prosperous age

"Has Li Chengliang in the southwest reported how much silver he was able to send back?"

In response to Zhang Juzheng's question, Wei Guangde shook his head and said with a wry smile, "Calculating the time, they should have received the official document from the Ministry of War. Even if they start shipping immediately, it will take at least three to five months."

"That was after the New Year. What do you think? Can we move the money that was reserved for His Majesty's wedding to make up for the shortfall at the end of the year?

Wait until the silver from the southwest arrives next year and then make up for it?"

Zhang Juzheng said hesitantly.

Hearing Zhang Juzheng's words, Wei Guangde frowned slightly, then shook his head and said, "Uncle, this is absolutely not allowed.

Those two people in the palace care about Your Majesty very much and will definitely not agree to do this.

Even if we hide it from the palace, once the news gets to their ears, it will be bad for you, me and the king."

Wei Guangde didn't think this was a good idea, and he also knew Zhang Juzheng's considerations.

In fact, no matter what, it is impossible for the emperor to lack money for his wedding.

Not to mention the silver deposited in the inner court, even the silver in the Changying Treasury was piled up like a mountain, exceeding tens of millions of taels.

But so what?

Zhang Juzheng still wanted to maintain the normal operation of the court without using the silver in the Changying Treasury as much as possible. This was the achievement of the Cabinet and the Ministry of Revenue.

Even if the court's revenue and expenditure are still in deficit, as long as the silver in the Changying Treasury is not used, it means that the deficit is not large and is still within the controllable range.

Zhang Juzheng actually took the financial deficit of the imperial court very seriously and also grasped the foundation of the operation of the feudal empire, which is money.

There is nothing in the world that cannot be accomplished as long as you have money.

Even if the money was collected through "exorbitant taxation", as long as it was not used for an extravagant lifestyle but was kept in the court for future use, the world would not be in chaos.

Because the imperial court has money, it can quell all disobedience.

"Brother, please be patient. Once the land survey is completed, the court will no longer be short of money."

Wei Guangde finally gave some advice, saying that if he really did so, he might gain points in the eyes of the court officials, but in the palace, it would greatly reduce his points.

"Haha, the news of the Fujian land reclamation has just been announced, but the outside world is already spreading the dirty things about me and the palace. I don't know what will happen after the land reclamation in Fujian is completed and the land reclamation in other provinces across the country begins."

Zhang Juzheng had a bitter smile on his face. He sighed and stopped talking.

"What Mr. Zhang did was for the country and the people. We know that, and the palace knows it too."

Wei Guangde had no choice but to say.

There are too many things involved here. Zhang Ji still hasn't found out where the rumor came from, and the palace hasn't found out either.

However, the Empress Dowager was angry, so Feng Bao simply cleaned the palace and did it for Empress Dowager Li to see and calm the anger of the Cining Palace.

However, Wei Guangde also knew that Feng Bao was still asking the East Factory and the Embroidered Uniform Guard to continue investigating the matter, and it was obvious that the matter had not been resolved yet.

Apparently, Zhang Juzheng had already determined that it was some gentry officials in the court who were responsible.

Think about it, this possibility is the greatest.

Just because you are the prime minister doesn't mean others will be afraid of you.

Everyone has an official position, but their positions are different.

In the Ming Dynasty, people in official circles were actually equal to each other under normal circumstances. They were all Jinshi, and there was no one who was better than the other.

Of course, those who are out to get their way will naturally flatter their superiors to the utmost, but that is another matter.

"Let the Ministry of War discuss it and then submit a memorial. I agree to the northern tour to Nurgan City."

Zhang Juzheng calmed himself down and said to Wei Guangde.

In Ava, Myanmar, Li Chengliang had finished reading the document sent by the Ministry of War in the capital, and immediately said to his personal soldiers: "Send this document to Toungoo immediately, and tell Rusong to count the harvest as soon as possible, send the list back first, and report to the capital immediately."

Just as Wei Guangde said, Li Chengliang had just received a document from the Ministry of War, and saw that it required the southwest to transport the spoils of this battle back to Beijing as soon as possible.

Although Li Chengliang was somewhat dissatisfied, he did not even say how much silver would be left as a reward for the meritorious soldiers in this battle. How could he, as the commander-in-chief, face the soldiers under his command?

The purpose of joining the army and fighting in wars is just for that little bit of money.

Well, now all of them have to be transported away, and the people below have no hope at all.

Of course, the silver here refers to the reward money given by the court to the soldiers. The soldiers who participated in the war, as long as they ran in the front, had more or less gains, and he had also collected several boxes of property.

However, those were his spoils and were not counted as those handed over to the imperial court.

In that era, it was actually very common to divide the spoils privately. Except for things from special places that had to be handed over, most of the other things were ignored.

Because there is no exact number at all, it is just the number reported below.

When Li Rusong went south, Li Chengliang told him the main mission of this trip.

