Daming Town Haiwang

Chapter 2051, still need to be practical people
The Beijing-Tianjin area is at the foot of the emperor, and the prince is the chief envoy of Beizhili. Even if there are thorns, they will be dealt with severely soon. Therefore, although they are banned, everything is still very stable.

In just two days, the epidemic situation in the Beijing-Tianjin area has improved a lot. The number of infected people has decreased, and the whole situation has changed for the better.

At the same time, in various places in the Ming Dynasty, the imperial court's strict orders have also been issued, but when they are implemented, the differences are reflected.

The places where the officials of the Practical Faction are in charge can naturally strictly follow the requirements of the court, seal and control all places, and investigate and deal with profiteers who want to make money for the country.

While ensuring social stability and order, the local epidemic situation was quickly controlled.

But in some places dominated by conservative officials, the situation is quite different.

In some places, the old-fashioned officials were afraid of death, so they had already taken refuge in the countryside early on, leaving the matter to their subordinates.

The old-fashioned officials in some places don’t care about this, thinking it’s not a big deal, there’s no need to close the city or something, just do what they should do, isn’t it just the plague, it will disappear after a while, history It's not that it hasn't appeared before, it's all in the past like this.

In some places, the old-fashioned officials not only did nothing, but also colluded with illegal profiteers to make a fortune for the country and make a lot of money.

A typical representative of this is Tang Mu, the governor of Shandong.

In Jinan City, at this moment, the strict order of the imperial court has been followed, and the entire Jinan City has also been sealed off. However, Tang Mu's closure of the city is not to fight the plague, but to make a fortune for the country.

Here is a factory in Jinan City. When other factories have shut down, this factory is busy in full swing. It is working day and night and rushing to produce goods in two shifts.

"My lord, almost all the factories in the northern area of ​​Daming have shut down. The prices of all kinds of goods are going up, and the prices change every day. As long as you have the goods in hand, the prices are easy to negotiate."

Tang Quan, the director of the factory, took Tang Mu to inspect the factory with a smile on his face. There was no doubt that this factory belonged to Tang Mu and belonged to the Tang family.

"Well, good, good!"

"Work overtime. Now is a rare good time. After everything recovers, it will not be easy to make money."

Tang Mu nodded in satisfaction.

As the chief envoy of Shandong, instead of sitting in the town to direct the prevention and control in person, he went to his own factory to see the production situation in the factory. All he could think about in his mind was to make a fortune.

"Master, if we can bring over the factories next door, our output can still be doubled."

Tang Quan thought for a while and said in a low voice.

"Hmm~"

Tang Mu nodded slightly, and then nodded to the people around him, who immediately went to handle it with understanding.

At this time, it is a very easy time to do things. It is very easy to annex other people's factories and industries. Just find a reason to seal up the other party's factory and let the people who stay inside be driven away. You can take it for yourself.

If the other party dares to say anything more, they will be locked up immediately on the grounds of hindering the control of the epidemic, and now they can be dealt with strictly, severely, and quickly, and they can be killed directly.

As for whether to worry about things being revealed, then there is no need to worry.

He, Tang Mu, also has someone in the court, as long as he has money in his hands, everything can be settled.

"Master, Master~"

At this time, people from his own family came to report the matter.

"whats the matter?"

Tang Mu asked quickly.

"Master, the disobedient grain merchants in the city have been locked up now, and the price of grain has also risen. The price of a catty of grain has now reached [-] Wen."

Tang Zheng reported to Tang Mu in a low voice.

"Is it only fifty cents a catty?"

When Tang Mu heard this, he frowned slightly.

After thinking for a while, he said, "Continue to increase the price. You won't be able to make much money at fifty Wen a catty. At least the increase to a few hundred Wen a catty will be very profitable."

"There are now more than 300 million people in Jinan City, and they consume millions of catties of food a day. This is a good opportunity to make a fortune. If you miss this opportunity, you will not have such a good opportunity."

"Yes~"

When Tang Zheng heard this, he hurriedly went to deal with it.

Now that the epidemic is closed, almost everything is decided by him, the chief executive. On the one hand, he secretly sends people to find those profiteers, colludes with each other, and raises the price of grain. On the other hand, he seals up those grain merchants who are unwilling to cooperate To put it bluntly, the reason is that the price of the other party's grain has risen a little bit, which is making the country miserable.

At the same time, on the other hand, the disaster relief food issued by the court was withheld, and then sold to profiteers.

The price of grain took off directly. Originally, the grain was only a few pennies a catty, but it suddenly reached tens of pennies a catty, but this still made this Tang Mu dissatisfied. He felt that the price was too low, and he couldn't make much money in a short time. silver.

