Prime Minister Bizen

Chapter 130 Husband Service Arrangement and Royal Encouragement (Big Chapter)

While the Tongfangyuan was handling the internal affairs of the palace, the Xiu family was also handling the political affairs of Yuxi family in the front hall.

During this period, Hanabou Masako made a rough summary of the four nationalities held by the Uki family. There are 11.5 people in Misaka, 16.8 people in Bizen, and 13.2 people in Bichu. The population is only 8.3 people.

The Hide family firmly controlled a large amount of land and population in Bizen, and Bizen was also one of the main places where Ukido's elite troops were based, so the Hide family did not want to waste these elite soldiers on Jodan's labor.

In contrast, most of Bichu and Mizuo are the territories of wealthy families, and the quality of their soldiers is uneven. Most of them were responsible for the defense during the Battle of Sanuki, and they have been gradually excluded from the ranks of field troops by Ukido.

For more than a year, Xiujia has controlled China and the United States, and the two countries have experienced rare peace. As the key points of the Western Kingdom, the two countries used to be fought back and forth by Mimura, Nizi, Urakami, Mori and other families, and the people's livelihood was in decline.

Now with the rule of the Xiu family and the reconciliation with the Maori family, the two countries have gained a rare opportunity to recuperate.

These troops composed of peasants and soldiers in the old era needed to participate in the recruitment work of the territory when there was no war. This time, Ishida Mitsunari came to Ukido's important people, and he could just hand them over to ensure that Bizen's elite Rest and recuperate.

After discussion, it was decided that Bichu would gather 8000 people, Misaku 6000 people, Sanuki 3000 people, and Bizen 3000 people a distribution plan. A total of 2 people would be handed over to Ishida Mitsunari.

The 12th New Year of Tenzheng is coming soon, Ukido has taken control of Sanuki again, and Okayama Castle is celebrating the festival in a cheerful atmosphere.

And Ishida Mitsunari also saw Hideka again after being left out for a few days. This meeting was much more solemn than last time. The second of the three elders, Hanafang Masayuki and Oka Toshikatsu, were together as companions. Akashi Jingzhen and other important ministers also attended the meeting.

In the Daihiro Room of Okayama Castle, without any greetings, Hideka straight to the point and talked about Ukita's decision with Ishida Mitsunari.

"Lord Ishida, our family has been the pioneer of my father for many years. I have fought bravely in battle and never retreated. However, the battle has been going on for a long time, and now the people's livelihood is indeed a bit sluggish, and the Okayama side has some vitality as you can see."

"Sanuki Xinling has just been evaluated. It is really difficult to send so many manpower to Osaka in a short time. Here I ask for forgiveness. Allow me to send 1.2 manpower to Osaka in advance. Please allow me to send the remaining 8000 people one after another. Da. Wait until the beginning of the 13th year of Tianzheng, I guarantee that 2 people will definitely appear at the head of Osaka Castle."

Ishida Mitsunari is actually very satisfied with Hideka's arrangement. Before he went to Bizen, Hideyoshi had ordered that Uki's family should not be forced too quickly, so Ishida Mitsunari's bottom line was 1 people.

Now, after half a month of discussion, Ukido has agreed to dispatch manpower in full accordance with Hashiba Hideyoshi's requirement of 2 people, which is enough to show Ukido's loyalty. , naturally everything is allowed.

However, the manpower standard on Xiujia's side has been confirmed, but the engineering bid section in Osaka that he is in charge of has not yet been established.

As mentioned above, in order to ensure the smooth and orderly progress of the project, Hideyoshi divided the Osaka project into multiple tenders, and different daimyos were responsible for the different tenders, and they were all responsible for the materials and manpower.

Hideka accepted Ishida Mitsunari's request to send manpower this time, so he naturally wanted to get his own bid. If he only sent manpower and was not in charge of the bid, then these Ukido leaders might be assigned to other daimyos. Will they be cherished by those big names who have lost their backing?I am afraid that the acquisition is not as good as the civilian husband who has already arrived in Osaka.

The Xiu family's purpose of firmly controlling these 2 people is also out of the idea of ​​​​cherishing their people's power. They will never allow these people's power to escape from the control of the family and be assigned to other daimyos.

Hideka therefore put forward his own request and said, "Since Ishida-sama said that we want our family to supply lime to build walls in Osaka, why don't we subcontract the building of the stone wall above the stone wall on the Honmaru of Osaka Castle?"

