Red Mansion: I am Jia Lian

Chapter 592 It’s time
The people in the old districts performed two popular performance arts, one is called Hanging Street Lamps and the other is called Confused.

The great locksmith Louis XVI experienced what it meant to suffer the consequences of one's own actions.

After the Jacobins came to power, they started killing people.

In the spring of the 21st year of Chenghui, the new British minister requested a meeting and presented his credentials. During the meeting, British Minister George reported to Emperor Chenghui in person what had happened in France.

Emperor Chenghui was excited and alert about this, and at the same time he was impressed by Jia Lian's foresight.

Emperor Chenghui immediately stated that traitors and rebels should be killed by anyone.

Emperor Chenghui then summoned the French envoy, who was at a loss, and expressed that the Zhou Empire was willing to provide necessary assistance to the French Kingdom in its process of restoration.

In the words of the people in the old revolutionary base areas, the reactionaries have united and are launching a frantic counterattack to strangle the new political power in the old revolutionary base areas in its cradle.

The French ambassador was overjoyed upon hearing the news and said he would return to Europe immediately to convey the good news to the escaped royal family members.

Emperor Chenghui then expressed that due to his lack of understanding of the situation in Europe, he decided to send an inspection team to accompany him.

A fleet of six warships escorted the French ambassador and thirty-six members of the Zhou Empire's expedition to Europe.

As an aside, because the Beiyang Fleet did not meet the requirements in terms of quality or quantity, it was excluded from this trip to Europe.

The Zhou Empire's military friendship delegation to Europe was a first. The first stop of the delegation was the Ottoman Empire, and the reason was very good: it wanted to examine the use of military equipment and the results of battles.

As for the request of the British envoy to purchase military equipment, Emperor Chenghui handed it over to Jia Lian for disposal.

When Jia Lian met the British envoy, he tactfully said that the production of the new rifled guns was not high and the inventory had already run out. In order to pay for the Ottoman orders, the army had already taken out all the equipment. If Dai Ying really wanted to purchase, he would have to wait for more than two years.

Although he knew it was a perfunctory request, George could only express his understanding and hoped to purchase a small number of rifles.

Jia Lian said that there was no need to purchase in small quantities, and that fifty new rifled flintlock rifles could be donated.

It's not that the British have never thought about imitating the rifle, but they really can't do it in mass production. In Europe now, this thing can only be hand-rifled by top craftsmen, and they can produce two or three per year.

The relevant technology is strictly blocked and it is impossible to get started.

Because of Jia Lian, not only the technology but also the tea trees were blocked.

It is strictly forbidden to take this thing out to sea, and even on the island, it is forbidden to plant it. It is even more impossible to go out to sea, and once discovered, it will be treated as treason.

Jia Lian's insidiousness lies not only in providing equipment to the Ottoman Empire, but also in providing rifles to certain local states through the Xue family trading company.

Over the past year or so, the resistance of the Indian princely states against the East India Company has become more intense and frequent.

Because what was sold was a smoothbore rifle, Dai Ying couldn't find any fault with it. The technology for this thing had already spread a long time ago.

After all, it still comes down to mass production. Equipment that cannot be mass produced is of little significance.

It is not difficult to make a smoothbore gun by hand in a state, but the quality is not good. The smoothbore guns provided by Xue's Trading Company are of high quality and large quantity.

Smoothbore rifles are being sold to various princely states in India at a rate of 5,000 per year.

The annoying thing for the princely states was that the quantity sold each time was not large, at most two or three thousand sticks, and they were sold to different princely states.

Each local king had a musketeer team of several thousand men, who fought each other and at the same time had to fight the British.

The business philosophy of Xue's Company is to help the weaker ones. It is not possible to buy enough rifles by paying more money.

In Jia Lian's words, this is a long-term business, the difference between doing it for one year and doing it for a hundred years.

I'm not looking down on India. India is now just a geographical term, not a country.

It seems that after three hundred years, the essence of this country has not changed much.

The British knew that there was a group of smugglers causing trouble, but it was very difficult to catch them in the vast ocean.

There is no shortage of desperate people in this world who are willing to make a lot of money.

There is a very contradictory thing. On the one hand, a large amount of precious metals entered the country, and on the other hand, the central bank reduced the issuance of silver coins. After the market banned the use of silver as currency, if the public wanted to trade, they had to go to the bank to exchange silver for silver coins. Otherwise, if they were found out, they would be fined a huge amount or even face exile.

The same is true for Australian gold mines. Private individuals are prohibited from directly trading in gold and can only exchange it for silver coins first.

In order to collect seigniorage, the emperor cared about this matter more than anyone else.

With the development of the Nanyang trade, there were two groups of people in the country who benefited the most. One group was ordinary citizens who could buy cheap food, and the other group was high-ranking officials who could profit from the trade.

Ordinary people have also reaped certain benefits from the rapid development of industry and commerce, but they are very few.

