national surname chiming

Chapter 349
Steady and steady farming while calming the chaos, as time entered the 17th year of Chongzhen in August, Nanming finally entered a prosperous period of cohesion and unity——

Except for the Puppet Regime of King Fu in the Lianghuai area, the riots in that place have been less than two months old. Because of the priority, the imperial army has not had time to attack there.

However, the lack of action in the military does not mean that there is no political wooing. At least Liu Zeqing, the general soldier of Shandong, has chosen to no longer be attached to the court of Fu Dynasty under the promise of the messenger sent by the Nanjing court from the sea, and publicly announced that King Fu is a usurper.

Those who really insisted on following King Fu were Ruan Dacheng the civil servants, Liu Liangzuo and Xu Dingguo the military commanders, and no one else.

The temporary ruled area covered by King Fu’s puppet regime, that is, the entire Fengyang Mansion, Huai’an Mansion, and the part of Yanzhou Mansion in Shandong located south of the old course of the Yellow River, plus Guide Mansion in Henan, is just three and a half mansions.There is no one who dares to call himself emperor with this little territory.

Among them, the local officials of Huai'an Prefecture, as well as some middle-level generals under Liu Liangzuo, the Nanjing court is still trying to win over and divide them, and wants them to attack Liu Liangzuo again, and the court will pardon their sins, which will further reduce the casualties of the Han Chinese civil war , to win over more people peacefully.

The part of the land in Yanzhou Prefecture, Shandong Province was not captured by Liu Liangzuo, but because Liu Zeqing saw that the Qing army was approaching southward, so he voluntarily chose to cede the plain area along the canal, and moved the main force and the family members of the direct line army to Dengying. Lai, on the Shandong Peninsula, so as not to be pushed forward by the main force of the Tartars alone.

After Liu Zeqing's men slipped away from the abandoned land, Liu Liangzuo had nowhere to run, so naturally he wanted to temporarily occupy the land to maintain his defense line.Being squeezed by various forces in such a land of four wars, he also had a hard time, and even considered whether he should sell King Fu to the Tartars and become a puppet controlled by the Tartars.

In the southern area controlled by the Nanjing imperial court, not only did the troops begin to pay their full wages and strengthen training, their morale was restored, and agricultural production was also visibly optimized. It can be said that every season can change a little bit.

Corn, potatoes, etc., which have been popularized by Zhu Shuren for more than three years, plus other fine varieties, were only promoted in Sui and Huang Erfu in the 13th year of Chongzhen, and most of them were reserved. The coverage area grows.

In the 14th year of Chongzhen, it expanded to all the state capitals controlled by Zhu Shuren at that time. In 15 years, it expanded to the entire Huguang jurisdiction, as well as Henan, Jiangxi, and Nanzhi counties bordering Huguang. In 16, it was further expanded to the whole of Sichuan and Hanzhong.

This year, of course, during the season of summer grain planting, it has fully expanded to the entire territory of Jiangxi, Nanzhi, and Guangdong and Guangxi.It is equivalent to all the areas controlled by the Nanjing court, and the land suitable for planting new crops has been promoted by icing on the cake.

Just considering the acceptance speed of local farmers, the whole process of learning and adaptation is still needed, but at least the farmers in each province have been publicized, know the existence of new crops, and understand the imperial court's preferential policies for planting high-yield crops.

Of course, the land suitable for growing rice still needs to grow rice. The geographical pattern of south rice and north wheat will not change. Corn replaces mainly summer grain land interplanted with winter wheat, and there is no conflict with rice.

The areas to be promoted in the south are only small plots or dry land where rice cannot be grown, and corn and potatoes are used as much as possible.The specific work will naturally be promoted by the new household officials. Now that Zhu Shuren's father, Shen Tingyang, has officially become a minister, he also wants to do something big.
In addition, he doesn't need to be greedy for money, and he also understands tricky accounts very well, and has insight into the human nature of government-business collusion. Once he gets serious, although he can't completely eradicate Daming's corrupt government, at least he can try his best to change the atmosphere in a small area, so that those who want to do practical things One has a slight opportunity to stretch one's ambitions.

