I want to be emperor

Chapter 735 Jinling Rewards
Waiting for the news of a series of victories of the Indian Expeditionary Force, especially the occupation of the last British colonial stronghold on the Indian Peninsula, and also when the news of Surat, the last colonial stronghold of all European colonists on the Indian Peninsula, reached the mainland.

That was already the spring of Chengshun's 27th year.

Overseas news transmission these days, because of the long distance, it is very common for a month or two or even longer at every turn.

The good news this time is that it departed from Surat, a port city in northwest India, first arrived in Colombo, Ceylon Island, and then crossed the Indian Ocean into the Strait of Malacca. After passing through Singapore, it stopped for supplies, and then went north into the South China Sea and arrived in Guangzhou. After stopping supplies, go north to Songjiang Mansion to reach Wusongkou, then transfer to the post office's steam-powered motor-sail inland river communication express boat, and finally arrive at Jinling City.

The whole journey is more than 1 kilometers!

Even if it is a flying arrow-style communication clipper powered by the latest naval aircraft sails, sailing day and night without even resupplying at ports along the way, it will take nearly 20 days to run.

In the actual voyage, because it needs to stop at some major ports along the way to receive or deliver communication documents from other places, it actually takes more time.

After all, it is impossible for the navy to specially arrange a ship to send a letter in order to send an ordinary good news, isn't it... Unless it is an emergency, otherwise, the navy's communication ships need to pass through several major ports along the way to send and receive various messages. class of official documents.

However, even so, it is impossible for other types of ships to deliver the news from Surat back to the mainland within a month.

It can even be said that the speed of naval communication clippers has reached the limit of the speed of sailing ships before modern industry.

The Navy's latest type of sail-flying arrow-type communication fast ship, namely the Dongjiang-class communication ship, when its lead ship, the Pacific Ocean, traveled across the Pacific Ocean to and from North America many times, its maximum sailing discipline was an average speed of [-] knots.

Note that this is the average speed, which also means that the speed of the communication clipper will be even faster on the smooth sailing route, and it can even reach more than 20 knots at the fastest time.

The Navy's Dongjiang-class latest communication speedboat has almost reached the peak speed of ships in this era, whether it is a sail or a steam ship.

At the same time, the steam engine is used as auxiliary power, which greatly saves the time of entering and leaving the port, and still allows the ship to maintain a certain speed and sail for a long distance when there is no wind.

The Navy's communications clippers, well, the Post Office's fast mail clippers... Both are actually the same type of racing motorboat.

This kind of flying arrow-style motor-sail fast boat represents the maximum speed of contemporary ships, regardless of whether it is a pure sail, a steam ship, or a motor-sail ship... because this kind of ship is born for speed .

It's just that this kind of fast boat with sails is really useless except for its speed... For example, the cargo capacity that is very important to contemporary ships, this thing has no cargo capacity at all!

After all, this thing is only used to transport documents, at most it is to transport some official small items.

The tonnage of its ships is basically given to the hull and steam engine, and the remaining tonnage is used to load coal and various living materials such as fresh water.

So this thing basically can't be used to transport people or goods on a large scale.

In addition, the seaworthiness of this speedboat is also particularly bumpy...

After all, for the sake of speed, the tonnage of this shit is generally not large, only a few hundred tons, and the aspect ratio is exaggerated, and the hull is very slender...

This means that when sailing at sea, it will be very bumpy.

If ordinary passengers take this kind of sail boat, they will be able to pour out their bile in a few minutes.

Even some old sailors can't bear to sail for a long time on this kind of motor sailing ship.

The captains and sailors of the communication ships of the Great Chu Empire Navy and the fast mail ships of the postal department had undergone special training, otherwise they would not have been able to serve on such fast ships that were extremely turbulent and braved the wind and waves on the sea.

Some fast arrow-type transport ships that have appeared in the past two years are imitated by the post office and the navy's fast communication ships. Although they are not so extreme, they are still very fast, and they are mainly used for those with high timeliness requirements. commodity!
Well, mostly tea.

Tea is a commodity that has very high requirements on timeliness. At the same time, tea is easily damp and deteriorated during the wet sea transportation. Therefore, if tea is transported by sea, the shorter the voyage time, the better.

In the tea export trade of the contemporary Great Chu Empire, there is such a rule, that is, the shorter the time for tea to be transported on the sea, the higher the quality and the more expensive the tea will be when it arrives at the destination.

The faster the tea is delivered from the home port to the destination port, the higher the rewards the captain and sailors will get.

Therefore, during the tea harvest season, in several major tea export ports of the Great Chu Empire, you can often see a slender hull full of sails flying arrow-style clippers soaring on the sea!
In order to earn more money by sending the tea to the destination as fast as possible, those captains are very rough when sailing...

