There is no such thing as the Kangxi and Qianlong eras

Chapter 158: Greedy Governor
"The Biography of the Lustful Monk of the Qing Dynasty".

You can tell it’s not a serious book just by looking at the title, but it’s really good!

After all, in the Qing Dynasty, where thoughts were extremely conservative and restricted, it was very rare to be able to buy a marginal novel with marginal illustrations.

In order to launch this book, Nie Yu spent more than half a year polishing it. He also set up a temporary department to write promotional manuscripts and cooperate with the external intelligence department.

Many of the plots in "The Biography of the Lustful Monk of the Qing Dynasty" were sourced from material personally provided by Nie Yu. Examples include the claim that Hong Chengchou and Dayu'er were in a relationship, that Shunzhi was actually Dorgon's son, and that Qianlong was the son of Yongzheng's concubine and a Han official named Chen. Yongzheng knew about this, but feigned ignorance in order to secure his throne.

These stories have basically no basis in fact and are written in a very clichéd way that cannot stand up to scrutiny, but it doesn’t matter, because everyone likes to read gossip.

There's no basis for this! So, let's add a sentence to the side of the book: the entire book is based on the author's conjecture, and readers are welcome to consider it at their own discretion.

It is so ambiguous and involves the issue of the pseudo-Qing royal family's bloodline. Some of the key plots do reveal some clues.

For example, the relationship between Dorgon and Dayuer is not clearly explained in history books, which gives the audience endless imagination...

Anyway, when Chen Linlan took the book out to a private room on a certain day, a few scholars initially scolded Han Jun for being shameless for writing such a vulgar and speculative book. But then, under the pretext of returning to criticize it, they borrowed the book from Chen Lin. Within a few days, a handwritten copy of this vulgar book… began to circulate among the Huizhou literati circle.

At night, in the cellar of Liuweiju.

Chen Lin and several waiters sat together. The daytime accountant of the restaurant had already put on the equipment and was repeatedly adjusting the radio on the table.

"Drip drip..."

"How is it?" Chen Lin asked.

The accountant nodded: "Almost done, we can send the message now."

"Well, send this letter back to Jingzhou. It contains the detailed information I've gathered over the past few days regarding the new Governor-General of Huguang, E Hui, and the Governor-General of Yunnan and Guizhou, Le Bao. It also contains information provided by the Huizhou merchants about the possible next major move by the Qing Dynasty."

"Drip drip..."

……

E Hui arrived quite quickly, arriving in Wuchang in early March, and brought with him the Eight Banners of the Manchu Guard, numbering over 3,000 men.

The fact that Delentang had previously sacrificed a thousand Eight Banners guards clearly didn't frighten Emperor Qianlong; at most, he simply believed that the Han army was more powerful than ordinary rebels. Furthermore, Delentang, the Mongol, was also reckless. He dared to charge tens of thousands of rebels with only a thousand cavalrymen. He was simply foolish.

Emperor Qianlong had high hopes for E Hui. When he arrived in Wuchang as the new governor of Huguang, the first thing he did was not to discuss suppressing bandits or collecting intelligence on rebels.

This guy first summoned Hubei Governor Hui Ling and all the Hubei officials, big and small, and said under the pretext of holding a banquet:
"This Governor has received an imperial decree from the Retired Emperor and has come to Huguang to oversee the suppression of bandits. The Governor of Hubei and the provincial government officials must fully cooperate. Starting tomorrow, the people of all prefectures in Huguang will be levied with silver to suppress the bandits. Furthermore, all merchants in Huguang must donate money and grain to help the government recruit and train troops!"

My goodness, you summoned these Huguang officials just to tell them about this?
Hubei Governor Hui Ling was a little confused and couldn't help but look at the Governor Chen Wangzhi beside him.

Chen Wangzhi was also a little embarrassed, and there was a bit of contempt in his embarrassment.

Damn, is this new governor of Huguang obsessed with money?
You should at least pretend to eat properly, it's so ugly.

You've made so much money, aren't you afraid that someone will write a memorial to impeach you?
Afraid of impeachment? What are you afraid of?

If these people were to inquire about E Hui's previous actions, they would know that it was just a blatant money-making scheme, which was nothing!
E Hui had fought under Agui and Fukang'an, and indeed had distinguished himself in battle, making him a truly formidable general. However, his character flaws were also evident: he was extremely greedy and daring, even taking advantage of the national crisis right under Emperor Qianlong's nose.

When the Gurkhas invaded Tibet, E Hui accepted bribes from them and took the initiative to let Bazhong negotiate peace with the Gurkhas, which resulted in the Gurkhas becoming even more aggressive.

When Emperor Qianlong learned about this later, he was furious and scolded E Hui for "harming the country". He demoted E Hui and ordered him to follow Fu Kang'an in the expedition against the Gurkhas, so that he could make meritorious contributions while serving his sentence.

Then, another outrageous move happened. This guy found that he had lost money, so he intercepted the tribute from the Gurkhas and embezzled the tribute.

Qianlong was so angry that he almost laughed, so he simply demoted this bastard servant to the lowest position. Only now did he reinstate him because of Agui's recommendation.