As for the sufficient salary of the imperial army, it is due to the large amount of lijin newly levied by the imperial court, and the confiscation left over by Zhu Shuren when he destroyed Zhang Xianzhong last year. ,
Zhang Xianzhong killed so many feudal lords, robbed so many wealthy households, and finally left a total of nearly 2000 million taels of silver seized, all of which were sucked by Zhu Shuren.Although the cost is that the rich population in Huguang and Sichuan has lost a lot, it was stolen, and the damage to the sustainability of the economy is relatively large.

But I have to say that if we rely on normal taxation, the Sichuan area will not be able to collect so much fiscal revenue for seven or eight years. Zhang Xianzhong has robbed so many years of fiscal revenue in one go. .

This amount of money cannot be spent for a year or so, so Zhu Shuren can rely on this wealth to forcefully support the military pay and armaments of the southern court for at least two years, which is definitely enough to last until the tax reform is completely and smoothly transitioned.

As for the Ming troops in Nanzhili, Zhejiang, Jiangxi, and Guangdong, after being paid in full for the first time, officials sent by the Ministry of Household Affairs, supervisory officials from the Metropolitan Procuratorate, and the accountant of the Shen Family Chamber of Commerce came to the localities in person. After verifying the accounts and distributing them directly, the Ming army was also invigorated, and their spirits and spirits were completely different from the original state of eating empty salaries and drinking soldiers' blood.

Although this kind of payment may still be tricky, and there is a possibility that the household department and the Metropolitan Procuratorate will be bribed together, but under the determination of Shen Tingyang, the shopkeeper and accountant supervisor of the Shen Family Chamber of Commerce, it will be better to some extent.After all, the bosses of private enterprises who distribute their own money must be more tolerant and punished more severely than state-owned enterprises.

This kind of temporary approach can't last long, it's just a stopgap measure, because the Shen family and his son know very well that this method of solving the problem by adding approval links is always a temporary solution, and it will only make the system more and more redundant. complex.

It’s like Yuriolov’s classic line in the movie "Lord of War": If Kiev sends more people to inspect and prevent Uncle Dimitri from selling equipment, then the new inspectors will also be dragged into the water .

In the Ming Dynasty, the Jinyiwei was built to monitor the officials, and the East Factory was built to monitor the Jinyiwei. In order to monitor the East Factory, there were the West Factory and the Expert Factory. It is abhorrent.

After the transition is over, these temporary measures must be abolished in time. This is like trying to avoid danger by feeling for stones when crossing a river.

……

After the finances, farming, mulberry, military and military equipment have been steadily developed, the next problem that the Nanjing court must face is about to emerge:

King Lu of Jian Guo, it's time to formally proclaim himself emperor.As for the civil and military personnel who helped stabilize the operation of the Nanjing court and contributed to the transition of the regime during the process of King Lu becoming emperor, they should also be rewarded for their merits.

This is a very natural thing. After all, the pseudo-emperor Fu Wang on the opposite side has called it for more than 50 days. The reason why Lu Wang delayed a little bit was to show that "we respect the late emperor's edict, and we will not accept it because of some opposition." The thief's move will change the steps of our plan."

After all, if King Fu proclaimed himself emperor, King Lu would rush to proclaim himself emperor within ten days and a half months, which would seem too passive, as if he was forced to grab orthodoxy in a hurry.

The enthronement ceremony itself must not be well prepared, notified at least one month in advance, and announced to the world?There is no one who says that as soon as he ascends the throne, he ascends the throne.

Therefore, when he heard that King Fu proclaimed himself emperor, Shi Kefa still suggested that Guangdong and Guangxi should be pacified by force first, and then follow the procedures here step by step.

And Zhu Changping was originally benevolent, cowardly and unambitious, afraid of taking responsibility, so he hit it off and let Yousi arrange it.

In July, after the news of King Jingjiang Fuzhu was sent back from the south for the first time, another group of people in the court persuaded him to enter. If you don't see the corpse, how can you make a mistake."