The first is to completely control the south. After all, Yu Dayou also said in his letter that the navy lacks combat troops and it is difficult to control the vast area of ​​southern Myanmar for a long time.

The second is the capture of Toungoo City. Although the sea route is smooth, there is also the risk of capsizing. Although the land route is difficult, it is safe.

As for the time, it seems to be not much different, both take several months.

Of course, for Li Chengliang, it is more important to obtain food and fodder replenishment from the south.

The military rations stored in Yunnan were almost empty. If Li Chengliang couldn't find enough military supplies, he could only give the order to allow his troops to plunder and let his men raise food and fodder on their own.

After all, it takes time to transfer funds from Guangxi, Guizhou and other places, and it seems a bit too late.

The terrain in the southwest seems to be more complicated than that in Liaodong, with mountains and gullies connected to each other, and rivers, canals and swamps densely covered, making it very difficult to transport large amounts of supplies.

However, the journey from southern Myanmar is quite smooth and the transportation of supplies is extremely convenient.

At this time in Toungoo City, the former capital of Myanmar, Li Rusong was leading his men to check the property seized by Yu Dayou's troops.

After Li Rusong's first contact with Yu Dayou's scouts, both sides came to a similar conclusion, believing that they were all Ming troops.

Therefore, after Yu Dayou sent scouts to contact Li Rusong's troops again, the two sides would soon come together.

With the scouts of Yu Dayou's troops leading the way, Li Rusong's troops moved south faster.

After all, they were completely unfamiliar with the geography along the way, and in order to avoid missing the best camping spots, their marching speed was not very fast.

The simplest thing is that the army must be stationed near a water source. If they leave this ideal camping spot and continue to march for several miles or even dozens of miles and then cannot find a water source or the water source is not enough to supply the army, it will be very troublesome.

With Yu Dayou's scouts leading the way, the location for their military camp was planned when they arrived, which naturally made things much easier.

Afterwards, Yu Dayou met Li Rusong in Toungoo City.

At this time, Li Rusong did not yet have the arrogance he had after the three major expeditions in the middle of the Wanli period, and he did not call himself "the first military general of the Ming Dynasty." Therefore, when he met Yu Dayou, who was more famous than his father, he behaved very well.

It is worth mentioning that although Yu Dayou held a high position in the Ming army, Li Chengliang's position was higher than Yu Dayou in the southwestern army sequence issued by the Ministry of War.

In any case, Yu Dayou has now been transferred from the land army to the navy. The Ministry of War has given Li Chengliang the position of governor of the southwest military. Yu Dayou's navy is not included in this sequence, but according to the documents, he must obey Li Chengliang's dispatch at this time.

After the welcoming banquet, Li Rusong's troops only rested in Toungoo City for two days before continuing their march southwards to garrison in various towns in southern Myanmar.

After the city defense was handed over, the navy officers and soldiers would also begin to gather in Pegu and Dagon, which had been designated as military ports by the South China Sea Navy and were prepared for long-term garrison in the future. However, Yu Dayou did not know that the navy he left behind would eventually be separated from the South China Sea Navy and form a separate West China Sea Navy.

In the current Toungoo City, Yu Dayou only leads a small number of naval officers and soldiers to garrison. In fact, the city defense has already been handed over, and the rest are the spoils captured in the Burmese royal palace.

However, the Burmese kings, ministers and royal family members captured by the Ming army were simply ignored by Li Rusong.

At this moment, Yu Dayou and Li Rusong were counting the supplies.

"I have already made an inventory of the sixteen boxes of various gemstones and artifacts. After they have been counted, they can be sealed and stamped."

There are more than ten boxes in the room. Now the lids have been opened, revealing all kinds of gems, which are dazzling.

Li Ruzhen and Li Rubai looked at the gems in a daze, greed evident in their eyes.

The two people's eyes fell into Yu Dayou's eyes, but he had no expression.

After the things are transferred, he has nothing to do anymore.

As for if Li Chengliang's son had any inappropriate thoughts, it had little to do with him.

6◇9◇Book◇Bar

However, Li Rusong was only looking at the list in his hand from beginning to end, and was not affected by the valuables in the box at all.

As the person destined to inherit Li Chengliang's family fortune, Li Rusong naturally knew what he could do and what he could not do.

It’s like this batch of things that already have a list, and nothing can be missing.

When Yu Dayou handed over these things, he made it clear that they were all used by the Burmese king or privately collected, so naturally they had to be handed over to the inner court.

As for the other hundreds of thousands of taels of gold and silver, they had already been counted and packed by Yu Dayou's troops. They could only watch and had no idea where to start.

Fortunately, Li Rusong was already very satisfied with the gains from Ava City, so he would naturally not lose the big picture for the sake of small gains and covet the treasures of the Burmese kings.

