Jiajing Chengming

Chapter 243 The Queen gave birth to her eldest son, Jiajing was overjoyed!

Fei Hong was stunned for a moment, then he said, "Yes, I know about this too, and I can testify to it!"

Zhang Cong said, "I'd better go and ask Lord Xie in person what's going on with these bamboos and woods, whether he knows anything about them, and how he plans to explain it to the court!"

Xie Qian had just woken up and was asking his servant, "Where is Xie Zheng?"

"Reply to the Master!"

"The government troops found a lot of bamboo and wood in the second master's house, and they said they found hundreds of golden nanmu trees! Lord Fei sent someone to ask our people to go and tell us what happened, and he went."

After hearing this, Xie Qian fainted again.

"Master!"

"Doctor, take a look!"

When Xie Qian woke up again, Fei Hong, Zhang Cong and others had all come here.

When Fei Hong saw Xie Qian wake up, he smiled and asked, "You finally woke up!"

Xie Qian didn't say anything. When he saw Zhang Cong following him, he couldn't help but raise his hand, his eyes once again showing shock, anger and fear.

But in the end, fear overwhelmed anger, so Xie Qian just had someone help him up.

then.

Xie Qianjue bowed to Zhang Cong with a pale face:
"Minister Rong report!"

"I have no idea what my brother Xie Di did. I have been living apart from him for a long time according to our father's order, so I never thought that he would do such a rebellious thing!"

"But after all, I am of the same clan and brothers with him, so if the ministers want to punish him according to the law, I will plead guilty! Search and arrest him, it's all up to you!"

After hearing what Xie Qian said, Zhang Cong knew that he probably wouldn't be able to find out anything, and he still had to be on guard against the smooth transportation of all the bamboo and wood. He also couldn't offend Xie Qian too much. After all, there were at least tens of thousands of Xie family members in Yuyao, and it was undoubtedly impossible to keep an eye on them with only the 3,000 soldiers under the command of Zhejiang Commander Li Bing.

and……

He also knew that to deal with someone as valuable as Xie Qian, it was indeed appropriate to ask for the Holy Judgement, so he returned the greeting:
"You don't have to do this. I am only checking the bamboo and wood. As for how to punish the Xie family, you should ask the emperor for judgment. If your brother hadn't interfered with the official business, you wouldn't have died under the imperial sword."

"That's what the Minister said."

Xie Qian replied with a wry smile.

"I have something else to do, so I'll take my leave now!"

After Zhang Cong said this, he bowed and left.

Xie Qian said: "Farewell, Minister!"

"Stay!"

After Zhang Cong left, Xie Qian looked at Fei Hong and bowed to him: "Please also intercede in front of His Majesty. For the sake of the late emperor, please don't kill all of my Xie family!"

"Even if you don't tell me, I will do the same."

"As a cabinet minister, I don't want the residence of the Grand Secretary to be searched at will."

Fei Hong smiled and supported Xie Qian, saying, "However, I believe that the Lord has now realized how powerful Zhang Fujing is, right?"

"I've never seen it before, and the thought of it makes me shudder!"

Xie Qian said with lingering fear.

Fei Hongze added: "Those bamboos and woods are obviously not from the Hangzhou Bamboo and Wood Extraction Factory, because according to the highest number of high-quality woods handed over by the Hangzhou Bamboo and Wood Extraction Factory every year, the number is not even one-tenth of the bamboos and woods collected by your brother!"

"How dare I hide the truth from you, Lord? Most of those are bamboos and woods that are destined for the sea!"

“Many goods have not been paid yet!”

"Now it will all fall into the hands of the court."

After Xie Qian said this, he started coughing violently and then even coughed up blood.

Seeing this, Fei Hong hurriedly advised: "Don't hurt yourself because of this!"

Xie Qian smiled bitterly and said, "It's okay! Please rest assured, although a lot of the bamboo and wood will be in the hands of the court in the future, I will still pay for the goods on behalf of my brother!"

"This is a wise move, Lord. Now that it has come to this, these bamboos and wood can only be given to the court. Don't mess around!"

Fei Hong said solemnly.

Xie Qian nodded: "It can be considered that our Xie family has learned a lesson! But this lesson is too profound!"

"So you should think again about what our cabinet means."

"You can't have your cake and eat it too! You can't want to overthrow Zhang Fujing and restrict His Majesty from strengthening his maritime defenses!"

After Fei Hong finished speaking, he added: "I have to leave for Beijing too. Anyway, please think about it carefully."

Xie Qian nodded.

Mainland gentry like Fei Hong, who came from Jiangxi, did not care whether the profits from maritime trade went to the wealthy families in Fujian and Zhejiang or to the imperial court.

Anyway, no matter who monopolizes the maritime trade, they have to purchase goods from mainland tycoons like Mr. Fei.

Therefore, Fei Hong had no objection to letting Haili serve the court, and was more willing to accept it than Xie Qian. What really made it difficult for him to accept was that Zhang Cong, a radical who wanted to change the tax policy of the world, was in power!

After Zhang Cong seized a large amount of bamboo and wood hidden in Xie's "Dafangbodi" at a risk of his life, he calculated it based on Xie's accounts and obtained the actual bamboo and wood income of the Hangzhou Bamboo and Wood Extraction Factory.

