Tang Shiji's attack on the Kang clan soon spread back to the capital, and the Kang clan's relatives soon found good friends with the gentry and in-laws for help, especially Jiang Xuan and Jiang Xuan's brothers.

The coinage bill issued by the imperial court, to be honest, except for the Shanxi Bank and some merchants who followed the imperial court to do business on the grassland, other Shanxi merchants actually did not take any advantage.

In particular, the merchants who did the business of pawn shops and money houses, as well as the generals and gentry families who made a fortune by relying on the border army. They were asked to turn over most of their deposits to the bank, not to mention whether the paper money they had exchanged would be exchanged for the gold and silver they had handed over, and the mere explanation of the origin of the gold and silver already made them feel uneasy.

For example, the two brothers Jiang Xuan and Jiang Xuan, in addition to being the general soldiers of Yanghe and Datong, are also local big landlords. To some extent, the generals of these border armies have become essentially representatives of the local gentry, and it is difficult to classify them as representatives of the army.

The reason for this situation has to start with the Longqing Peace Conference. Gao Gong and Zhang Juzheng reached a tribute and mutual market with Altan Khan. The Ming Dynasty named Altan the king of Shunyi and opened 11 border trade ports, while Altan Khan submitted to the Ming Dynasty, ending nearly 200 years of hostility between Ming and Mongolia in one fell swoop.

As a result, the northern part of Shanxi, which had been directly facing the Mongol invasion, suddenly became a trade frontier with the Mongols.

In the past, when the war between the two sides was not extinguished, the line from Datong to the Great Wall was the front line of the war that needed to be abandoned at any time, and naturally there were not many border people living and developing fields here.

However, after the Longqing Peace Conference, these combat areas, which originally had little development value, became the most valuable pioneer areas in northern Shanxi. Of course, this land was theoretically supposed to belong to the army, but with the operation of the gentry, the land here was soon turned into civilian land.

In this silent process of changing landowners, the generals in the army naturally benefited a lot. And compared with the local gentry, the generals in these armies also had the advantage that they did not have to recruit the vagrants at all, and the sergeants in their hands were the best labor.

The soldiers of the border army who use the state's income to support not only have their own income deducted by these officials, but also basically work for the officials without compensation. This is why, less than 40 years after the Longqing Peace Conference, the Shanxi border army was completely unable to fight.

Compared with the Shaanxi border army, which had to deal with the southward movement of the Mongol tribes, the soldiers in the Shanxi border army basically did not know how to fight, and they had become Tian Shehan who could only farm. I am afraid that this situation was also unforeseen by the court officials who advocated peace with the Mongolian people back then.

It is precisely because the northern part of Shanxi is different from other regions of the Ming Dynasty that the army occupied it first, and then the gentry set foot here. Therefore, the relationship between the local gentry and the generals in the army was basically interdependent, and it was not like the rest of the interior, where the two sides were in opposition to each other because of land disputes.

It is precisely because of this particularity that after the Kang clan was taken down, it immediately caused many Shanxi gentry to attack Tang Shiji, and Jiang Xuan and Jiang Hao The two brothers even went on several self-defenses in a row, counting their own generations of exploits in guarding the frontier for the Ming Dynasty.

As for the boss of the Jiang family, who is the general soldier of Yulin, he is far away from Shanxi, and it is inconvenient to communicate with each other on the news; secondly, the place where he is located is not the same province as Kang's, so it is not good to make remarks on the affairs of neighboring provinces; The third is that he himself is already old and frail, and he is almost at the age of retirement, so he simply does not report on this matter, and he is completely ignorant of it.

However, even if he didn't say anything, the two Jiang brothers and those Shanxi gentry who were unhappy with the Kang clan had already caused a fierce debate among the cabinet ministers.

For example, Li Banghua was very dissatisfied with Tang Shiji's behavior, thinking that he was chasing after the wind and shadows, and he was dizzy, and in order to be able to make political achievements, he even disregarded the dignity of the imperial court. This kind of slander is a thief, and the method of dealing with the Kang clan can be distinguished by a person with a little sense.

If the imperial court affirms Tang Shiji's approach, it will only make the villains below who flatter and invite merit to follow suit, and wantonly button their hats to the gentry and good people, thus causing chaos in the world, which can be described as infinitely poisonous.

Qian Qianyi also did not approve of Tang Shiji's behavior, not to mention that this was still Wen Tiren's cronies, so he chose to support Li Banghua's opinion in the cabinet meeting, trying to correct the unjust case made by Tang Shiji in order to appease the Shanxi gentry.

Wen Tiren naturally refused to let them overturn the case, and after trying to no avail, he asked to report it to the emperor, and the emperor made the final ruling.

Qian Qianyi is not a strong person after all, and he did not dare to make any arbitrary decisions about this big case with great impact, so he agreed with Wen Tiren's proposal to report the case.

After receiving the report sent by the cabinet, Zhu Youzhen summoned Qian Qianyi and Wen Tiren, and the other cabinet members were not summoned together.

When Qian Qianyi and Wen Tiren came to Xiyuan, they found that in addition to them, Xia Yunyi, who had not been back in Beijing for a long time, was also in the emperor's living room.

