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In the eyes of the people of Lu'an Mansion, after Zhao Junchen came to Lu'an Mansion, Lu'an Mansion, which was already plagued with locusts, became more and more chaotic. (If you like this book, please bookmark biquge.info)

First of all, Zhao Junchen was attacked by a stone when he was inspecting the disaster area, and the government arrested many people, but they neither said punishment nor release, so they kept being detained, which made people panic.

Then, within a few days, the squires and elders from all over Lu'an Mansion all received invitations from the government, saying that they had something to discuss, and the attitude of the officials who sent the letter was mostly polite, but the meaning was very clear, that is, they must go and must not be absent. For a while, it made the people speculate.

Almost at the same time, the monks, Taoists, gods, and witches in Lu'an Mansion also received a post from Grandma Temple, saying that the Zhang family was going to preside over a "Five Religions Ventilation Meeting", compared with the politeness of the government, Zhang Daoquan, the head of Grandma Temple, was very domineering - "If anyone dares not to come, then don't think about gaining a foothold in Lu'an Mansion in the future" - this is Zhang Daoquan's original words.

Then, the garrison near Lu'an Mansion began to move frequently, and the chief officials of the county near Zuofu gathered in Lu'an Mansion, and while they were panicked, they also made the people secretly speculate, could it be that something big happened in Lu'an Mansion?

Finally, a well-informed person spread the news that the government was preparing to organize a large number of people to cull the locusts!!

It is said that this mention was strongly advocated by Zhao Junchen, the prefect Liu Changan, and although other officials expressed doubts, they were all suppressed by Liu Changan, who has always been very good at speaking.

For a time, the feelings of doubt, anxiety, and hesitation began to spread among the people.

Is the government ready to cull locusts? What if the locust god retaliates in the future?

The people had the heart to ask the nearby clan squires about countermeasures, but the clan squires were all invited away by the government, and they had the heart to go to the hosts of the nearby temples to seek answers, but unfortunately those monks, Taoists, gods, sticks, and witches were also invited by the grandmother temple.

………

Zhao Junchen paid attention to the reaction of the people, so he also learned about the people's feelings through various channels.

But Zhao Junchen didn't care, in Zhao Junchen's opinion, even if people were panicked, it was a manifestation of vitality, which was better than the despair and even numbness he saw a few days ago.

Since that day Zhao Junchen inspected the disaster area, it has been three days now, and the elderly squires from all over Lu'an Mansion have now gathered in the yamen, waiting for Zhao Junchen's summons, but Zhao Junchen is not in a hurry to meet them.

Because, Zhao Junchen is preparing more important things, and it can even be said that whether this disaster relief and disaster relief can be successful in the end depends on this to a large extent.

That was the meeting with the Shanxi merchants, to be precise, with the Jin merchants.

Yes, compared with those old squires, Zhao Junchen attaches more importance to these Jin merchants, and he must also pay attention to these famous Jin merchants in the Ming and Qing dynasties.

Not only because these businessmen have a large amount of food hoarded in their hands, after Zhao Junchen extinguishes the locust plague, the food shortage for the victims needs to start from these businessmen, but also because Zhao Junchen wants to organize manpower to fight the locust plague in Lu'an Mansion, and he can't do without the nod support of these merchants.

According to the general view of later generations, in ancient China, the merchants of the Song Dynasty were the richest, the most free and the most energetic, for this, Zhao Junchen did not deny, but if you want to talk about status, power and influence, in Zhao Junchen's view, the past dynasties, but also the Ming Dynasty merchants as the head.

How powerful were the merchants of the Ming Dynasty? Not to mention that Zhang Juzheng, Zhang Siwei and others, who are famous in history, became the first assistant of the cabinet with the support of businessmen, nor does it show how many officials in the dynasty were inexplicably dismissed and demoted because they offended businessmen, not to mention the conflict between the famous Donglin Party and Wei Zhongxian in history, which is essentially a conflict between the emperor and the merchants, just a record that Zhao Junchen had seen in his previous life can very well illustrate the power of merchants in this era.

In the Jiajing period, there was a rich businessman named Zou Wang in Wuxi, he set up a feng shui dojo after the death of his old mother, because the pomp was too big, too many people came, and the streets were blocked, and Zou Wang also had the courage, in order to free up the vacant land, with a wave of his hand, the house opposite the Zou Mansion was demolished.

