Back to the end of Ming Dynasty to be a warlord

Chapter 360 News
"Excuse me, Sir, what is green tea?"

Jones didn't quite know what tea was. Westerners didn't accept tea very much in this era, and what they barely accepted was black tea from Guangdong and Fujian. Jones had never heard of green tea from Jiangsu and Zhejiang.

Yang Chao pointed at the table with a smile: "Mr. Jones drinks that. This tea is a good thing. It can be used to treat illnesses, and to protect oneself if one is not ill."

At the same time that he sent someone to sell tea, Yang Chao had already asked someone to brew a pot and brought it over. Since it was a sales promotion, he naturally asked the customer to taste it.

"Oh, that's right. Then I have to take a sip!"

After speaking, Jones picked up the cup and took a sip. After drinking, he frowned, obviously not used to the taste of tea.

The other sailors didn't understand Chinese, and couldn't understand it at all. After drinking it, Jones told them that the tea could cure sepsis.

The sailors immediately began to drink loudly, obviously they were also afraid of getting infected.

But Jones is still dubious, can this slightly grassy tea cure diseases?
So I sent the patient to Yang Chao's military camp, watched him chew a few sips of green tea, and kept an eye out for someone to watch the patient, and told the patient not to take any medicines given by the Chinese except for green tea. Know whether green tea can really treat sepsis.

The sick clerk still ate the meat and bread that the Dutch are used to every day, and then ate a few mouthfuls of green tea and some clean water three times a day, but he really got better after three days, and he already had strength after five days, obviously He recovered from his illness.

Jones couldn't help being pleasantly surprised, and begged to see Yang Chao.

"Thanks to the Earl, the crew members below have recovered from illness, I wonder if Your Excellency Earl still has the red and green tea?"

Jones had apparently come to believe that the green tea worked wonders for treating sepsis.

Septicemia is also called nautical disease. In the age of superstition, Westerners believed that it had something to do with the devil, but once they recuperated on land, time would recover.

But the diet of Westerners has not changed. They are on land just because they eat some fresh meat, which also contains vitamins.

But compared to vegetables, the content is obviously still less, so it will take ten and a half months for them to recover on land, but Yang Chao gave his people some green tea, and they recovered in just five days. He had to be convinced that green tea could cure diseases.

So he couldn't wait to ask Yang Chao for this kind of green tea.

"Green tea, there's plenty of it. As long as Mr. Jones wants it, you can put it in the cargo. Because of our friendship, I decided to give Mr. Jones a thousand catties! Remember to drink tea frequently on the way back. But just drink tea It’s not safe, if you get sick, you can just swallow it. The lord really hopes that Mr. Jones will always be healthy.”

Jones immediately expressed his gratitude and expressed his gratitude to the Earl for his care.

It took 20 days to prepare the goods for the Dutch. In order to prevent those brokers from engaging in speculation, Yang Chao kept it secret, but this still inevitably affected the prices. In a short period of time, the silk and other things in Nanjing rose by three percentage points, which made Yang Chao A few thousand taels of silver were posted.

At the same time, before leaving, Yang Chao gave Jones a lot of gifts, of course, they were all products he hoped to develop.

Including Yunjin, the most famous product in Nanjing, I told Jones that the dragon robes of the Chinese emperors are made of this fabric, and I hope he can take them back to make some clothes. In addition, there are some special handicrafts, such as fans, embroidery, etc. Wait.

The autumn grain in Xinjiangkou has been harvested, the taxes and grain in various places in the south of the Yangtze River have also been harvested, and the autumn tax has been handed in.

Except for supporting local officials, Zuo Liangyu intercepted Huguang's Qiufu, and the court had no choice.

However, the autumn tributes from Zhejiang, Fujian, and Guangdong were deported to Nanjing. Zhu Cihong, the emperor, was obviously recognized by the southern civil society, and there were no historical pretexts to detain them. Even Jiangxi paid half of the autumn tributes.

Taxes in Jiangxi are not too high. According to the Yellow Book of the Ministry of Households, Jiangxi has 43 hectares of land, 900 million people, 250 dan of summer tax, and more than 100 million dan of autumn grain. Jiangxi was captured by Zhang Xianzhong last year, although it is better than Hu Guang. , In fact, there is a reason for tax exemption, but they paid [-] million tons.

But the most important thing is Nanzhili. The tax trace of Nanzhili exceeds 700 million dan. Based on the current silver price, that is more than 2000 taels of silver. Of course, the government does not use the market price to collect taxes. The government sets a dan The rice is less than one tael of silver, so in fact only 500 million taels of silver were collected.

After losing the northern region, leaving only Nanzhili, Zhejiang, Jiangxi, Fujian, and Guangdong, the fact that they were able to collect so many taxes is actually considered an effort by the officials.

But the money is far from enough. Huguang’s taxes were withheld by Zuo Liangyu, and the imperial court did not need to control Zuo Liangyu’s soldiers. Draft for the emperor and renovate the palace.

Therefore, before the autumn grain comes down, people look forward to the autumn grain. After the autumn grain comes down, they feel that they are even more short of money.

The four towns in Jiangbei immediately clamored for the imperial court to make up for the shortfall in their military salaries. They said that the imperial court was short of 300 million taels of soldiers, but according to the statistics of their four towns, the court officials were only short of 200 million soldiers. Um, in fact, I sent them overtime.

I have to say that the Four Towns actually bullied the imperial court a little bit, which is domineering.

