A Good Landlord in the Tang Dynasty: Emperor Yuan Cong

Chapter 446 Merchants pay more attention to profits than righteousness

"Kang Alang is so talented, it's a pity that he has been a big farmer in Pei's mansion for ten years. It's too inferior."

Wu Huaiyu took the nomination certificate and looked at Roshan, "The Duzhi Division is just a way to employ people. I recommend you to be a school inspector in the Duzhi Division of the Ministry of Civil Affairs."

In order to coordinate the current financial reform, the emperor Li Shimin specially gave Wu Huaiyu a lot of authority. Under his judgment, 24 new cases such as commercial taxation, Changping warehouse, and Yicang were newly established. Dispatch capable officials to assist in the division of affairs and coordinate the various divisions.

Wu Huaiyu admired Kang Po's ability. People who can become the richest man in one party are not ordinary people.However, he worked under Pei Ji for ten years, yet he could turn his head and bite Pei Ji back. Such a person has a problem with his conduct. How could Wu Huaiyu let him come to his Yiguo Duke's mansion to be a big farmer in the proper Anlu Mountain.

But this person is capable, so it's not a problem to arrange for him to judge Duzhi and be responsible for coordinating the case.

If Yuanwailang is a sixth-rank official, if he is a school inspector, he is still a non-official Yuanwailang.

Under normal circumstances, a farmer who is regarded as the seventh rank is not qualified to directly take up this position. You must know that if there are no other officials in the Shangzhu Kingdom, after serving in the Ministry of War, they will be eligible to participate in the election and pass the exam. After that, only the sixth rank can be awarded.

Shangzhu Kingdom regards the second rank, and the big farmers only regard the seventh rank. Even if a normal big farmer gets an official, he must start from the lowest rank and start from the ninth rank. , that must have a strong background relationship.

Kang Po was very disappointed with Wu Huaiyu's arrangement.

He was rejected.

Wailang, the school inspector of the Duzhi envoy, is not as good as the big farmer of Shangyi Guogong. At the age of Kang Po, who is more than 60 years old, he actually has no intention of official career. What he wants is to protect the wealth of the Kang family and the stability of the family .

This refusal disappointed him and made him even more frightened.

He didn't know if he would be liquidated afterwards.

Gritting her teeth, Po Kang promised that she would hand over all of Pei Ji's private money workshops to Huaiyu, and even give Wu Huaiyu the tens of thousands of Pei Ji's Kaiyuan Tongbao that he kept in secret.

It's a pity that Wu Huaiyu just smiled, but shook his head.

"It's not handed over to me, but reported to the Yamen and handed over to the imperial court."

"The young ones also know that Ge Guogong Liu Yijie has been secretly minting coins, mining minerals, and occupying fields and many other illegal things,"

Huaiyu looked at this guy like a mad dog.

"Oh?"

Wu Huaiyu asked him to report all of Liu Yijie's illegal acts, and said that if the investigation was true, he would ask the emperor for his credit.

Liu Yijie is one of the 17 meritorious officials in Taiyuan and Yuanmou who sealed six hundred households.

This person used to be called Liu Shilong, but later he was supported by the dragon and asked the emperor to change his name.

Liu Shilong used to be the same as the samurai Xun. He was powerful and rich in business, and he was called the two richest men in Hedong.

Seeing the turbulent situation at the end of the Sui Dynasty, the samurai Xun paid out money to buy a soldier from Yingyang Mansion to protect his wealth, while Liu Shilong paid out money to seek the post of Jinyang Township Chief.

Later, when Li Yuan was planning to raise troops, his deputy Wang Wei and Gao Junya were going to kill the traitor Li Yuan, so they recruited their confidants to plot and set up an ambush to take him down when Li Yuan went to Jinci Temple to pray for rain.

Liu Shilong, the Changxiang, was regarded as a confidant by Wang Wei and Wang Wei, and participated in this plan.

Then, two days before the start, a warrior from the east of the river and a former business partner brought Pei Ji to visit Liu Shilong.

Pei Ji came here on behalf of Li Yuan, to attract the rich and powerful in this place for Li Yuan, and then Pei Ji led Li Yuan back the next day.

Li Yuan was very polite to Liu Shilong, treating him like a friend to the little township head.

