prosperous age

Chapter 306 305 Shortage
"Do you have any clever people under your command?"

Now that he knew the location of the prison van and the official post, Wei Guangde had to settle the matter as soon as possible and arrange for someone to do it.

As for the final result, he doesn't care anymore, let's just listen to fate.

Originally, it was okay to write a letter and tell Ma Fang to do it, but Wei Guangde still wanted to see Ma Fang. After all, if he wanted to win over a deputy commander, he couldn't do it without using more means.

In the past, maybe Wei Guangde could just treat Ma Fang as an ordinary general, but Ma Fang's promotion from general to deputy commander was not his handiwork.

It's so easy to come to Xuanfu once, meet Ma Fang, and inquire about the information on Mongolia in the north by the way.

As for asking if Ma Fang has any smarter people under his command, he naturally planned to let Ma Fang's people do the work of administering the medicine.

"My lord means"

Naturally, Ma Fang didn't know what Wei Guangde was planning, so she asked in surprise.

"Yes"

Wei Guangde told Ma Fang about the means he had prepared to delay time, "After all, he is a loyal minister and righteous man, and if he knows that if he doesn't rescue him, he will always feel uneasy."

"My lord is benevolent."

Ma Fang clasped her fists in compliment.

In fact, Wei Guangde's determination to make a show is also to express an attitude to Ma Fang. For loyal ministers and righteous men, Wei Guangde is willing to take action and try to save them.

This is true for people who have never met before, but it is even more different for our own people.

But Wei Guangde's show ended here, he still had the emperor's order to inspect Ji Town, so naturally he couldn't stay in Xuanfu for long.

Wei Guangde called Zhang Ji, and handed the medicine he had prepared to Ma Fang, "You also know that I still have the emperor's life on me, so I can't stay here for long. Find two smart people and find a way to get rid of this medicine." Let Shen Xiang take the medicine, he will be weak for three days, but there will be no danger of his life, and he will gradually get better after that, this is the only thing I can do."

After hearing Wei Guangde's words, Ma Fang still hesitated.

For the prisoners under escort, life and death are actually not important, even if they are dead, they will report to the local government to verify their identity, and if they have official seals, they will have proof.

When the time comes, he will give Shen Xiang the medicine, what will those officials do if they don't care and continue on their way?
Isn't that going to kill people directly on the road?

Thinking of this, Ma Fang couldn't help but said, "What if the officials continue on their way regardless of whether people live or die?"

"Then it's up to fate, you can't stop it."

Intercepting the official missions is actually no different from rebellion, Wei Guangde naturally will not let Ma Fang do such a thing, "Those official missions did not embarrass Shen Xiang all the way, and the people who came to his hometown also gave enough oil and water. Not so."

Seeing that Ma Fang was still worried, Wei Guangde smiled, "Life and death are fate, wealth and honor are in the sky. If Shen Xiang didn't deserve to die, he would not die here. If we don't stop him, he will not be able to survive if he is sent to Baoanzhou two days.

At that time, it should be even worse, just like his two brothers were killed by sticks. "

Wei Guangde's words fell into Ma Fang's ears, which naturally made him less worried.

In the prison, there are many ways to kill him, and it will be as miserable as it is.

To put it bluntly, it may be luckier to die outside than to die in prison.

Thinking of this, Ma Fang no longer hesitated, clasped his fists and said, "Don't worry, my lord, I will leave this matter to the general, and it must be done well. I will send someone over tonight."

Wei Guangde has already said before that he has to rush back to Jizhen to inspect the border town, and he has no reason to stay here in Xuanfu, even though it sounds like he came to Xuanfu by Emperor Jiajing's secret decree.

As for the secret decree, it's okay for their military generals to follow the decree, but it is open to question if the civil servants follow the decree, because the secret decree means that there is a high probability that it is a decree issued by the cabinet and the six departments.

Arrange the guards to search in the direction of Baoanzhou, looking for the sent guards. After a short rest, they will leave Xuan Mansion and return to Ji Town along the original road.

Wei Guangde didn't know that he was involved in this matter. If Emperor Jiajing found out, what would he think of him, but please be clear.

Anyway, in Wei Guangde's plan, doing this at Ma Fang's place would be beneficial but not harmful.

For more than a year, Wei Guangde also paid attention to collecting information on the border towns, knowing that there are really not many generals on Xuanda's side who seem to be able to win the battle, and Ma Fang is one of them.

At least among the few good news reported in the newspaper, Ma Fang's battle report accounted for as many as three, accounting for nearly half.

