prosperous age

Chapter 579 Chapter 578
Gao Gong said there, but Wei Guangde was silently saying, "Polido's house, Portugal."

"After looking through the classics, there is no such so-called Pulidu's family. The Ministry's proposal intends to directly ask the inspector of Guangdong Town to investigate the matter. If it is a deceitful entrustment by Francois, it will be rejected; Rule by law."

After Gao Gong said the final decision of their Ministry of Rites, everyone in the room couldn't help nodding, thinking that it would be safe to deal with it this way.

Of course, the matter of Gao Gong being late was exposed.

It is related to the state system, of course, we can't delay the business because of the banquet.

"Shan Loan, what were you thinking just now?"

When Wei Guangde heard what Gao Gong said earlier, when he heard the "Polido family" at first, he didn't feel much. But when he mentioned Haojing later, he suspected that these so-called Pulido family were fraudulent people from the Frangipani. Trust, it is natural to have some doubts.

Chinese transliteration often has differences.

For example, Altan Khan is often mentioned in the official circles in the capital. In the mouths of the generals on the nine sides, especially those who fled from the grasslands, they often use "Altan".

This Pulidu family may have been translated into Portuguese later.

At least when Wei Guangde read it, he felt a little similar.

Moreover, Wei Guangde also discovered a problem in the Ming Dynasty. Although it didn't talk about the kingdom of heaven all the time like the Manchu Qing Dynasty, from the king to the ministers, and then to the people below, they actually thought so in their hearts.

Naturally, because of this arrogance, they couldn't even arouse any interest in the surrounding countries.

Although they can face up to the skills of the barbarians, they don't pay much attention to them. It should be because they feel that they are too far away from Daming, and they don't know why they are barren.

Up to now, Ming officials still refer to Westerners as Yi people, or Frangji people.

From this, Wei Guangde thought, whether we should teach King Yu another lesson, explain to him the importance of intelligence collection in the relationship with foreign countries, not only for the familiar surrounding countries, but also for the barbarians. He categorizes.

It just seems that he himself didn’t know much about Europe in this period. Spain and Portugal were the first countries to start their voyages, but he did know that it was Holland later, and finally England.

As for other European countries, it seems that they are just soy sauce.

As for Tsarist Russia in the north, it seems that they will come over after more than 100 years.

At that time, Daming was gone, and it was Kang Mazi from the Qing Dynasty who beat him.

Let’s not talk about winning or losing. Anyway, Tsarist Russia’s control over the northern lands has been recognized, and the northern border of China’s territory has been completely locked, making it impossible to expand northward.

At this moment, Zhang Juzheng's soft call brought Wei Guangde back to his senses.

After thinking for a while, Wei Guangde replied in a low voice: "I just think that this country called Pulidu's family may be the citizens of the Frangji people. You must know that Mr. Gao also said that some of them are suspected to have appeared in the moat. mirror."

Speaking of this, Wei Guangde said after a slight pause: "I remember that when talking with Yu Dayou at the beginning, he mentioned that what we call Frangji people does not seem to be from the same country, because someone has seen two Flangji people. Armed ships driven by humans fought at sea, and the flags on the two ships were different.

Of course, it does not rule out the existence of bandits similar to those in our country.

However, I always feel that we still know too little about the Frangji people, and our understanding of their so-called country is too poor. "

"That's it."

Zhang Juzheng did not express his opinion, but nodded slightly.

"Brother Uncle is aware of the firearms used by Frang Robots, and now I, Ming Dynasty, have also begun to manufacture such weapons, so it can be seen that their domestic strength should not be underestimated.

Knowing a little more can never go wrong. "

Wei Guangde felt that it was still necessary to attract the attention of the future prime minister of the empire, and let him give a little attention to the barbarian personnel affairs.

"What you said is true. Although Francois is poor, they can sail a long distance to my Ming Dynasty, which shows that its national strength will not be weak."

Although Zhang Juzheng didn't care much about Fu Langjiren, Wei Guangde's words still attracted his attention.

There are documents to check the consumption of the Zheng He Fleet established by the Ming Dynasty.

Because of excessive consumption, after the Ming Dynasty's national strength weakened, the power of the Ming Dynasty began to shrink continuously, not only gave up Annan, but also the old port.

You know, even Wei Guangde, who is poor in historical knowledge, knows that the location of the Old Port is the later Sumatra Island in Southeast Asia, right next to the golden waterway, the Strait of Malacca.

It can be seen that Zheng He's vision is still very good. If he laid this chess piece early, he could block the Strait of Malacca and cut off the sea passage between East and West.

It's just a pity that the enemy attacked the Old Port when the Ming Dynasty was at its weakest, and the Ming Dynasty at that time was unable to regain this area.

