Brother Zhu Youxiao

Chapter 41 Inspecting the Armor Factory

"Can this make a fuss?"

On the side of Mingshifang and Paozi River in the inner city of the capital, Zhu Youjian was sitting in the carriage, listening to the urgent news from the palace, feeling speechless.

He didn't expect that Yang Lian, an old man who was so stubborn and didn't have the merits of supporting the palace transfer case, would dare to confront Sun Ruyou head-on.

On the other hand, Sun Ruyou solved the problem of Guanglu Temple by doing three things and two divisions. It was definitely not because of his strong ability to handle affairs.

Officials at the end of the Ming Dynasty, when they accomplished one thing in terms of money, it was often to hide the later things.

Zhu Youjian said to the General Banner of Jinyiwei sent by Lu Wenzhao:
"How did Sun Ruyou agree with Guanglu Temple's idea of ​​escorting the money on time?"

The General Banner of Jinyiwei outside the window of the carriage heard it and explained:

"According to the Jinwu Guard stationed in the Wenhua Palace, it seems that Yang Ge said in the matter that he would let the Guanglu Temple in Fujian and Guangdong be transported by sea, and then Sun Gechen solved the problem of Guanglu Temple."

"So it's like this..." Hearing this explanation, Zhu Youjian is not a fool after all, he knows the secrets of shipping in these places.

Guangdong, Guangxi, Fujian, Jiangxi, and Nanzhili are all small local township parties attached to the Zhejiang party.

Yang Lian dared to ask Fujian and Guangdong to escort Waijieyin by sea this time, so next time he would dare to ask these places to escort Qiushui by sea.

After Waijieyin was apportioned by several places under the Zhejiang Party, it was only tens of thousands of taels?The autumn tax and land tax are the big ones.

As far as Zhejiang alone is concerned, the regular tax of the summer tax is [-] taels, the regular tax of the autumn tax is [-] million taels, nearly [-] extra silver, [-] miscellaneous items, and [-] foreign settlements. One hundred and seventy-nine thousand taels.

This is only Zhejiang, the headquarters of the Zhejiang Party. If you add Nanzhili, Fujian, Guangdong, Guangxi, Jiangxi...

The value of various taxes that should be paid in these seven provinces every year is about [-] million taels, but half of them are converted land taxes and grain.

Really calculated, it should be more than [-] million taels of silver, and more than [-] million stones of land tax.

This land tax and regular tax are almost 45% of the regular tax of the six ministries of Ming Dynasty.

The officials of the Zhejiang Party can delay this amount of money and food for a day, even if it is delayed for a day, and then hand it over to maritime merchants, merchants and merchants, and they can earn thousands of taels of silver.

Merchants made a lot of money, so they naturally posted it to the local gentry, nicknamed it "Run Pen Silver".

This amount of money is legal and compliant, and local officials don’t need to pay too much. They only need to lend a certain amount of money to merchants and squires, and they can earn thousands or even tens of thousands of taels of profit.

When the big and small officials are full, all the silver, grain and fodder will be transported to the north, and when they reach the mouth of the canal in Yangzhou, they will have to face the corrupt officials and subordinates on both sides of the water transport.

After all kinds of fire consumption, it is not bad to have six million taels worth of silver and fodder that can be transported to the capital.

Therefore, every day that these shipments of grain and silver are delayed, the profit they can earn is a huge amount.

This is just a way to make money by defaulting on Cao Yin, and there are countless ways to make money like concealing tea tax, wine tax, etc.

As Zhu Youjian read in Mao Yuanyi's book in his previous life, at the same time, when Shaanxi sold some old tea, it could hand over [-] taels of silver to subsidize Yulin Town, while Jiangnan is obviously the most popular place for drinking tea, but the tea tax is only tens of thousands. two.

After Mao Yuanyi saw the atmosphere in the south of the Yangtze River, he said, "The four provinces of Shaanxi, Sichuan, Yunnan and Guizhou are not as good as one-tenth of the south of the Yangtze River."