Such resignation also made Lu Wang's humble image more and more well known.Shi Kefa went to the table again and stated repeatedly:
"It has been half a year since the news of Dingwang and Yongwang's suspected misfortune came back. If you are lucky enough to know that the imperial court has a vacant seat, why can't you rush to Nanjing for half a year?"

Taking a ten thousand step back, Shi Kefa's subtext is that in the state of a false monarch to supervise the country, the imperial court has announced to the world for three months, as long as he is alive and wants to be emperor, he should have come a long time ago.If you don't come, you feel that you are not good enough, that the world is hopeless, you can't afford such a heavy responsibility, and you want to live incognito!

If the two sons of the first emperor dared not to be orthodox for the world and gave up the throne, what is there to wait for?In such a time of national calamity, the most important thing is to save the country and preserve the great unity!
After repeated analysis, King Lu also took advantage of the slope to go down the donkey's mouth, and then still asked Shi Kefa to find a way to sort out Gangchang's name.

After thinking about it, Shi Kefa went on the table again, suggesting that the king be given the posthumous title of "Prince Shang", which shows that the court believed that he died after the prince Xianmin Zhu Cihong.It is believed that when Chongzhen was dying, he had realized that the eldest son would be captured or even killed by the intruders with him, and the second son might live longer.

In this way, it means that when Chongzhen was about to die, he changed his will to establish a crown prince, and made the son who was likely to live longer as the new prince, who was invited by Uncle Lu to supervise the country.But in the end, the plan still couldn't keep up with the changes, and it was only at this point.

After all the orthodox work was done, Zhu Changqian finally straightened out his status. On the other side of the city, Nanjing was preparing for the ceremony at the same time. Finally, the enthronement ceremony was scheduled for the Mid-Autumn Festival on August [-]th.

Zhu Shuren, who was in Wuchang, was ordered to go back to Nanjing after receiving the report in advance to attend the ceremony.

Anyway, the troops he stayed in Huguang were still in the rest period after returning from Guangdong and Guangxi. Basically, they would not be able to recover from their injuries until the end of August. Therefore, during August, the troops could not move at all, so he, the coach, left for the time being. For more than half a month, there is no problem.

He set off from Wuchang on the sixth day of August, traveled along the Yangtze River for seven or eight days, and finally arrived in Nanjing two days before the ceremony.

Needless to mention all the red tape thereafter, the Mid-Autumn Festival on August [-]th, at three o'clock in the morning, the main courtiers in Nanjing city lined up in order, advanced and retreated in an orderly manner, and participated in the ceremony.

King Lu of Jian Guo, Zhu Changqin, visited the Xiaoling Mausoleum again, and offered sacrifices to the Taimiao. He also invited Empress Yi'an from Hangzhou in advance to witness the whole process as the narrator of the late emperor's will, and even Princess Kunxing attended the ceremony.

After working hard, Zhu Changping was officially enthroned under the reading of Shi Kefa's foreman. Because there is no New Year's Eve, there is no need to change the Yuan for the time being, and it is still Chongzhen's 17th year.However, it has been planned that on New Year's Day next year, the name will be changed to "Longwu" to demonstrate martial arts and restore the Central Plains.

Shi Kefa, Minister of the Ministry of War, was a Bachelor of Wuyingdian and served as the first assistant of the cabinet. Shen Tingyang, Minister of the Ministry of Households, was a Bachelor of Wenhuadian and served as the second assistant of the cabinet.

In order to win people's hearts, Zhu Changqian even made them all earls.Among the military generals, two of the generals who made major contributions to the establishment of the prison and later in the process of containing King Fu also won the earl, namely Huang Degong and Zhang Mingzhen.

Huang Degong was sent by Zhu Shuren to prevent King Fu from invading Xinyang from Fengyang and expanding his territory.Zhang Mingzhen was lucky, blocking Liu Liangzuo from crossing the river.But their merits are one level lower after all. These earls cannot be hereditary, and only they themselves can serve as one generation for life.If there are more credits in the future, they can be rewarded again as appropriate.

Other generals who have made great achievements in countering the rebellion are not outstanding enough, and those who originally had the rank of commander-in-chief are now also given the title of general to increase their honorary treatment.