Of course, if in Wei Guangde's hands in the future, if the Ming Dynasty has enough sea power, it will be easy to find a reason to go to war under the banner of recovering the Xuanweisi of the old port.

However, considering the current financial situation of the Ming Dynasty, Wei Guangde does not think that the Ming Dynasty has the ability to send troops there.

"Businessmen seek profit, and these Frangji people come to our Ming Dynasty for nothing but goods, to do business with my Ming Dynasty, and they bring silver to buy our silk, pottery, and tea.

This shows that this business is very profitable, and they will make huge profits by trafficking these things back.

But our Ming Dynasty restricted our merchants from going to sea, and handed over such huge profits to others.

If my Daming Shibo can make good use of the monopoly rights and take half of this part of the profits, I think it will be a very huge number, which is enough to solve my current predicament. "

Wei Guangde whispered again.

"It's difficult. If the profit is not high, the Frangji will not come again. Businessmen are after profit, not to mention the opposition will be very loud."

Zhang Juzheng felt that Wei Guangde wanted to participate in this kind of business through Shibo.

Although Zhang Juzheng didn't speak very bluntly, he believed that Wei Guangde understood.

If you want to share this part of the profit, it is nothing more than to increase the price of the domestic commodity significantly and then sell it to the Franc Robot.

Of course Zhang Juzheng understands the businessman's skill of buying low and selling high, it's too simple.

But there are actually many problems here. First, the Ming Dynasty did not allow sea trade. In fact, Shibo is a country-to-country trade in principle, and will not trade with foreign merchants.

Second, according to what Wei Guangde said, participating in the sharing of profits is vying for profits with the people.

Why can't this part of the price increase money be given to the people so that they can live a better life?
Taking the money away in order to solve financial difficulties is definitely not the teaching of saints.

Wei Guangde raised his eyes and looked around, knowing that today's occasion is not right, it is inconvenient to discuss this matter with Zhang Juzheng in depth, so he said in a low voice: "Brother Uncle, let's find time to talk about this after this matter, and I will go to toast Mr. Gao."

"Go together."

Who knows, upon hearing Wei Guangde say that, Zhang Juzheng said immediately.

Gao Gong's promotion to Minister of the Ministry of Rites was finally a dream come true. In the next two months, the court of the Ming capital was relatively stable, but as news from the Yan family in the south of the Yangtze River continued to come back, the attention of all the officials in the court was attracted at this time.

In fact, everyone knew that the Yan family was very rich, but after the investigation of the assets, it still greatly shocked the nerves of all officials.

But by this time, people with belated awareness found it difficult to intervene in it, and the cake seemed to have been divided.

On August 44th in the [-]th year of Jiajing, the memorial to Jiangxi Yushi Chengshou Festival, which did not record the number of Yan Shifan's Jiangxi family property, was finally sent to the capital.

Before that, the figures circulated by the government and the public were finally confirmed by Cheng Shoujie's memorial.

According to what Cheng Shou Rhythm said, Yan's family property has been counted to include 960 taels of gold and 90 taels of silver.

There are more than 57 houses in the mansion, and [-] houses, with a total of more than [-] mu of fields and ponds.

There are 850 pieces of jade cups and plates, more than 120 pieces of jade belts, more than 33 pieces of gold necklaces and tortoiseshell belts, 63 pieces of golden cabinets with beads, jade belts and rings, etc. Five egg pots, [-] pearl crowns and other items, and other pearls and precious stones are innumerable.

In addition, more than 18 taels of silver were entrusted to others and borrowed.

With such a large amount of wealth, the Ministry of Households was the first to react. Gao Yao and other officials of the Ministry of Households wrote memorials and sent them to the palace overnight, naturally in order to get a share of it.

Over the years, the Ministry of Household Affairs has accumulated too much deficit. Although the 200 million taels cannot solve all the holes, it finally gives people a little hope.

For example, in the 43rd year of Jiajing, after a year of careful calculation, the account book of the household department had a balance of 5 taels of silver, and finally changed the deficit of 10,000+ or ​​several 10 taels of silver every year in the previous few years.

If things go on like this, there is still a chance to fill up the arrears accumulated by the imperial court in the past few years.

Of course, the Household Department was not the only one who took a fancy to this money. Almost all the yamen of the imperial court had more or less holes, that is, the money approved by the imperial court could not be obtained in the Household Department for a long time.

Now seeing that the imperial court has money, all ministries naturally want to take their own share first.

For a while, the cabinet and the Yongshou Palace were overwhelmed by memorials from various ministries asking for money.

In Prince Yu's Mansion, Wei Guangde and Zhang Juzheng had just entered when they were stopped by Li Fang at the door.

Pulling the two aside, he said in a low voice: "Master Zhang, Lord Wei, Your Highness has been in a bad temper all day today. Please come back just to ask the two adults to go in and persuade him."

