It was already late, Hu Chuyuan was wearing the official uniform of a first-class officer, and silently and resolutely led the ministers of the Military Aircraft Department and Zhang Jing into the Qianqing Palace.

After the eunuchs opened the door, Hu Chuyuan looked up and saw Emperor Guangxu sitting on the dragon chair with some fear, surrounded by Zhang Baixi and other close ministers, he was not flustered, but his face was pale.

Seeing Hu Chuyuan, Emperor Guangxu wanted to stand up to greet him, but he didn't stand up, just sat on the dragon chair a little indifferently.

Hu Chuyuan took a few steps forward and paid homage to Emperor Guangxu and said: "Weichen is late to save the car, please ask the emperor to punish him!" ”

Zaiyan's heart seems to be a little cold.

He is not stupid, he knows that if Hu Chuyuan comes back two months earlier, Cixi will not be released, and if Cixi does not come out, he will be able to stabilize the situation.

He silently wanted to punish Hu Chuyuan, but he didn't dare to speak, and after a while, he didn't seem to want to pursue it anymore, sighed in a low voice, and said, "What is Aiqing's crime, let's be even...... Give Hu Zhongtang ...... Sit! ”

It took a lot of determination for him to get the last word out.

It can be seen that he really hates Hu Chuyuan, but he doesn't know how long he will hate.

Hu Chuyuan was silent, sat down first, and then continued with Zaiyan: "Your Majesty, Weichen has controlled the situation, the Queen Mother temporarily lives in Jingyi Garden, and no one will disturb it, Prince Shiduo and Prince Zhuang, Prince Yi and others have also taken it one by one, and Jingqi is detained in the camp, and there is no other panic for the time being." Take this opportunity, Your Majesty, you should officially declare the constitution and stabilize the situation once and for all. ”

Emperor Guangxu looked at the floor silently, unable to speak for a while.

After being silent for a long time, he asked Zhang Baixi to take out a cabinet list and asked the eunuch to transfer it to Hu Chuyuan.

Hu Chuyuan opened this legendary list, and it was not as terrifying as the legend, the first minister in the prime minister's cabinet was still Prince Gong Wang Yi, but he was temporarily sketched with a red pen and replaced with him - Hu Chuyuan.

The original arrangement was that Hu Chuyuan would be the second deputy assistant minister in the prime minister's cabinet, in charge of internal affairs and military affairs, Prince Su Longqin would be the third prime minister and foreign minister, Zhang Baixi would be the prime minister and minister of coastal defense, and Liu Mingchuan would be the prime minister and minister of land defense.

On this list, the ministers of the six Shangshu are still retained, and the Manchu and Han still have one each, the Han Shangshu is the mainstay, and the Manchu Shangshu is only responsible for supervision and containment, and the overall change is not large.

After a rough look, Hu Chuyuan said: "Your Majesty, this is no different from an unconstitutional, I'm afraid it won't be able to calm the people's hearts." Please also hand over this matter to Wechen to handle, and after a while, Wechen submitted a more detailed constitutional proposal, and asked the emperor to rest assured. ”

Emperor Guangxu didn't know what to say, but Zhang Baixi asked, "I don't know how Lord Zhongtang wants to plan?" ”

Hu Chuyuan said: "The matter has come to this, let's draft the constitution first, there is a law to follow, it is the real constitution, just submit a cabinet list, what does it mean?" In the final analysis, it is just a change of tricks for ordinary mediocre ministers, hastily covering up the constitution, and Weichen thinks that this is definitely not the emperor's original intention! ”

Emperor Guangxu bowed slightly, and said: "Hu Zhongtang still understands my intentions, now that you are back, no matter how big the matter is, you have a bottom in your heart, and you also have a way to do it, so I naturally don't have to worry too much." Okay, you go back and think about it first, and I'll see your excerpt later! ”

Hu Chuyuan nodded, got up and left.

He and Emperor Guangxu Zaiyan's words were also heard by the Minister of Military Aircraft, Weng Tongyi, Zhang Zhiwan, and Yan Jingming, and everyone gathered together to discuss when they returned to the military aircraft yamen.

