"Jiannu suffered such a big loss the year before last, will he still come?" Although Zhu Youzhen didn't want to believe it, he couldn't help but get nervous when he thought of the Qing army's raids every two years in the past ten years.

"Jiannu does not produce, although they have plundered a lot of Han people over the years, but they still can't meet their consumption, especially Huang Taiji and Dolgon and others are ambitious, constantly expanding their armies, Mongolia and Korea are so poor that they are clanging, and the only thing that can be harvested is Daming. But now that Lord Lu is in Liaodong, the minister has arrived in Datong, and as long as Jiannu dares to come in winter, the minister will keep him and there will be no return. There is Lord Hong in Xuanfu, and now the weakness of the border town is in Jizhen, and the emperor and the court are asked to pay attention to it, and the defense adjustment must be completed in the summer. ”

"What Aiqing said is very true, now that there are signs of a resurgence of thieves in Henan, Sun Chuanting can't move, otherwise there are Jiandou, Hengjiu and others in my Daming border town from east to west, and you must be in Datong to be Gutuo Jintang. Ay...... Or are you right, you have to reduce the burden on the peasants, otherwise there will always be thieves in Henan who will follow. ”

"What does the emperor mean?" Seeing that Zhu Youzhen's face was not good and he mentioned the peasant uprising like cowhide fresh, Yang Hongzhang also put away his smile and asked carefully.

"It's a pity that I only have one Yang Hongzhang, hey, when you put the Datong border defense in order, go to Jiangnan for me, go to Jiangnan to collect taxes, and the imperial court can exempt the peasants in Henan, Shaanxi and other places from taxes if they have money, and then I will see who is willing to rebel with the thieves."

"Your Majesty, in fact, the minister has long said that the best way to solve the emptiness of the imperial treasury is to develop the water division, and the minister will go to the commander of the Yangtze River water division to ensure overseas trade, and the tax is not enough for the minister to snatch it back. If Jiannu dares to go south, he will take people to Shengjing. In this way, Liaodong's military salary can also be reduced, and there will be no worries about running out of money at that time. It is only natural to reduce the tax burden on the peasants. ”

"The prospects are good, but we have to solve the problems in front of us. Besides, it is not my fault to go overseas to rob overseas. ”

"Your Majesty, you are still imprisoned by Confucianism, since ancient times, which great king has not been a scholar and martial artist, it is better to go overseas to rob other countries than to be robbed, it is better than to keep robbing your own people. Isn't the tax burden of the imperial court robbing the peasants now? ”

"Say it again, say it again. When the time comes, I will not care about you. ”

The two chatted for a while, and Zhu Youzhen kept Yang Hongzhang and had lunch together before letting him leave.

Then Yang Hongzhang began the journey of debt collection in the ministries, he first came to the household department, although Ni Yuanlu had a good impression of her, he was also a member of the household department, but let Yang Hongzhang say that he broke his mouth, he only gave 100,000 taels of military salary and 20,000 stone of grain, less than half of Yang Hongzhang's requirements, and did not mention the purchase of silver taels with insufficient weapons, so angry that Yang Hongzhang turned his feet and scolded.

In the end, Ni Yuanlu could only pull Yang Hongzhang to no one before saying: "Shi Lin, it's not that the old man doesn't give you money and food, don't you know that since the retreat of Jiannu, Datong, Xuanfu, Baoding, and Jizhen have to re-recruit troops, and all the weapons must be equipped, although you got a lot of silver for the imperial court during that time in the capital, but there are many places to spend money, and then there was a plague, and it was finally easy to clean, and it was a big drought, and Zhili plus Shanxi, Henan, and Shandong had to provide disaster relief everywhere......"

"You have all the waste in the royal suit, now do you see that I am a bully, I am short of catties and taels, you must know that the Mongols are still in Datong, how can I go to war if you don't give me enough military salaries and grain and grass?"

"At most, at most, I'll give you a little more salt to attract ......" Ni Yuanlu didn't expect Yang Hongzhang to be so popular, but then he also understood that in fact, each of these frontier generals was like this, but he was too familiar with Yang Hongzhang to ignore this, and he knew that he should let the squire deal with this evil star.

"How much salt?" Yang Hongzhang did not back down at all, and when he saw that there was a ready-made salt on Ni Yuanlu's workstation, his eyes suddenly lit up.

"I'll see, you sit down first, sit down first."

"Lord Ni, I want the rest of the salt, and I told the emperor, if the military salary is not enough, I will go to Datong to mine by myself, and then you don't keep staring at me." Yang Hongzhang took advantage of Ni Yuanlu's unpreparedness to directly grab the salt and said with a sly smile.

"As long as the emperor agrees, the old man will naturally not have much to do, but where Datong is entangled in interests is very complicated, you have to be careful."

Looking at Yang Hongzhang's back in the distance, Ni Yuanlu sighed in his heart, it is also that the imperial court is too poor, if there are enough silver taels, it is very likely that this young general will recruit troops and horses to fight with the Qing army and win, and from then on, I am afraid that the Ming Dynasty will be as safe as Mount Tai for decades.

Leaving the household department, Yang Hongzhang's second target is the military department, and the military department still receives him by his acquaintance Chen Xinjia, but Chen Xinjia is as his name, just like the old turtle, there is only so much in the treasury, if you want to take it, you don't have to wait. Yang Hongzhang asked, how much less? Chen Xinjia stretched out three fingers, and Yang Hongzhang immediately shouted that it was not good, because it was impossible for this old man to give him 30,000, that is, at most, 3,000, or those broken copper and iron eliminated from the Beijing camp. Yang Hongzhang looked at Chen Xinjia's rogue look, and knew that it was impossible to use the method of dealing with Ni Yuanlu again, so he came to Chen Xinjia's workstation and wrote an IOU and asked Chen Xinjia to sign and pledge. Chen Xinjia was also dumbfounded when he saw the IOU, in the past, the arrears of weapons often happened, and he was the first one to force the soldier to write an IOU like today.