So Liu Shilong took the initiative to go to Li Yuan for a secret meeting on the eve before the attack, and told Wang Wei and the others about their plan. Afterwards, Wang Wei and the others ambush Li Yuan, but Li Yuan took the blame instead.

Li Yuan raised the flag to raise troops, and both Liu Shilong and Samurai Xun contributed all their huge family wealth to help recruit soldiers. After that, Liu Shilong and Samurai Xun also gave full play to their strengths in business and financial management. One managed logistics for Li Yuan, and the other helped Li Yuan raise money. funds,

Liu Shilong can even do business everywhere to earn military expenses.

At that time, Liu Yijie was the emperor's purse, just like Wu Huaiyu's current situation in the court.When Li Yuan first entered Chang'an, there was a lack of military expenses. Liu Yijie thought of a way and asked Li Yuan to cut down all the trees on Chang'an Street and the palace gardens, and sell them to the people as firewood. Hundreds of thousands of years old.

This is the origin of the allusion that the emperor sells firewood.

Later, I also thought of a way to stretch the existing inner library with a shaft, cut off an extra foot, and supplemented miscellaneous fees to get more than [-] pieces.

This method has the characteristics of a profiteer. Obviously, a piece of silk is forty feet, and he insists on stretching the silk to make it longer. He stretches it to a foot, and each piece of silk is pulled out by a foot.

As Li Yuan's purse, Liu Yijie was still very favored in the Wude Dynasty. Not only was he named Ge Guogong, but he was also included in the list of meritorious officials.

But in the Zhenguan Dynasty, he could only sit on the bench, and now he has been reduced to a Shaofu prison.

The Shaofu Supervisor is the department in charge of the handicraft industry, and even manages the casting of money.

Liu Yijie took advantage of his position to secretly engage in private casting.

Kang Po also told Huaiyu that before Liu Yijie purchased jewels for the court, she deliberately colluded with a merchant and bought them at a high price.

He also sold the copper material at a low price to Pei's family and his family, and a subordinate official found out, and was framed by him to lose his post.

Wu Huaiyu knew from Liu Yijie's method of stretching the silk in the treasury by one foot to make a profit, that this guy had no ambitions and was just a profiteer.

As the Shaofu supervisor in charge of casting money and all kinds of craftsmen, he engaged in private casting, and even poured precious and scarce copper materials into his own family and Pei Ji's family.

Compared with the samurai Xun, the gap is really too big.

The meeting with Mrs. Kang was quite successful.

But it also made Wu Huaiyu see a problem in the Central Plains today, that is, there were a large number of Sogdians who moved eastward in the Tang Dynasty. It is a century-old wealthy family in Liangzhou, and a hereditary business group Sabao.

The Kangpo family is also a Sogdian who moved eastward for a hundred years, and their family took root in Boling, Hebei, and became a famous and powerful family.

Moreover, these Sogdians have a characteristic. Even after moving eastward for more than a hundred years, they still retain many traditions of the Sogdians. Even in the Central Plains, they are scattered and live in small groups. Settle down, even Wubao and manor autonomy.

It seems that there are some tastes of people outside the country.

Moreover, they are especially good at doing business to make money, and they have close ties with the Zhaowu nine surname countries in the Western Regions, and even have a strong control over the trade on several Silk Roads.

They also have Tuojie mercenary warriors with strong combat effectiveness.

No wonder when the Anshi Rebellion broke out in Emperor Xuanzong of Tang Dynasty, the barbarian generals in the rebel army were so powerful and infiltrated a bit seriously.

It would be fine if Xianbei took the initiative to sinicize, but although the Sogdians moved eastward to the Tang Dynasty and scattered in various places, they still kept living together as a group, still followed their own traditions, and even united the Sogdians with fire worship. Big hidden danger.

If they have always refused to take the initiative to integrate into Huaxia, then no matter how long these people live in the Central Plains, they are not Xia.

People who are not of my race must have a different heart. It seems that it is necessary to investigate carefully and explain the power of it to the emperor seriously, so that we can take precautions and plan ahead.

Huaiyu confiscated the big gift Bao Kang Po sent.

But Kang Po is a flexible person. He sold eight water mills and ten hectares of fertile land to Wu Huaiyu.

