The Prosperous Era of Longwan

In the past few days, in addition to the trivial things that were reported in the streets and alleys, there were also major events that happened in the capital and court affairs, and the Liaodong disaster was a new topic in the conversation in the city.

According to market rumors, today's Liaodong is already like a hell on earth, with people starving to death thousands of miles away, people exchanging children for food, no matter how miserable it is.

However, when such a topic came out among the people in the capital, apart from sighing from time to time, everyone was foaming at the mouth and in high spirits.

The common people talked about this, and the question among the officials in the capital had changed from asking Emperor Jiajing to issue an order for disaster relief to how to transport the food there.

The water transportation problem mentioned by Jia Yingchun, the Secretary of the Ministry of Revenue, has spread among the officials in the capital. In fact, many officials were more or less aware of the matter before this, but they did not think about it when talking about disaster relief in Liaodong.

Now after hearing the conversation in Xiyuan that day, many officials suddenly realized that water transportation was really important.

These days, it would be difficult for merchants to do business in the capital's business community without the support of Beijing officials. Just the gang of government officials in Shuntian Prefecture and the county government are enough to annoy them, and they can definitely eat them alive.

Therefore, officials in the capital are naturally aware of the water transportation difficulties caused by the severe drought in the south recently, and water transportation may be interrupted at any time.

However, most officials are still hesitating on which side to stand at this moment.

Yes, on the day after the Xiyuan Imperial Court meeting, many low-level officials from the Ministry of Revenue and various yamen in Beijing wrote letters requesting Emperor Jiajing’s permission to reopen the sea route and transport relief grain directly to Liaodong by sea ship. Instead of transporting it to Taicun by canal as usual, and then transporting it to Liaodong through Jizhen.

Disaster relief is like putting out fires. To waste time at this time is to waste human life.

While some people supported it, others naturally opposed it. There were also many fourth- and fifth-level officials in major government offices who wrote letters against shipping to Liaoning. The reason was also fair and square, that is, Taizu Zhu Yuanzhang issued an imperial edict to stop shipping.

Supporters naturally cited the circumstances at the time. In the early Ming Dynasty, military supplies were transported by sea to the Ming army that was developing Liaodong. The suspension of operations was because the military garrison in Liaodong was beginning to take shape and the local area was able to be self-sufficient. This edict was issued.

The current situation is far different from that at that time, so it should naturally be restored.

Just kidding, if Liaodong could be self-sufficient in food now, there would be no disaster in Liaodong.

It is another debate over whether we should maintain the ancestral system or save the people from disaster. However, most of the officials who used to choose to sit on the fence gradually turned to support the shipping camp in the face of the disaster.

In their opinion, even if they launch a sea transport in response to the Liaodong disaster, they should save people first.

What time has it been? People are starving to death in Liaodong every day. Those Shangguan officials are still arguing about how to transport food there. It is really a lack of moral character.

There are more and more memorials supporting the launch of maritime transport, but the officials who submit the memorials are generally not of high grade, and their words are not influential enough.

Officials in major yamen in Beijing were clearly divided into two factions. They not only criticized each other in memorials, but also often exchanged words when meeting in the yamen, but they would soon be separated by others.

Regardless of whether they support or oppose it, anyone will be annoyed when a subordinate openly contradicts them.

However, in the Ming Dynasty these days, the upper-level officials did not have much binding force on the lower-level officials. It was difficult for them to retaliate against their subordinates because of political disagreements. If the imperial censor knew about this, it would be enough for him to take a copy of it. He drank from a pot, so he could only roll up his sleeves and spray, and he didn't talk about the official power that a Shangguan should have.

Perhaps, only the censors of the Metropolitan Procuratorate did not participate in this debate, because they were still arguing in the yamen about who should be sent to the south to buy grain.

This is a good job. The household department received 600,000 taels of silver. Even if it was sold out as usual, it would still be almost 500,000 taels. I would easily get tens of thousands of taels of silver as soon as I passed it.

Sending food worth 400,000 taels of silver to Liaodong, he was really kind.

When the food is delivered and there are countless people alive, will the people of Liaodong build a shrine for themselves?

If this is really the case, then do you want to accept it?

This is what the censors who are interested in this job are thinking about now. Many censors who used to have good relationships are now having a tense relationship due to competition for the job.

There are many people who are ready to move, and there are also many who end up making excuses, but they are still a minority among the huge group of Beijing officials.

So far, more officials are just confused but have not followed suit.

At this time, in a restaurant in the inner city of the capital, in a large elegant room that could accommodate several tables, a group of green-robed officials were drinking around the table, and the atmosphere was very lively.