However, looking at Yang Hongzhang's angry look, and then remembering the scene when Yang Hongzhang roared in the past few days but played a round for him with a smile, Chen Xinjia smiled miserably, and finally signed with his eyes closed.

This is not over, Yang Hongzhang kept the IOU and changed his expression with a grin: "Lord Chen, I also know that no matter how difficult you are, you can't estimate how much, so the craftsmen of the Firearms Bureau borrowed a few of me to accompany the army, and when I got to Datong, there was iron ore and coal, and I made it myself." ”

Chen Xinjia hesitated for a moment and asked, "How many people?" ”

"Fifty." Yang Hongzhang said tentatively.

This time it was Chen Xinjia's turn to jump up: "Yang Hongzhang, do you want to move the Firearms Bureau to Datong?" ”

Yang Hongzhang shrugged his shoulders and said with a smile: "Lord Chen, in fact, I want to do this too, but it is estimated that the emperor will not agree." Don't look at the Firearms Bureau, so many people in the capital can't actually make anything good every year. If I move to Datong, I guarantee that within three years, the soldiers of Datong Town, Xuanfu, Jizhen and Jingying will all be replaced with new equipment. ”

"Up to 10 people!" Seeing that Yang Hongzhang was grinning and nagging, Chen Xinjia bit and said.

"Forty, it's useless if it's less."

"Twelve."

"Thirty-five."

"Fifteen, no more."

"Thirty, if I don't go out, I'll go out and let Jean say that the military department owes us new army weapons."

"Twenty!" Chen Xinjia waited for a pair of red old eyes, and seemed to have reached the bottom line.

"Deal, thank you, Lord Chen, you write an appointment, and I'll pick the person myself."

"Humph!" Chen Xinjia's face was decadent, obviously because he was not happy because he did not resist Yang Hongzhang's pressure.

"Lord Chen, if you want to think so, I will take someone to Datong to fight in the future, I will give you whatever you want in Jingying, don't you think that guy from Fang Zhenghua will hack me dozens of artillery? If this is made by the craftsmen of the Firearms Bureau, will it be made? Even if it doesn't take three or five years to build, I'm afraid it won't work. Put it in my hands for a while, don't worry, I guarantee that they will all be able to make artillery, and you will not be able to do it when the time comes. ”

Chen Xinjia wrote the order and turned his body on his back, never wanting to deal with Yang Hongzhang again.

Yang Hongzhang shrugged his shoulders and said goodbye, Lord Chen, and headed for the next goal.

Running the Admiral's Mansion, Fang Zhenghua greeted the distinguished guests with a smile, but when Yang Hongzhang explained that he came to Yilian, he immediately collapsed, yes, the emperor issued an order to let Jingyingyun come out with some weapons, but Fang Zhenghua usually takes these broken copper and iron to replace them with the military department, if Yang Hongzhang moves away, what if he will replace it in the future.

"Lord Fang, the civil and military forces of the Manchu Dynasty are the most angry to you, and the remaining copper and iron in your Beijing camp refuse to give me this one who is about to go to the front line to fight. You know, I never wanted to come back with those dozens of guns. Think about it, if we are defeated in Datong and let the Mongols break through the Juyong Pass, won't you, the commander of the Beijing camp, be worried again? Would you rather let them rust in the treasury than let my men take them to the Mongol Tartars? In this way, I don't want it either, you give me back those cannons, even if the shells are given to you, okay? ”

"You ......" Founder turns into a gas knot.

"What are you, the emperor made it clear at the beginning, I am because I have no right to command the army for the time being, and the army and weapons are temporarily stored in the Beijing camp, and when I went to Tianjin, I accepted your great favor, but I didn't take a single artillery with me. So be it, I'll take half of it. ”

Fang Zhenghua glanced at the corner of his mouth, and asked with a long sigh of relief, "How many weapons do you still lack?" ”

"We have 3,000 ourselves, and the Ministry of War has given 3,000, and we are still 6,000."

"What?" Hearing this, Fang Zhenghua jumped up again, "Two thousand at most, one more." ”

"Lord Fang, do you really want to see me Yang Hongzhang being chased around by the Mongols, and finally running back to the capital? I said six thousand, that's not counting the auxiliary barracks, I'm already very kind. ”

"Then our family doesn't care, you go and ask the emperor to ask for it, ask the military department to ask for it, our family can't take care of it."

"Lord Fang, in fact, if I can gain a firm foothold in Datong, maybe I can still attract Jiannu, if Jiannu goes south from Datong this winter, you give me weapons, I defeat Jiannu for you, Jiannu will not have a chance to come to Gyeonggi to make trouble, isn't this a win-win situation? Take a long-term view. Besides, you stay at the feet of the Son of Heaven, you said that your subordinates have no weapons, and those old men in the military department and the household department are not more anxious than you, why do you want to hide it. ”

"You ......"

"The extra one, even if I asked you to borrow it, I will return it to you with a cannon in half a year, how about it?"

"What did you say?" Fang Zhenghua hesitated.

"Don't worry, Lord Fang, I dare to force Lord Ni to dare not see people and dare not offend you. That's it, I've borrowed craftsmen from the military department, and I'm sure I'll be able to make artillery soon with my training. At that time, except for Lord Fang, no one will want to get artillery. ”