Immediately some civil officials stood up to object, saying that Yang Chao hadn't asked for a penny so far, and that the four towns should share the court's worries.

Yang Chao was also somewhat dissatisfied with the four towns, Yang Chao didn't believe that the money they looted was only the few million taels given by the court.

They sit in the Jianghuai area, among other things, the salt industry alone makes tens of millions of profits every year.

Song Yingxing recorded that "there are no less than 3000 million taels in Guangling, and 900 million taels of children can be born every year."

The capital of the Lianghuai salt merchants is 3000 million taels, and the interest on loans alone is more than 900 million. However, lending is only a sideline of the salt merchants, and the profits of the main business, the salt industry, may be difficult to estimate.

The four towns in Jiangbei don't have to do anything, cover up the salt merchants and sell some private salt, it is not a problem to divide three to five million taels a year, but Yang Chao received the news, I am afraid that the four towns really do this, why Liu Zeqing who lives in Huaian Recruiting troops and buying horses can also carry out large-scale construction projects at the same time. It would be no wonder if he was short of money.

However, the courtiers still hope that the court will transfer the money. It is one aspect to appease the warlords. I am afraid that private kickbacks are also indispensable.

Knowing that the warlords and officials are lying on the people to suck blood, but Yang Chao can't touch them at this time.

Especially the warlords, the situation in the north has been changing.

After Yang Chao went south, he left his own people from Linqing to Yangzhou, equipped them with a large number of war horses, and asked them to collect information if they were not to fight.

The information that Yang Chao has now is faster and more accurate than that of the imperial court.

But the news is still very vague, because of the restrictions, the government's post station has long been unable to reach the north. Yang Chao's biggest source of news is actually brought over by refugees who fled.

Henan has undoubtedly the largest number of refugees, and Henan is also the most chaotic.

Originally, for more than ten years, this place has been the battlefield between the peasant army and the officers and soldiers. After Li Zicheng captured Beijing, almost all the officers and soldiers here surrendered, but after Li Zicheng withdrew from Beijing.

Many officers and soldiers turned against each other again, killing the officials sent by Li Zicheng, and unfurling the flag of Ming Dynasty again.

Local thieves from all over Henan also took advantage of the momentum to gather. For example, Liu Hongqi occupied Runing, Hanjiadi occupied Xuzhou, Li Jiyu occupied Dengfeng, Li Hao occupied Yuzhou, and Liu Xuan occupied Xiangcheng. There are more than one hundred thousand each."Some of these people are local tyrants, and some are unemployed heroes. When the peasant army and officers and soldiers fought in Henan, they took advantage of the situation and organized regiment training for self-protection.After the victory of the imperial court, he was ordered to An by the imperial court, and after Li Zicheng won the victory, he belonged to Li Zicheng.After Li Zicheng failed this time, they rose up again, under the banner of killing thieves for revenge, attracting people who were dissatisfied with the peasant army, and once again expressed their support for the court.

The Manchu Qing would not give up Hena, and appointed Yang Fangxing as the governor of the river, Su Hongzu as the branch patrolling the North Road, Shen Chaoji as the branch guarding the North Road, Luo Xiujin as the governor of Henan, Zu Kefa as the general officer of Henan Weihui, Jin Yuhe As the deputy general of Huaiqing in Henan, these civil and military officials led the Eight Banners soldiers to recruit the Ming army, and they have already controlled the area north of the Yellow River in Henan.

Henan was occupied by local regiments, officers and soldiers of the Ming army, the remnants of the peasant army, and the forces of the Manchu and Qing forces.

The situation in Shandong is roughly the same. The officers and soldiers, the peasant army, the Manchus and the local regiments are intertwined, but the Manchus slowly occupy the top. It is worth mentioning that the one who helped the Manchus quickly gain an advantage is the one that the small court wanted to confer Wu Sangui.

Shandong and Henan are both close to the south of the Yangtze River, so the information received is more accurate. As for the places further north, the value is limited. Yang Chao only heard some very uncertain news. Some said that the Qing army pursued Li Zicheng to Shanxi. It is said that the Qing army has entered Shaanxi.

To obtain more accurate information, information stations must be established in more remote places, but how to infiltrate into the north is a difficult problem.

A recent agreement of the imperial court caught Yang Chao's attention.

The small imperial court finally decided to send a mission to the Qing Dynasty.

Shi Kefa has always insisted on contacting the Manchu and Qing forces to suppress the thieves, but Yang Chao has always opposed it.

But there was no personal conflict between Yang Chao and Shi Kefa. On the contrary, Yang Chao had always respected Shi Kefa and knew that he was one of the few clean and honest officials.

At that time, there were quite a few people vying to be the first assistant. Ma Shiying was one who was awarded the title of Minister of the Ministry of War and Bachelor of Dongge University when King Fu was in charge of the country. They all strive to be the chief assistant.

Liu Kongzhao was suppressed first by the joint civil servants, saying that the ancestral system did not have honorable ministers as chief assistants, and Ma Shiying also kept a low profile because of King Fu. Finally, with the support of Yang Chao, Shi Kefa overwhelmed Wang Duo and became the new chief assistant. .

So Yang Chao and Shi Kefa just disagreed in political opinion, and the emperor obviously trusted Yang Chao more. He had already rejected this proposal and was not allowed to discuss it again. I don't know why he agreed again this time.

Yang Chao decided to manipulate this matter.

(End of this chapter)