In mid-June, the criminal case file on the Shaanxi San Francisco clan was finally sent to Cui Chengxiu, who looked at the two stacks of documents on the table in front of him, and couldn't help but ask the two staff members who sent the documents: "Have you all checked and distinguished?" ”

The older staff member immediately bent down and replied: "Back to the owner, we have carefully checked it three times, and the pile of files on the left hand side of the owner is a normal punishment; On the right hand side of the owner is the lenient penalty and has reduced the number of people who have been punished. Now, as long as the owner is confirmed, it can be sent to the Beijing Central Criminal Department for approval. ”

Cui Chengxiu randomly selected a few copies from the two piles of documents and flipped through them, then hesitated and said: "Put them first, wait for the news from Beijing, and then decide which pile of documents to send..."

As soon as his words fell, he heard the voice of the report from his entourage outside the hall, and Cui Chengxiu summoned his entourage to come in for questioning, and it turned out that the envoy from Beijing had arrived. Cui Chengxiu immediately tidied up his clothes and walked down the hall to greet the envoy from Beijing. Half an hour later, Cui Chengxiu, who had returned after talking with the envoy from Beijing, immediately ordered his staff to send the pile of files on the left to the criminal department in the capital.

At the same time, Zuo Liangyu's headquarters, which was stationed in the camp on the outskirts of Xi'an, also received an order from the General Staff. Zuo Liangyu was told by the envoy that Sun Chuanting was rushing to Chengcheng and asked him to lead his troops closer to Chengcheng and prepare to accept Sun Chuanting's dispatch to suppress a possible armed rebellion in the local area.

When Zuo Liangyu sent the envoy down to rest and was about to summon the subordinates in the middle of the army to give instructions before the march, he found that his deputy, the director of mission, had already distributed the order to mobilize the army in an orderly manner. Seeing this situation, Zuo Liangyu could only scratch his head and instructed the staff officers on the side to draw up a marching plan, while he himself planned to go to the army for a walk, which could be regarded as winning over the hearts of the army.

However, after inspecting the camp for less than an hour, Zuo Liangyu returned to his big tent in a feigned manner. In the companies he inspected, the soldiers' committees and mission committees were motivating the soldiers step by step to prepare them for the departure of the troops, and there was no need for him to motivate the soldiers to go on the expedition.

Although this army is still the old foundation he brought out from Liaodong, after several adjustments and exchanges, more than half of the middle and lower-level officers have been replaced. Although these soldiers and officers still maintained their awe for him, Zuo Liangyu could still feel that the special relationship he once had with these soldiers had been severed.

In his former troops, although some of them relied on the relationship between the generals of Liaoxi, their orders to him were quite disobedient. But at least there is a small half of the staff, who blindly follow his orders, and these people do not get his orders, even if the emperor Lao Tzu comes, it is not very easy to make it.

But now, although the officers and men of the entire army can obey his orders, they must be issued through the mission system and the staff system. But if he wants to bypass the mission system and the staff system to issue orders, it seems that most people will not obey him anymore. This unit now belongs to the General Staff and His Majesty the Emperor, Zuo Liangyu thought of it quite unhappily in his heart.

After entering June, Huang Liji, the first assistant of the Ming cabinet, focused on the issue of this year's summer harvest. At the urging of the emperor, he sent inspectors to various places in the name of the cabinet. Unlike in the past, these officials did not rush to collect taxes, but mainly investigated the state of the summer harvest.

The change in the mission goal made the officials who went to Beijing this time regard the patrol mission as a chore. After all, in the past, he just went down to the yamen to sit down, and then urged the local officials to complete the tax prescribed this year. Even if some local officials can't complete the local taxes, this responsibility is also on the local officials, and the officials who go out to Beijing to do business can still collect some local filial piety, which is really a beautiful difference for the mountains and rivers.

But this time it is different, the survey of the yield per mu of the summer harvest in various places, and last year's harvest is still compared, if there is no increase in yield, the reason needs to be explained. Obviously, these things cannot be done by sitting in the yamen, and if you want to be lazy, the accompanying ICAC personnel are obviously not vegetarians.

Therefore, the officials named by the cabinet were full of complaints, and the officials who had some connections all walked in front of Huang Liji, wanting to remove their names from the list of inspectors who went out of Beijing. In order to ensure that the task of going to Beijing for this inspection trip could be accomplished, Huang Liji could only threaten and lure the officials on the list one by one, and put the officials attached to him at the top of the list as an example for the named officials.

Huang Liji was immersed in official business when he suddenly heard a knock on the door. He looked up and saw Wang Chengen standing at the door with a smile, and after seeing that his attention was attracted, Wang Chengen put down his knocking hand and said to Huang Liji: "Huang Ge Lao, Your Majesty asked the miscellaneous family to invite you to go to the next door to talk, please ask Ge Lao to stop the work at hand for a while." ”

Chongzhen, who was sitting in his office room in Wenhua Palace, looked at the sunlight shining obliquely on the ground in front of him, and the gray gold bricks on the ground seemed to be smeared with a layer of white paint, and the dust flying in the sunlight made these floor tiles that were directly exposed to sunlight look steaming. Midsummer has finally arrived, Zhu Youzhen wiped the beads of sweat on his temples while muttering in his heart.

When the sunlight shining in from outside the house was blocked, Zhu Youzhen saw Huang Liji, who walked in with Wang Chengen. While beckoning the eunuchs waiting in the room to show Huang Liji the tea seat, he greeted Huang Liji cordially.