Hideka's words are actually asking Ishida Mitsunari for the construction rights of the ground works of Osaka Castle. Compared with the labor-intensive work of excavating water bores and building stone walls, building stone walls, gates and scull towers The project is relatively simple, and the consumption of people's manpower is also small.

The previous arrangement for the Osaka bidding section was to cut the Osaka project into pieces. All the projects within this area, including the construction of the underground and ground buildings, were all subcontracted by the daimyo. Now Xiujia wants to contract the Osaka stone wall project. It is indeed in Ishida Thirty percent expected.

Of course, the purpose of the Xiu family is to cherish the power of the people and delay the time for the husband to be in place.

In this time and space, due to the fact that Bizen and Echizen became pro-vassal domains, the power of the people was much less than in history. As a result, most of the rammed earth and excavation of the water hole in Osaka Honmaru have not been completed, and the stone walls have not yet been built. Only the Ohonmaru where the castle tower is located has completed the construction of the stone wall, and the underground works have not been completed, so why the above-ground projects?

"This time the Osaka city is being built, I am going to let me, Akashi Satsumamori and Hanabou Harumiya Ryo's eldest son, Hanabang Masanari, go to supervise the construction, so as to ensure that the progress of the city building will not lag behind."

Ishida Mitsunari frowned when he heard the Hideka's request, and thought about the purpose of it, but he heard that the Hideka would send important ministers such as Akashi Kagenin and Hanabang Masayuki's eldest son to supervise the progress of the project, and he felt even more concerned about the Hideka's response. satisfy.

Ishida Mitsunari quickly stretched out again and said, "At this time, I still need to go back to discuss with the followers. I think it's not a big problem. Does Your Highness have any requests?"

"I hope that the first batch of civilian husbands will be sent to Osaka by myself, so that I can pay my respects to my father during the New Year. I would like to ask Lord Ishida to convey it on my behalf."

At this moment, Hideyoshi has initially established hegemony in Kinai, and the control over his daimyo is becoming more and more strict. If Hideyoshi brings more than 1 people to Luoyang without Hideyoshi's permission, it is likely to cause misunderstandings, so Hideyoshi will let Ishida Mitsunari applied to Hideyoshi on his behalf.

Ishida Mitsunari listened to Hideka's request and said, "These are due meanings, Your Highness need not worry, I will definitely convey them to His Highness."

Seeing that the matter had been finalized, Xiujia saw that Ishida Mitsunari was relatively easy to talk to, and didn't criticize Yukiduo too much, so his guard against him had gradually dropped.

The Xiu family was going to do their utmost to invite him to stay for one more night. After being entertained by Haosheng, they would return to Kyoto tomorrow, but Ishida Mitsunari declined.

After Ishida Mitsunari left, Hideka, Hanabou Masaoka Toshikatsuaki Ishikage and others continued to hold meetings in Ohiroma to carefully finalize the operation of this matter.

The Xiu family spoke first and said, "We must guarantee the people's strength of the direct leaders, and give priority to recruiting the people of the powerful family's retainers. After all, after the reform of the military system, the direct-controlled military is the backbone of the family's combat power, and it cannot be wasted on things like city building."

"The first batch of 1.2 people will be allocated in this way. Bizen 3000 people will go first, Misaku 4000 and Bichu 5000 will follow up. The rest of the population will not be mobilized for now. After Sanuki stabilizes, the leaders will gather and go to Osaka together."

"The construction of the Osaka city cannot be completed overnight. The number of civilians recruited by Beichu and Misaku is equivalent to 8% of the usual military service. Years and months will inevitably delay the farming season."

"Ryo Haruna, go and prepare some money and silk, and hand it over to Seto Jiazheng, and ask him to go to North Korea, Kanto, Northeast, Ezo and other places to buy some cattle and pack horses, so that they can supplement the lack of people's strength during farming."

"When the farming season is busy, people from the Bizen area will also be dispatched to Misaka and Bichu to help with the farming, so we can't miss the harvest."

"The wooden plow used to plow the ground in the collar is too backward. Now that there are livestock plows, you can buy the latest wooden plow from the merchants of the Ming Dynasty to counteract it and improve the efficiency of the people's plowing."

"These investments are all provided by the family. Usually, all the cattle and horses are collected under the unified jurisdiction of the county divisions. When the farming season is in order to lend the livestock to the common people. After the Osaka Fudu is no longer so tired, you can collect 1 stone of grain for lending a year. Livestock for income."

