After reading the excerpt that He Jing was about to send out, Hu Chuyuan couldn't help but praise He Qigong, and said, "The Governor is really very shrewd!" ”

"If you don't have this ability, how can you be in this position?"

He Qigong raised his eyebrows proudly, looking very proud, as if he also contributed to those proposals, but he immediately sighed: "It's a pity that my uncle still feels that these three reasons are also lacking in strength, and they may not be able to reverse the situation." Therefore, he asked me to come and discuss with you immediately, and take advantage of the time he is in charge of his post in the capital. If he waits for the end of his post, it will be extremely difficult to recover the situation after leaving the Jingshi. ”

Hu Chuyuan nodded slightly, pondered carefully for a moment, and then said to He Qigong: "When you go back, tell the Governor and let him add these two proposals to the excerpt." First, Fujian Shipyard took the opportunity of buying a ship to purchase equipment and technical patents from the West to imitate new ships, and sent shipyard trainees to learn art in various shipyards in Europe, so that our shipbuilding level was gradually improved, and we could build the world's first-class ironclad ships in ten years. Second, when the number of ships of the Fujian Naval Division increases, the old ships will be transferred to the Nanyang Naval Division, and the Nanyang Naval Division will not need to increase military spending to purchase new ships. ”

He Qigong smiled happily: "Wonderful, the virtuous brother is really not an ordinary person." As long as these two articles are added, the imperial court will definitely not be able to refute it, and at least it will give us a military fee. ”

Hu Chuyuan said: "That's true, let's buy half and build half, if we can't buy a boat, it will be difficult to imitate a new ship." ”

"There's one more thing ......!"

He Qigong really had a lot of things to discuss, and after talking about the twists and turns, he lowered his voice and whispered to Hu Chuyuan: "Uncle will secretly bring a sum of money when he returns to Beijing in previous years to dredge up the senior members of the Beijing division and make diplomatic connections. There are a lot of things to dredge up this year, and it is not easy to compete with Li Hefei for military spending, so ...... Uncle wants to take a lump sum from you. ”

Saying this, he also quietly observed Hu Chuyuan's expression, not knowing if Hu Chuyuan would agree.

Hu Chuyuan was noncommittal and asked, "How much?" ”

He Qigong stretched out three fingers and said, "I'm afraid that it will cost 300,000 taels of silver, and I have to pry open Prince Gong first, which is not so easy." ”

Hu Chuyuan said: "I will write a letter to you, you go directly to Jingshi Rong Baozhai to find my family's big shopkeeper Shen Furong, he will prepare everything." As long as it is in the capital to dredge up personnel, within 500,000 taels of silver, the uncle can be transferred at any time. ”

He Qigong was overjoyed and said with a smile: "300,000 taels of silver is roughly enough, if you smash out 500,000 taels of silver, this matter can be directly decided, let's smash out 500,000 here, and we can increase the military expenditure by at least 1 million taels every year in the future." ”

After a pause, he said again: "I'm afraid that there is no benefit from these things, and I am afraid that the 500,000 taels of silver will go and there will be no return, and I will damage my family for the affairs of the court, good brother...... Sure enough, there is a wind that makes my father anxious for justice and righteousness. ”

Hu Chuyuan said: "Brother, don't think about it, I'm also doing it for my own career, if the Fuzhou Shipbuilding Yamen has sufficient funds, I will be able to do things much more smoothly." Spend as much as you want, don't mind! ”

He knew in his heart that half of the money was for the purpose of dredging the financial problems of the Fuzhou Shipbuilding Yamen and the Fujian Naval Division, and the other half was that He Jing himself was also going to be active in Beijing.

He Qi immediately laughed a few times and said, "Okay, I will understand...... In fact, the virtuous brother can rest assured that the uncle will definitely not let his family suffer, but with the uncle sitting firmly in the position of the governor of Fujian and Zhejiang, and the business of the virtuous brother's family is profitable, then it will be ......! ”

Needless to say, these words are too innocent, and both of them know it very well in their hearts.

Hu Chuyuan's business has gone so smoothly, at most thirty percent of the credit belongs to him, and more relies on the secret support of Zuo Zongtang and He Jing.

At the moment, it can be said that as long as Hu Chuyuan secretly contributes money and efforts, conspires for Zuo Zongtang and He Jing on those things in the officialdom, he is more shrewd and cautious, and sets up camp step by step, the Hu family will not have any problems in the business field, and the speed of making money is even more amazing.

As for the future, we will have to see who the new governor of Liangjiang and Fujian and Zhejiang will be, but that will have to be after 1885.