As for the price, it is based on the market price, and it does not say that it is half sold and half free.

Of course, this kind of sale is actually an exchange of benefits, but everything goes through formal procedures, first find a middleman to make a white deed, and then go to the government to exchange a red deed.

But in fact, given the current situation, who would sell these eight water mills and ten hectares of fertile land at the market price?

Fundamentally, it is a scarce resource that is hard to come by and has a price but no market. Even if the price increases a lot, many people are willing to queue up.

There is a word difference between giving and selling, but the results are different. Wu Huaiyu bought at the price, and these properties can be taken with peace of mind, and he is not afraid of being pursued and impeached.

Po Kang was also very satisfied. He is a businessman who is good at government-business transactions. If Wu Huaiyu doesn't accept any benefits, he will be very upset.

Although it is bought with money now, Duke Yi must understand the sincerity and filial piety in it.

Businessmen are not afraid of spending money on giving gifts, but they are afraid that others will not accept the money. As long as they accept gifts, they will be lenient and have to do things.

As for the 100 bolts of silk and [-] million yuan, Wu Huaiyu suggested that he donate it to the imperial court, and then it can be used as the capital of the Changping Cooperative, and the people will release young crops to help farmers.

Po Kang didn't feel bad, and readily agreed.

Anyway, when the money was taken out, he didn't think about taking it back, but he didn't send it to Wu Huaiyu's private hands, and finally donated it to the imperial treasury. He still felt a little regretful.

Donating to the country is not as good as giving gifts to private individuals. He prefers to establish personal friendships.

After morning,
The emperor deliberately listened to Wu Huaiyu's report.

These illegal actions of the two heroic figures, Pei Ji and Liu Yijie, left the emperor with a gloomy face for a long time.

"check."

After three days,
Proclamation on the Golden Palace, one of the 17 Yuanmou heroes in Taiyuan, one of the 48 Zhenguan meritorious officials, once served as Guangluqing, Taifuqing's current Shaofu supervisor, Ge Guogong Liu Yijie, guilty of death, remember his old honor, and take it back Exempted from death for gold medals, exempted from officials and seized titles, exiled to become citizens, exiled to Qinzhou in Lingnan, and lost his family property.

The inside story was not announced in the hall.

However, Wu Huaiyu reported to the emperor and copied a large amount of gold, silver, jewelry, money and silk from Liu Yijie's name, as well as a large number of fields and manors, water mills, car workshops, mansions, etc., and the next Liu Yijie copied more than one year's household tax.

Moreover, many private money workshops owned by Liu Yijie, as well as many mines that were secretly dug and illegally mined were also copied.

Pei Ji, who has already rushed back to his hometown of Puzhou, was also investigated this time, for private money workshops, stealing mines, encroaching fields, illegal usury and so on.

The emperor's disposition to him was to take back all the rest of Pei Ji's Shiyi Zhenfeng, and confiscated all his illegal properties and illegally obtained properties.

Send envoys to Puzhou to warn Pei Ji.

Wu Huaiyu's three consecutive copyings of the Sanjiejiao, Pei Ji, and Liu Yijie, and the property income such as land, house, money, silk, slaves, and livestock were more than the three-year tax collected by the imperial court.

Li Shimin was deeply moved.

In the account of Zhidu Division, the national finance suddenly has a large amount of living money.

The imperial court still showed some sympathy towards Pei Ji, or the emperor was not in a hurry, so the treatment of Pei Ji is not made public now.

But sooner or later, he still couldn't escape the final liquidation. Now these are just economic problems, not enough for the emperor to kill him, or the emperor deliberately let the bullet fly for a while, and didn't want to be so desperate.

"Your Majesty, I really can't take care of my job because I have several jobs, especially now that the responsibility of adjudicating Zhidu is heavier, and there are 24 new cases, I can't take care of it.

The minister asked His Majesty to choose an important minister to judge the branch, and even add a title to pay homage to the prime minister, for the purpose of planning and sharing the worries and financial management for His Majesty. "

"I recommend Kaifu Yitong Sansi, former Youpushe, Zhao Guogong's eldest Sun Wuji to be the judge of Duzhi, to take on this important position!"

Regarding Wu Huaiyu's recommendation, Li Shimin just smiled, "I will consider it."

(End of this chapter)