This gave him sufficient reasons to advise the emperor to continue to agree to his commercial tax reform and to cancel the tax on bamboo and wood!
Many of the Xie family's smuggled bamboo and wood materials were subsequently shipped to the capital.

Therefore, there were constant sailing ships carrying timber heading north along the entire canal.

If Zhu Houcong knew that Zhang Cong had seized a large amount of smuggled bamboo and wood for him, he would naturally be very happy, because these would save him a lot of costs when he built warships next time. The key is that many of these smuggled bamboo and wood are good bamboo and wood that are difficult to buy on the market!
Because the bamboo and wood smuggled by the Xie family were originally sold to the Japanese, Portuguese and others as raw materials for building and repairing warships.

After all, it is impossible for these people to purchase bamboo and wood from other places. Other places are either primitive and lack mature transportation and rough processing talents, or are too far away, so they can only import bamboo and wood from Daming.

Many of their warships sailed on the sea, especially the Portuguese, who often sailed on long seas, so naturally they had high requirements for wood.

Therefore, the quality of these bamboos and woods is mostly of the best quality.

The Xie family was naturally very sad about this, but it was useless to be sad as they could not ask for it back. They said that many of the bamboo and wood they were planning to smuggle. They could only ask the emperor to give face to old man Xie Qian and not be too picky.

……

……

Capital.

After Zhang Cong went south to investigate the situation of bamboo and wood extraction, the most noteworthy thing was that Empress Yao gave birth to a pair of twins, a boy and a girl, after ten months of pregnancy.

Zhu Houcong was naturally very happy about this.

Because it's not just about his personal instinctive joy at becoming a father, but also because it has very positive political significance.

The whole court was delighted by this.

Both those who advocated rituals and those who defended them felt reassured and hopeful because of this.

The two Empress Dowagers were extremely delighted. After the twins, a boy and a girl, were born, they stared at the babies intently.

Even Empress Zhuangsu couldn't help but stretch out her index finger and gently poke the two babies' pink faces, smiling and saying, "So cute!"

Seeing that all the nobles in the harem were gathering around the two babies, Zhu Houcong didn't want to join in the fun, so he had to go and see the empress first.

What made Zhu Houcong happy was that Empress Yao did not encounter any major problems during childbirth. Not only were her children healthy, but she herself did not suffer from any hemorrhage or the like.

Of course, this may be related to the fact that the imperial physician who has been in charge of preserving the fetus is Doctor Zhou, who he brought from the palace.

When Zhu Houcong came in, Empress Yao, who looked a little haggard, smiled sweetly at him and then was about to stand up.

"No gift!"

Zhu Houcong said, then sat down next to Empress Yao and held her hand, which looked like water lilies. "You have worked hard and made great contributions to the country! I will reward you, and I will also reward your father and brother generously!"

"Your Majesty, I dare not refuse your kindness. But please do not reward my father and brother too much, so as not to encourage their greed!"

Queen Yao answered.

Zhu Houcong smiled and nodded, then asked, "Have your father and brother come to see you?"

Empress Yao nodded, then took out a pair of bamboo dragonflies from under the pillow behind her, spread her hands to Zhu Houcong, and said with a smile: "My father gave them to me!"

"I know, this is something you played with when you were a child. Is your father going to give it to his grandchildren?"

Zhu Houcong took the pair of bamboo dragonflies with a smile and asked about Queen Yao.

Queen Yao nodded: "Yes!"

Zhu Houcong smiled and said, "It's quite exquisite!"

"Your Majesty, thank you!"

At this time.

Zhu Houcong saw Empress Yao blinking again, so he asked, "Are you sleepy?"

Queen Yao shook her head: "No!"

"Then I'll stay with you for a while."

Zhu Houcong said with a smile.

"Your Majesty, please give the heir and princess a name!"

At this time, Queen Yao pulled Zhu Houcong's sleeve and said with a smile.

"Then I have to think about it carefully!"

"Emperor Taizu Gao established some rules for naming future generations. It's time for my next generation to be named Tu!"

As Zhu Houcong spoke, he listed a few while thinking, and asked Empress Yao for her opinion. Empress Yao sometimes shook her head and sometimes nodded, and because of this, she and Zhu Houcong laughed more frequently.

Wang Chunjing couldn't help but smile as he watched, but soon he suddenly felt nauseous and covered his mouth.

Just at this time, Huang Jin came to report that Zhang Heling and Zhang Yanling's uncles-in-law wanted to see him.

Zhu Houcong came out to meet them first and asked them, "Why are you two uncles here?"

"I'm here to congratulate your majesty on having a legitimate son!"

"Yes, this is a blessing for our Ming Dynasty. All the people in the world are very happy!"

As they spoke, Zhang Heling and Zhang Yanling each took out a brocade box, opened it, and showed Zhu Houcong a pearl as big as a longan in the box: "This is a small gift to congratulate your majesty on having an heir!"

After hearing this, Zhu Houcong asked the eunuch to take it and asked the two men, "Why did you suddenly think of giving me pearls?"

"It is said that the Empress loves pearls, and the Emperor dotes on her very much, so he is willing to spend money and manpower to build warships to search for large pearls. I am naturally trying to please your Majesty and the Empress! I have specially found these two priceless large pearls and present them to your Majesty! To show my loyalty!"

"The same goes for me, my minister!"

After Zhang Heling and Zhang Yanling said this with a smile, Zhu Houcong's face darkened.

(End of this chapter)