Fang Yuan found Wang Bingjian, the first assistant, and Shen Xiang, the head of the household, and told them straight to the point that the grain in the emergency reserve granary was wrong than the previous estimate, and there was a shortage of 400,000 stones, and they needed to think of 400,000 stone of grain.

Of course, Fang Yuan did not inform the two of them of the reason for the food shortage, and the emergency grain reserve in Zhejiang Juntian was a militarized management, and the granary was not publicized. Neither the Cabinet, the Sixth Ministry, nor the military have yet to receive information.

Wang Bingjian tentatively asked the reason for the food shortage, and Fang Yuan also looked at him and dealt with the past vaguely. Before arresting Ma Lin, Fang Yuan didn't want to leak any rumors, so as not to have too many dreams at night.

Shen Xiang, who is the head of the household department and the president of the business association, is not most concerned about why there is a shortage of food, but how Fang Yuan is going to gather this shortage of food, and hurriedly asks, "Regent, the huge amount of 400,000 stone grain, where to gather it in a hurry?!" ”

Fang Yuan stared straight at him and asked, "How much grain is there in the granary of Shen Shangshu's house?" ”

Shen Xiang saw that he suddenly had the idea of his own granary, and his heart suddenly sudden, and he said, "This, it is estimated that there are three thousand stones!" ”

The dignified Dongshan Shen family, the descendant of Shen Wansan, only has 3,000 stone of grain in the granary at home, and he is simply fooling Fang Yuan. Everyone is a smart person, Fang Yuan will not recruit him to talk about things if he has nothing to do, the purpose is of course to target the granary of those rich merchants in the business association.

It is more efficient and faster to raise grain by rich businessmen than to go to the government to raise grain and buy grain in the market, disaster relief is like fighting a fire, and if it is delayed for a day, hundreds of people will die, otherwise Fang Yuan would not want to open his mouth to these iron roosters.

As soon as Fang Yuan's words were asked, Shen Xiang guessed Fang Yuan's thoughts, and immediately gave the number of three thousand stones, which was to tell Fang Yuan bluntly that the grain that the Shen family could donate was only three thousand stones, and the more would be gone.

Fang Yuan saw that Shen Xiang was crying with himself at this juncture, and he wanted to be angry, but after thinking about it, there was no harm if there was no comparison.

Historically, the capital was already in danger, Chongzhen raised donations in the court, and Zhou Kui, the national abbot, also took the lead in giving 2,000 taels, or because Queen Zhou secretly gave him 5,000 taels, and he also filled his pocket with 3,000 taels. Other officials donated a few dozen taels or a few hundred taels.

Two thousand taels of silver, at the price at that time, could only buy one thousand stone of grain.

As a businessman, Shen Xiang was able to promise to donate 3,000 stone of grain, although the amount was much smaller than 400,000 stones, but it was already a world of difference compared to the cabinet scholars and six scholars of the Chongzhen Imperial Court.

The wealth of these merchants is not earned, let alone owed to Fang Yuan. 400,000 stones, such a huge amount of grain, it is difficult for these businessmen to donate it out of thin air.

Fang Yuan thought about it, if he wanted to raise food quickly, he could only spend money to buy it. If these businessmen did not take advantage of the food shortage and take the opportunity to raise prices to extort silver, they would have been the greatest support for the other party's former regime.

Fang Yuan groaned and said, "Shen Shangshu, three thousand stone grain stones is really a drop in the bucket!" Neither your silver nor your grain is brought by a strong wind. So be it! I have two plans for raising grain, and you can announce it at the business association to raise 400,000 stone of grain as soon as possible within one or two months. ”

"First, the current market price of grain is 1.5 taels / stone, because the required quantity is large, and it has to be transported to Huai'an and Fujian, I will pay 2 taels / stone to buy 400,000 stone of grain; Second, I borrowed grain and returned it after one year, paying interest of two stone for every ten stone of grain, 400,000 stone of grain, and 500,000 stone next year. ”

Fang Yuan stared at Shen Xiang directly, and said in a deep voice, "Shen Shangshu will tell those rich businessmen again that now is the juncture of disaster relief, and hundreds of thousands of people affected by disasters in Fujian and Huai'an are waiting to be fed. The silver in the world is inexhaustible, and fine water can flow for a long time. Don't think about hoarding and raising the price of grain, if you can't buy food with money, you will force me to raid the house door to door! ”

His suggestion was not to ask the major merchants to donate grain, but to spend money to buy it, or pay interest to borrow grain, and Shen Xiang was secretly relieved when he heard it. If everything is bought according to market principles, or borrowed to pay interest, then what is there to say? When it is profitable, no one will have trouble with money.