This is a tax of millions of taels, but it was played by Jiangnan officials into the fact that the court could only get tens of thousands of taels.

Zhu Youjian didn't want to get involved in the grievances between the Donglin Party and the Zhejiang Party, because he knew that even if the Donglin Party was an active party at the moment, it would become corrupt in the near future.

His best choice is to let many parties fight among themselves, and then reform the tax system of the Ming Dynasty little by little.

With the size of the economy of the Ming Dynasty, as long as it can collect taxes normally, even if the poll tax is abolished, it can still earn [-] to [-] million taels a year, excluding the kind of land tax.

However, tax reform is not so easy. Instead of thinking about collecting taxes from Jiangnan, it is better to abolish the guard first!

However, the abolition of guard posts and tax collection all require military power, and an elite army must have extremely elite equipment.

It is precisely because of this that Zhu Youjian came to Mingshifang before the enthronement ceremony tomorrow.

Mingshifang, located in the southeast corner of the inner city, has the largest armor factory in the world.

"Your Highness, the armor factory is ahead."

Cao Huachun, who was in the imperial carriage, suddenly spoke, and Zhu Youjian also lifted the curtain and looked at a large building complex in front of him.

The armor factory, also known as the saddle and bridle bureau, is where the Ming Dynasty built armor, guns, bows, arrows, and gunpowder.

According to the Records of the Ming Dynasty, armor factories manufactured and stored a lot of armor, weapons, and gunpowder. According to the old regulations, more than [-] pieces of armor, guns, and other weapons were recorded every three years.

Zhu Youjian was going to Changping for military training, so he naturally had to bring some quality armor and weapons.

Cao Huachun and Wang Cheng'en had already told him that the four guards and one battalion of the Yumajian were mostly empty, and many people even sold their weapons, and the armor was also in disrepair and rusty.

It was impossible for him to train with an army without armor, so the armor and weapons in the armor factory became his target.

"Stop, who is it!"

When they came to the main entrance of the Armor Factory, the guards of the Bingma Division immediately scolded them because the accompanying guards in Jinyi had changed into casual clothes.

At this time, Cao Huachun handed Zhu Youjian's sign to Jin Yiwei, turned around and helped Zhu Youjian get off the car, and Jin Yiwei also showed the sign to the Bingmasi guard.

"See Your Highness Fifth!"

When he saw the jade plaque, the captain of the Bingma Division stationed at the main entrance immediately knelt on the ground, and the other ten guards also knelt down one after another.

"Okay, tell the prisoner of the armor factory to release the internal officials!"

"Yes!"

As soon as Zhu Youjian opened his mouth, the guards of Bingma Si hurriedly went to inform people.

Unlike the Tang and Song Dynasties, the Ming Dynasty did not set up a department in charge of weapon manufacturing, but was in charge of the Military Weapons Bureau of the Ministry of Industry, the Bingjue Bureau, Armor Factory, and Anmin Factory of the eunuch system.

That is to say, as the emperor, Zhu Youjian can pick up as many armors as he wants from the armor factory, as long as Zhu Youxiao nods.

This is only Zhu Youjian's first stop. He has to see how much inventory the armor factory has before heading to the Bingzhan Bureau and Anmin Factory.

"Fifth Highness, the slaves are late to welcome His Highness, please forgive me..."

From a long distance, Zhu Youjian didn't hear footsteps, but heard a harsh voice.

A fat-headed eunuch in his forties rushed over with a group of young eunuchs, and knelt down on the bluestone floor anxiously.

"Your Highness, this is Sun Liang, the supervisor of the armor factory."

Cao Huachun had a good memory, and explained the identity of this person to Zhu Youjian, but Zhu Youjian just nodded slightly after hearing this, and stopped talking.

Seeing this, Cao Huachun bowed slightly, then looked at Sun Liang and said:

"His Highness Fifth came to inspect the inventory of the armor factory, and I will give you six quarters of an hour to check everything quickly."

"Yes, yes! This servant will do it now!"

Hearing this, Sun Liang quickly kowtowed, then got up and asked someone to check.

(End of this chapter)