After resting at home for three days, Chen Lifu set off for Texas to start a new round of patrol career.

At the same time, the five-year examination of Xuanping of the Tang Dynasty was also held, and this time, the examination was postponed for two months compared with previous years, but it did not cause opposition from the scholars, but won the favor of a large number of scholars.

Because the time is relatively relaxed, so that many scholars in remote places can also rush and participate in the imperial examination, and in addition, the Tang Dynasty newspaper also revealed the rumors, this time the scale of admission of scholars will exceed previous years.

Although it is not known how much more it will be, it is a foregone conclusion that it will definitely be more than in previous years.

Increasing the number of admissions is Li Xuan's decision, in fact, in the past few years, the number of admissions to the Tang Dynasty's entrance examination has been increasing, from more than 100 people in the past to more than 200, and then to more than 500.

And this year's number of admissions, Li Xuan is ready to directly increase to more than 1,000 people, and 500 people will be admitted to the Jinshi Department and the Doctoral Department!

Don't worry that so many officials can't be arranged, now that the Tang Dynasty has newly occupied large areas such as Jiangnan and Zhejiang, and various directly subordinate institutions are gradually improving, the demand for officials is very large.

Don't worry about not having enough scholars to participate in the imperial examination, last year the Tang Dynasty had not occupied Jiangnan, and there were two or three thousand scholars who participated in the imperial examination, and this time, the Ministry of Rites estimated that the number of scholars participating in the imperial examination would probably reach more than 5,000.

A small number of them are scholars from Hunan and Jiangxi, and although there were scholars from these two regions who came to participate in the imperial examination last year, there were still not many of them who came to participate, and this year, it is not surprising that a large number of scholars will come to participate in the examination.

However, there is still a large part of the newly added scholars, which are the scholars in the Jiangnan area, which is originally a place with a strong literary style, and there are many scholars, even if there are only a few people who come to participate in the imperial examination, but the total amount is still very large.

The opening of the imperial examination has always been a weapon used by the Tang Dynasty to appease and recruit the gentry class.

On 20 April, the general examination officially began, and more than 5,300 people had signed up in advance, and interestingly, more than 3,000 of them had applied for the doctoral examination.

For the first time, the number of students applying for the doctoral program exceeded that of the Jinshi department.

This is because after the new department officials of the Jinshi Department and the Doctoral Department are in the middle test, although they are the same in grade, the Doctoral Department has more advantages when selecting officials, and can enter the Ministry of Taxation, the Ministry of Industry and other real power departments to hold real power positions, and in the follow-up promotion, the Tang Dynasty also prefers to promote the students of the doctoral department.

It has been so many years since the establishment of the Tang Dynasty, and such unspoken rules have only gradually appeared in the officialdom, and they are well known to outsiders.

Jinshike, which was the most popular in the Ming Dynasty, was gradually reduced to the second rate in the Tang Dynasty.

After the scholars entered the examination room one after another, it was to start the examination for three consecutive days, and the questions of the examination were more than before, and they were more comprehensive.

At present, the admission rules of the imperial examination of the Tang Dynasty are basically that the eight-share article is just a stepping stone, and if it is not written well, it will definitely not be successful, but the eight-share article basically does not have any difficulty for these people, and the examiners' selection standards for the eight-share article are also relatively low.

Taking Jinshi as an example, 2,000 scholars who apply for Jinshi do not dare to say 100%, but 80% can pass the most basic eight-share article, but how to choose it in the follow-up, the focus naturally falls on policy theory and science.

Then in the science stage and the primary selection stage of the policy theory, directly brush off half of the science topics, the science topics of the Jinshi Department are relatively basic topics, even if they are not specialized in research, but as long as they memorize the science books published by the Tang Royal Publishing House, they can basically pass the exam, but all the candidates who do not do well in the science examination are basically students who do not pay attention to it, or who are excluded from the imperial examination policy of the Tang Dynasty, what is the use of such people!

The policy theory is also, whether the policy is written well or not, it is not only a test of the candidate's article skills, but also a test of the candidate's ability to see and hear and deal with affairs.

And the remaining about seven or eight hundred people how to select the last five hundred jinshi, the answer is very simple, naturally based on comprehensive scoring, each candidate's three test papers, eight articles papers, science papers, policy papers, the examiner will score individually, and then add the three to the total score.

However, the proportion of policy scores in Jinske is relatively large, accounting for half of the total score, science accounts for 30 percent, and liberal arts accounts for 20 percent.

The admission process of the doctoral program is also roughly the same, but their core subject is science, although the eight-strand essay is also examined, but the topic is very simple, as long as it is not really unsightly eight-strand essay, then it can basically be selected.

In the total admission stage, the score of science directly accounts for half of the total score, the policy account for 30%, and the liberal arts only occupy 20%.

When it comes to the palace examination stage, whether it is the Jinshi or the doctoral department, only one subject is examined.

