Emperor Hongzhi's order was soon transmitted to Ma Wensheng, the secretary of the military department, and Zhou Jing, the secretary of the household department, and the two received the will of the Hongzhi Emperor, and they were also confused.

"What is this clairvoyant? It costs 10 taels of silver each, and a purchase is 2,000, and the 20,000 taels of silver are used to purchase this clairy? ”

The telescope in Zhu Houzhao's hand was naturally still in Zhu Houzhao's hand, so Ma Wensheng and Zhou Jing didn't know what this clairvoyance was and what it did.

As the head of the household, this Zhou Jing has always been a notoriously miserly, and if he wants to take money from him to do things, it is more difficult than ascending to the sky.

There is no way, the master knows the difficulty of being in charge, especially the Ming Dynasty has been very poor since the founding of the country, although there are many things such as grain, cloth, silk, tea, etc., which are collected every year, but the silver is less than 3 million taels of silver a year.

The 3 million taels of silver are basically left to pay salaries to officials in the court, and it is difficult for the imperial court to come up with silver for disaster relief in the year of famine.

Therefore, another unique skill of Zhou Jing is to pit Emperor Hongzhi, and try all kinds of ways to pit Emperor Hongzhi's internal money, anyway, this country belongs to their old Zhu family, and their old Zhu family should pay for it, which is more reasonable.

Now Emperor Hongzhi has a will to pay 20,000 taels of silver to buy any clairvoyance, this clairvoyant doesn't know what it is, and he even wants 10 taels of silver, he immediately seems to be cutting meat, a thousand unwilling, ten thousand unwilling.

"I don't know what this clairvoyance is, but the will says that it is purchased from Liu Jin, and you should have heard of this Liu Jin, it is the one who made a splash on the Moon Tower, and now he is also the young man who helps His Majesty take care of the Xishan coal industry."

"He has been taught by a master, maybe this clairvoyance is really very useful, otherwise it would not be worth 10 taels of silver."

Ma Wensheng thought about it and said, he didn't see the physical object of the clairvoyant, and the purpose of the clairvoyant was not written in the will, but he just asked himself to purchase from Liu Jin, Liu Jin is now famous in the capital, and basically everyone knows it.

"But what kind of clairvoyant is purchased for these 10 taels of silver, and it will cost 20,000 taels of silver at one time... You also know that the treasury is empty, and there is not much money left at all. ”

Zhou Jing shook his head, thinking of the treasury that was already able to starve rats to death, he was even more reluctant to spend so much money to buy any clairvoyance.

"This is His Majesty's will, and the cabinet has also passed it, so let's follow the will."

Ma Wensheng and Zhou Jing are still different, because this money is still spent on the military, and he is the secretary of the Ministry of War, so he is still more supportive of spending money.

After all, since the Tumubao Change, civilian officials have completely mastered the military power, and this military support is getting less and less year by year.

In the past, I was able to go to the grassland for a walk, but now I don't even dare to go out of the grassland, so I can only retreat into the city for passive defense, and a very important reason for this is that the military expenditure is being compressed by the civilian officials more and more small.

The civilian officials finally grasped the power of the government, so naturally they would not give the opportunity to give those Qiu Ba, military generals, honorable nobles, etc. a chance to turn over, not only suppressing the military generals and nobles, but also constantly reducing military spending, and holding the military power in their own hands.

Although Ma Wensheng is a civilian official, and the interests of the entire civilian official group are the same, as the secretary of the military department, he also clearly knows the importance of this military to the country.

Over the past few years, the drawbacks brought about by the continuous reduction of military spending have become more and more prominent, the Ming Dynasty's military strength has weakened, its combat effectiveness is low, it is not uncommon to eat empty salaries, kill good people and take meritorious deeds, soldiers and bandits have a family, and military equipment has been slackened, and so on, and all kinds of problems have emerged one after another.

Although it was a successful realization of the goal of suppressing the military generals and nobles, now the court is full of literati who have the final say, and those generals don't even dare to put a fart, and there is no place to speak.

However, a country will certainly not be able to do without a strong army, and the Tatars and Warats in the north have repeatedly invaded the border, and the scars of the Tumubao Revolution have not yet been completely healed.

In May of this year, the little prince went south, the soldiers were in Datong, the company camp was twenty miles, and the Beijing division was shaken, and now in winter, the Tatars and Warat moved frequently, and there was a faint trend of going south.

As the secretary of the Ministry of War, Ma Wensheng is still very clear about the current situation of the Ming army, and it is good to be able to allocate more money to the past, and it should still play a little role.

"That's the only way, it's just that Your Majesty now has Xishan Coal Industry, with an annual income of one million, and this silver should actually come out of Your Majesty's internal money~"

Zhou Jing thought about it and nodded, and then remembered Emperor Hongzhi's internal affairs.

Soon, the joint official notice of the Ministry of Household and the Ministry of War fell into the hands of Liu Jin, and Liu Jin was still confused, not knowing what was going on.

"This clairvoyance should be a telescope~"

"I only made a few telescopes, and only one was given by Zhu Houzhao, why did the purchase order from the military department and the household department come?"

"Could it be that Zhu Houzhao dedicated this telescope to Emperor Hongzhi, and Emperor Hongzhi knew the role of this telescope, so he decided to purchase a batch?"

Liu Jin studied carefully, and soon guessed the matter, because this was the only reasonable explanation, and in addition, he really couldn't figure out how to purchase a telescope with a good end.

"10 taels of silver for a telescope, who gave the price?"

When he saw the purchase quantity and total amount of the telescope, Liu Jin immediately calculated the purchase price of the telescope, and the purchase price of 10 taels of silver was simply sky-high.

"Could it be that Emperor Hongzhi saw that I was working very hard to manage the Xishan coal industry for him, and he gave me specific benefits?"

"Most likely they think this glass is very valuable, so they will set 10 taels of silver each."

Liu Jin thought about it carefully, but soon shook his head with a smile: "Whatever, anyway, 10 taels of silver for a telescope, this time I want to make a lot of money, seeing that the New Year is coming soon, I don't have to worry about running out of money for the New Year." ”

It is not too simple for Liu Jin to make this telescope, this glass can be burned out by itself, as for polishing, it is not a difficult task, the glass is not a very hard thing, it is easy to polish, 2000 telescopes, if you have enough manpower on your side, you can do it in a few days.

As for manpower, the most important thing here in Xishan is manpower, there were originally more than 2,000 people, and they have been recruiting displaced people these days, and now there are almost 3,000 people, and it is enough to transfer some people out at will.

A few days later, Liu Jin delivered the 2,000 telescopes to the Ministry of War, and took 20,000 taels of silver from the Ministry of Households.

"I want to see what these 10 taels of silver and a clairvoyant look like?"

Knowing that Liu Jin delivered the goods in a few days and cut off 20,000 taels of silver, Zhou Jing was very heartbroken, and hurriedly found Ma Wensheng to see what this clairvoyant was.

"It's just child's play, I bought a bunch of such things for 20,000 taels of silver and came back~"

After carefully studying the so-called clairvoyance, Zhou Jing couldn't help but scold, and then hurriedly pulled Ma Wensheng into the palace to find Emperor Hongzhi.