Although the new tax plan launched by Hurd was very unpopular, it was secretly cursed by businessmen with shops in various places, and no one dared to scold the government, but it didn't matter if he scolded Hurd, and gradually the nickname of Hurd was called, because Hurd was blown off one of his legs by Zhu Jinglun. Pen, fun, pavilion www. biquge。 info

But they did not rise up against taxes, because the merchants did not have a strict organization, and even if there were some spontaneous guilds, they were mainly used to coordinate the competition between them, not to fight against the government, and they did not have the courage of the landlords and gentry to take up the knife to protect their land, so they could only be suppressed by the landlords and gentry for thousands of years, and they could only be reduced to second-class citizens in this country.

Although Hurd now collects their taxes, he has abolished the old tax system, and the old county officials can report to the officials if they collect taxes at their door. In contrast to the county officials, who extorted bribes far more than the government levied taxes, merchants slowly began to welcome Hurd's tax agency, which they still called Hurd lame, but a more neutral term.

The official representatives of Denmark and Sweden went to Peking, but the nobles who had come to China for tourism stayed, because they figured out that none of the Chinese officials would welcome them, except for Zhu Jinglun, and that they were likely to be in danger when they went to the north.

Zhu Jinglun sent people to protect them throughout the tour in Guangzhou, and even asked his wife Zhang Rou to travel with Alexandra and other noblewomen, playing a hand of lady diplomacy.

It's just that Zhang Rou is a little unhappy to stay with these foreign devils, and she doesn't know how to communicate with them at all, Zhu Jinglun told her that if these people are some poor relatives from afar, they will not be rude to entertain them in this way.

When I think that my husband is now a figure who monopolizes the power of Guangdong, even if I don't want to think about my status after the rebellion, even if I am now a high-ranking official at the Taoist level, then I can't embarrass my husband, grit my teeth, endure the disgust and contempt in my heart, and stay with these foreign women who have no women's morals at all, and I don't know the shame of men, stay with them all day long, take them to visit the temples in Guangzhou, the huge school palace, let them see the flower boats with Guangzhou characteristics, and invite them to eat all kinds of Guangdong food, I didn't expect those foreign ladies to dislike Chinese food, but they were very interested in Chinese handmade products in the shops, and they purchased all kinds of hand-woven silk fabrics, embroidered silk embroidery, and even homespun cloth They liked it very much.

Zhu Jinglun also asked Zhang Rou to come forward and told Alexandra that he would send a tea garden to her, so Zhang Rou deliberately went to Heshan and met Zhu Jinglun's concubine who had not yet passed the door, Gao Yuan, the sister of the third year of high school. This girl is only fourteen years old this year, Zhu Jinglun also thinks she is young, and she has not yet opened, so she is a little entangled in her heart, and then the overall situation has been decided, and she is not in a hurry to win over the strength of the Hakka family, so she is a high-ranking official who has just died, and her sister is unlucky to marry, so she is very filial piety to her brother, and the Hakka leader Zhang Baoming is very unhappy, and finally bargains, no need to keep it for three years, just keep it for two years, and Zhu Jinglun will have to marry this concubine next year.

For Gao Yuan, a little girl, Zhang Rou has a sense of crisis, because she feels that Gao Yuan is much younger than her, and she will definitely be left out in the cold in the future, after arriving at the Gao family, Zhang Rou did not give this future sister a good face, but Gao Yuan screamed as a sister, as well as the widow of Gao Guanxian, her smart sister-in-law helped on the side, and finally Zhang Rou left them a little thin face.

He came to the Gao family because the Gao family was a local wealthy family, and the high-ranking officials and immortals were able to organize the village warriors when they were angry, and the money must be indispensable, and his family had more than 500 acres of tea plantations, and later sold his property, but he only sold the shops and houses everywhere, and the land was not sold at all.

Zhu Jinglun asked Zhang Rou to discuss with the Zhang family if she could give up a hundred acres of her family's tea garden, and the widow of the high-ranking official said yes.

In the past few days, Zhang Rou took Alexandra to wander around the tea garden, asking her to choose the tea garden she liked and then assign it to her.

After the Swedes in the arsenal left thirty, plus the thousands of Chinese skilled workers that had been trained, the factory did not fall into chaos, but after a short period of adjustment, it was quickly on the right track, and immediately decided to expand the scale again, machinery and equipment to be purchased, but people to be trained.