Historically, this man refused to change his ways even after such a fate. After being reinstated, he continued to suppress bandits in Huguang while resuming his old ways, soliciting bribes and amassing wealth. He was finally successfully prosecuted by the then-empowered Jiaqing, and even his eligibility to be enshrined in the Temple of the Sages and Good Men was revoked. Using his position as Governor-General, E Hui ordered the imposition of levies on the prefectures of Hubei, and even forced Hubei scholars and merchants to contribute to the military budget.

All the money collected as donations was divided into a 30% and 70% ratio. Governor E Hui took 70% and the remaining 30% was used by Hubei officials and for training troops to suppress bandits.

This caused a lot of trouble for the Hubei officials. The money was originally theirs. Before E Hui came, everyone was greedy for the money. Even if they couldn't get 70%, they could still get 50%, and the remaining 50% would be given to the Emperor.

Now, E Hui took away 70% as soon as he arrived, and the remaining 30% was divided among them.

What kind of distribution is this? His Majesty has to get 50%, which means they can't get any of the 30%, and they have to pay the remaining 20% ​​out of their own pockets to give His Majesty the rest.

After that was done, he still had to pay out of his own pocket to support the new governor E Hui in his anti-bandit and military training.

If the officials in Hubei are like this, the local gentry and common people are naturally even worse off. These gentry and common people have already been repeatedly exploited and squeezed by the government, and even the landlords don't have much surplus grain left.

When the new governor E Hui arrived, he did nothing but collect donations. Even if a dog passed by, it had to leave two ounces of oil.

Who can bear this?
That month, in Wuchang Prefecture, a local squire named Wu could no longer bear the situation and led his servants and fellow villagers to revolt, killing the officials and rebelling.

Upon hearing the news, E Hui ignored all dissuasion and personally led the 3,000-man Manchu guards without even bringing the recruits from Wuchang. He marched lightly and quickly, reaching the rebel base in just half a day.

In the first surprise attack, although the rebel army had the advantage in numbers, their combat effectiveness was too weak. They were caught off guard and suffered a great defeat. The leading gentry was killed in the battle, and the rest of the troops fled in all directions.

E Hui won a great victory in the first battle and felt very confident. He thought that the Hubei rebels were no better than him. After returning, he held the Hubei Governor Hui Ling accountable and asked him how he had allowed rebels to emerge in Wuchang and how he had been deadlocked with the bandits in Xiangyang for so long.

Chen Wangzhi, the governor of Hubei, wrote down all the things that E Hui did when he came to Wuchang in a secret memorial, and secretly delivered it to the capital to present to the emperor.

……

Jingzhou.

Nie Yu looked at the secret letter in his hand, not knowing whether to be happy or speechless.

Liu Jun laughed and said, "General, the Qing Dynasty could send such a governor. That old dog Qianlong must have become so old and dim that he can no longer distinguish between loyalty and treachery."

Lin Wenchang said with some worry, "Whether he is loyal or treacherous, good or bad is not important. The governor sent by the pseudo-Qing Dynasty has arrived so quickly. I'm afraid that in a few months, we will have to fight another war."

Wang Ruoyu nodded and said, "That's right. The intelligence agency reported that this pseudo-Qing Qing Governor-General E Hui had fought behind the pseudo-Qing generals Agui and Fukang'an. He should be difficult to deal with."

"..."

The civil and military officials from various departments discussed the new pseudo-Qing governor of Huguang.

Nie Yu suddenly smiled and said, "It's not difficult to deal with. If it were half a year ago, we might have had to think twice, but things are different now. Our Han army is no longer as weak as it was six months ago. We now have territory close to the entire Hunan Province, and we also have the important city of Jingzhou in our hands. In addition, the Fire Control Bureau just solved the problem of mass production of rifles a while ago."

"Everyone has probably witnessed the power of rifles. As long as we have rifles, the Qing will attack immediately. In a few months, we will be able to mass-produce and arm tens of thousands of musket-wielding soldiers. With tens of thousands of rifled musket-wielding soldiers, the Qing's bird guns will be nothing but fire sticks. There is no place in the world that we cannot conquer."

These words were arrogant and boastful, but also just right. For they were all true. The power of the rifles had inspired both the civil and military officers of the Han army.

Not only has the hit rate been greatly improved, it would be an understatement to say that it is ten times better than a smoothbore musket, but the range is also several times higher than that of a smoothbore musket.

These two advantages combined are basically equivalent to the Han army's muskets being able to hit the Qing army, but the Qing army being unable to hit the Han army, and even the cavalry no longer need to be feared.

Because normal cavalry has to reach the charging distance, the Han army's rifles can already carry out covering fire strikes, so what's the point of this?

In fact, it was precisely because of the large-scale popularization of rifled guns that cavalry began to gradually withdraw from the stage of history and became an auxiliary branch of the army, rather than an ace mobile force.

Just as Nie Yu was inspiring the people, a Han soldier suddenly came in with a telegram in his hand: "General, Yongshun Prefecture surrenders!"

(End of this chapter)