In the past few years, Hu Chuyuan believes that he has enough time to operate, to put it mildly, if he can decide on the candidate, he is definitely willing to invest a few million taels of silver at a time.

As long as this kind of trading is done well and done well, the investment of several million taels of silver can be recovered in a year.

At the very least, he had to help Mei Qizhao find a position as a governor, and now, he and Mei Qizhao were already tied to the same boat.

And then backwards...... Hu Chuyuan understood that he had to rely on himself at that time.

At this moment, he threw out 500,000 taels of silver, if he could run the affairs of the Fuzhou Ship Administration Yamen well, it would be the basis for him to control a strong fleet.

Thinking of these things, he sneered in his heart.

What kind of ability is it to go to Nanyang to develop the navy, he still wants to control a navy under the noses of the Manchurians, and if it is well operated, it will not only be able to protect himself, but also be able to restrain the Manchurians, and he can play a role in drawing salaries at critical moments.

He was thinking like this, thinking about it, He Qigong also gave him another secret letter, and said: "When I went south, Lord Shen Baozhen, the secretary of the military department, also asked me to send a letter to you, I don't know what I want to say to you!" “

"Oh?"

Hu Chuyuan was slightly surprised, he didn't have any contact with Shen Baozhen, and immediately, he opened the letter and looked at it.

The content of the letter surprised Hu Chuyuan, it turned out that Shen Baozhen directly told him that there was a private money inside the shipmaster's yamen, that is, the legendary small treasury.

When the shipmaster yamen was first established, because there was always a surplus of the imperial court's appropriations, it was impossible for Shen Baozhen to send the money back to Beijing, so the surname Suo withheld the money and distributed it to Ye Wenlan, entrusting him to use the public funds to run a business and issue loans.

By the time Shen Baozhen was transferred from the governor of Liangjiang to the capital division to serve as the secretary of the military department, he had a total of 1.94 million taels of silver in his private possession, and had been working hard for many years, with a total amount of about 3.44 million taels of silver.

That was a year ago.

This year, Ye Wenlan privately transferred another 200,000 taels of silver, and the total amount was exactly how much, except for Ye Wenlan, no one else could say.

Shen Baozhen meant to give Ye Wenlan a dividend of 20% according to the original oral agreement, and the rest was taken back for public use, and said, "The virtuous nephew is very good at business, if there is spare power, it is advisable to operate on his own, and if the money is tight, he will take advantage of it to fund the shipping administration."

After reading the letter, Hu Chuyuan folded it and hid it in a secret bag between his clothes.

He Qigong asked curiously: "What is Lord Shen talking about, it seems to be very serious!" ”

Hu Chuyuan glanced at him and said, "It's not very serious, it's just that there is a private amount of money inside the yamen." ”

He Qigong sighed and said: "This matter, many people know, Ye Wenlan has often embezzled the public funds of the Yamen to do business over the years, and when Ding Yuechang was the Minister of Shipping, he received a huge bribe of more than 100,000 taels of silver from Ye Wenlan, and as a result, he was dismissed by the Huai family. Probably because of Shen Baozhen's protection, Ye Wenlan did not have an accident. After his uncle concurrently served as the Minister of Shipping, he was more afraid of this, but this private money did not exist. ”

Hu Chuyuan snorted.

He knows that He Jing is a very good "mixed" person, good at human feelings, and will not offend people easily, if it were not for his goal of being promoted to "Lord Zhongtang", and with his richest man's treasury as a guarantee, He Jing would never have gotten along with Li Hongzhang.

Hu Chuyuan weighed it in his heart, and wrote a reply letter to Shen Baozhen.

He first told Shen Baozhen that he would definitely deal with this problem properly, and would not be greedy for a cent, nor would he let more people know.

In addition, he had another proposal, hoping that Shen Baozhen would give a discount to the imperial court to strongly recommend the imperial court to set up a Fujian naval division, buy new ships, and imitate new ships; in order to solve the problem of funds, the imperial court can allocate an additional part every year, and the Fuzhou Shipbuilding Yamen can also invest in the establishment of a joint venture with the Jiangnan Commercial Bank to set up a Nanyang Commercial Bank, which is mainly engaged in import and export trade from Nanyang to China.

Second, in order to further improve the shipbuilding administration of Fuzhou and become a first-class shipyard in Asia within 10 years and a world-class shipyard within 20 years, it is necessary to carry out internal structural reforms, and it is also necessary to have the Fuzhou shipbuilding administration to fund a number of shipyards run by the government and the commercial companies, so as to use the commercial shipyards to train talents and accumulate experience.

A commercial shipyard can build a 6,000-ton merchant ship, a government factory can build a 3,000-ton warship, a commercial shipyard can build a 10,000-ton merchant ship, and a government factory can build a 7,000-ton warship.

