In the past year, Emperor Chongzhen has not gone to Banzai Mountain again, and has been busy in the palace, naturally for a reason.

On the one hand, it is because of the tragedy of Chongzhen's seventeenth year in history, which is getting farther and farther away from the current Chongzhen Emperor.

He believes that as long as he doesn't do anything wrong and doesn't die in tricks, then with the situation that the Ming Dynasty has opened up now, the result of the death of the country in history and the laughter of the world should not happen again.

On the other hand, it is also because since the third year of Chongzhen, the Jingshi of the Ming Dynasty, and even the entire land of Gyeonggi, are often shrouded in a thick haze.

Now this Emperor Chongzhen, it has only been two or three years since he came to this era when the sky is clean and the air is clear and bright, and the haze that he has experienced in later generations has shrouded his head again.

In spring and summer, a large number of iron smelting plants, coke plants, cement factories, brick and tile factories and other industrial and mining factories in the area east of Jingshi, Zunhua Baiye City, Kaiping, Luanzhou and Qian'an in Yongping Prefecture are full of fireworks at night, and whenever the southeast wind blows, the land of Gyeonggi is shrouded in a boundless smoke and dust.

And in winter, the cold wind from Saibei, although it brought a cold snap to the Jingshi, it was also able to sweep away the smoke and dust over the Jingshi.

But in the winter of the third year of Chongzhen, the situation changed, although the cold wind from the north of the Saibei blew away the dust in the Jingshi area, but also brought smoke from the grassland in the south of the desert.

The smoke was triggered by the large-scale burning of the grasslands by more and more migrants who had gone to the desert area to reclaim the land outside the border.

And because of the continuous drought in Chongzhen for three years, the fires caused by the burning of the grassland are simply every day, and the smoke created by the fires still chokes even if it blows eastward for more than a thousand miles.

At the same time, the entire Gyeonggi area, during this winter, is shrouded in a layer of smoke that is thick or light, sometimes thin and sometimes thick.

The Forbidden City is in the middle of Beijing, and even if it is the residence of the Ming Emperor, it cannot be isolated from the invasion of smog.

Being in such an environment all day, even if he had some rare leisure days, he was reluctant to go outside to breathe the smog air.

However, this time, the heavy snow completely cleaned the sky over Kyoshi, which had been covered with dirty air for almost a winter.

Emperor Chongzhen has always done what he said, never dragged the character of mud and water, and now took a few big eunuchs who followed him from the period of the Qiandi Palace, out of the Qianqing Palace, all the way through the harem garden, stepping on the snow that the eunuchs in the palace had not had time to sweep away, and went north.

And Chu Xianzhang hurriedly sent his little eunuchs to pass on the attendants and military attaches on duty, and made a detour to wait outside the Xuanwu Gate to wait for the escort.

In the first two years of coming to this time and space, Emperor Chongzhen always took his attendants, military attachés and ministers around him every once in a while, and went north out of the Xuanwu Gate of the Forbidden City to the opposite Banzai Mountain for a walk and contemplation.

And each time, he deliberately walked a path up Banzai Mountain to see an old locust tree with lush leaves.

And every time I went, I either stared for a long time, or sat silently under the tree.

No one knew why he did it, only he knew that he was paying tribute to an indomitable soul.

He was the only one who knew what this rocky place, shrubs and weeds on the east side of Banzai Mountain meant to the dynasty.

Around the morning of the fourth day of the second month of the fourth year of Chongzhen, Emperor Chongzhen took the ministers in the palace to meet the attendants and military attaches outside the Xuanwu Gate, and once again came to the Long Live Mountain outside the Xuanwu Gate of the Forbidden City.

I also came to the east side of Banzai Mountain again, under the ancient locust tree that was originally inaccessible, and silently watched the thick snow on the branches of the tree fall under the cold wind.

The topography of Long Live Mountain is the highest in the inner and outer cities of Beijing, which was originally the town mountain of the Forbidden City, but in the last years of the Ming Dynasty, it had an indecent nickname, that is, Coal Mountain.

Located outside the Xuanwu Gate of the Forbidden City, it was originally a place for the Yongle Emperor to personally select the royal martial arts practice place after moving the capital to Beijing, and it was a place for the emperors and their sons and grandsons in the Forbidden City to ride horses and shoot arrows to practice muskets and birds.

However, in addition to the Yongle Emperor's own use, most of the later emperors of the Ming Dynasty lacked interest in horseback archery.

Although there are still places that should be, there are also many weapons such as swords, guns, swords, halberds, axes, hooks, etc., but they have all become decorations.

Needless to say, Zhu Gaochi, the eldest son of Ming Chengzu Zhu Di, Emperor Renzong Hongxi, is himself heavy on literature and light on martial arts, and is not interested in dancing with guns and sticks.

Moreover, he is obese and not good at walking, and he has no way to dance with guns and sticks, and engage in archery and horse riding.

As a result, the place soon lost its original purpose.

Later emperors of the Ming Dynasty, except for Emperor Zhengde of Ming Wuzong, who liked to practice martial arts since childhood, none of them were determined to emphasize martial arts and liked to practice martial arts.