With the grain saved by major merchant gangs and wealthy merchants, as well as personal connections, it is still easy to raise 400,000 stone of grain in one or two months.

Moreover, Fang Yuan has drawn a red line, that is, hoarding and raising grain prices will never be allowed. Those who dare not sell grain find that there is no one. With Fang Yuan's temperament, what he said would definitely be fulfilled.

Shen Xiang thought about it for a while, and then readily agreed to the deal with Fang Yuan.

According to the degree of urgency, Fang Yuan and Wang Bingjian redistributed the distribution of the remaining 400,000 stone of grain. From the 200,000 stone of grain borrowed from Zhu Yihai and Fujian for disaster relief, 50,000 stone was deducted from each and transported to Fengyang as military rations. After Shen Xiang raised food, it was redistributed to Zhu Yihai and Fujian for disaster relief.

As for the 800,000 taels of silver to buy grain, Fang Yuan could only pay out of his own pocket and draw it from the two or three million taels of silver used to build Fengyang. Fengtian Palace, Wenlou, Wulou, Wuying Palace, Wenhua Palace, these office premises should continue to be repaired. The construction of the East and West Second Palace, which he enjoyed himself, could only be suspended.

A month later, the grain raised by Shen Xiang in the business association was in place one after another, 300,000 stone was purchased directly, 600,000 taels of silver were paid, 100,000 stone was borrowed, and 120,000 stone needed to be returned next year.

In this way, it can be regarded as solving Fang Yuan's urgent need.

Fang Yuan was slightly pleased, recruiting these businessmen into the household department, in terms of funds and food raising, the efficiency is obviously higher than that of appointing bureaucrats from the imperial examination.

This time, if it had been replaced by the bureaucrats of the imperial court in the capital, it would have been impossible to raise such a large amount of food in such a short period of time.

The process of these bureaucrats must be to talk about the people in the world above the court, emphasizing how the people of Li are suffering and how they are distressed; Then he began to emphasize a lot of objective difficulties and how difficult it was to raise military rations.

Of course, the reason why these bureaucrats emphasize objective difficulties may be because these officials are mixed officials who have come to power by touting each other, and they really have limited ability to do it; Maybe he wanted to take the opportunity to raise the price for the emperor and calculate how much benefit he could get from it.

What can be done with 800,000 silver is estimated to be 1 or 2 million taels of silver from these officials who have withheld layers of deductions.

Chongzhen was so angry with these grandsons that he scolded the civil officials and everyone could kill them.

Everyone is profit-seeking, Fang Yuan would rather adopt the method of talking about business, talking more about win-win and mutual benefit, and less about the male thieves and female prostitutes who are born in the world on the surface and behind the scenes.

How much do these businessmen want to make from it, quote a fixed price, whether they can make a deal, how to bargain, the two sides pick out and negotiate, and then everything is done according to the contract. Giving these businessmen some benefits can improve their efficiency, which is far better than listening to the nonsense of the bureaucracy in the court.

According to the news sent back by the Fujian government and the local Jinyiwei, the total number of people affected by the disaster and starvation to death in the local area did not exceed 5,000. Although many people still died due to the delay in disaster relief, it was still much less than the previous estimate of more than 50,000 casualties.

Fang Yuan also secretly breathed a sigh of relief, but this time he had a big burst of blood, and even the construction of the dormitory was stopped.

When a large amount of grain was sent to Fujian and Huai'an Prefecture, the prefects of Fuzhou, Quanzhou, Guangzhou, Zhaoqing and other prefectures named by Fang Yuan, the same people in charge of account verification, and even the officials who came to Nanzhili to reconcile the accounts all went to Fengyang to wait for Fang Yuan's summons.