Come to the Lantern Festival in the first month.

Among the customs of the farming people, the New Year is always the most leisurely month. Spring sowing is generally around the third month of the lunar calendar, and before that, in early February, it is necessary to prepare seeds, repair farm tools, level the land, and burn grain grass, so the first month is just the time to have fun. However, in the first month of the fourteenth year of Chongzhen in the Ming Dynasty, farmers in most parts of Sichuan were not in the mood to have fun. In addition to last year's lack of water and poor harvest, the thieves were harassing again, but also because the new governor of Sichuan, Liao Daheng, recently presided over the introduction of a new measure to strengthen tax collection and management.

The finance of the Ming Dynasty was mainly based on natural colors (rice, cloth and other physical objects) in the early days, supplemented by money; After Jiajing, the banknote law was bad, and it was unanimously resisted by the top and bottom, and the imperial court was unwilling to levy its own treasure banknotes in taxes. Therefore, the combined force of the upper and lower forces forced the imperial court to change to silver and other folded colors; Wanli's new policy, the implementation of the "one whip" law, taxation all in silver. Zhang Juzheng died, but his whip method remained. From the end of Wanli to the period of the Apocalypse, the imperial court's finances could not make ends meet, and the small treasury of the provinces, prefectures, prefectures, and counties that were originally needed by the local government from time to time were transferred to the household department according to the emperor's edict. So far, all the officials and banks in the world have entered the Beijing Division. After the three major expeditions of Wanli, military spending increased day by day. After Chongzhen, the military expenditure was even greater. A little meager income has long been beyond its means. There is no money, but the battle has to be fought. The only way for the imperial court to deal with it was to continue to increase taxes.

There are four main types of taxes added during the Apocalypse and Chongzhen years: three salaries; Somuro Lumi and Zhuangtian; band and pre-enlistment; Local private banks are additionally assigned (Note 1).

The three salaries are the collective names of Liao's salary, repression, and training. Starting from the end of Wanli, Liaozuo used troops, and added nine cents of silver per mu. Chongzhen levies an additional three cents in three years, and a total of one cent and two cents per mu, collectively referred to as Liaoyu. In the tenth year of Chongzhen, according to Yang Sichang's suggestion, the world added grain to Liuhe according to the mu, and each stone was converted into eight coins of silver, and a total of more than 280,000 taels were added, which was called the salary; In the twelfth year of Chongzhen, on the grounds of military training, he sent an additional training salary of 7.3 million taels. The total increase in the three salaries was more than 16.7 million taels of silver, more than double the annual income.

Many of the clan's rice and fields were also achieved through additional taxes. The number of people in the Ming clan increased by a geometric progression of about a doubling in thirty years. During the Wanli period, the newly feudal king's farmland, often tens of thousands of hectares, in fact, there is no so much ownerless idle land in the fiefdom, in addition to some of the seizure from the people, a considerable part of the need to be replaced by additional taxes to obtain rent silver. For example, King Rui in the Han Dynasty. His so-called 20,000 hectares of farmland was realized by the four provinces of Henan, Shaanxi, Shanxi, and Sichuan in paying additional taxes according to the number of acres of land apportioned.

When collecting taxes, there are so-called levies and pre-levies. Levy refers to the arrears of money and grain in previous years, and a certain amount of levy is levied when the current amount is collected; Pre-levy refers to the collection of part of the money and grain for the following year in addition to the tax payment of the current year.

The local private practice is even more cleverly set up in the name, which has the pain of knocking out the bones and sucking the marrow of the people. During the Chongzhen period, Liang Tingdong, the secretary of the Ministry of War, once said, "Although Lu Zuo is poor today, he is not poor in Liao's salary." In the first year of age, the number of Yin is added. If the Hajj examination is full, and the line is promoted, the fee for the least is five or six thousand gold. In the domestic calculation, the country chooses to obey the order, and the world sends millions more. Patrol according to the investigation and investigation, give the bereaved thanks, and the most of them are up to 20,000 or 30,000 gold. In the sea, the country sent a patrol, and the world sent more than one million. Liang Tingdong, as the secretary of the Ministry of War, originally intended to defend the increase in the amount of Liaoyu, but he believed that the amount of the local officials was greater than the Liaoyu, but it was in line with reality.

