otherwise what is right will become wrong, and what is wrong will become even more wrong!" Liu Jian seemed to be teaching Xie Qian how to handle things.
Xie Qian frowned and said: "Does that mean that if Zhang Bingkuan is allowed to act randomly in the future, we won't even be able to remonstrate him!?"
As I was talking, I was thinking, and sure enough, the wind in the cabinet has turned. I am the only one who has not yet woken up.
Liu Jian finally finished writing his resignation, put down his pen, and waited for the ink to dry. Only then did he have the heart to face Xie Qian and said, "Go to the Ministry of War and ask, just say that you want to know the details of going to sea. There is no need to embarrass the people in the Ministry of War. Now the government and the public are not interested in it." What happened to Zhang Bingkuan was an afterthought, and they couldn't change anything. By the way, let's expand on the topic a little bit, but don't say it yourself, just pretend it was Wei Guogong's memorial and leak it out by the way."
Xie Qian said: "Both the government and the public know about it, and they will definitely talk about it in secret. Will your Majesty not know about it?"
"It's okay for Your Majesty to know," Liu Jian said. "As long as I don't mention it to the court, Your Majesty won't bother to ask. Your Majesty only cares about the results."
"Um."
Xie Qian nodded, stood up and was about to leave.
Liu Jian reminded: "The memorial is here to stay, and the vote does not need to be decided in the future."
Xie Qian was surprised for a moment.
Let me ask the Ministry of War about this in the name of drafting the draft, but you have already decided on the content of the draft? Then what else should I ask?
Liu Jiandao: "Yu Qiao, Bingkuan is very disciplined in his work. Externally, he is very tough, like a tiger who never lets his food get away; internally, he is very weak, and never seems to have a head-on confrontation with us."
"Occasionally, he confronts us in court, and this is intentional. Every time, he seems to be passively fighting back. This will win a good impression in front of His Majesty, and make Your Majesty feel that he can fight outside and be at ease inside. A wise minister."
"We need to understand his intentions and change some strategies."
(End of chapter)