Jia Lian certainly saw the seriousness of the gap between the rich and the poor in the country, but there was no good solution for the time being. Fortunately, the country was vast, and infrastructure could be built everywhere, creating more jobs.

The same problem appeared in the Great Zhou Dynasty, that is, housing prices in the capital city remained high.

The capital city inside and outside the city walls presents two different states.

Outside the city, three- and five-story tube-shaped buildings can be seen everywhere, while inside the city, courtyard houses are still the main type of buildings.

Jia Lian had no idea what to do about this problem. He couldn't just tear down the city wall, could he? He could build some tube-shaped buildings in the outer city to ease the housing conditions, but what about the inner city?
As I said, develop first and solve the rest later.

In the summer of the 21st year of Chenghui, Emperor Chenghui went to Rehe again to escape the summer heat. Last year it was Li Heng who was in charge, and this year it was Li Yuan's turn to be regent.

It's a draw, very fair.

The Tianjin-Liaoning Railway was built to Shanhaiguan, the exploration work on the Beijing-Hankou Railway was basically completed, but the design of the Yellow River Railway Bridge still did not find feasibility.

The Jinpu Road was built to Xuzhou, but there was still no bridge over the Yellow River.

As summer arrived, Jia Lian couldn't help feeling a little annoyed when he learned that the School of Engineering was still unable to build a bridge across the river.

The Huguang case finally came to an end. The eight county magistrates, four prefects, and six officials under the Governor-General's Office of the Rivers involved in the case were sentenced to death by beheading.

The Governor-General of Huguang, the governors of Hubei and Jiangxi provinces, and 26 other officials were dismissed, half of whom were sentenced to exile and the rest were dismissed.

The reason why it took so long was nothing more than the repeated tug-of-war within the court. Such a big case naturally involved the capital.

Li Heng, who followed Emperor Chenghui to Rehe, was called before the emperor and received an unprecedented scolding that lasted for half an hour.

What made Emperor Chenghui angry was that the Jiangxi flood case still involved many royal relatives and high-ranking officials.

Emperor Chenghui was very disappointed and sent people back to the capital to question the royal family and clan members involved in the incident face to face, asking them why they were so greedy.

After the questioning, there was no follow-up except dismissal from all positions.

As for what the Xue family business did, it was not discovered, but the fact that the Xue family assisted immigrants from various provinces was exposed.

Jia Lian, who had been watching coldly, felt even more disappointed after seeing how the emperor handled the situation.

As a privileged person, Jia Lian can certainly understand what factors are at work behind such things.

When Lin Ruhai was supervising the case, he did clarify several issues in his memorial. The Jiangxi Governor and the three courts actually sentenced him to death.

However, after reporting it, the emperor changed the sentence to exile. During this period, Jia Lian also received a letter from Zhang Tingen, hoping that Jia Lian could intercede for the Governor of Huguang.

After reading the letter, Jia Lian burned it without taking any other action.

After the emperor left Beijing for the summer, Jia Lian ordered a survey to be launched to compile statistics on national steel production.

In this tough summer, there is finally some good news.

That day, when Jia Lian got off duty and returned home, he learned that Daiyu was unwell and the imperial physician had been called to treat her.

Jia Lian was so scared by this guy that he hurried to Daiyu's yard.

There are quite a few people waiting here, including Wang Xifeng, Baochai, Ping'er, Mrs. Xing, Mrs. You, Qin Keqing and others, even Mrs. Wang and Aunt Zhao have come.

When Jia Lian appeared, the imperial physician had just come out with a smile on his face. When he went up to ask, he found out that after unremitting efforts, Daiyu was finally pregnant.

Jia Lian was very happy. To be honest, up to now, the legitimate women had given birth to two sons, one by Wang Xifeng and one by Baochai.

He hoped that Daiyu would also give birth to a son, so that the family would be prosperous. As for Youshi and Qin Keqing, Jia Lian did not dare to acknowledge them.

Even though Wang Xifeng had already given the reward, Jia Lian gave it again. The imperial physician received another 1,000 yuan in reward and left happily.

Afterwards, Jia Lian issued an order that everyone in the mansion, regardless of whether they had anything or not, would receive a reward.

To be honest, the last time there was such a big commotion was when Wang Xifeng was pregnant with Qiaojie.

Lin Ruhai received the good news, but because it was night, he couldn't come immediately, so he visited early the next morning.

Jia She's household servant came out to greet him, and the middle door of the Jia Mansion opened to welcome the distinguished guest.

Things are different now. Lin Ruhai, the prime minister, has a higher status than the Jia family.

In any case, Lin Ruhai received a high-level reception and Jia Lian was forced to accompany him.

Jia Min was surrounded by other female relatives and came to Grandmother Jia.

Speaking of Lady Jia, her health has not shown any signs of aging over the years. Compared with ten years ago, there has been little change, which is really strange.