After a few trivial greetings, Huang Liji hurriedly asked Chongzhen: "Your Majesty summoned the minister at this time, but is there anything to discuss with the minister?" ”

Zhu Youzhen nodded at him and said, "I am looking for Mr. to come over, I do have something to discuss with Mr. Actually, it's not a big deal, it's just that I want to ask Mr., I plan to reply to Wenqi, what does Mr. think? ”

Huang Liji was silent for more than ten seconds before calmly replying to Chongzhen: "Jiangnan Shilin praised Wenwen for being upright and upright, and he was reprimanded by His Majesty last time, because there were villains who were blinded, so there were many scholars and doctors who were upset about it.

And the minister also heard that after Wen Wenqi returned to his hometown, he did not repent, but invited friends to gather at the end of three days, and often wrote poems and essays to express his dissatisfaction, and his resentment was overflowing.

Is it too early for His Majesty to reply to him at this moment? It's better to wait a little longer and sharpen his temperament. ”

Zhu Youzhen thought for a moment before continuing: "After all, Wen Wenqi is a famous family, and he has always claimed to be a gentleman, so it is impossible to be driven home by me without a little resentment. In fact, I didn't really think that what the scholars said was right, it was just the situation. ”

Huang Liji asked with some confusion: "The situation? What does Your Majesty mean? ”

Zhu Youzhen lowered his head and rummaged on the table in front of him, then found a document and handed it to Huang Liji, "Sir, take a look at this document first." ”

Huang Liji took the document in Chongzhen's hand, first glanced at the text on the cover, and understood that this was the information provided by Jinyiwei, and then turned the inside page. There were not many pages in the document, and he quickly finished reading the contents inside, raised his head and said in surprise: "This, is this Wen Changqing doing too much in Nanjing?" Of the more than 300 new imperial examination personnel, he dismissed 47 people in one go, nearly half of the number of new middle school examinations, and all the members of the Fushe were dismissed, which may be difficult to convince the public. ”

Zhu Youzhen also replied a little helplessly: "Wen Shilang, this person, the others are okay, but they are not broad-minded enough. When he went south, I told him that although the people in the Restoration Society were suspected of forming a party for personal gain, most of the scholars who joined the Restoration Society were the elites of Jiangnan, and the imperial court always gave them a chance to repent.

For example, Chen Zilong and Xu Fuyuan, although they were listed in the Restoration Society, they had also made great contributions to the establishment of the Agricultural Research Branch opened by the imperial court in Shanghai, and they always had to open up to them. Moreover, Chen Zilong is still a disciple of Mr. Xu, even if he doesn't look at the monk's face, he has to look at the Buddha's face, how can he get rid of Chen Zilong because he quarreled with him.

In this Jiangnan Township Examination, although some people in the Restoration Society communicated privately with the examiner, there was indeed fraud. But if the restoration society is wiped out like this, I am afraid that the Jiangnan gentry will have to break with the imperial court.

The court is like parents, the gentry are like children, and children must be taught a lesson when they make mistakes. If they are not taught, they will not know what rules are. However, when folk parents educate their children, they have to rub them with a stick, so as not to really force their children to become rebels, which is against the original intention of parents to educate their children.

This time, the imperial court dealt with the Jiangnan scientific research fraud case, which is roughly the parents educating their children, this Wen Tiren is a strict father, and the court must always be a loving mother, and pull the hearts of these gentry back, lest they deviate from the court and morality.

Wenwen is a famous family and has a great reputation in Jiangnan Shilin. I reinstated him, first, to calm the dissatisfaction of Jiangnan officials with the new policy of the imperial court in the past two years; Second, he can also use this to rectify the atmosphere of Jiangnan Shilin.

I hope that these Jiangnan gentry officials will understand one thing, this Jiangnan is the Jiangnan of the Ming Dynasty, but this Ming Dynasty is not the Ming of the Jiangnan gentry officials. The new policy issued by the imperial court was to save the national fortunes of the Ming Dynasty, which was not something that a group of corrupt Confucians could criticize wantonly. These gentry built academies in various parts of the Yangtze River and funded literati associations in various places, and they wanted to fight against the imperial court. ”

Knowing Chongzhen's intention to reply to Wen Zhenmeng, Huang Liji suddenly breathed a sigh of relief in his heart, and he couldn't help but ask carefully: "Then how does Your Majesty plan to enable Wenwen Qi?" ”

Zhu Youzhen said without thinking: "The Jiangnan scientific expedition case undertaken by Wen Tiren is almost over, and it won't be long before the impeachment of Wen Tiren will fly like snowflakes."

I don't want to fight a lawsuit with these people, so let's just prepare for it in advance. As soon as the Nanjing imperial examination fraud case came out, the two chief examiners and the Nanjing Ministry of Rites Shangshu were obviously responsible. How to deal with them, the cabinet can come up with an opinion, but I am afraid that the secretary of the Nanjing Ministry of Rites will have to be replaced.

I think I should let Wen Wenqi take over as the secretary of the Nanjing Ministry of Rites, let him review this fraud case, and give him nine places to restore the name of the department, so that he will not refuse the appointment of the imperial court. In addition, after he took office, he was required to strictly check the teaching content and the qualifications of teachers in the academies in the southern provinces. In the future, academies that have not been registered with the Ministry of Rites will be strictly ordered to be destroyed by local officials, and students who have already studied will be transferred to legal academies..."