But what makes the situation worse is the inequality of the tax burden. The royal palace, the nobles, and the gentry have certain tax-free privileges. They evade grain taxes by means of deceit, sprinkling, insinuation, etc., so that the entire tax burden falls on the common people and small and medium-sized landlords, causing them to be overwhelmed and flee in large numbers. However, in order to fulfill the heavy tax burden in full, the local officials had to dig out their minds and adopt various methods to collect taxes. The new governor of Sichuan, Liao Daheng, was no exception, and as soon as he came to power, he made a lot of efforts to continuously strengthen the responsibility of the prefectures, prefectures, and counties for tax collection.

At the beginning of Emperor Chongzhen's accession to the throne, he was strict with the collection of money and grain, and there were strict and specific regulations. For example, the prefect cannot be promoted if he does not complete the tax, and the prefect and other officials cannot even participate in the examination before the promotion if they do not complete the tax. At the same time, if the task of money and food cannot be completed, it will be demoted and the payment will be withheld. The Songjiang and Suzhou prefectures had a heavy task of money and food, and there were even cases where officials were detained dozens of times and demoted to 10 or 8 levels (Note 2). However, with the advent of the 14th year of Chongzhen, the Sichuan thieves were no longer able to collect enough money and grain from a limited number of small and medium-sized landlords and civilians, so the local arrears of taxes became more and more. For the sake of his own future, Liao Daheng, the governor of Sichuan, had to strictly order all parts of Sichuan to complete the recovery of tax arrears during the Spring Festival. Who would have thought that his new measure to strengthen tax collection and management would soon lead to serious mass incidents in various parts of Sichuan, known in history as "removing the five beetles". If it weren't for a god reaching out to pull him, he would inevitably fall to the ground, arrest Jingshi, and then behead Caishikou.

Peng County, which is under the jurisdiction of CD Mansion, is a little north and west of the provincial capital, less than 100 miles away from the center of CD Mansion and the Shu Wangfu. The surrounding Xinfan County, Guan County, Pi County, Xindu County, and Hanzhou (now Guanghan City) all belong to the Dujiangyan Irrigation District. These states and counties are not only rich, but also densely populated with kings.

On the last day of the first month of the fourteenth year of Chongzhen, on the same day that Zhu Pingjin left Bifeng Gorge for Tianquan, in the back garden of the Pengxian County Government, a thin old man in a green cloth robe was sitting in a bamboo circle chair with a smile, chatting with a few young students.

"What a good trick, my lord! A simple arrangement made those Xu (XU) officials energetic! A student from the county school praised it from the bottom of his heart.

Another scholar in the older grade also shook his head and praised: "Those officials are just some people who chase fame and fortune. Relying on their native origins, when did they not give eye medicine and problems to the county elders in this matter of money and food? Now it's good, the county respects a paperwork, and in order to get official money, they have to chase the tax arrears everywhere. The students thought that there were three wonders about the county's honorable elder's move: one was that the county had recovered the tax arrears, and the performance appraisal would definitely be on the table in the coming year. The imperial court rewards capable members, and rewards the boss with a state capital is also a proper topic; Ermiao used the arrears of taxes to offset the official silver of the officials, and the county lost a lot of expenses; Sanmiao is one of those officials and servants, who only know how to pick words and argue on weekdays, fox and fake tiger, and in the fish and meat township, they don't take the major affairs of the court to heart at all. Now they're going to the countryside to earn that muddy money. After this cleanup, in the future, the boss will call these little officials, but will they not come and go as soon as they are called? ”

Everyone praised each other, and the old man in the green cloth robe was praised all over his body, and was about to say a few words of humility, when he suddenly heard a hurried sound of a gong tapping in front of the yamen, and then gradually there was a loud voice. The old man was about to open his mouth to ask about the left and right, when he saw his master rushing in from the second gate, stumbling on the garden steps, staggering over a few steps and hurriedly saying, "Dong Weng, something is wrong!" ”

This old man in a green cloth robe is Wang Guolin, the magistrate of Peng County. Seeing the master's gaffe, Lord Wang looked displeased: "Why are you so panicked?" Changyu, this county often teaches you to nourish qi, you are in the left ear and out of the right ear! What big things can be out there? Could it be that the thief has come back again? ”

The master wiped his sweat and said: "Dong Weng, it's not a thief, it's those people who owe taxes!" They gathered at the gate of the yamen to make trouble, and they said that they wanted to get rid of the yamen! At the head are the two tycoons, who are beating the gong to gather people! ”

"Or are they Wang Gang and Renji?"

