The Wanli Emperor of the Ming Dynasty was extremely rebellious

Chapter 205: All the Royal Family Members Are Dealt With

Wanli suddenly issued an edict, ordering all the princes to register all the land donated by them and hand it over to the court for processing. Otherwise, their power would be reduced!

The civil servants in the court all thought that this little emperor had become extremely arrogant because he had some followers.

Can something like reducing the power of the feudal lords be done casually?

Those princes and royal family members are all blood relatives of your Zhu family. Are you going to deal with all the royal family members?

Besides, if you want to reduce the power of the vassal kings, won’t they be able to quell the rebellion?
The lesson of Emperor Jianwen is there for us to learn.

This will cause chaos in the world!
However, what was strange was that this time not a single civil official submitted a memorial to persuade the young emperor not to reduce the power of the princes.

Those civil servants with ulterior motives are eager for the princes to put an end to the rebellion as soon as possible. Changing the emperor is better than the current extremely rebellious little emperor.

This little emperor goes against them in everything, and their civil officials are almost being suppressed by the military generals.

If they are really suppressed by military generals, then nine times out of ten they will end up like in the Hongwu and Yongle dynasties, where they won't get any profit at all, and if they covet 60 taels of silver, they will be skinned and stuffed with straw!

Naturally, they did not want to return to the Hongwu and Yongle dynasties, so they all wanted to change the emperor.

Some people have even begun to think about which vassal king to secretly join.

If they bet on the right thing this time, they will be the heroes who follow the dragon!

Of course, not all civil servants in the court have ulterior motives.

There is also a part that is heartless, or in other words, they just want to do their own thing and don't want to meddle in other people's affairs.

These civil servants are usually invisible and will never submit any memorials unless necessary. Naturally, they will not get involved in matters such as reducing the power of the feudal lords.

There is also a part that is truly for the country and the people.

Although there are not many such civil servants, they still exist.

They all knew very well that if the issue of vassal states was not resolved, the Ming Dynasty would sooner or later be dragged down by these vassal states.

Since Wanli wanted to reduce the power of the feudal lords, they naturally would not object.

Perhaps, one of Qi Tai and Huang Zicheng of the Jianwen Dynasty was a time traveler.

They knew that the problem of vassalage would become more and more serious as time went on, so they strongly advocated that Emperor Jianwen reduce the power of the vassal states.

Of course, this is off topic, so let's skip it for now.

Wanli did not really want to reduce the power of the princes. If the princes and royal family members had been obedient and registered all the land they had donated and handed it over to the court for processing, he would not have risked chaos in the country by reducing the power of the princes.

Because before Shen Shixing submitted his memorial, he had already considered how to solve the vassal issue.

That is to expand the territory and enfeoff the vassal kings to territories outside the two capitals and thirteen provinces of the Ming Dynasty, so that these guys can exploit and oppress the barbarians who are against the Ming Dynasty.

However, at this moment, Shen Yikuan had already provoked conflicts between the local vassal states and the imperial court in order to use the issue of clan salaries to deal with Zhang Juzheng's old party.

If he didn't take action to intimidate those vassal kings, they would probably start a riot.

The problem of clan salary is definitely unsolvable now, because the population of princes and royal family members has exceeded 60,000, and all the land taxes in the entire Ming Dynasty are not enough to pay the clan salary.

However, he could first solve the problem of a vassal king with a serious problem to deter other vassal kings.

So, what did the princes from all over the country think?
The princes from all over the country did not think that the young emperor would reduce the power of the princes. After all, reducing the power of the princes was no joke.

The current population of princes and royal family members has actually exceeded 100,000. However, since the Jiajing period, the imperial court has deliberately delayed the registration of new princes and royal family members in order to delay the payment of salary and rice to the princes and royal family members, so it appears that there are only tens of thousands of them.

They all believed that the young emperor should be clear about how many princes and royal family members there were now. Even if they did not recruit any soldiers, there were still more than 100,000 of them. If their servants and domestic slaves were added, there would be more than one million of them.

Isn’t the little emperor afraid that they will really suppress the rebellion?
They all believed that the young emperor was probably trying to scare people into handing over the land they had accepted as donations, and that he would not really reduce the power of the feudal lords.

Naturally, they would not hand over the donated land because the amount was too large and the benefits were too great.

Even if two thousand acres can yield fifty stone of grain per year, that is still a terrifying amount.

The land they accepted as donations was different from that of scholars with official titles.

Those scholars with official titles could only accept a maximum of 2,000 acres of donated land, and they could accept any amount.

