And the reason why Zeng Guoquan and Zuo Zongtang can be like this is actually due to Zeng Guofan. Although Zeng Guofan and Zuo Zongtang were out of harmony, he didn't want to affect the relationship between his younger brother and Zuo Zongtang because www.biquge.info of himself, so he also wrote a letter to his younger brother and said: "Zuo Jigao treats his younger brother very concerned, and his younger brother should be sincere to each other, and he should not always have wisdom to meet each other." Mortals come with hypocrisy, I go with sincerity, and after a long time, the hypocrites tend to be sincere. Zeng Guoquan was originally sandwiched between his brother and friends, and he didn't know what to do, but after knowing his brother's attitude, while maintaining contact with Zuo Zongtang, he also tried every means to reconcile the relationship between the two, but unfortunately it had little effect.

"How's Yuanpu's account going?" Zuo Zongtang looked at Zeng Guoquan who was sitting there with a big grin, made him a cup of tea with his own hands, and served it to him.

"I've been busy for the past few months, hehe." Zeng Guoquan laughed, "I can only play back with 'no evidence'." ”

Listening to Zeng Guoquan's answer, Zuo Zongtang's heart fell to the ground and he also laughed.

"As long as the salary and equipment are sufficient, there will be no worries about the westward expedition." Zuo Zongtang said, "Now that Ma Hualong is dead, the thieves have lost their chieftains, and they can be leveled with one blow." ”

"On the day of success, don't forget the love of the old people." Zeng Guoquan said meaningfully.

Of course, Zuo Zongtang understood the meaning of Zeng Guoquan's words, this time the imperial court sent Zeng Guoquan to check his expenditure on Zuo Zongtang's military expenses for the Western Expedition, Zeng Guoquan helped him block it, this favor is not ordinary.

And the "old man" that Zeng Guoquan said did not only refer to himself, but also his brother Zeng Guofan.

This time, the imperial court sent Zuo Zongtang to the west. Zeng and Zuo also had another chance to meet (and the last).

Zuo Zongtang attaches great importance to this opportunity to lead the army to make contributions. pacified the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom, and he has always been a supporting role in Zeng Guofan. This time, he became the main character. Although Zuo Zongtang is now old and his beard is gray, he is full of pride and determination to play in his last life drama.

However, this expedition faced one of the biggest problems, and that was to raise money. Because the northwest is a barren region under heaven, the source of income cannot be counted on the locality, and it is necessary to "use the wealth of the southeast to support the armored soldiers of the northwest." At the beginning of the Western Expedition, he declared to the imperial court that in this war, "raising salaries" was more important than commanding battles.

In this way, Zeng Guofan and Zuo Zongtang will inevitably have to deal with each other again. Because in the ninth year of Tongzhi, Zeng Guofan returned to serve as the governor of Liangjiang, and Jiangsu under his jurisdiction was an important source of income for Zuo Zongtang's western expeditionary army. In fact, although the imperial court stipulated that the provinces should supply the military expenses of the Western Expeditionary Army in a timely manner according to their shares, only a few provinces with a good personal relationship with Zuo Zongtang tried their best to supply, and those provinces with an average personal relationship with Zuo Zongtang failed to meet the deadline. However, Hunan has stopped solving one-third, Henan has allocated less than one-tenth, and Guangdong, Fujian, and Sichuan also have many unresolved." Therefore, when Zuo Zongtang heard that Zeng Guofan had returned to Liangjiang, his first reaction was that he was worried that Zeng Guofan would not support him sincerely and sabotage his great achievements: "I am not in agreement with Zeng Gong, and now he is the governor of Liangjiang, for fear that he will hide my source of salary and lose my merits."

