Save the Bachelor of Heaven

Half a year later, Tiangongfang successively launched soap, perfume, glass, mirrors, clocks and other items. Once they came out, they immediately attracted rushes, allowing Xiang Nan to easily obtain hundreds of thousands of taels of silver.

When the courtiers saw this, they were naturally very jealous and suggested that the industry should be handed over to the Ministry of Household Affairs.

However, Xiang Nan did not agree and instead left the responsibility to the inner court.

The inner court was originally responsible for serving the emperor and his family. After Xiang Nan came to the throne, he repaired the eunuchs in charge of the twelve eunuchs one by one. The ones who are now in charge are all newcomers promoted by him.

Moreover, the number of prisons was changed from twelve to eleven, excluding the Secretary of Ceremony. This greatly reduced the power of eunuchs. From now on, he can only be responsible for the affairs of the palace and the clan. As for foreign affairs, he has neither the power nor the ability to intervene, which prevents the eunuch party from getting bigger.

Xiang Nan did not spend the money earned by Tiangongfang, and then invested it in the construction of steel plants.

Because there is enough steel, cannons and guns can be produced, and the Ming Dynasty army can be armed to win the war.

You know, the Ming Dynasty seemed powerful, but in fact it was surrounded by enemies on all sides.

There are Oara and Tatars in the north, Eastern Chagatai Khanate in the west, Annan and Bagan in the south, Uzang in the southwest, and Japanese pirates in the east...

Coupled with the Tumubao Incident a few years ago, the Ming Dynasty lost 500,000 soldiers and civilians, and its national strength was greatly reduced. It also made surrounding countries have an ambiguous attitude towards the Ming Dynasty.

The fear and fear during the Ming Taizu and Ming Chengzu periods gradually turned into contempt and provocation. Even Bagan dared to cause chaos on the border. Therefore, forging firearms and increasing armaments must be done.

And once the foreign war is won, Xiang Nan can also wash away the humiliation of the Tumubao Incident and accumulate enough prestige to attack the domestic civil servants.

At the end of the Ming Dynasty, the reason why the Donglin Party kept making troubles and even refused to pay taxes was because the emperor was not prestigious enough and the gentry would not give him money if they had it.

They especially like to play a trick, which is to go to the Confucius Temple and cry at the temple, using public opinion to fight against the court, leaving local officials and the court helpless.

After the Qing Dynasty entered the Pass, anyone who cried would be beheaded. Even the great talent Jin Shengtan was beheaded for this reason. Since then, the Jiangnan gentry no longer dared to play the trick of crying spirits.

Later, Kangxi, Yongzheng, and Qianlong successively established literary prisons, which also used the theme to suppress the scholars.

In fact, if it were not for the great changes unseen in a thousand years, the feudal system of the Qing Dynasty would have been the most perfect.

During the 12th emperor of the Qing Dynasty, in the 276th year of the reign of Zuo, there were no eunuchs, relatives, or powerful ministers to disrupt the government, and no vassal kings rebelled. Its vast territory and large population are unmatched by any previous dynasty.

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Xiang Nan is now actively raising his hopes, worrying about state affairs, and constantly launching various policies that benefit officials and people, such as opening up mutual markets, returning land to locals, increasing wages, etc.

Mutual market is a general term for trade between the central dynasty and foreign countries or alien races.

At that time, the Central Plains was extremely rich in technology and products, so the products from the Central Plains were very popular among foreign countries and foreigners. Such as tea, silk, cloth, salt, porcelain, ironware, etc.

The products of foreign countries and ethnic groups are also very attractive to the Central Plains. For example, horses, furs, cattle and sheep from the grassland, snow lotus, gold, and cordyceps from Qinghai-Tibet; pearls, spices, silver from the South Sea, and so on.

Therefore, the Tea-Horse Mutual Trade, the Silk Road, the Maritime Silk Road, etc. were derived.

However, the Ming Dynasty, as a powerful state in the Celestial Empire, often restricted and banned mutual trade due to political and military reasons.

For example, when the Ming Dynasty and Mongolia traded with each other, they not only restricted the number of people trading with each other, but also placed great restrictions on the commodities. For example, ironware is absolutely not allowed to be bought or sold. Because they were worried that the Mongolian Congress would smash the iron weapons and then forge weapons.

Even so, various ministries in Mongolia have high voices for opening up mutual markets. Because after the Mongols retreated to the desert, their technological level declined rapidly.

During the Yuan Dynasty, the Mongolian army could even use artillery skillfully. Now, I can't even make an iron pot. Moreover, they are also in urgent need of salt, tea, grain, cotton cloth, etc. Therefore, Mongolia even threatened war to force the Ming Dynasty to open the market.

Now Xiang Nan wants to open up mutual markets, mainly to make money and promote trade.

You know, the national treasury is now empty, and the entire household department's total deposits are less than five million taels of silver.

In the last years of Kangxi's reign, even though he was once fatuous and allowed princes to fight for power and ministers to be corrupt, he still left Yongzheng with 27 million taels of silver.

Therefore, five thousand taels of silver was really too little, and it was barely enough to maintain the operation of the court. If there is a sudden famine, the court will not be able to spend money for disaster relief, so it must increase revenue and reduce expenditure.

Opening up markets to each other is a good idea.

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The purpose of reforming the native land and returning it to local minorities is to strengthen control over minority areas.

Since ancient times, there have been many ethnic minorities in Yunnan, Guizhou, Hunan, Hubei, and western Guangdong. Although they have been conquered by the Central Plains regime many times, their assimilation has been very difficult.

During the Yuan Dynasty, the strategy of controlling the minority with the minority was adopted, and the leaders of local tribes were granted the title of chieftain, recognizing their hereditary status and giving them official titles.

Under the rule of the chieftain, the land and the people are hereditary owned by the chieftain. Each chieftain forms a sphere of influence. Judicial, financial, administrative, and military matters can be autonomous. They can ask for and take from the local people and have all the power of life and death.

Except that he cannot ascend the throne and claim the title of emperor, everything else is even comparable to that of an emperor, and he only needs to pay a small symbolic tax to the court.

In the Ming Dynasty, the chieftain system of the Yuan Dynasty was still continued. This also led to the continuous growth of those chieftains, to the point of splitting and separatist regimes with the help of the Turkish army they controlled.

For example, during the Yongle period of the Ming Dynasty, the two Xuanwei divisions of Sizhou and Sinan rebelled; during the Longqing period, Mang Ruiti, the chieftain of southern Yunnan, rebelled; during the Wanli period, Yang Yinglong, the Xuanwei division of Bozhou, rebelled...

The reform of local chieftains means to ban these hereditary chieftains, remove them from their official positions and powers, and replace them with officials dispatched by the court to govern, implementing the same local administrative system as in the mainland.

In this way, not only can Yunnan, Guizhou, Hunan, Hubei, Yunnan and Guangxi and other places be brought under the control of the imperial court, but also millions of people can be added. You must know that no matter what era, people are wealth.

In ancient times, when evaluating whether an era was prosperous, population was a very good criterion.

However, the interests of those chieftains would be affected if they changed their ways.

After all, they are like local emperors, and they are not willing to hand over their power to officials sent by the imperial court.

At that time, when the Qing Dynasty implemented the reform of native land and returned it to local people, it took many battles to successfully implement it.

The most famous one is the Battle of Jinchuan and Jinchuan during the Qianlong period. This battle lasted for twenty or thirty years. In the end, the chieftains of Jinchuan and Jinchuan were defeated, and the Qing Dynasty officially took control of that place.

Therefore, Xiang Nan knows that it is not that easy to change his roots and return to his hometown, but he will still continue to push forward.