After all, these people are all going to be officials, science and liberal arts are just the embodiment of their basic knowledge, and the assessment of whether they can become officials is actually based on strategy.

After such screening, the Tang Dynasty directly admitted 1,000 candidates in the imperial examination in the five years of Xuanping, and 500 people each in the Jinshi Department and the Doctoral Department.

After admission, in addition to the first class and the top three in the second class, a total of twelve people will be directly awarded the official status of the seventh grade, and then enter the Hanlin Academy.

For others, after the fourth place in the second class and the third class, they are awarded the rank of seventh-rank official, and these people also need to go through a three-month internship in various cabinet ministries and other institutions before participating in the election of officials, and finally they will be awarded official positions.

The selection of officials is presided over by the Department of Literature and Selection, taking into account the performance of these new officials during the internship, and at the same time, according to the independent wishes of the candidates, and then distributed, a very small number of the best will be assigned to the Hanlin Academy, and the outstanding ones will stay in various departments of the Beijing Division, and the general is sent to the provincial, government, and state subordinate institutions to serve.

It is worth noting that from the very beginning, the Tang Dynasty did not have the practice of throwing new officials directly to the ruling party of a certain place.

And this point is also the difference between the Tang Dynasty and the previous dynasties and generations of the election system, the Tang Dynasty clearly stipulates that new officials are not allowed to dominate the party.

This is naturally to prevent these new officials, after being admitted to the Jinshi and doctoral examinations, and throwing down their books to become a county magistrate, that is a county parent official, let a novice officialdom be a pit people!

However, if it is a person with outstanding ability, these new officials will soon be able to govern the party, and now their grade is from the seventh grade, if they do a good job and are promoted, they are the seventh grade, that is the grade of the county order, and if the ability is excellent, they will be sent to a county to serve as a county commander for training.

However, there are relatively few such people.

After all, in the official system of the Tang Dynasty, the three levels of county orders, governors, and prefects, are all full of power, and can directly affect the livelihood of tens of thousands or even hundreds of thousands of people under their rule, so officials who can serve as a landlord, even if it is a county order, are the most outstanding group of Zhengqipin officials.

At the same time, these local officials are also promoted very quickly, and if they do a good job, it won't take long for the county order to become a prefect, and then become a prefect again.

Rapid promotion across levels is a huge advantage for local officials, of course, the premise is to do a good job, and if you don't do a good job, you will get out of the way in minutes!

As the saying goes, with great power comes great responsibility!

After the April imperial examination is over, the time is also in May!

At the beginning of May, the wharf outside Jinling City also ushered in a huge fleet!

This huge fleet is a fleet directly under the Yangtze River Fleet, with 12 armed merchant ships under its jurisdiction, and all of them are sand ships suitable for inland navigation, ranging in tonnage from 200 tons to more than 300 tons.

In the first half of this year, the Datang Navy carried out reform and division, formally determined that the First Fleet and the Second Fleet were ocean-going fleets, and that they did not retain traditional Chinese-style armed merchant ships with weak combat capabilities and insufficient long-sea navigation capabilities, but only retained brand-new professional warships, and also retained a number of armed merchant ships converted from Western-style soft-sail sea ships, but these armed merchant ships were actually remodeled on a large scale, and their firepower was much stronger than that of traditional armed merchant ships.

As a result, the First Fleet and the Second Fleet have been greatly downsized, and the redundant sub-fleets have been withdrawn, and only three sub-fleets have been retained, and at present the First Fleet has only four cruisers and eight frigates, which belong to the First and Second Fleets respectively.

The Second Fleet consisted of only one cruiser and four frigates, and was composed of the Third Fleet and the Fourth Fleet.

Among the many armed merchant ships converted from traditional Chinese-style merchant ships, some of the Fu ships began to be handed over to the Navy's logistics department, and some of the armed merchant ships such as Guangzhou ships and sand ships that were suitable for inland and offshore navigation, and at the same time had weak firepower, were handed over to the Pearl River Fleet, the Yangtze River Fleet, and the newly established Minjiang Fleet for use as inland river and offshore combat vessels.

The Yangtze River Fleet, on the other hand, received a full 26 armed merchant ships in one fell swoop and formed a fleet directly under the Yangtze River Fleet, second only to the Pearl River Fleet in number.

A few days ago, this part of the warships of the fleet directly under the Yangtze River Fleet, taking advantage of the heavy rain and night, ventured through Yangzhou, and on the way there was a big battle with the Ming army sailors, and two ships were destroyed, which rushed to Jinling City with scars.

Although the losses were not small, this move allowed the Tang Dynasty to have a considerable combat force in the Yangtze River valley west of Yangzhou and east of Hukou.

And this is very beneficial to the follow-up operations of the Tang Dynasty!

At least with this directly subordinate fleet, the Ming army sailors will not be able to operate unscrupulously in this section of the Yangtze River!

At the same time, if the Datang Army wants to launch a river-crossing operation in the future, this fleet can also play a huge role!