Looking at the somewhat surprised eyes of the two ministers, Zhu Youzhen casually explained, "... As we entered May, reports of drought and disaster relief from all over the country flew to the capital like snowflakes.

Although Xia Qing had a special office in Wuying Hall to sort out these reports for me, it was still far away from Xiyuan, and he couldn't communicate the situation to me at any time.

So I had three rooms downstairs arranged, one for him, one for the cabinet, and one for the army. Starting tomorrow, the affairs of drought relief and disaster relief will be handled in one place in Xiyuan, and the cabinet and the army will each send officers on duty for liaison and official purposes. ”

Qian Qianyi and Wen Tiren's eyelids jumped, so that the Drought Relief Committee would not be above the cabinet, and the cabinet would become an errand agency for the committee.

However, in the face of the increasingly severe drought in various places, the two finally suppressed their hearts and wanted to persuade and oppose them, and prepared to come over this year after the New Year, and then slowly persuade the emperor to cancel this temporary institution with too much power.

Seeing that the two did not express their objections, Zhu Youzhen turned the topic back to the topic and said: "I have already read the opinions of Tang Shiji on handling the Kang case reported by the cabinet yesterday afternoon.

I don't think there's anything to talk about about this fact. It doesn't matter whether Tang Shiji has a problem with dealing with Kang's family, the important thing is that now there are disaster victims dying in various places every day, and the cabinet doesn't want to raise materials as much as possible to save more victims, but instead argues for more than a day whether a businessman has been wronged, is the cabinet really so idle?

Compared with whether the Kang family reported to you has any grievances, I am more concerned about where is the first batch of grain shipped from overseas? How exactly did the Disaster Relief Committee and the Food Bureau manage and distribute this batch of food..."

After listening to the emperor's accusations, Qian Qianyi had to defend the cabinet head-on: "Back to Your Majesty, the ministers and others also disturbed the place because of this case, and many Shanxi gentry wrote to the court to cry out for the Kang family. The ministers were worried that because this case had chilled the hearts of the local gentry and large families, they would not be willing to cooperate with the imperial court, so it would be difficult to ensure that the local disaster relief affairs would not be ruined..."

Zhu Youzhen didn't want to listen to Qian Qianyi's defense, so he directly interrupted him and said: "Qian Shoufu thinks, what is the country? ”

Qian Qianyi, who was suddenly interrupted from his train of thought, couldn't reply for a while, and even Wen Tiren lowered his head and was silent, both of them obviously failed to understand the question raised by Chongzhen. And Xia Yunyi, who has been training in the local area for several years, knows that there is no room for him to speak on such an occasion, so although he disagrees with the emperor's views on Kang's case, he still maintains a listening posture on the side.

Seeing that the two ministers were silent, Zhu Youzhen continued: "If the people are compared to a flock of sheep, then the gentry are sheepdogs, and the officials and I are shepherds of all levels. The forces around the Manchu Qing and the Ming Dynasty were wild wolves roaming outside the sheepfold.

Whether it's a shepherd dog or a shepherd, in fact, we all depend on the flock to survive. Without the presence of the flock, the shepherd dog and the shepherd have no need to exist.

Therefore, the hope that the flock can multiply and become more and more numerous is the common ideal of shepherds and sheepdogs. In order to protect the flock from thriving, we need to expand the size of the sheepfold so that the sheep have enough land to graze, and prevent wild wolves outside the pen from taking the sheep into the sheepfold.

However, due to poor management and continuous natural disasters, the size of the flock is constantly decreasing. However, the number of sheepdogs and shepherds who grew up during the flock boom in the past has not decreased, so there is a problem.

The number of sheep is no longer enough to feed so many sheepdogs and shepherds, and if they continue to be fed in the same way as before, the sheep will lose the possibility of growth, and will only become smaller and smaller, and eventually everyone will starve to death.

So may I ask the two Aiqing, when you encounter such a situation, what should you choose? ”

Qian Qianyi was unable to answer the emperor's question for a while, but Wen Tiren beside him replied without hesitation: "Back to Your Majesty, if you want everyone to live, I'm afraid you have to get rid of some sheepdogs and shepherds." ”

Zhu Youzhen stared at him and asked, "Will these shepherds and shepherds agree with the reality that they have been laid off?" ”

Wen Tiren's eyelids jumped, but he still said in a calm voice: "Then I have to use force to suppress these shepherds and shepherds who don't know what to do." ”

Only then did Zhu Youzhen say leisurely: "This is the country, the country is such a violent machine without blood and tears, without the slightest sympathy. It has only one criterion for making a choice, which is to maintain a balance between the sheep, the sheepdogs, and the shepherds, so that order in the fold can perpetuate.

What is the grievance of a mere Kang's family? What is the dissatisfaction of the Shanxi gentry? If the country is gone, will there be a tomorrow for us people? Who cares if they live well or not at such a moment?

Kang's crime of disobeying the imperial court decree and accumulating silver and grain in the famine year in an attempt to incite the people of Shanxi to rebel is unforgivable. Among the gentry in Shanxi, there were still their comrades who shouted for them, and Tang Shiji was arrested, and the cabinet issued a circular as soon as possible to clarify public opinion and set the record straight.

As for the three Jiang brothers, I will order the General Staff to deal with them..."

(. = )