----

And by using these fast communication ships sailing in the Indian Ocean and the Pacific Ocean, the Great Chu Empire was able to receive news from India and even North America within a month or two, and use the same time to transmit various local instructions to India or North America. Overseas Territories of North America.

Luo Zhixue, who was in Jinling City, did not express his joy or surprise when he received the report from the Indian peninsula. After all, this was expected.

Send out more than 5 troops plus hundreds of warships, and have absolute advantages in equipment performance and quality of soldiers. If this is not enough for those European colonial companies, then it will be hell. If this happens, Luo Zhixue had to kill a large number of people as a punishment.

However, although they were all expected victories, the rewards for meritorious officers and soldiers still had to follow the rules, and Luo Zhixue didn't need to worry about this, it was naturally handled by the army, navy and the internal military and political organizations of the Guards.

In the twenty years since the founding of the Great Chu Empire, wars of all sizes have been fought almost every day. There are already very complete rules on how to evaluate military merits and corresponding rewards, and everything should be done according to the rules.

Luo Zhixue was not in a hurry for the few high-ranking generals who needed to be personally handled by Luo Zhixue, because the tactics in the direction of the Indian peninsula seemed to have achieved a lot, but in fact the intensity was not high and the difficulty was also very low.

In fact, this kind of battle can be won by sending any normal general over there, so the senior generals in charge of leading the troops should win the battle, and there is no extra military work.

At best, it is a hard work, after all, the expedition to India is indeed a hard job.

Because a small number of generals, whether it is the army, the navy, or the guards, just remember their hard work and qualifications, and if there is a suitable opportunity in the future, they will be promoted first.

As for finishing a battle in India, it is impossible to be promoted on the spot from a major general to a lieutenant general, and from a lieutenant general to a general.

The military rank of the Great Chu Empire has not been quoted so much!
The ranks of senior generals cannot be promoted for the time being, and they can only be promoted in the future, but some other awards can still be carried out now.

For example, awarding some honorary titles, giving some awards to family members, and so on.

Among them, Major General Bai Zhen was awarded the Dragon Pattern Sword Holding Medal. This dragon pattern sword holding medal evolved from the Dragon Pattern Holding Sword Army Banner, and was mainly given to middle and senior generals in the army... At the same time This thing is not a medal of military merit, but a service medal that rewards generals for their loyalty to the monarch and hard work.

Basically, senior generals who lead troops to fight overseas or in remote areas in the northwest can basically get one.

At the same time, the wife of Major General Bai Zhen’s Army canonized as a third-rank Shuren, the great life of the Great Chu Empire. It doesn’t mean that the husband will definitely be canonized after reaching a certain level, and it doesn’t mean that the wife’s level of life will definitely follow her husband’s. The official ranks go.

Instead, the official needs to make certain achievements, and after obtaining permission, the imperial court will confer the title of his mother and wife Haoming.

And Haoming's grade may be one level lower or equal, but it will not exceed the grade of her husband's official.

For example, in the Great Chu Empire, when the major generals, brigadier generals, civil servants of the third rank, and their wives were enshrined as Haoming, the upper limit level was the third rank of Shuren, and the standard was the fourth rank of Gongren.

His wife's life also needs the husband who is an official to do things step by step, and then he can gradually reach the upper limit. It does not mean that once the husband is promoted, his wife can immediately seize the corresponding upper limit level of life.

Even if many officials have not made any special contributions, even if many officials have become high-ranking officials in the ministry, their wives may not necessarily be able to get a good life.

Because Hao Ming is different from normal promotion, this is the authority of the royal family, and the queen is responsible for it, and has nothing to do with the previous dynasty.

After all, the wives of Haoming belonged to the wives, and belonged to the Queen's jurisdiction... Well, during the festivals, the Queen would often invite some Mrs. Haoming to attack and watch a show for dinner or something.

Although there is only a small symbolic salary, it represents the social status of an official's female family member.

And Luo Zhixue often uses canonization as a substitute for rewards, especially when civil servants and generals have made a little credit, but not much, and when it is not enough for promotion, then Luo Zhixue will give their mothers or wives an extra level of life. Come to show your favor.

For example, Bai Zhen, after all, Bai Zhen is a person who has worked hard, and also has a little credit. Although this credit and hard work are not enough for him to be promoted quickly, those who should be rewarded should still be rewarded... at least have an attitude.

Therefore, canonizing Haoming is a good choice.

In addition to honors, there are also some rewards in kind, such as a Jinling horse, gold, silver and jade, some high-quality dragon gold tea from the Royal Tea House, some silk and satin, etc. There are many names, but apart from the Jinling horse, other The items seem expensive, but for a major general in the army, they are actually not too expensive.