"Why is Your Highness so angry?"

Wei Guangde asked puzzledly.

"It's not Cheng Shoujie's rhythm."

Li Fang said in a low voice.

"Why?"

Zhang Juzheng also didn't understand, shouldn't King Yu be happy to copy Yan's family property?Why did you lose your temper?

"The number is too huge, beyond His Highness's imagination. He has been saying that Yan Shifan just killed him too cheaply."

Li Fang explained in a low voice, "Anger hurts the liver. If His Highness continues to do this, it will not be good for his health."

Wei Guangde and Zhang Juzheng looked at each other, but they didn't expect King Yu to be angry about this matter.

"We know, brother uncle and I will discuss how to persuade His Highness first."

After knowing the details, Wei Guangde and Zhang Juzheng did not immediately enter the hall to persuade them, and he heard King Yu's angry scolding from time to time, but temporarily turned a deaf ear to them.

"Brother Uncle, what's going on with Cheng Shoujie?"

The numbers that appeared in the memorandum were too huge, even though Zhang Juzheng had vaccinated him at the beginning, but if it was really written in the memoir, the nature would have changed.

"Too many people want to reach out, especially those in the south of the Yangtze River, which has pushed Cheng Shoujie into a hurry."

Zhang Juzheng said in a low voice, his complexion was also very bad at this time.

"Mr. Xu Ge didn't make peace with it. You see, this matter caused trouble."

He didn't say that because King Yu was angry. They acted so recklessly, and the consequences were serious.

Xiyuan, Yongshou Palace.

The memorials brought by Chen Hong put all the memorials asking for money from various yamen on the imperial book case, and Emperor Jiajing waved all of them down without turning over one, and fell to the ground.

In an instant, Huang Jin, Chen Hong, and the little servants who delivered the memorials in the main hall were all frightened and knelt on the ground without daring to vent their anger.

"When the court had no money, it was like this. Now that there is money, everyone is crying poor and clamoring for money.

What a good servant of mine. "

Emperor Jiajing didn't even look at the memorial that fell on the ground, but turned his head to look at Huang Jin who was kneeling on the ground and asked, "Huang Jin, tell me, are they afraid that I will use the money to practice and build Taoist temples?"

At this time, Emperor Jiajing's nerves were sensitive, and his suspicion was heavier than before.

The confrontation between him and the courtiers, in the eyes of Emperor Jiajing, was that his practice took away the money from the treasury, and many of them lost their income.

You know, Zhu Houcong was born as a vassal king, and he is more or less familiar with the officials of the Ming Dynasty.

He took away the imperial court's money, which was tantamount to robbing them of their money. The money went to various ministries. Although there were formal uses in the ledger, no one knew how much was used for it in the end.

"They are forcing the palace."

Emperor Jiajing suddenly roared angrily.

"My lord, they may be due to the shortfall in the past few years, so..."

"So what?"

Huang Jingang answered, but was interrupted by Emperor Jiajing's roar.

"Deficit, the court's deficit is not the past few years, it was like this more than ten or twenty years ago, it was able to pass before, but now it cannot pass?"

Emperor Jiajing got up while speaking, walked back and forth in the hall a few times, and finally roared angrily: "No matter which department sent these memorials, they are all rejected, and none of them are allowed to be approved. Those accounts continue to be owed. Let's wait until the court's finances improve.

Didn't the Ministry of Households have a surplus last year?
Gao Yao is capable, let him continue to work, and sooner or later he will be able to plug those holes. "

"Your Majesty, this."

At this time, Huang Jin instinctively felt that something was wrong, those civil servants had no integrity at all.

Don't look at their mouths and words in the past are sage words, but their actions are completely different.

But Huang Jin wanted to speak, but he didn't know what to say for a while, and stuck there after saying three words.

"You don't need to say it. The decree is that all the wealth and silver of the Yan family will be sent to Taicang, half of which will be used for the border, and the other half will be used for the inner treasury."

When the Emperor Jiajing said this, Huang Jin's heart trembled, but Chen Hong below was delighted.

Half of it is charged to the internal treasury, that is more than one million taels of income, tsk tsk
Immediately afterwards, Emperor Jiajing said while pacing slowly, but his voice gradually calmed down his anger at this time, "Confiscate the precious jade wares and bring them to the inner court.
Its land and real estate are sold for silver, and it is up to the local governor to decide the district. "

Finally, Emperor Jiajing said as if he had made up his mind.

Huang Jin looked up at the emperor, knowing that His Majesty hadn't been completely mad, at least he knew how to give the local officials a little sweetness so that they could handle things with care.

It's just that the bulk is taken away, whether those fields and real estate can satisfy their appetite.

(End of this chapter)