At the beginning of Zeng Guofan's return to office, because of the delivery of procedures, the first batch of salaries arrived a little slowly. Zuo Zongtang thought that this proved his guess, and wrote indignantly in a letter to Wu Tongyun: "Zeng Digong is not an old friend for forty years? It is the salary of the first expedition to the east, and then the salary of the expedition to the west. He was relieved of his salary for several months upon the arrival of Ma Gushan (i.e., Ma Xinyi...... Worlds apart. Di Gong is still like this, let alone anything else. ”

However, it was not long before he discovered that he had misjudged. Subsequently, the share of military salaries in Zeng's share of the feudal domain was continuously delivered, stably and reliably, not only in full but also in a timely manner, "to as much as 1 hundred thousand taels". This surprised Zuo Zongtang. "He has always spared no effort to raise salaries for the Western Expeditionary Army, and he has relied on it to make a lot of money."

In addition, Zeng Guofan handed over his most proud subordinate Liu Songshan to Zuo Zongtang for use, and Liu Songshan made great contributions during his westward expedition, which helped Zuo Zongtang greatly.

The intersection of Zeng and Zuo in his later years can be regarded as a little moved by Zuo Zongtang. Prior to this, Zuo Zongtang was wearing two pairs of colored glasses, "Imperial Examination Complex" and "Yuliang Complex", and always thought that Zeng Guofan was a hypocrite who used art to control people, and only then did he have the intention of overturning his previous judgment.

Zuo Zongtang thought about it, and felt that he was still pressed by Zeng Guofan, since Zeng Guofan did such a beautiful job, he Zuo Zongtang also had to behave more chicly. So, when summing up his achievements in the west, he gave most of the credit to Liu Songshan, an old subordinate of the deceased Zeng Guofan, and thus gave Zeng Guofan a lot of praise. In the recital, he also said: "The minister tasted the private talk of Zeng Guofan, known as a knowledgeable person, and Liu Songshan was especially insightful late. Liu Songshan from Anhui and Henan to the provinces, Zeng Guofan tasted enough of his military food to treat each other, relieved of 1 million taels of salary, so that he was a thief, worry-free lack, with the ability to protect the dying Qin, the Jin who could not support it, the speed of defending Gidian, to see the horse on foot, for the first in the world. That is, this huge stock swing, in all fairness, why not Liu Songshan's power? In this way, the ministers obeyed the wisdom of the people of Zeng Guofan, and the loyalty of the country was beyond the reach of the ministers...... He has no admiration for the grace of heaven, and will be able to appoint Liu Songshan of Zeng Guofan, whose heart is important to the king, and its effect is attributed to the current situation, and it is clearly declared, and it is persuaded to be useful to the ministers of Xinjiang. He also "modestly" said that he knew Liu Songshan more than ten years ago, but he did not discover his talent.

said this openly on the scene, but in private, Zuo Zongtang explained his motives for such a twist and turn in a letter to his sons: "I have been dissatisfied with Digong recently, and I am only interested in appreciating Shouqing (Liu Songshan's character Shouqing), and I am the most insightful, which can be described as knowing people and being loyal to the country. This time, Shou Qing is the leader, and it cannot but be attributed to the ability of Di Gong to be a personnel king. Although there is a slight suspicion of personal relations, Yu Gongyi is deeply respected, so he specially invited the award to encourage Xinjiang officials. The husband is bright and upright, and the righteousness of the Spring and Autumn Period: 'The pen is the pen, and the cutting is sharpening'; Wu Neng harms the public friendship with his personal suspicions, and all of them are wiped out, which is similar to the contemptible husband who hides the virtuous and jealous of the ability! People think that I and those who have had a discord, look at this and know that I am black and white, and I am not a person who is dedicated to making trouble. ”

Zuo Zongtang thought that such a twist would reveal his "big husband's bright and upright" mind, "I should know that my black and white are clear, and I am not a person who is dedicated to making trouble." But I didn't want to play this performance, and the audience was shocked. People in the officialdom couldn't turn the corner for a while, and they couldn't understand why Zuo Zongtang suddenly had such a big change, so they unanimously recognized that Zuo's motives were impure, thinking that he used Yang Zeng to promote Liu Songshan, and Yang Liu Songshan was to promote himself, and Yang himself was to belittle Li Hongzhang. As a result, Zeng Guofan also speculated. Zeng Guofan then said in a letter to Guo Songtao: "Zuo Shuai and Liu Shouqing are fallacious and contemptible, and the commentators say that he stretches out the Qin master and suppresses Huaiyong, but I don't know what it means. ”

And Zeng Guoquan said such a thing at this time, obviously reminding him not to make such an oolong again.