The adventurous spirit of the Europeans is precious, and the hardships and hard work of the Chinese are equally valuable, and stimulated by the good salaries and a better future, the Chinese apprentices in the arsenal burst out with an amazing enthusiasm for learning, they follow the oral teaching of the master during the day, and at night in the night school to supplement the knowledge of natural science, in three years, from the initial simple mathematical operations, to even the basic metallurgical and mechanical knowledge.

I dare not say that all the apprentices are proficient in this knowledge, but there are always some differences between people, there are still some geniuses among more than a thousand people, at least a dozen demons, who can already discuss mechanical principles and designs with Swedish masters, but most of them are just decent skilled workers.

In addition to those demons, the middle backbone may be the most scarce at present, the so-called backbone, that is, they have been technically impeccable, and the knowledge they have mastered can allow them to take apprentices, at present, the Swedes have identified that the number of Chinese who can take apprentices is only more than 100 people, so that they have no one to take ten apprentices, oral teaching, and Zhu Jinglun's arsenal can be doubled in a few years.

Everything went on in an orderly manner, and it seemed that this year would go on so smoothly, but God did not fulfill people's wishes, no matter how gradual the reform, it would still touch the interests of vested interests, some of whom did not dare to resist, such as merchants, but some of whom had vested interests were easily opposed, such as the squires, landlords, and officials.

It was the county officials who were the first to make trouble.

In August 1862, the county officials of Guangzhou, who had completely lost the right to collect taxes, suddenly colluded with each other and stormed the yamen of the Guangdong Customs, almost killing Hurd, who jumped off the back wall and escaped under the protection of several soldiers, but one soldier was killed, and more than a dozen were injured in various ways.

This kind of serious case made Zhu Jinglun extremely angry.

Directly in the Guangzhou Prefecture martial law, the four gates were closed for ten days, 20,000 troops searched in the city, arrested every county official in the government who participated in the troublemaking and did not participate in the trouble, and then concentrated on interrogation, distinguish the good from the bad, and finally punish these people for the crime of assassinating the court officials.

On the court, Zhu Jinglun pulled out the two mud bodhisattvas of Baigui and Mukdenne, in fact, they were in the trial, and there was nothing to trio, the criminal master of Guangzhou Mansion turned out the article and directly announced the crime, these county officials also confessed, but they did not admit that they assassinated the court officials, they did not admit that Hurd was the court official of the Qing Dynasty, and said with disdain that Hurd knew a Yi person, and something inferior to a beast.

At this time, it was Hurd who came forward to intercede for them, Hurd was really a China expert, and he also learned this kind of thing with a white face and a red face, Zhu Jinglun sang white-faced Liwei, and he sang red-faced grace.

In the end, the murderer who killed with a knife was sentenced to be hanged, and the dozen or so old county officials in Guangzhou City, who had instigated the county officials to make trouble, were put on display, and the rest of the county officials were to serve a month of hard labor.

The problem was dealt with, but the contradiction was not resolved, it was only temporarily suppressed.

Zhu Jinglun ignored the problem of the resistance of those with vested interests, and he thought that he did not infringe on the interests of these people too much, but many poor county officials reached the point where they could not survive, and although they did not extort money in the past, the salary they gave them by the government was simply not enough to support their families, and the fundamental motive for extortion was that they could not live without extortion, and they had no choice.

Zhu Jinglun is not afraid of exposing problems, exposing problems, solving problems, the society is moving forward in this kind of cycle, and discussed with Hurd, the county officials who used to collect taxes in Guangzhou City were all merged into the management of the Taxation Department, and Hurd was responsible for training them, so that they could reach the level of employees of the Taxation Department, and they could not be improved, so they were arranged for a low-level position, anyway, the low-level position in the Taxation Department also had 60 taels of silver every year, an average of 5 taels a month, which was enough to feed a family.

These people are not useless, they have been collecting taxes for a long time, although they have the vice of extortion, but they still have relevant mathematical knowledge, and some are even ancestral crafts, passed down from generation to generation, from generation to generation as tax collectors, and if they are well trained, they are also a rare talent.

Guangzhou City is the largest commercial port, and it is normal for the contradictions here to break out first, but the incident here has sounded the alarm for Zhu Jinglun, I am afraid that the county officials in other counties have long been dissatisfied, and it is only a matter of time before they break out, let Hurd formulate a detailed plan, and all the tax officials in various places will be managed by him, and they will be trained, and the reform will cost and damage the interests of some people, which can be understood, but at least let those who have lost their interests live.