"Besides, when people leave home, what worries them the most is the land at home and their wives and children. Every time you recruit a civilian husband, you must properly explain the policies of your family to them, and hand them over to their wives and children in front of them. Let them go to Osaka with peace of mind with the rice noodles and copper coins from Anjia."

"In this case, the first wave of recruits will not have a large number of people, so it should not consume too much people's power. And after the cattle and horses are in place to replace the family's people's power, the second batch of people who set off will bring their new policies. Go and inform the first batch of civilians who are already in Osaka. This way, they can build the city with peace of mind after knowing that their homes have been properly settled."

Many people rumor that Japanese agriculture is very backward and there are no cattle for farming. This is actually wrong. As early as the Kamakura period, Japan had "cattle and horse farming".

It's just that during the war years, the people were not as good as cattle. A large number of farm cattle could not be preserved during the war-torn years, or they were eaten as food or plundered by other countries.

As for the pack horse, there are not many big names to pay attention to. It takes 20 shi of food to raise a war horse, and a pack horse will not eat less because you can’t run. Like a war horse, a special "horse pass" was arranged for him.

With so much food, I am enough to support dozens of untouchables. For the Warring States daimyo who are not well-off, this is a loss-making business.

"Shimadzu Family Documents" records that the Shimadzu family has an army of 1.5 people and 272 horses, of which there are only 10 draft horses, and 262 are warrior horses.

It was not until the Edo period that pack horses were really widely used. After the world was at peace, the role of war horses gradually weakened.The frequent attendance made the daimyos urgently need a means of transportation that consumes less energy and can carry more cargo.

In Japan, there is no uniformly planned road at all. Zhongshan Road is only 0.5~1 meter wide, and even Sanyo Road and Tokai Road are only about 2 meters wide. The road is completely blocked.

Therefore, pack horses began to be widely used in the Edo period. The military service requirements of 3686 people from the Sakai clan of the Maebashi Domain included 350 riding horses, 570 pack horses, and 1179 civilian husbands.

In addition, Japanese cattle breeds are naturally smaller than mainland cattle breeds, and most of them live in the mountains. Shikoku Sanuki and Awa have stories of borrowing cattle for farming.

During the Taiko inspection period, the height of Sanuki table was 12.6 shi, and the height of Awa was 18.4 shi. The height of the stones in Sanuki was obviously hidden. Sanuki is originally a large plain with many paddy fields. , with a table height of 17.5 stone.

In the Edo period, when the world was at peace, the people of Sanuki would borrow cattle from Awa every year, and borrow cattle for 1 days a year for 70 shi rice to farm in Sanuki. The stone height exceeds Awa's 29 stone.

The Xiu family hopes to take this opportunity to re-plant the culture of livestock farming into the minds of the people. Although it is only a supplement to the people's power for the time being, in the long run it will lay the foundation for Shi Gao, who will increase the territory in the future.

Luckily, the flower house followed the words of the Xiu family and used the abacus to roughly calculate the money and silk needed. Since the Xiu family took over the throne, they have made various reform measures. There is little accumulation.

Now that they want to plow cattle into the fields, Hanfang Zhengxing actually refuses.After all, pack horses and oxen are only useful during the busy farming season. When the farming is slack, it is tantamount to raising and consuming food for nothing, and the gain outweighs the gain.

The key is this purchase. He roughly calculated that no less than 2000 cattle and horses will be needed. The expenditure of nearly 10,000+ pennies really made him breathless.

Seeing that the flower house Zhengxing hadn't answered, the Xiu family turned to look at the frowning old man who was counting accounts, and saw his dilemma.After thinking for a while, he said, "Nowadays, the armor rate of the directly-administered and standing equipment in the family is not low. The equipment manufacturing can be temporarily stopped, and some money can be embezzled and sent to the Seto family and Ming merchants to buy livestock. The swords produced by the long ship are sufficient Ming people can't eat so much, so they can sell it to warriors of other countries to earn income."

But the Xiu family knew that the money was far away and could not satisfy their thirst, so they said, "I have some expensive military equipment around me, and my father has also collected a lot of expensive tea sets, and the family members have some gold and silver jewelry. I will sort them out after I go back." Come out, you go to dispose of it in exchange for money to buy livestock."

"Starting from today, I will lead by example. The food of the family and maids in the palace will be deducted by one-third. Clothes, gold and silver jewelry will not be replaced unless necessary, and all the saved funds will be handed over to Harmony Liang to contribute to the development of the family. "

Hideka remembers that in order to purchase British warships, the later generations of Japan worked together from the emperor onwards, and all staff cut down on food and clothing. The emperor only ate one meal a day, and handed over the saved food expenses to the navy to purchase warships.