As a result, after the middle and late Ming Dynasty, the political functions of the area around Banzai Mountain in the north of the Forbidden City were basically deserted, with bushes, lush forests, birds and beasts, and could be seen everywhere.

At the same time, because it is relatively secluded, I don't know when it began, and it became a place for stacking and storing coal in the Imperial Palace.

Therefore, over time, a good long live mountain fell into the nickname of Coal Mountain, and it spread from inside the palace to outside the palace.

After the Manchu Qing Dynasty entered the customs, the matter of Emperor Chongzhen's hanging on the coal mountain had already spread all over the world, and the people inside and outside the capital called this place the coal mountain, and the name of the long live mountain was obliterated.

Because the homonym of the coal mountain is not good, as the town of the Forbidden City, it is very unlucky, so after the Manchu Qing Dynasty entered the city of Beijing, it was quickly renamed Jingshan.

And this is also the origin of the so-called Jingshan Park in Beijing in later generations.

On the morning of this day, the sky was fine after the snow, and Emperor Chongzhen and several great eunuchs stood on a high ground on Banzai Mountain and looked south.

At this time, the air on the mountain is exceptionally clean, the sunlight is also extraordinarily bright, and the red walls and yellow tiles of the Forbidden City not far away are hidden in the white ice and snow, which looks beautiful.

Looking at the magnificent scenery in front of him, thinking of the despair and desolation when the original Emperor Chongzhen looked back at the Forbidden City before hanging himself, he was really emotional for a while!

The news that Emperor Chongzhen took some people out of Xuanwu Gate to Wansui Mountain to watch the snow scene was naturally sent to Gong Yonggu, the commander of Jinyiwei, and others as soon as possible.

Emperor Chongzhen hadn't finished his sigh yet, when he saw Gong Yonggu, the commander of Jinyiwei, Gao Wencai, the commander of Tiancewei, and Li Ruolian, the commander of Yulinwei, rushed over with one foot deep and one foot shallow.

Emperor Chongzhen came to Banzai Mountain, and these henchmen who were responsible for guarding the palace ban naturally had to guard them anytime and anywhere.

As soon as Gong Yonggu and the others came to the front of Emperor Chongzhen, they were about to kneel down and salute not far away, looking at the thick snow on the ground, and then turned their heads to look east at the old locust tree halfway up the mountain, Emperor Chongzhen waved his hand at Gong Yonggu and the three of them, and said:

"Forget it, let's be exempt! I saw that the sky was sunny after the snow today, and the scenery was good, but I just came out for a walk, why did you bother to mobilize the people, everyone is here?! ”

These people waited beside the emperor for a long time, and knew that the emperor did not mean to blame when he said this, so they hurriedly thanked him and bowed down.

Gong Yonggu, the commander of the Jinyi Guard, said: "Your Majesty! It's windy on the mountain, so it's better to go back to the palace early! If Your Majesty is still interested, it is better for the ministers to accompany the palace under the mountain to see the sheltered place! ”

At this time, there were not as many pavilions and pavilions as later generations saw on the Long Live Mountain, and those pavilions and pavilions were later ordered to be built by order of the Manchu Emperor Qianlong, who liked vassal elegance.

At this time, this platform on Banzai Mountain, as well as the stone bench on the platform, is still in this life Cao Huachun saw that Emperor Chongzhen always came here from time to time to stop and watch, so he cleaned up the shrubs and small trees in this place and took care of such a viewing platform.

Originally, Cao Huachun also asked the eunuchs and miscellaneous servants of the Shengong Prison to clean up all the rocks and bushes under the old locust tree in the east of Banzai, and wanted to give the emperor who always came to meditate to get a place to take a cool refuge from the heat, but he was severely criticized by Emperor Chongzhen, and finally gave up.

Since then, except for the road from the Xuanwu Gate of the Forbidden City to the Banzai Mountain, and from the Banzai Mountain to the Shouhuang Hall in the north, everything else has maintained its original tree-covered wild appearance.

"Let's go! Let's go with me to see the Temple of Protecting the Country and Loyalty! ”

Emperor Chongzhen said this, even if he agreed to Gong Yonggu's proposal.

Next, a few people walked down the stone-paved steps path on Banzai Mountain towards the back mountain.

The palace attendants who had already been ordered to come were busy clearing the snow from the road ahead, and the personnel of the three guards of the pro-army had already arrived and guarded both sides of the road below the mountain.

From Wansui Mountain all the way to the north, the palace group on the same central axis of the Xuanwu Gate of the Forbidden City is called the Shouhuang Palace.

The Shouhuang Palace is the place where several generations of emperors died after moving the capital to Beijing.

Later, because the road on the Long Live Mountain was in disrepair and slack, after the death of the emperor of the Ming Dynasty, if the coffin was still sent to the Shouhuang Palace to be parked, it was easy to overturn when crossing the Long Live Mountain, so the rules of the Shouhuang Palace were not abolished.

When the Emperor of the Apocalypse died, he simply parked his coffin in the White Tiger Hall in the Forbidden City.

But in the final analysis, of course, if you don't go to the Shouhuang Palace, there is nothing to see.

And the Protector Zhongyi Temple on the east side of the Shouhuang Palace, but you should go to see what the situation is.