A few days ago, Hu Chuyuan was not in the country, and many things were controlled by Zhang Baixi, the problem is that Zhang Baixi does not have that kind of control and prestige at all, and the contradictions between them are not small.

In addition, there is not even a single Manchu in this batch of military ministers, and the Manchus don't know what they are plotting at all, so they will naturally be suspicious.

Hu Chuyuan deliberately excluded Zhang Baixi temporarily, and secretly discussed with the three of them all night.

First of all, it is necessary to legislate, the "Provisional Charter Act of the Qing Empire" has already been drafted, and Hu Chuyuan has already prepared it, which is drafted by Niu Yugeng, Ouyang Geng and others, and is tailored to the current situation with reference to the Qing law and the British constitutional bill.

None of these three people are constitutionalists, but they understand that the current situation has reached the point where there is no turning back, either constitutionalism or get out together.

Hu Chuyuan put forward a suggestion, that is, to enact a new law, do old things, and gradually change it year by year.

The new interim constitution was erected first, and things were still handled in the same way as before, and gradually improved.

First of all, the Military Aircraft Department was reorganized into the Cabinet Office, with three prime ministers, the prime minister's first assistant, the prime minister's interior affairs, and the prime minister's foreign affairs, and the Cabinet Privy Council, with the Privy Council foreman Zhang Jing, responsible for coordinating the cabinet's official affairs and formulating administrative laws, and then managing affairs, finance, agriculture, industry, commerce, education, the army, navy, communications, postal services, and civil affairs, a total of 16 cabinet ministers.

In addition, there is an internal affairs office, with two ministers, the internal affairs clan and the etiquette administration, who are responsible for maintaining the royal etiquette and the imperial family treasures, supervising the construction of palaces and gardens, and also responsible for protecting the security of the Forbidden City, and has the sole right to command a Praetorian Guard with four battalions.

In accordance with this system, the governors of each province set up a general administrative office in each province, which was responsible for the specific affairs of each province.

Hu Chuyuan is naturally the prime minister, there is no doubt about this, and he will not consider letting Xian, this is indeed the moment to give in.

He was responsible for submitting the list of other ministers, with Mei Qizhao as the prime minister's deputy assistant to the interior minister, and the prime minister of foreign affairs still let Prince Su Longqin take the role, but Ouyang Geng was transferred back from the post of minister to the United States and appointed as the prime minister's foreign affairs and consular minister.

Zhang Jing, the foreman of the Privy Council, is headed by Gu Jiaxiang, the Minister of Justice is led by Zhang Zhiwan, and the position of Minister of Finance is still under Yan Jingming, and the rest of the positions are appropriately arranged.

The Senate was set up, and the governors and governors of each province recommended one person to enter the Senate to discuss the government and politics in Beijing to ensure that local interests were fully considered in the implementation of the new policy. Weng Tong-yong was placed in the seat of the Minister of Counsel and Counsel of the House of Councillors, responsible for coordinating and negotiating with the provincial senators, and concurrently serving as the Minister of Etiquette of the Ministry of Internal Affairs, and continued to serve as an academician of Hallym.

In general, there are only two major changes in the constitutional reform led by Hu Chuyuan, first, the power of the Manchus has basically been eliminated, and there is no distinction between Manchu and Han scholars and ministers, and the main positions are Hanchen; Second, the Manchu flattery system was completely abolished, the establishment of the Eight Banners Battalion was abolished, and the annual living allowance of 60 Qingyuan was only continued for ten years, and the new army was re-trained to defend the Forbidden City.

Not only that, Hu Chuyuan also put all the blame on Cixi and those Manchu clans, and suggested in one breath that the six iron hat kings should be abolished, and more than 70 county kings and Baylor should be abolished.

With Hu Chuyuan taking control of the entire Jingshi, most of the Manchu nobles were expelled from Huguangying to the Xishan area and detained, and the whole situation had to change so much.

After Hu Chuyuan proposed a new provisional constitution and cabinet list, Emperor Guangxu officially issued an edict on May 14, 1896, implementing the reform of the new constitutional monarchy.

