William saw that Uncle Adolph accepted his kindness, nodded contentedly, his eyes fell on the other two, and said: "Sir Hubert, butler Osborne, here I have left you two large estates of 1,500 acres for you, although they cannot be compared with your manor in Rouen, but please accept it." ”

"Yes, Young Master William (Your Highness)." The two of them bowed and saluted, and said.

"Ahem, yes." After the three of them were seated again, William coughed and said, "Now that the Barony of Alençon can be said to have no more noble forces and merchants who oppose us, I will try some reforms that are different from the past." ”

William's words immediately attracted Uncle Adolf and Steward Osborne. Sir Hubert's attention, and the three of them sat upright and listened.

William looked around at everyone, nodded, and said eloquently: "After some research, I have decided to divide the messy tax of the manor into land rent and agricultural tax, of which the land rent is four layers - this income belongs to the respective owners of the estate, and the agricultural tax one - this income belongs to me.

If a serf cultivated the land on the estate, he would pay four layers of rent and one level of agricultural tax at the same time, while if a serf cultivated the wasteland around the estate, the rent and tax would be halved within five years, that is, only two layers of rent and half a layer of agricultural tax would be paid in five years.

As for the land owned by free peasants, merchants, artisans, officials and gentry, they all had to pay one layer of agricultural tax, and the same amount of land that was reclaimed within five years was only half of the agricultural tax. ”

"Your Highness William, you'd better not do this, it's immoral to levy agricultural taxes on all land, it will invite rebellion within the territory!" Sir Schobit shook his head in disagreement.

Uncle Adolphus and Steward Osborne also shook their heads, objecting to William's move.

It was generally believed in the Middle Ages that a well-governed state or territory should not be based on taxation of its subjects.

It was basic common sense in the Middle Ages that kings or lords should be content with the income of their domains and not tax their subjects at will.

According to Scottia, the adage "the king should live on his own" has been around since the 14th century, but before that time similar ideas had taken hold. Inherited from Aristotle's political and moral philosophy, medieval political philosophers believed that a happy life stemmed from self-sufficiency and self-control, especially when a monarch or lord was a model for his subjects.

In the eyes of the people of the time, it was the virtue of a wise king or lord to live on the income of his own territory and not to exploit his subjects or harm the interests of them.

It can also be seen from the wording "shall" in the expression itself that this maxim expresses a moral demand, a moral demand made in order to limit the excessive rights of the king or lord.

Therefore, in the Middle Ages, the lords mainly relied on the rent and labor paid by the serfs in their estates to support their armies and bureaucrats, and were not allowed to levy agricultural taxes on other nobles, merchants, gentry, free peasants and other landowners in the territory.

"What are you afraid of! Now that most of the arable land of the Barony of Alençon is in our hands, and the few who disobey can be sent to subdue them. William shook his head and replied, "And I have the duty to protect them, so I have the power to collect taxes from them, which is also in accordance with the principle of equal power and duty." ”

Uncle Adolf, Steward Osborne, and Sir Hubert were dumbfounded by William, and had to admit that William's statement had a point.

"In addition to that, I will also make some taxes such as commercial tax, mining tax, customs duty, property tax, window tax and inheritance tax." William ignored everyone's surprised looks, and continued: "However, in order to collect these taxes, a strong government must first be established to rule the Barony of Alençon, and there is no hurry now. ”

"Well, little William, I'll help you no matter what."

"Young Master William, what do you want to do?"

"Your Highness William, I will obey your orders."

Uncle Adolphus, Steward Osborne, and Ser Hubert, though they all felt that William's idea was unrealistic, all nodded in agreement and spoke.

In the Middle Ages, due to the imperfection of the administrative system, tax collection was a problem, so the simple and crude method of poll tax and toll tax was more popular with the lords, and the cost of taxation was relatively low.

It was impossible to collect all kinds of taxes as William had envisioned, and it required the formation of a very large number of bureaucrats and administrative forces, and it was unlikely that even the taxes that could be collected would be able to feed them, which was extremely uneconomical.

Even so, the three Adolf will want to see what William will do before commenting.

After all, the entire Barony of Alençon was beaten down by William, and it depends on William's mood how he wants to knead it, and if something goes wrong, Adolf will also come forward to clean up for William.

William's gaze turned to Adolphus and said, "Uncle Adolf, I would like to ask you to be the mayor of Alençon City and help me establish the municipal government agency that rules the entire Barony of Alençon. ”

"Looks like you've got some ideas, let's talk about William." Adolf said with a smile on his face.

William nodded and elaborated: "I am going to divide the Barony of Alençon into the city of Alençon and eleven counties, which are mainly divided according to the terrain around the large villages and towns with large populations.

In the eleven counties, a number of gentlemen will be elected to form a council of elders to govern with the local officials we have dispatched, who will have the power and responsibility to supervise the officials but not interfere with the administration of justice, while in the city of Alençon, Uncle Adolf will form a city government to administer the city and suburbs of Alençon.

The Alençon City Government will set up a city defense bureau, a police station, an industrial and commercial bureau, a tax bureau, a civil affairs bureau and a court.

Among them, the military and police, taxation, and industry and commerce are the most important. ”

"If that's the case, then we need a lot of people with management experience, and we can't support them at all with the manpower we have." Adolf shook his head slightly and said.

"On the one hand, you can bring in some talent from Evre. At the same time, I pardoned some of the capable capitulation bureaucrats and asked Bruce to help us recruit local officials, professional managers, and business talent. This way, you don't have to worry about not having enough talent to manage Alençon City well. William replied with a firm look.

"I'm relieved!" Uncle Adolf breathed a sigh of relief and said, "How are you going to form the city defense army and the police team?" We don't have a lot of troops! It's too late to recruit from scratch, not to mention that we have Baron Richard of Argenton at our head on the side. ”

"Don't we still have more than 3,000 surrendered town militias and more than 500 surrendered mercenaries on our hands?

This is a very good troop resource, as long as the soldiers with the stronger combat effectiveness are recruited to form the city defense force, and the weaker soldiers form the police station, you can quickly pull up a team with combat effectiveness. William pondered for a moment and replied.

..........

The men discussed how to manage the Barony of Alençon until late at night, and then went back to rest.