It is not enough to increase the price by more than ten times, and even said that the price of grain will be raised to hundreds of Wen, so that the money will come soon.

This is a typical case of making a fortune in a country, a profit-making business, just like the previous grain merchants, who specially took advantage of the famine to deliberately hoard food prices to drive up food prices, desperately sucking blood from the common people.

Of course, from Tang Mu's point of view, he did everything seamlessly.

Because the grain stores are not under his name, even if something happens, those merchants can be directly used as scapegoats.

As for the factory or something, it's not a problem, that is, the workers in the factory know it, so what if they know it, and they can't give feedback at all, so it's still nothing.

Besides, even if something happened, some unimportant people could be thrown out as scapegoats. Anyway, he didn't know anything, nothing happened, and the money flowed into his pocket.

"The plague is good, the plague is good!"

"Without the plague, how would I get rich? If I don't have money, how can I climb up the ladder in the future?"

Tang Mu was so happy that he was about to start singing, and now this little life is really comfortable.

The money that comes into the account every day is like running water. This factory is not a big deal. The real money comes from selling grain.

This person can't do without food for a day. Food is an indispensable thing for three meals a day.

Relying on the control of grain, driving up the price of grain, the price is more than ten times higher than before, and the profit in it can be imagined, but he is not satisfied with this, and he still feels that the price is low, and the price of grain will continue to rise Going up, it can be said to be black-hearted to the extreme.

Tang Mu made a fortune here, thinking that no one knew about it.

However, he didn't know that his affairs had already been revealed, and everything had already been placed on Emperor Hongzhi's desk.

Now that there is an epidemic, in order to control the epidemic and implement strict containment measures, Emperor Hongzhi naturally had to use the power of factory guards in order to grasp the situation in various places.

Dongchang and Jinyiwei are the most important forces in the hands of the emperor, and the most important role is to control information from all over the Ming Dynasty and monitor every move of civil and military officials.

Over the years, Emperor Hongzhi invested a lot in the factory guards, and the annual appropriation increased. Up to now, the money spent on the factory guards has reached tens of millions of taels of silver every year.

With sufficient funds and the attention of the emperor, the strength and number of factory guards have grown unprecedentedly, not only penetrating into all fields of Ming Dynasty, but even having the power of factory guards all over the world, including Europe, Egypt, The Ottoman Empire and Percy both have factory guards, and they can report back to the capital as soon as anything happens.

At the same time, the use of wireless telegraphy has also made a qualitative leap in the information and intelligence energy of the factory guards.

With wireless telegraphy, anything can be reported quickly and without anyone noticing.

At this moment, Emperor Hongzhi held the performance and actions of officials from all over the Ming Dynasty in the implementation of the anti-epidemic.

"You still need to be a practical person."

"At such a critical moment, these officials of the practical faction are just like Liu Jin. They can always go forward and take the lead in doing their own things well, guarding one side and stabilizing the other side."

"Look at the chief envoys of Shaanxi, Henan, and Liaodong who have done a good job. Especially in Henan, where the epidemic first appeared, but it is also the first to be controlled now. The number of new cases now is There are very few, and the social order is quite stable.”

"These old school officials just can't do it. They are loyal to the emperor and patriotic with their mouths open, and they write beautiful articles at hand. But when they encounter difficulties, they either shrink their heads and hide in fear of death, or they don't pay attention at all. They think it doesn't matter. It's nothing. Big deal."

"What's more, people like Tang Mu, the governor of Shandong, colluded with unscrupulous businessmen and made a lot of money for the country. They have long ago strictly prohibited food price increases, business closures, and sales bans. We must ensure the food security and needs of the people. .”

"But this Tang Mu actually colluded with the government and businessmen to make a fortune for the country. The grain price has increased by more than ten times. Instead, the grain price that is unwilling to increase the price has been arrested and seized."

Looking at the situation reported by the factory guards from all over the Ming Dynasty, Emperor Hongzhi's anger was like a volcano accumulated for thousands of years.

When my imperial decree came to these places, it was like farting. No one cared about it, and they didn't care at all. They even used it as an opportunity to make money, colluding with officials and businessmen to make money, driving up food, and making a fortune for the country.

He didn't care about the plague that was currently breaking out at all, and didn't feel how terrible the plague was, with terrible harm and serious consequences.

"Immediately summon the cabinet masters, six ministers, and ministers to discuss matters!"

PS: It shouldn’t be too much, after all, there were real cases in the past few months~
(End of this chapter)