When the wine was in full swing, a young official at the middle table suddenly stood up. Holding a wine glass in his hand, he deliberately coughed twice to attract the attention of the guests at several tables around him. This year, the first thing is to get together with all the Nian brothers. In the past two months, everyone has been busy with royal affairs and has no time to go out for a drink and keep in touch.

Secondly, in the past two days, Guangde has been thinking carefully at home. Many of his brothers may also know that a few days ago, I also wrote a letter requesting the imperial court to transport disaster relief grains directly to Liaodong by sea for the sake of the people of Liaodong.

At the time when Guangde wrote the letter, Xiyuan was probably still discussing disaster relief matters. It can only be said that Guangde's original idea coincided with that of Jia Situ of the Ministry of Household Affairs.

In the past few days, many people in the DPRK have written to each other and criticized each other because of this matter. Guangde felt really uneasy after seeing it.

However, after spending these two days behind closed doors at home, I finally came to the conclusion that the only way for the people of Liaodong to survive was to transport disaster relief food directly to Liaodong by sea. "

The person who spoke was naturally Wei Guangde. Although after the meeting that day, they had planned to mobilize Prince Yu's Palace, Wei Guangde's same year, and Xuge's old disciples to fully support the idea of ​​reopening shipping proposed by Jia Yingchun, the Secretary of the Ministry of Revenue, but there were still some difficulties in the final implementation steps. Refinement.

The person who opposes Gao Gong's full support is naturally Wei Guangde, and his reasons are also very good. If everyone gives full support from the beginning, the opposition will quickly gather and jointly oppose the opening of the sea, which is likely to delay the disaster relief. It turned into a party struggle in the court.

The result of the final discussion was naturally the current situation. The officials who could be influenced by Prince Yu's Mansion took the lead, including officials from the Ministry of Revenue. The bosses all spoke out. Can the officials below not support it?

What's more, this is also the most reasonable solution. If you object, you can come up with practical and effective means.

As a result, the first shot in support of opening up the sea fell on the officials of Prince Yu's Mansion and the Ministry of Revenue.

Whose person is Jia Yingchun? Of course he is from Prince Yu's Mansion. It is reasonable for Prince Yu's Mansion to come forward to support him.

As for the second shot, it was natural for Wei Guangde's classmates to write a letter of support.

Nowadays, the Jinshis of Wei Guangde's class can no longer be called Xinke Jinshis.

In the spring of the thirty-eighth year of Jiajing, a new joint examination and a palace examination were held successively, and the title of "New Science Jinshi" had been changed.

The first three people on the Jiwei Ke Palace examination list are Ding Shimei, Mao Dunyuan and Lin Shizhang, followed by 85 people in the second class, and more than 200 people in the third class. Now they are the influential figures in the capital.

This may mean that the waves behind the Yangtze River push the waves ahead, and a new generation replaces the old.

As for Mr. Xu Ge's disciples, they are the last step to launch, because these people are of higher rank and have more influence than the first two waves.

As for the purpose of doing this, Wei Guangde naturally wanted to give the officials in Beijing a feeling that opening sea transportation to Liaodong was a general trend. The number of supporters was gradually increasing, and the weight was gradually increasing.

The general trend of the world is vast and powerful. Those who follow it will prosper, and those who go against it will perish.

As a result, more people choose to support them instead of just sitting on a small bench and watching the show as usual, and their support is only verbal.

And now, it is time to mobilize his classmates to respond. Wei Guangde specially booked this place to invite his classmates who stayed in Beijing to attend a banquet to lobby for this matter.

In fact, everyone here in the same year already knew that Wei Guangde had already submitted a letter in the afternoon of the same day when Xiyuan was still in the court meeting, asking to open a sea route to transport disaster relief food to support Liaodong. For this reason, two impeachment memorials were submitted to him on the second day. General Affairs Department.

However, Wei Guangde did not write a letter to defend himself when someone impeached him. Instead, he took a few days off from Director Yin and then went home to thank guests behind closed doors. He had the attitude of "sitting alone in a small building to form a unified body, regardless of the wind, east, west, or west." ” posture.

Yesterday, Zhang Ji, the young butler of the Wei family, started running around various houses in the capital, and issued today's invitation letter. Wei Guangde wanted to invite his peers to come here for a banquet. In fact, everyone had more or less guessed it, but now It turned out to be true.

In fact, those who can sit here are not stupid people. The stupid people have been screened out in previous imperial examinations.

Wei Guangde supports shipping to Liaoning, which is considered the right answer by most people. As for why there are so many objections, everyone knows very well that the interests here are a bit big.

As for whether to submit a letter or not, standing with Wei Guangde, everyone also has Xiao Jiujiu in their hearts.

Now that everyone has been officials for several years, they are no longer as innocent as before.