Almost killed, Hurd also had a long memory, and did not dare to continue to put pressure on the old officials on this issue, so he immediately implemented it at various ports, formulated detailed regulations, and let the areas that have implemented the new tax policy be implemented as agreed, covering the entire Guangdong Province except for Nanshao Liandao.

In fact, the county officials are not making trouble, Zhu Jinglun is really worried about the land problem, the land in the countryside is the dead end, that can really cause tens of thousands of ordinary people to revolt, but in the case of exempting the fourteen counties from two taxes next year, the local government has been calm, the squires are happy to be exempt from taxes, and the slogan of not paying grain when the king comes can make the people in the late Ming Dynasty look forward to the king, in fact, it is not how heavy the official taxes are, but that there are too many taxes and miscellaneous taxes.

For example, the government stipulates that Nanhai County has 40,000 taels of silver per year, but the local officials actually collect as much as 150,000 taels of silver, and the overcharged part will be divided between the Nanhai County and the Guangzhou Governor.

But Zhu Jinglun exempted the tax with one rod, they did not have to pay grain and taxes to the government, and the county officials had no excuse to ask them for this year's bad rules (harsh taxes and miscellaneous taxes, etc.), and it was not only the little bit of land and silver that was exempted, but also those invisible bad rules, so the attraction of not paying grain was so great.

But the vast number of county officials who originally had to rely on these bad rules to live couldn't survive, so they naturally had to rise up and make trouble, judging from their last actions, he really planned to kill Hurd.

Therefore, Zhu Jinglun has to think of a way to relieve this pressure, then he can only let Hurd's customs accommodate these people and give the lowest tax collectors a bite to eat, as for those officials who are dissatisfied with this, then they can only continue to wronged them, anyway, they will not starve to death.

I thought that after the county officials problem was dealt with, there would no longer be too much contradiction for the time being, but the land problem that Zhu Jinglun was most worried about still broke out, at the end of September, the Kowloon landlords and squires were entangled with tens of thousands of young people, and destroyed hundreds of warehouses built in Kowloon by Jardine Matheson and Qichang Foreign Banks at one time.

These oceanic companies had great energy, they encouraged the British troops in Hong Kong to march into Kowloon City, and fierce clashes broke out with the local villagers.

Zhu Jinglun was extremely concerned about this, because the land conflict finally broke out, and the Kowloon Peninsula was not a colony of the British, but according to the declaration signed by Chen Zhiting and the British Parliament, the British were allowed to do business, buy land and live here, and it was actually equivalent to a port.

At first, the local squires agreed, and they also agreed not to sell land to the British, but the interests were the most difficult thing to balance, although most of the squires kept the agreement, but there were still people who were moved by the price paid by the foreigners, and sold some of their own not very good sandy land to the foreigners, and the foreigners built docks, houses, and even ports here.

Foreigners are a lot of people, mixed habits, this kind of problem will break out, positive look at the foreigners here to build docks, warehouses, hire a lot of locals, is to create jobs, but as long as people get along with people, there will inevitably be problems, such as salary contradictions, quarrels, mutual discrimination, negative and those who are dissatisfied with others selling land privately, and they do not sell land and discriminate against others, you sell more, I sell less, feel that you are at a loss, and there are contradictions between locals and locals, Some of the villages that had made their fortune from selling their land were collectively ostracized by other villages, and the gentry held meetings with each other to demand that they take back their land.

In short, all kinds of contradictions, when they finally converge into one point, turn into a blind xenophobic mood, as if as long as the foreigners are driven away, everything will return to the previous harmonious and happy time.

In particular, it was the villages around Tsim Sha Tsui that sold the land, not the five major families of Kam Tin Tang, San Tin Wen, Sheung Shui Liao, Sheung Shui Hou, and Fanling Peng, but some poor Hakka families who later emigrated in this generation, and the deed they sold their land was not a red deed written on official deed paper, but a lease contract written privately, in other words, these Hakka people were tenants, and they sold the landlord's land, but what they sold was not the property right of the land, but the right to use it in their hands, which was indefinite and belonged to the perpetual lease right.

The problem is extremely complicated, involving contradictions between land property rights and use rights, contradictions in the uneven distribution of interests, contradictions between Chinese and foreigners, and even contradictions between local guests.

Zhu Jinglun's response was to send 3,000 elite soldiers at the first time, order them to stabilize the situation first, separate the British army from Xiang Yong, and then he himself immediately rushed to Kowloon by boat, and at the same time asked someone to bring a letter to the Governor of Hong Kong, Robinson. (To be continued.) )