Jia Lian privately suspected that Grandmother Jia was worried about the Second House, so she psychologically reminded him not to fall down.

It really is a day-to-day protection.

Fortunately, Jia Zheng has risen to power now. The position of Deputy Chief Censor is not low. He is a Beijing official and a censor, so he is three times more powerful.

Lin Ruhai stayed at Jia's house for half a day and then left, after all, he had a lot of things to do. It was not a problem for Jia Min to stay for a few days.

The group saw Lin Ruhai off. Before getting on the carriage, Lin Ruhai called Jia Lian forward and whispered to him, "I'm going to Rehe tomorrow. I heard that His Majesty is not feeling well. Please send a letter of greetings."

Jia Lian knew about this in advance. After all, when it comes to spies, Lin Ruhai is far inferior.

Jia Lian pretended to have just understood: "Okay, I'll remember it."

Lin Ruhai went back happily, and Jia Lian was able to get away and returned to Daiyu's yard. Looking at Daiyu twisting in Lai Jiamin's arms, Jia Lian coughed.

Daiyu sat up lazily, but her movements were a little slow, and she received a slap on her butt from Jia Min, which was neither light nor heavy.

Jia Lian smiled and went forward to greet him. After Jia Minsheng accepted the gift, he asked him, "Do you think Yu'er is a boy or a girl this time?"

Jia Lian was surprised and said, "It's the same for both men and women."

Jia Min was dissatisfied and said, "I am definitely a boy!"

Jia Lian immediately came to his senses and agreed, "If you think it's a boy, then it must be a boy."

This is not the time to talk about science, whatever Jia Min says is the truth.

It was not even dark yet, but Jia Min was chased away by Jia Lian!

Jia Lian was helpless about this. After leaving the house, he sighed, "Reputation has misled me."

How to say this? For Jia Min, it is better for Jia Lian to have fun outside than for him to have more affairs at home and outside.

Jia Lian, feeling relieved, decided to stay overnight in the study and wrote a letter of greeting himself.

After diagnosis by the imperial physicians, the so-called physical discomfort of Emperor Chenghui in Rehe was unanimously believed to be due to lack of rest.

In some cases, the imperial doctors were unable to persuade the emperor in person and could only speak vaguely.

Qiu Shian understood, and said to the emperor privately: "Saint, the imperial physician's words are that you should exercise restraint."

Emperor Chenghui snorted after hearing this, but said nothing. He struggled to sit up and said, "I am really old."

Qiu Shian didn't say anything. Was Emperor Chenghui's problem serious? In fact, he fainted while playing with his favorite concubine.

Fortunately it wasn't a stroke, otherwise it would have been troublesome.

As the emperor's power reached its peak, even his ministers, eunuchs, and imperial doctors did not dare to speak too clearly.

It was seven days later when Jia Lian's greeting letter was delivered, and Emperor Chenghui was already able to walk.

Lin Ruhai brought many ministers to visit the emperor. When he saw that Emperor Chenghui was able to get up and walk, he was immediately relieved.

After Emperor Chenghui sat down, he mentioned the greeting letter sent by Jia Lian and said, "This bastard advised me in his letter that I should stay away from women during my recovery. Is this how he sees me?"

Emperor Chenghui cursed angrily, but Lin Ruhai and others did not say anything and just listened with their heads down.

"He is a lustful man himself, and he has the nerve to say that about me?" Emperor Chenghui cursed more and more vigorously, and the ministers bowed their heads more and more.

After scolding for a while, Emperor Chenghui felt much more relaxed. He took a sip of tea to moisten his throat and felt better.

Suddenly, he could not help but said with red eyes: "Buqi, you are asking for a scolding! Other ministers are very reserved when speaking, but Buqi is the only one who speaks out loud, as if he is afraid that I am angry and cannot vent it."

Everyone was very curious about what was written in Jia Lian's greeting letter. It was almost a mystery.

Qiu Shian knew it, but he couldn't say it.

In fact, Jia Lian was really advising the emperor to take care of his health in the memorial. Of course, there was also this sentence: "Although the times are prosperous today, internal troubles are growing. Your Majesty is kind and they may not appreciate it. Your Majesty, if you hold the resentment in your heart, it will harm your health over time."

In light of the actual situation, what is the internal trouble? The emperor knows exactly what Jia Lian is talking about. He should say what he should say, and let the emperor scold him to relieve his anger.

The problem of the Zhou Empire was not only a problem of gentry, but also a problem of the powerful.

When they dig into the empire, they don't feel ashamed, but instead feel it's natural.

Emperor Chenghui scolded Jia Lian, but he saw the meaning behind Jia Lian's words. Especially when Jia Lian mentioned the sentence "determine the crown prince position early" in the text, Emperor Chenghui was helpless.

This is the first time Jia Lian advised the emperor to appoint a crown prince!
Even Jia Lian said so, which means the time has really come.

(End of this chapter)