Because the scale of this reform was larger than everyone expected, especially the suppression of the Manchus was too harsh, and soon, another skirmish broke out among the Manchus in the Xishan area, resulting in a fighting between the two armies.

The governors and governors of various places can't help but be a little worried, is this law still the Qing Dynasty?

But no matter what everyone says or thinks, Emperor Guangxu Zaiyan still supports this, and his rights must have been restricted, but there are no particularly big changes, and the three prime ministers, cabinet ministers, and ministers of the army, and the navy, must still be approved by his appointment.

At the same time, he had the right to replace the three prime ministers' cabinet ministers at any time, so as to control the government, and he had no right to change the two military ministers at any time, but only had the right to appoint or refuse to appoint.

For the time being, this is acceptable to both sides.

What Emperor Guangxu could not accept was that he dismissed too many princes of the clan at one time, plus the second Xishan Rebellion, a total of eight iron hat kings were abolished, which is equivalent to the removal of the iron hat kings of the clan, and the amount of county kings and Baylor was even greater, and these people must also be escorted back to Fengtianfu.

He knew in his heart that he was a Manchu after all, and without the support of these Manchu royal families, his position as emperor might not be stable.

In short, it's a tough thing to do.

The problem is that Hu Chuyuan doesn't intend to compromise, he has endured it for so long, just to empty the rotten flesh in Yanjing City once and drive them back to the northeast. When he arrived in the northeast, where the emperor was far away, he came to slowly clean up these people.

The two discussed this for a long time, and in the end, Zai Yan still had to accept Hu Chuyuan's death advice and dismiss all these princes. In addition, there is another thing, Zhang Baixi, who Zai Xiang admires the most, did not appear in the cabinet list.

This made Jae-yan dissatisfied, but he didn't say it.

Hu Chuyuan understood in his heart that after Zai Yan approved the new constitution and the first batch of cabinet lists, he talked with Zhang Baixi at the Qinzheng Hall in Zhongnanhai for a night, asking Zhang Baixi not to rush into the cabinet.

He also persuaded Zhang Baixi not to think that he could do everything with the emperor's trust, but to start at the local level, train in the position of governor and governor for a few years, and then return to Beijing to become the real prime minister and minister of the interior.

After all, Zhang Baixi was a person he cultivated, so he accepted Hu Chuyuan's suggestion and went to Fujian and Zhejiang to replace Mei Qizhao as the governor of Fujian and Zhejiang.

On the one hand, Zhang Baixi was sent out of Beijing, and on the other hand, Hu Chuyuan also promoted his descendant Huo Hongji to replace Liu Kunyi as the governor of Liangjiang, and Tan Zhonglin replaced Liu Jintang as the governor of Liangguang, and Rong Lu was transferred to the governor of the three eastern provinces...... It can be regarded as a comfort to Zaiyan, and Lu Chuanlin succeeded Rong Lu as the governor of Huguang.

Hu Chuyuan's basic policy is indeed to enact new laws and do old things, and to do the old things of the pragmatic school, and there has been no major change on the whole.

It's just that the group of scholars in the Beijing division changed positions and powers, and the Manchurians were driven out, and a new group of special officials were recruited. Most of these officials came from the senior government yamen, and they were full of various parts, focusing on some important matters.

In addition, Hu Chuyuan reopened the mechanism of erudition and Hongzi, and recruited Jinshi through other channels, the so-called Erudite Hongzi is like the Han Dynasty's filial piety and honesty system, recommended by local officials, reviewed and assessed by the imperial court, and confirmed that he was able to give Jinshi the background, and prepared to appoint a scholar.

This mechanism was used on a large scale in the early Qing Dynasty, and now it is being used exclusively for overseas students who have returned from studying abroad.

It was during this period that Hu Chuyuan appointed Zeng Pu, one of the second batch of young children studying in the United States, to replace Hurd as the General Taxation Department of the General Administration of Customs, and replaced Hurd's cronies on a large scale.

Everything is very well prepared, Zeng Pu served as the deputy commissioner of customs in San Francisco before that, and has been working in the customs since returning to China, and other customs officers have also been trained and interned in foreign countries, and have successively taken over Min Customs and Guangdong Customs.

(To be continued)