Back then, Lan Yu, a founding hero and famous general of the Ming Dynasty, was executed. One of the charges against him was embezzlement of Emperor Yuan’s property.

Although Mang Yinglong was nominally an envoy, the Ming Dynasty actually regarded him as a local vassal king, so his things could only be owned by members of the royal family of the Ming Dynasty who were vassal kings or above.

If anyone else gets it, it would be considered as transgression.

This is also the reason why Yu Dayou tacitly allowed his subordinates to divide the spoils from the Burmese treasury, but he attached great importance to the things in the royal palace and the Burmese king's private treasury, and did not allow his subordinates to do anything dishonest.

If you are even slightly careless here, it may lead to a catastrophic disaster.

The sixteen boxes of treasure in the house were only a small part of what needed to be handed over. In fact, there were many large objects stored in the warehouse, and some of them would also be loaded onto trucks and shipped to the capital.

As for the gold and silver that were handed over, Yu Dayou also sorted out more than 70,000 taels of gold and 410,000 taels of silver and handed them over together.

There was an unknown amount of treasure piled up in the navy warships on the Pegu River outside the city. The entire Toungoo City was looted by them, and all that was left for Li Rusong was an empty city.

Of course, Li Rusong did not value the money, but cared more about the food in the warehouse of Toungoo City.

"Rusong, the handover of Toungoo City is almost complete. The remaining inventory should be completed in the next two days. I plan to bring people back to Pegu the day after tomorrow."

Yu Dayou said to Li Rusong.

"Don't worry, Admiral. With my brothers stationed in southern Myanmar, we will be safe."

Li Rusong replied with a fist.

"When will you transport these things north to the capital?"

Yu Dayou asked.

“Admiral, we were lucky to load these boxes of gems and gold and silver onto the truck, but it would be too troublesome to transport the large artifacts we visited two days ago by land.

I don’t know if it can be directly loaded onto a ship and transported to Tianjin by sea.”

Li Rusong asked in a low voice.

"can."

After just a brief thought, Yu Dayou nodded and said.

The value of those treasures was actually not that great, but because they were copied from the palace, they were sensitive and had to be either destroyed by imperial order or transported to the capital and handed over to the court for processing.

But if we really calculate the value, that batch of gems is more valuable.

After all, gems are a specialty of Myanmar. The Ming Dynasty did not produce much and their quality was also slightly poorer, so the palace would regularly send people here to buy them.

Among the sixteen boxes of treasure, eight or nine were filled with various gems, enough for the palace to use for decades.

“It is better to temporarily seal these things here and wait for the imperial court’s order.

I plan to let my younger brother lead 5,000 soldiers tomorrow to escort a batch of food and fodder northward in advance to alleviate the problem of food and fodder shortage for the army.

At the same time, the list of property was also reported to the capital, awaiting the court's order.

Therefore, I ask the Admiral to leave a few navy warships at the dock outside the city. If the court intends to go by sea, they can load directly on board. "

Li Rusong spoke.

They crossed mountains and rivers and fought all the way here from Yunnan.

However, until now, Li Rusong is still very curious about whether the navy from Jiangnan can reach Myanmar by sea.

After all, it is very difficult for someone who has only crossed the river by boat to talk about the sea.

People nowadays have completely different minds than people in later generations. They already have a model of the earth in their minds and know the concept of seven continents and four oceans.

With this concept, it would not be surprising at all that the Ming army came across the sea from Jiangsu and Zhejiang.

Li Rusong didn't think so. He just thought that since it was so difficult to travel on land, how could one get there by sea?

Even though he had attended the welcoming banquet and had subsequent discussions with naval officers, he still had no concrete concept. He only knew that it would take several months by boat to get here from Ming Dynasty.

If they travel by land, wouldn't it also take them several months?

The ships docked outside Toungoo City were all small ships of the navy, but they were not small in Li Rusong's eyes.

Thinking of what Yu Dayou said before, his boat was more than ten times bigger than those boats outside the city, so he took this opportunity to ask: "Admiral, when your sea ship comes here, does it also need boatmen to pull it like the canal?"

“Haha, how could that be? If there is a difficult sea route, just take a detour.

There are hundreds of ships in the fleet, large and small. If there is such a sea route, we would rather not take it. "

Yu Dayou smiled.

However, he soon realized that many Ming generals did not understand geography at all, so he simply ordered people to take out the nautical charts for Li Rusong to see.

In fact, there are nautical charts among the public, but they are very simple and even contain large errors.

However, the nautical charts in Yu Dayou's hands were much more accurate, and they were even compared with maps drawn by the Portuguese and Spanish.

"This is Ming Dynasty Guangdong, and then Fujian and Zhejiang."

Yu Dayou pointed at a corner of the map and began to explain to Li Rusong, "Go south from Guangdong to Luzon, go to Jiugang after replenishing supplies, and cross the Mancijia Strait to reach Pegu" (End of this chapter)