It is a pity for Yu Dayou that Wei Guangde still has a sense of accomplishment for being able to gather such a capable general under his command.

This guy is too famous, but he can't win him over, no matter how Lu Bing's thigh is much thicker than his own.

On the way back, Wei Guangde was still thinking about this matter. If he could bring Yu Long Qihu under his command, he would probably be the most capable commander in this era. If he was put in the game, he could fight for anything The world is over.

Ma Fang is good at fighting in the northern town, that is, large-scale infantry battles. Qi Jiguang doesn't know much about it. He only knows that he is good at fighting Japanese pirates. It is probably similar to special operations. After all, the mandarin duck formation is still very famous in later generations. co-operate.

The war to suppress the Japanese that Wei Guangde experienced was originally small in scale, but the scale of the Ming army's deployment was not small at all.

Even Wei Daddy, who went to Zhejiang to suppress the Japanese, said that the Japanese pirates have no concept of a battle formation at all. According to the confession of the captured Japanese pirates, they all followed the leader to attack and escape, so the Japanese pirates' tactics are actually in accordance with the Japanese pirates. The big and small leaders of the gang gathered in a bunch, attacking means swarming out, and escaping means running away in a swarm.

From this, Wei Guangde imagined the scene of the war against the Japanese pirates as a group of Japanese pirates rushing towards the Ming army. The Japanese pirates won if they broke the Ming army's formation at once.

Then the Ming army will divide into groups to surround the fleeing Japanese pirate teams, large and small, and the scale of the battle will not be very large.

As for Yu Dayou, Wei Guangde naturally knows more. This guy was born by the sea like Qi Jiguang, but judging from the battle reports from Zhejiang, it seems that Qi Jiguang does not know how to command water battles. Yu Dayou commanded the naval battles between the Daming Navy and Japanese pirates before. .

After Yu Dayou was arrested and moved to Beijing, the Jiangsu and Zhejiang navy fought against Japanese pirates several times at sea, but they were defeated. Since then, they have almost chosen to hide in several ports and no longer go out to patrol the sea.

In fact, the main reason for this is that Wei Guangde thinks that Yu Dayou is really a treasure, and he is actually a very powerful general in both water and land battles.

It's just that such a person was actually sent to the capital to retire because of Hu Zongxian's impeachment.

However, Wei Guangde also felt that Emperor Jiajing might not have really believed Hu Zongxian's words before punishing Yu Dayou. Yu Dayou's life in the capital was only limited in his movements, but he did not actually suffer.

Perhaps, Emperor Jiajing just wanted to meet Hu Zongxian's request, as long as he could solve the Japanese pirate problem as soon as possible.

If you don't like Yu Dayou, then I will take him away, and it will not prevent you from suppressing the Japanese.

In fact, both Yu Dayou and Wei Guangde felt that only a powerful navy fleet to intercept the Japanese pirates on the sea is the magic weapon to fight against the Japanese pirates. If they hope that the Japanese pirates will land and fight on land, how many innocent people will die in vain .

With Yu Dayou taken away, Haiphong is gone now, and only soldiers recruited by Tan Lun and Qi Jiguang can fight Japanese pirates. Wei Guangde is not very optimistic about Hu Zongxian's strategy of suppressing Japanese pirates.

But thinking of Qi Jiguang, Wei Guangde could only shake his head. Now this person is doing a good job under Hu Zongxian, unless Hu Zongxian is overthrown, forget it. Even if Hu Zongxian is overthrown, will Qi Jiguang know who Wei Guangde is?

How old is Wei Guangde in the court today?

In fact, with his current official position, it is really not enough.

The main reason why he can have some face in the capital is that Emperor Jiajing showed his extraordinary appreciation for him, so his colleagues seemed cordial and warm in front of him, and he was envied and hated by many people behind him.

A group of people hurried on, followed the road they came from, passed through Bohai Sea, entered Ji Town, and followed Tang Shunzhi's team along the road.

When Wei Guangde found Tang Shunzhi, they had just inspected the guards in Zunhua and Santunying, and now they were on their way to Yongping Mansion, where there were still two guards in Funing Guard and Shanhai Guard to check, and then they were on their way back Stop by to check Kaiping Zhongtunwei, and return to the capital via Xianghe.

In the next half month, Wei Guangde followed Tang Shunzhi to check the number of soldiers and military households in several guards, and checked it with the military registration book.

Fortunately, with the education of later generations, Wei Guangde is not at all like many Jinshi in this era, who don't know anything except "Zhihu Zheye", and elementary school mathematics knowledge can handle these tasks.