And that house was the old hometown of Gu Shangshu (Note 1), and Gu Shangshu had just returned to Wuxi at that time! That Zou Wangming knew this, but he didn't take Gu Shangshu in his eyes at all!

Then Gu Shangshu was naturally angry, so he asked the yamen to send someone to arrest Zou Wang in prison, but it caused big trouble.

On the day Zou Wang was arrested and put in prison, the merchants in Wuxi City went on strike, and the Wuxi prefect received intimidation one after another, and was forced to release Zou Wang the next day.

However, the matter is far from over, although the merchants have resumed business, but under Zou Wang's arrangement, in Wuxi City, Gu Shangshu's family up and down, whether it is vegetables and fruits, or fish, meat and cloth, or even sewing paper, no matter how big the price is, they can't buy it. And Gu Shangshu's servant maid, as long as he left the Gu Mansion, he would be bullied by the local ruffians. Gu Shangshu intended to find the officials of the government to protect the Gu family, but the officials of the government asked for leave one after another.

In the end, Gu Shangshu's family couldn't survive in Wuxi City, and they were forced to leave helplessly.

A dignified scholar, a second-class member of the Ming Dynasty, couldn't even fight a local rich businessman, this was the situation of the Ming Dynasty at that time.

There are various reasons for this situation, but in the final analysis, it can be summed up in one sentence - "officials can't fight officials, and officials are subject to business"!!

Since the Song Dynasty, there has been a situation in China where "officials have no feudalism, officials have feudalism", officials are sent from abroad, but officials are locals, and officials can only rely on officials to do things. However, the income of the officials is very low, and most of them need to accept the "funding" of the local merchants, so that the local merchants become the bosses of the officials, and the officials become the partners of the local merchants. Because of this, for most of the Ming Dynasty, merchants had the ability to influence local politics.

That Zou Wang is just a local rich businessman in Wuxi, he has such an influence, and in the Ming and Qing dynasties, the famous Jin merchants, not to mention, although the Jin merchants have always been low-key, not as unscrupulous as the Hui merchants and Zhejiang merchants, but they are higher and stronger than the Hui merchants and Zhejiang merchants in terms of power, influence and status, and financial resources.

And in this time and space, although because of Emperor Chongzhen's reforms, the merchant power was suppressed, and the influence was lower than in the history that Zhao Junchen was familiar with, but it still could not be ignored.

Therefore, whether it is to help the victims or extinguish the locust plague, Zhao Junchen thought of them as soon as he was planning.

The invitation to the Jin merchants was not only the first to be sent, but also written by Zhao Junchen himself, which was quite polite.

The Jin merchants also gave Zhao Junchen a lot of face, and Lu'an Mansion was the base camp of the Jin merchants, so most of them came in the fastest time.

Zhao Junchen met with them this time, firstly, to relieve the shortage of food and grass, and secondly, to let them support Zhao Junchen's action to fight the locust plague.

It is difficult to convince those squires and elders to support, because these squires and elders, although they are quite prestigious in the local area, but most of them are landlords, and after the locust plague, the people are displaced, and they will be the biggest beneficiaries, so from a certain point of view, although the locust plague will also cause losses to these squires and elders, they are still happy to see the locust plague happen.

In fact, in the past dynasties, every time after a catastrophe, it was the time when the landlord class was most active in annexing land.

Therefore, Zhao Junchen was ready to persuade the Jin merchants first, and then work with the Jin merchants to put pressure on those squires and elders, so that things would be much easier.

After all, the power of the Jin merchants is deep-rooted, and most of those squires and elders are also attached to them, as long as the Jin merchants and Zhao Junchen work together, those squires and elders will never dare to disobey.

Compared with the elders in those places with a strong sense of land, as the most active thinking of Jin merchants in this era, it is undoubtedly much easier to convince.

……

"Young master, the guests are all here."

Just when Zhao Junchen was secretly thinking about his countermeasures after meeting with Jin Shang, Xu Qingyan entered Zhao Junchen's room and reported softly.

Zhao Junchen nodded, tidied up his clothes, and then walked towards the living room with Xu Qingyan.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Note 1: This story is recorded in the biographies of various Ming Dynasty and opposition history, but Gu Shangshu's name is nowhere to be found, so the insect is simply called Gu Shangshu, please forgive me.

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