"Zeng Gong is very gracious, and he will never forget it." Zuo Zongtang said with a smile, and he didn't know which of the Zeng brothers he was referring to in this sentence "Zeng Gong".

At this time, outside the house, Xu Zhanbiao, Kong Dehong and Song Qing, who had just arrived, listened to bursts of laughter from time to time in the house, all of them were a little inexplicable, but although they looked at each other, no one dared to go in or leave, so they could only wait there helplessly.

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Hong Jun's "Diary of the West":

"On the tenth day of the first month, it was sunny, and the sun carved through Chaozhou. The ship sailed from Tianjin, and traveled 4,6700 miles in several days. If it is not the speed of a ship, how can it be like this? After breakfast, climb the rudder tower, look at the stormy waves and snow, and the sky is slight. I saw more than a dozen fishing boats in the distance, and hung the seats between the waves and waves. Counting the ocean, there are thousands of miles, and so far I have seen a boat. ”

"Eleventh, cloudy. Chenke to Hong Kong. The overlapping peaks are like a picture. Entering the port, dozens of miles of buildings are uneven, close to the foothills, compared with Tianjin, Shanghai and Fuzhou, there is a different scene. At noon, take a small boat to the shore at a glance. The streets are clean and tidy, and there are many Chinese in the market. Shen Zheng, open the line. ”

"On the twelfth, sunny, warm, noon, three or four people holding a clairvoyant mirror to peep into the shadow of the sun, the clouds sailed from the boat, and there were five miles of seven hundred and thirty miles in ten hours. It is night, the bright moon is like day, the blue sea is not waves, leaning on the railing and looking into the distance, fluttering and fluttering with the feeling of Lingyun. ”

"Thirteenth, warm. At the beginning of the day, I saw the sea and the sun rising, and the weather was myriad. At noon, the boat people peep into the shadow of the sun, Kun Yuyun since yesterday noon, it is twelve, and there are seven miles of 1,200 miles. It is only 1,180 miles away from the mouth of Annanhai. However, since the beginning of the Chen, it has been seen that the mountain islands of Vietnam stretch hundreds of miles away in the west. ”

"On the 14th, fine. Not carved into the port. Twists and turns to the northeast, the shrubs on both sides of the bank are overgrown, and the verdant is endless. It is only three or four miles wide, and it is a few feet narrow. Entering the Ludizhou in the south of the Yangtze River, and suspected of entering the Wuling Peach Blossom Spring. Traveling one hundred and eighty miles, you carved the beginning of the boat. Dozens of new western-style buildings were built on the left side of the bank, and the French naval commander garrisoned 3,000 soldiers, and it has been three years since the construction of the port office. The barracks are extremely various buildings, rough and large-scale. There are 50,000 or 60,000 people living in Fujian and Guangzhou. The natives use Chinese, and the name of the county is the same as Hua. This place is under the jurisdiction of Pingyang County, Xinping Prefecture, Jiading Province, and its local name is Yazhou. The royal residence is in Tokyo, half a month away. There are three out of thirty provinces in the country, and the territory is not wide, about one or two provinces in the Middle Earth. A few years ago, he fought with France and won the victory. Ten years old coins, 400,000 silver dollars a year, 4 million, and the army was dismissed. It was agreed to divide the three provinces with it, and collect rent and tax to be the current currency. There is no other production in the land, only rice. Chinese traffickers are in an endless stream. The inhabitants were only half covered with a single cloth. Men grow their hair in a bun, and they don't need to. The woman is barefoot and has no hairpins. What you see is not male and female. Residential thatched huts, all of which are made of wood, do not use bedding, and do not need cloth. There is no rain in winter and spring, and after April, the wind and rain are blowing, and the roof tiles are flying. Therefore, although the royal palace is also very humble. Coix is produced, and each stone is worth one yuan. Betel nut, coconut palm, a forest ......"

――――Dividing Line――――

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