In addition, during the pacification of Guangdong and Guangxi, Zhu Shuren also attacked the remnants of the bandits in the southern Jiangxi mountainous area at the junction of Guangdong, Guangxi and Jiangxi. Chance.

For example, Li Dingguo, who insisted on surrendering before Zhang Xianzhong's death, was dealt with in the last years of Chongzhen, so even if he committed crimes and made meritorious service, it was not easy to give him an official position before.

Zhu Shuren also took great pains to make good use of Li Dingguo, Sun Kewang and others. This time, he took them with him to claim credit on the way to suppress King Jingjiang's rebellion.Zhu Shuren couldn't use the old bandits to directly fight against the rebel vassals. He was afraid of being accused of "separation of relatives", so he could only let Li Dingguo use the gangsters in southern Jiangxi to make a fuss.

Fortunately, the bandits remaining in southern Jiangxi were basically the part of the division that fled westward after Zhang Xianzhong was defeated by Zhu Shuren in the decisive battle of Hengzhou in the 15th year of Chongzhen.

Therefore, Li Dingguo's grandson Kewang was ordered to suppress and use the auxiliary, and it was very smooth. The local leader heard that the court could let the past go. As long as a few typical cases of intercepting and killing law-abiding vassals were dealt with, others could join the army and pay enough to ensure that they would not be deducted. Most surrendered.A very small number of diehards have also become the number of people Li Dingguo takes credit for.

With this wave of fame, Zhu Shuren took advantage of the situation to help them claim credit, allowing Sun Kewang and Li Dingguo to temporarily obtain a rank of general.Whether they can be promoted in the future depends on whether they can make good contributions in the Northern Expedition with the reformed old troops of the Western Army.

Generally speaking, the wave of promotions and titles after King Lu Zhu Changpan ascended the throne has been very restrained.Compared with the history when King Fu ascended the throne, he directly gave the four towns of Jiangbei and Zuo Liangyu all the general conferments of uncle or even marquis; the title of Daming given by Zhu Changpan is still valuable and has not depreciated too quickly.

Of course, among all the people who should be promoted, Zhu Shuren should be promoted the most.

It's a pity that he is too young, and his biological father has been promoted to the position of second assistant in the cabinet, so it is impossible for him to join the cabinet.As for the title, in the last month before Chongzhen died, in order to persuade Zhu Shuren to go north to King Qin, he had already promoted his Kruhouhou to the Duke of E, and there was no way for him to be promoted again——

At least so far, King Lu has not been so determined that "because Zhu Shuren was given the surname of the country by the first emperor, and he is also surnamed Zhu, so he can be named king."

Historically, Zheng Chenggong was conferred the title of King of Yanping County in the late Yongli period, and Sun Kewang and Li Dingguo were even conferred the title of one-word king, but that was after the title was completely worthless and the court collapsed and wandered.Now the Nanjing court is still stable, and Zhu Shuren's contribution is not enough to make an exception.

In the end, all parties weighed and compromised, and Zhu Shuren was finally "added the title of Shangshu of the Ministry of War, and the governor of Huguang, Guangdong, Guangxi and Sichuan military forces."

That is to say, expanding his governor's jurisdiction from Huguang to Huguang, Guangdong, Guangxi, and Sichuan provinces, means that all affairs of the Nanming court from the west of Jiangxi are under the full control of Zhu Shuren.In addition, in order to cooperate with the jurisdictions of several provinces, it is natural to add the title of Minister of the Ministry of War.

According to the practice of the Ming Dynasty, the general governor of one or two provinces may not have the title of Minister of the Ministry of War, or only the title of Minister of the Ministry of War.But the governor of three provinces and above must be added the title of Minister of the Ministry of War in order to coordinate the overall situation - at the beginning of Zhu Shuren's crossing, his first official guide, Yang Sichang, old Yang Ge, was the title of Minister of the Ministry of War and the governor of the six provinces.

It took Zhu Shuren five and a half years to climb to a position barely close to that of Yang Sichang at the beginning of the crossing, but his governor's district was still a bit smaller, and he lacked the title of a bachelor and elder.

(End of this chapter)