"Exactly!"

The magistrate smiled and said to the students of several county schools: "Everything in the world is an article!" You come to ask the old man Shiwen, and the old man wants to ask you: How should this county deal with this wealthy people gathering people to resist taxes? ”

The students humbly gave in a few times, but the older scholar just now couldn't give in, so he replied: "The students think that the boss should get rid of the first evil and be lenient with the people. In this way, the law of the country can be corrected and evil spirits can be removed; It can also calm the grievances of the county people and show the boss's love for the people. ”

Zhixian sighed in his mouth, thinking about it with fascinated eyes, and the smile on his face was even better, obviously this scholar's opinion was deep in his heart. Seeing this, everyone hurriedly came up and agreed. Zhixian opened his eyes and was about to explain to his master, but out of the corner of his eyes, he saw a scholar standing outside the circle of people, bowing his head as if thinking about something. The magistrate smiled and called out the scholar's words: "Shizhong, what are you thinking, you might as well say it so that the county and everyone can listen to it." ”

This scholar was obviously a little shy, and when he heard the name of the magistrate, and saw his classmates giggling at him, he was even more nervous, but he just muttered in his mouth: "Students think, think, those Diao people are stubborn, will they take risks?" The student thought, either lock up all the troublemakers, or let the officials suspend some debt collection......" The scholar was talking, and suddenly thought of using the arrears as the official money of the officials, and let the officials ask for it themselves, which was the proud work of the county magistrate in front of him, and suddenly his heart was shocked, he stopped, and stood in place without words.

The older scholar had always been disdainful of this junior. He shook his head and said with a smile: "Shi Zhong may be thinking badly!" There are only dozens of officials in my county, how can it be ......?"

The rest of his words were interrupted by a loud cheer outside the yamen. The magistrate and the scholars were shocked by the sound in their faces, and they were at a loss, and a prison room clerk ran in a hurry with sweat, not caring to salute the magistrate, and shouted loudly while running: "My lord, quickly think of avoiding it!" Those Diao people reversed, just now the county lord led Zhang Dutou out to suppress, but Zhang Dutou was thrown into the dung pit and drowned! The prefectural lord and the other officials have all run away! The villain is risking death to come back to report the news, adults quickly avoid the limelight! ”

When everyone heard this, they ran away with a bang. The master grabbed the running Lord Wang and shouted, "Back door! Dong Weng, go through the back door! ”

In the first month of the fourteenth year of Chongzhen in the Ming Dynasty, Wang Guolin, the magistrate of Peng County, used the arrears as the official silver of the officials and asked the officials to ask for it themselves. The officials took the opportunity to pursue a large number of claims, causing the people of the county to complain. Two prestigious small landlords and businessmen named Wang Gang and Renji in Peng County took the opportunity to ring gongs and gather in front of the county government and issued an initiative to "get rid of the beetle." The initiative has received an enthusiastic response from the citizens of the prefecture. The head of the county led the troops to suppress the bullets, and was thrown into the dung pit by the angry people and drowned alive. Peng County's campaign to "get rid of the beetle" soon spread to neighboring prefectures and counties, and then to all parts of Sichuan. At the same time, the campaign to "get rid of the beetle" quickly expanded into the "get rid of the five beetles" campaign. "Five beetles", including beetles, fu beetles, hao beetles, eunuch beetles, and learning beetles. Many of the officials and officials who were referred to by the people as the "five beetles", the officials of the royal government, the management of the village and the shop, the local tyrants and hooligans, the gentry and the slaves and evil servants, and the scholars and scholars who caused harm to others, were beaten to death, stewed in pots, and pushed into the cellar and buried alive. Most of their property has been looted out in a frenzy; Most of their houses were set on fire. This spontaneous mass movement, while quickly destroying the evil forces that poisoned the people, also showed everyone the other side of its horror - the disorder inherent in the mass movement and its trembling destructive power!

Whether Zhu Pingjin wants it or not, this will be the first major test he has experienced since his crossing.

Note 1: The above data is quoted from Mr. Gu Cheng's article.

Note 2: Excerpt from "Chongzhen's Hanging Dead Bend"