The farmland they accepted as donations from their vassal states amounted to millions of acres, which meant tens of thousands or even hundreds of thousands of shi of grain income. How could they possibly hand it over?

Besides, most of the local tyrants and gentry who donated land to them were related to them, and many were even their in-laws. It was impossible for them to hand over these people's land to the court.

Therefore, they all put up a passive resistance, saying that they had not accepted the donated land. Wanli naturally guessed that these princes would not hand over the donated land obediently.

He just wanted to intimidate these vassal kings by dealing with the Dai vassal.

Time flies, and it’s May in the blink of an eye.

The capital city is already sweltering with heat, but the Mountain Resort is cool and pleasant.

Early in the morning at about noon, as the sun was rising, Wanli seemed to suddenly become interested. He actually took Yongnianbo Wang Wei and Li Shizhen and walked slowly to the place where herbs were grown in the Baihe River Valley.

What does he want to do?

To be honest, no one knows.

Because the herbs are not ripe yet.

At this moment, a mountain road of more than 20 miles has been opened up in the Baihe River Valley. The terraced fields on both sides cover tens of thousands of acres. The terraced fields are planted with various herbs, which are as lush and green as growing rice seedlings.

He took a quick look through the telescope and then asked, "Doctor Li, when will these herbs mature?"

It’s hard to say.

Li Shizhen explained in detail: "Your Majesty, the herbs in these medicinal fields were first planted on a large scale in October last year, and some were planted in March or April this year.

The earliest we can harvest last year’s crops is the end of June or early July of this year, and some will be ripe in August, September, October, November, and even next year.”

Oh, this is planted and harvested in batches?
Wanli nodded slightly and asked, "Doesn't collecting herbs require much labor?"

Li Shizhen nodded repeatedly and said, "Yes, we take turns to harvest anyway. The largest batch is only one or two thousand acres. A thousand strong laborers are enough. We don't need to find people to harvest. The children of doctors who study medicine with us are enough. It's just a little troublesome when planting.

I think it would be a good idea to let these children of doctors learn to grow herbs. After they return to their respective places, they can lead others to grow herbs suitable for their local areas, and our medicinal materials will increase in number.”

There is no need to find anyone to help.

That's good.

I'm thinking about this.

Wanli nodded slightly, then went to the riverside, found a patch of weeds about the same height as the rice plants, and gestured, "Father-in-law, I want you to make something for harvesting rice and wheat.

This thing is similar to a handcart, but the car board is not waist-high, it just needs to be slightly higher than the feet.

The sickle is installed on the left side of the cart board, but it should be longer than the manual sickle. It is best to make a sickle groove so that rice and wheat can be collected and harvested.

In addition, a thin iron plate roughly the same height as the rice and wheat should be installed on the top of the sickle. The function of this thin iron plate is to press the cut rice and wheat onto the cart board, so the top of the thin iron plate must be bent toward the cart board.

The other three sides of the cart can be made into frames half a person's height. It is best to install hinges on the baffle opposite the thin iron plate so that it can be opened to easily take out the rice and wheat inside.

This is a good thing.

Because harvesting rice and wheat purely by hand is too hard work. You have to bend over all the time, keep harvesting, and carry the rice and wheat to the thresher one handful at a time.

If you have this kind of cart, you can just push it over, fill a basket with harvested rice and then push it to the thresher. You don't even have to bend over, it's very easy.

Yongnian Earl Wang Wei pondered with great interest, "Your Majesty, how big is this cart? Also, what kind of wheels are used for it? It seems like ordinary wheels would sink into the rice fields."

As long as you understand what I mean, that's enough.

Wanli spread his hands and said, "You can ask those peasant women who have harvested rice and wheat. There are weeds everywhere along the river, and the harvest season is still early. You can take your time and try it out. By the way, the sickle must be sharp, so that even a peasant woman can push it easily."

Yongnian Earl Wang Wei nodded repeatedly and said, "That's no problem. We use 100% tempered steel to make sickles. Not only can they cut iron like mud, but harvesting rice and wheat is as easy as slicing through mud. Your Majesty, when will you order this, and how much do you want?"

Wanli said without hesitation: "Of course we need it during the harvest this year. We need at least 360,000 sets. If there are not enough craftsmen, you can recruit more."

what?
Do so much!

Still recruiting craftsmen?

Upon hearing this, Yongnian Earl Wang Wei was stunned.

Others were even more confused.

Why did His Majesty suddenly want to make so many carts for cutting rice and wheat?
This is naturally related to the reduction of feudal lords.

However, Wanli did not explain.

(End of this chapter)