Today's Xiujia certainly knows what kind of impact it will have on the local economy if Beichu and Mizuo recruit so many civilian husbands.The Xiu family can only increase income and reduce expenditure as much as possible, and buy cattle and pack horses to solve the shortage of local people's power.

But the Xiu family's ideas are a bit ahead of the times. For a samurai, the lord is not only his own lord, but also his own honor. If the lord loses face, it means he loses face.

Seeing that the Xiu family was going to buy farm cattle for the people by reducing their own expenses, Gang Lisheng directly knelt down in grief and shouted loudly, "Your Highness, why is this so!"

Hanafang Zhengxing, who was fiddling with the abacus on the side, was also surprised by the words of the Xiu family, and the movements of his hands froze until he was awakened by the big movement of Oka Lisheng. The family prayed for their lives to be taken back.

Mingshi Jingqin prostrated at the side and said, "The king humiliated the minister to death, the king humiliated the minister to death, Your Highness! Your Highness is the only son of the lord, and he is also the adopted son of the councilor. He has 4 stones from the four countries, how can he not have a decent one?" Where are the clothes!"

Huafang Zhengxing said from the side, the master's family is in danger, how can we wait for the servants to live? "The ministers can take the lead in saving food and clothing. How can your highness condescend to suffer? Please take back your order! Please allow me to hand in half of the money." The salary is used to support the country."

Xiujia didn't expect that his words would trigger such a big reaction, he was surprised and felt warmed by the veteran's performance.

For the first time, the Xiu family felt sincerely how much the old ministers left by the Zhi family cared about the Yuxi family, and truly counted themselves as a member of the Yuxi family, but this strengthened his idea of ​​sharing hardships with the ministers.

Xiujia first said to Akashi Jingqin, "Satsuma Shou misunderstood, how could I have no clothes to wear? It's just that I won't buy new clothes if it is not necessary. If necessary, I will naturally order new clothes at home to protect the appearance of the house. .”

Then he said to Hanafang Masako, "Don't bring up the matter of the erotic palace, you will mess up the foundation of the family. The samurai works for the family, and receiving the knowledge and action salary bestowed by the family is the right thing to do. "

"I remember when I was a child, Chun Gongliang told me that "Yu En" and "Feng Gong" are two inseparable individuals. If I am in financial distress today because of my willful behavior, I will deduct the favor of the master. When the warriors are needed to contribute, what qualifications do I have to ask them to serve the public?"

"But." Huafang Zhengxing wanted to persuade him again, but was stopped by the Xiu family.

Xiujia stood up from the imperial steps, walked to the door of Daguangjian, looked at the blue sky and said, "Many samurai in the family have a very difficult life. If you all take the lead in donating money, what about the lower-level samurai?"

"If they also donate, their lives may be even more difficult to maintain. If they don't donate, they may be judged and isolated by others. They are all elite warriors in the Ukita Army and should not be subject to this dilemma. Therefore, Important officials in the family must not take the lead."

Hideka turned around and continued to them, "I once told Councilor Hashiba that 'the foundation of the Yuki family is warriors, and you can only become the sharpest blade in your family if you maintain it well'. Today, you must not make any damage. The matter of Yuxi's family of blades came out."

"I proposed this matter myself. You must strictly tell the warriors in your family that you don't need them to donate assets to save the country, and you don't accept their donations. If they really want to thank me, then please do your best in the future!"

Xiujia's words were very decisive, completely blocking the way for Hanafang Masayuki and others to "voluntarily" donate.

Since Xiujia succeeded to the throne, the low-level samurai in the team usually received many rewards, coupled with the fact that they won many victories in foreign wars and obtained rich spoils, their living standards have been greatly improved.

Hanafang Zhengxing and the others did not expect that even in difficult times at home, the Xiu family would still care so much about the samurai at home, they were deeply moved, and bowed to the Xiu family, "Thank you, Your Highness, on behalf of the samurai at home."

After Huafang Zhengxing went down to the city, she spread the news about the policies and words of the Xiu family. The samurai and leaders of the family thanked the Xiu family for their kindness, and sincerely increased the centripetal force of the Yuxi family.

The Xiu family only spent a small amount of money, which not only strengthened the national strength of the Yuxi family, but also earned the loyalty of the warriors and citizens in the territory. It can be said that they made a lot of money.

(End of this chapter)