When Bai Zhen walked around India, he might bring back tens of thousands of Chu Yuan from the private trophies he seized on the battlefield.

It's not about corruption or anything like that, it's about private spoils that are allowed to be kept.

The military of the Great Chu Empire has always allowed soldiers to keep part of their private trophies when they went overseas to fight in order to encourage the soldiers to fight and to be independent. One important business is to send the soldiers' private trophies back to the soldiers' homes.

Therefore, although the soldiers of the Chu army went to sea to fight, although it was very hard, it was relatively dangerous. If they were not careful, they would get sick and die.

But the rewards are also very generous. When fighting with the natives, they can often capture a lot of spoils.

When fighting against the aborigines overseas, the military has always been very humane about the distribution of spoils: weapons, equipment, food, and a large amount of gold and silver in the warehouse are naturally confiscated from the treasury, but the enemy captured on the battlefield Personal items, small items, such as jewelry, jade, gold and silverware, as long as they are not too exaggerated, soldiers are allowed to keep them as private trophies.

The military eats the big ones, the soldiers eat the small ones, and everyone eats and drinks together. This is the basic strategy of the military when fighting overseas.

This is not beneficial, why do you send soldiers across the ocean to fight in overseas regions!
You must know that the overseas environment is not good these days. Soldiers have to endure the harsh and even the pressure of non-combat attrition at every turn.

Even if the soldiers are forced to go with orders, the impact on the morale of the army will be relatively large.

So simply use the loot as a subsidy.

Going to sea to make money, not shabby!
You said that this will lead to the corruption of military discipline and so on. As long as it doesn't harm one's own people, the top military officials don't bother to take care of it, and even the civilian officials don't bother to say a word.

Under such circumstances, many soldiers who were dispatched to serve in overseas territories can often accumulate a lot of net worth when they return to their home countries and retire.

Their spoils of war income can often reach several times or even dozens of times their regular salary income... After all, the salary income of ordinary soldiers in the Chu Army includes food, housing and food, but the income in cash is actually not much.

Because the Chu army adopts a system of combining conscripts and volunteers, ordinary soldiers are all conscripts... If you join the army, the military will provide food, housing and clothing, and will also provide education, professional skills training, and you can get a retirement bonus when you retire or arrange employment.

But apart from these things, there is no salary... only a subsidy, which is not high. In the early years, it was only a few hundred cash, and it gradually increased.

This amount of money is not considered high in the current Great Chu Empire. An ordinary worker in the Songjiang area has a monthly income of about three to four Chu yuan. Other places are lower, but basically have two or three Chu yuan.

Although the soldiers of the Great Chu Empire came to join the army, basically it was not for that little subsidy, but for other things, such as being able to eat openly, as well as educational opportunities in the army, professional skills training, stable employment after retirement, etc. .

But if you can get more money, why not Coke.

This is the biggest dream of many soldiers who go to overseas territories to serve in overseas territories after stationing and fighting for a year and a half, and then returning to China with trophies worth dozens or even hundreds of Chu yuan!
Ordinary soldiers are like this, and those officers are no exception. Many officers serve in overseas territories, on the one hand, to accumulate seniority and military merits, and on the other hand, to get spoils of war.

In recent years, the Great Chu Empire conquered the cities and even the capitals of many indigenous countries in Southeast Asia, and the treasury made a large amount of income, not to mention the soldiers who participated in the operation, all of them were full of food.

However, officers with higher status and power, and even high-ranking generals, after an operation to capture an indigenous city, can casually earn thousands or even tens of thousands of trophies worth thousands of Chu Yuan.

After Bai Zhen led his army to capture Goa, Mumbai, Surat and other colonial cities on the west coast of India, he directly entrusted the Western Trading Company to send his twenty or so boxes back to China.

There are a lot of messy gold, silver, jewelry, jade and precious stones, or other works of art and curiosities.

Compared to Bai Zhen's income from spoils from overseas battles, what Luo Zhixue rewarded him was nothing, even the most valuable Jinling horse was only worth two or three thousand Chu Yuan.

However, the significance of Luo Zhixue's reward does not lie in the amount of money, but in political significance.

It has been two months since the 27th year of Chengshun, and apart from the regular festival rewards, Bai Zhen is the only person who has received rewards for his meritorious service.

And more importantly, once the reward is issued, everyone can basically know that in the past few years, as long as Bai Zhen doesn't make mistakes halfway, there is a high probability of going further.

So this honor is very heavy, much more precious than the treasures of five or sixty thousand Chu Yuan.

(End of this chapter)