The work that seems very troublesome to others has indeed become extremely simple here in Wei Guangde, and he does not need to use the abacus like most people here. Wei Guangde knows how to use that thing, but because he is not proficient, it is not as good as calculating with a pen. quick.

It’s just that other scribes were surprised to see that Wei Guangde used Arabic numerals for calculations instead of abacus or “counting chips”. In fact, Arabic numerals had already been introduced to China in this era, and it was indeed much more convenient than counting with Chinese characters. Even if compared to counting chips, there are actually many advantages.

However, Chinese people have long been accustomed to using abacus or counting chips in calculations, so there are very few people who actually use Arabic numerals. People only know this counting method but few people use it.

Especially counting chips, which can not only perform calculations, but also represent numbers, and it is more convenient to write.

When the patrol team crossed the Xianghe River, Wei Guangde had already checked the numbers submitted by the clerk below, and the data was correct, but the actual situation was really shocking.

"Master Tang, is this truthful?"

Wei Guangde was a little hesitant, he understood why Yang Bo asked someone to lift the cover of Ji Town when he arrived in Ji Town, it was really scary.

There are no secrets in the capital, even though Wei Guangde didn't know it at the beginning, but as time went by, he knew it. It was the news that Yang Bo arrived in Ji Town and went down to the guards to understand the situation and then sent the news to the capital. Gently uncovered the tip of the iceberg of the severe shortage of military households in Jizhen.

Wei Guangde and the others have liquidated Jizhen's real family property this trip, but Wei Guangde was a little at a loss when he saw the final figures.

The shortage of soldiers is more than one-third. The reason is that more than half of the military households have fled. That is to say, there are 200,000 military households on the register, but there are actually less than [-] military households after an inventory.

For such a large reduction, the former governors of Jizhen to the commander-in-chief have been hiding it from reporting, and the purpose is naturally to make money.

Think about it, report according to the facts, and the allocation of military pay will inevitably deduct these shortfalls, which is a fart.

However, it has only been a few years since the Anda Department broke through the border defense of Jizhen, and it has been eight years since it has been full of efforts. The defense of Jizhen has not changed at all.

Tang Shunzhi had been in the Ministry of War for many years, so he had naturally heard about the lack of vacancies. He just didn't expect that Ji Town, which guards the safety of the capital, has fallen into this state. What about other military towns?
What is the situation in Xuanfu, Datong and Yansui?

I dare not imagine it, but this errand has to be done.

"If you don't report the truth, do you still want to deceive the king?"

Naturally, Tang Shunzhi could tell the difference clearly. Wei Guangde was probably just shocked by the numbers, so he was lost for a while.

To say that Jizhen made such a big mistake, he, the military officer, is more responsible, Wei Guangde is just a soy saucer, in fact, there is nothing wrong with it.

After the memorial was up, he slapped his ass and went back to the Imperial Academy, and they still had to clean up the mess.

It's easy to deal with the dissatisfaction of the soldiers, just go to the rest of the soldiers to make up for it, but the army leaders below may not be happy.

The Venerable Master means that they will receive a lot less money.

As long as you enter the army register, you will have to pay some food and salary more or less. If you are not as good as this person at all, you can eat all of them.

As for the fleeing of military households, it is not easy to deal with. If you hook up civilian households, I am afraid that the place will be messed up again. Who wants to be a soldier and join the army these days?
Even those families who are so poor that they can only work their lives are only willing to send their children to the military camp, because recruiting soldiers does not qualify for military registration.

If the folks know that they want to enlist military households on a large scale, I am afraid that the people outside the capital will start to flee, at least avoid the checks and come back, even if they get a lawsuit, it is better than joining the army.

Tang Shunzhi felt overwhelmed, but he couldn't discuss it with Wei Guangde, after all, these things had nothing to do with him, and he had to go back to the capital to discuss the matter with the department hall.

I just discussed the content of the report with Wei Guangde. Naturally, all the data will not be reported. It is too eye-catching, and the information on file is naturally complete. It is just that the report to Emperor Jiajing will use some Spring and Autumn brushwork, and the emperor will fool it without asking. never mind.

When they returned to the capital, Tang Shunzhi and Wei Guangde didn't bother to go back to rest, and went directly to the Tongzheng Envoy to submit the patrol memorial:

There used to be more than [-] troops in Jizhen, but now there are only more than [-] registered soldiers, and more than [-] people have fled.See those who are too old and weak to fight.The reason for fleeing was that the side walls were being built year after year, the rocks were transported up the mountain to cut trees, the labor was heavy, the labor was insufficient, and the money was used to pay for goods;
(End of this chapter)