Fortunately, because Wei Guangde submitted the letter early, no one in the same year thought that Wei Guangde and Jia Yingchun had anything to do with Prince Yu's palace, but just thought it was a coincidence.

"Everyone who is of the same year must have seen the nautical chart. In order to debate this matter in the past two days, many people must have looked it up, or at least know the details.

I just want to say that when we study, we set up our mind for the world, establish our destiny for the people, inherit the unique knowledge of the saints, and create peace for all generations.

No matter why they oppose saving the people of Liaodong, my original intention will not change.

Nowadays, only the sea route can quickly transport enough disaster relief food to Liaodong to buy time for Jiangnan to purchase food.

As everyone knows, the Ministry of Revenue transferred 50,000 shi of rice from Taicang to be shipped to Liaodong, but now we don’t know how to transport it there.

Taking the land route through Ji Town, Guangde has seen the high mountains in the north. It is said that after leaving Shanhaiguan, it is still mountains outside the mountains. How much food is wasted when transporting people to eat horse chews. This is life-saving food for the people of Liaodong. "

Wei Guangde spoke eloquently for a long time, stretched out his hand to wipe the corners of his eyes, as if the corners of his eyes were moist when he was talking about emotion, and finally raised the wine glass in his hand and circled it, and said cheerfully: "Guangde hereby sincerely asks everyone to support Guangde, We have submitted a letter asking for shipping, and 50,000 shi of life-saving food will enter the sea from Haikou, Tianjin, and reach Liaodong. We cannot afford to delay it."

Having said this, Wei Guangde's eyes were slightly red.

That thing is a bit eye-catching.

Opening the sea still needs to be done step by step. Now let’s tear open the gap and use the excuse of 50,000 shi of life-saving food to win the support of more officials.

Once the hole is opened, there will be disaster relief grains and grains that should be transported by water because the Grand Canal is cut off, so there is every reason to take the sea route to Beijing.

Wei Guangde's strategy is naturally to nibble away and open the hole bit by bit.

After domestic sea transportation is opened, we will consider opening up the sea in the true sense and establishing customs and foreign trade.

As long as there is money, the Ming Dynasty should be able to survive.

Some people may feel that even if they have money but no food, they will still be unable to solve the crisis in the future.

In fact, Wei Guangde is a half-hearted history buff, or it would be more accurate to say that he is historically illiterate. In his consciousness, because he still has the memory of future generations, he does not think that there are things that cannot be accomplished with money.

Are those foreign ships coming to China empty ships?

Or only carry silver on board?

The labor and capital are loaded with food, and the food is offset from the customs duties. As long as the court has enough food for disaster relief, it will not be afraid of frequent famines in various places and the displacement of the victims.

If they have food, they won't cause trouble.

Given the poor temperament of local officials in the Ming Dynasty, it was impossible for all the relief food to be sent out for disaster relief. All levels had to withhold some, which probably meant that the people below would be conscientious if they did not starve to death.

But this seems to be fine, and I am afraid that they will make trouble after eating.

Officials still need to supervise, so send more censors to at least ensure that no one will starve to death.

Wei Guangde's emotional performance first won the support of his fellow villagers. Lao Kan was the first to stand up, holding a wine glass in his hand and said to the others: "The charity loan is all about this, for For the tens of thousands of people in Liaodong, I have written this memorial. I will write it when I get back tonight, and I will submit it to the Communications Envoy early tomorrow morning."

As soon as he finished speaking, he drank the wine in the glass in one gulp.

Later, Zhu Dashou, Tao Dalin, Zhang Ke and others also stood up, saying the same words as Lao Kan, all supporting Wei Guangde.

In fact, everyone's official position is really not high now, and they have become shrewd after two years of experience in the officialdom. However, Wei Guangde's performance still succeeded in conquering everyone.

Wei Guangde is right. At this time, speaking out in support of transporting disaster relief food by sea is a kind act by a living person. Why not?

If you don't even dare to say the truth, then what's the point of being an official?

Establish a mind for heaven and earth, establish a destiny for the living and the people, carry on the unique teachings of the past saints, and create peace for all generations.

This was the initial sentiment of those in the officialdom. After being soaked in the big dye vat of the officialdom for two years, it seemed that they were no longer clean.

At this time, many people unconsciously felt that for the sake of the livelihood of the people in Liaodong, they wrote in support of taking the sea route to Liaodong, so that they could wash away the dirt stained on their bodies in the past two years, regain their original aspirations, and become a flower again. The lotus comes out of the mud without being dyed white.

Soon, the atmosphere at the wine table was ignited again. Everyone stood up with wine glasses in their hands, uttered a few heroic words, and then drank the wine in one gulp.