At this point, he couldn't help but stop writing.

He suddenly discovered that Shen Baozhen was the only person in the late Qing political situation who was proficient in shipping administration and coastal defense, Zuo Zongtang and Li Hongzhang were both half-way monks, and Peng Yulin, Yang Yuebin and others were too conservative and could only handle traditional sailors and forts.

He knew, and the imperial court also knew, that the strategy that the imperial court had decided to "focus on the Beiyang and Nanyang sailors, supplemented by the Yangtze River and Fujian sailors" was laid down by Shen Baozhen.

Hu Chuyuan believed that although Shen Baozhen's time was short, only by gaining Shen Baozhen's trust and support could he set up a real world-class shipyard in Fuzhou Shipbuilding and train world-class ship engineers and naval generals.

He put the pen aside and said to He Qigong: "This letter is very important, I want to be cautious, and I will make a decision after discussing it with my staff in the evening." Cousin, you first rest in Fuzhou for one night, and tomorrow, I will bring you the letter back! ”

He Qigong smiled: "Of course, I just have to go home!" ”

Hu Chuyuan smiled, got up to send him off, and immediately invited Yan Shizhang to discuss with him how to write a reply to Shen Baozhen.

After the two discussed together, Hu Chuyuan decided to write out his entire plan and let Shen Baozhen see his ability and ambition.

Before coming to Fuzhou, Hu Chuyuan already had a whole set of ideas in his heart.

First of all, he had to spend two sums of money from the Fuzhou Shipyard Yamen to set up the Nanyang Commercial Bank, and cooperate with the traditional local shipbuilders to build a Fuzhou shipyard in the name of the government-owned business.

With these two foundations, he can vigorously increase the enrollment of the manufacturing class of the Shipyard School, and take advantage of the contracts with Britain, France and Germany to continuously send students to study in various countries to absorb the shipbuilding technology of Britain, France and Germany.

Third, he will transfer the affairs of the iron mill and coal mining to the Jiangnan Commercial Bank, and use the commercialization and large-scale operation of the Jiangnan Commercial Bank to reduce the shipbuilding costs of Fuzhou Shipyard and Fuzhou Shipyard.

Fourth, he carried out rectification and reform of the Fuzhou Shipping Administration, under the Minister of Shipping, there are four people, namely, the General Affairs Department, the Finance Department, and the Supervision and Examination Department, and the Shipping Bureau, the Engine Bureau, the Military Industry Bureau, the Chemical Industry Bureau, the Metallurgical Bureau and the Technical Bureau, and the Bureau has a factory, and each of the three departments and six bureaus has a meeting office.

Promote the management of people, manage the accounts, manage the process and acceptance, and the chief teacher and manage the shipbuilding school, these four people are four ranks, the three divisions and six bureaus will be five ranks, each bureau has one to three supervisors, and the technical bureau has five to ten supervisors, all of which are six ranks, and five grades can be added because of merit.

Only these people belonged to the official officials appointed by the imperial court, and the rest of them were all hired and no longer belonged to the official establishment, and the official system of the entire shipmaster yamen was more inclined to technical personnel, and the number of administrative officials was only a small part.

In addition, Hu Chuyuan believed that if the Fujian Navy Division wanted to develop further, it must be transferred to the name of the Governor of Fujian and Zhejiang, which would be directly under the Governor's Office, and the Minister of Shipping of Fuzhou would only be responsible for co-organizing.

The original intention of the imperial court was to directly control the Fujian naval division through the Fuzhou Shipping Minister, so as not to let this fleet be subject to the local political axe, but the actual effect was unsatisfactory, so that Li Chengmou, Peng Chuhan and other famous generals of the Hunan army's naval division refused to serve as the commander of the naval division.

In the case of insufficient funds in the imperial court, the surname Suo was directly supervised by the governor of Fujian and Zhejiang, and taxes were levied on the spot and used on the spot.

Hu Chuyuan even wrote down his plan to open a railway in the future to transport coal and iron ore from central Fujian, and with the development of the whole plan, he wanted to build a new shipyard and naval base in Luoqing Bay, making Luoqing Bay the final naval base of the Fujian Navy Division, and opening a branch base in Ningbo.

Hu Chuyuan wrote tens of thousands of words, citing a large number of materials and research, proving that his idea is completely achievable, and only needs Shen Baozhen's full support.

Hu Chuyuan wrote the letter, and Yan Shizhang revised and copied it again, and then sealed it with vermilion lacquer, and then sent someone to hand it over to He Qigong and asked him to take it back to the capital and hand it over to Shen Baozhen.