The end of the year is approaching, and the storm and snow have been going on for many days. In the morning, it is sunny, but every time after noon, there is heavy snowfall, and the blizzard makes it difficult to walk in the streets and alleys of Beijing, and there is a white carpet of endless snow outside the city, and even the mountain tops are covered with thick snow. Located in Qianhai West Street, Prince Gong's Mansion has the first palace in this forty-nine city, and this mansion is the residence of the Qianlong Dynasty's Quan Xiang and Kun. He Kun played with power, embezzled and took bribes, accumulated countless amounts of silver, and built this mansion second only to the imperial palace. After Qianlong's death, Hekun fell, and Emperor Jiaqing gave it to his brother King Qing, and after several twists and turns, it came into the hands of King Gong. For more than 20 years, King Gong has been in an important position as the foreman of the Military Aircraft Department, taking charge of the government and power. In the past, the New Year's festival was approaching, and for a time the palace was full of visitors, and the officials of the dynasty would come to pay their respects in person, and the local officials had appointed their cronies to come to pay their respects. However, now this qiē has become a thing of the past, since four years ago, the queen mother used the unfavorable war profits on the Vietnamese front as an excuse to completely dismiss a group of military aircraft, since Jia Shen Yishu, once the power of the government and the opposition King Gong has become a thing of the past,

After breakfast, he took a walk in the east garden of the palace and recited a few Tang poems at will. Looking at the snow scene in the park, I suddenly got an inspiration in my head, and I got a collection of sentences. He hurried back to his study, took out a piece of paper, and wrote down the poem. As soon as he finished writing, the chief of the palace came to report: Li Zhongtang's sedan chair had stopped outside the mansion gate.

Although King Gong was dismissed, he is still the prince, and he has been in power for many years, and there are many people who have benefited from him. If it is an ordinary minister, after King Gong has read the name post, he will explain the long history with a sentence of "I know, thank you", and there will be no follow-up. Changshi understands what the prince means. Go out and politely turn away visitors. In this way, the visitor is not surprised, but thinks it is very appropriate, because at this time, the visitor is just the practice of the New Year, and it is inconvenient for each other to talk deeply, and even do not know whether there is a secret agent of the king of alcohol next to the palace, and the shorter the sedan chair, the better, and the mind is on the line.

This is the interaction between officialdom, which is unreasonable, but everyone does it, and it is reasonable. However, Li Hongzhang is not an ordinary minister, his friendship with King Gong is also unusual, for many years King Gong and the Queen Mother, is Li Hongzhang's reliance on Shandong, the reason why King Gong was called "devil six", is precisely because of his full support for Li Hongzhang and others to do foreign affairs, Li Hongzhang has lived in Tianjin for half a year, and now he personally visited before the New Year's Festival, and he can't see it. King Gong put down the pen in his hand and said to Changshi:

"Invite Li Zhongtang to the newspaper reading room."

The newspaper reading room in the palace is a house specially set up for King Gong to read newspapers and periodicals from various Western countries. King Gong did not understand foreign languages, and the articles in these newspapers and periodicals had naturally been translated by the General Administration. All the furnishings in the room are a set of Western style, exquisite and elegant, comfortable and practical.

"Lord Wang."

As soon as Li Hongzhang entered the newspaper reading room, he was about to bow down, but King Gong hurriedly held his shoulders with both hands and prevented him from kneeling.

"Zhongtang is old, don't be like this."

As he spoke, he personally led Li Hongzhang to the seat by the wall and invited him to sit down. This is a set of Western cowhide sofas, which were given by the British Minister Wittoma in the early years.

"Lord Wang, are you doing well lately?"

Li Hongzhang looked at King Gong, who was already showing signs of aging in his early fifties, and asked with concern.

"Thanks to the blessing of the ancestors, it's okay."

Yiyi smiled and said,

"Zhongtang looks very good, I really admire your maintenance skills."

"How can there be maintenance work, just don't want to do anything."

Li Hongzhang laughed.

"It's good not to think about things, but you can't think about this military event! But now, it's easier to miss people! People will naturally take good care of it. ”

Yi said a long sigh, but how could Li Hongzhang not hear the complaints in that sigh.

Over the years, Li Hongzhang has admired Yiyi's instrument, Yisu appreciates Li Hongzhang's talent, and the two are very compatible in the big plan, both internally and externally, so in the past 20 years, Li Hongzhang and Yiyi, in addition to the tacit understanding in the officialdom, also have a deep friendship in personal relations. Because he knows each other well, Li Hongzhang doesn't need to say it, and there are some things that don't need to be said.

Looking at Li Hongzhang in front of him, Yiyi suddenly thought: Li Hongzhang has always lived in Tianjin, why did he come to Beijing this time? In previous years, during the New Year's Festival, he always sent his cronies over, could it be that the Queen Mother had something important to summon him to discuss?

"After all this gossip, I haven't asked you yet, when did you come to Jingshi and where you live."

"I arrived yesterday afternoon, and I stayed at Xianliang Temple."

Yiyi nodded: "Is there anything important?"

"There is a major event to report to the Queen Mother in person, I haven't handed over the sign yet, I came here first, one to visit the prince, and the other to ask the prince for advice."

"What a big deal, don't wait until the end of the New Year."

Yiyi said, his expression immediately became solemn. He knew that Li Hongzhang came to Beijing to tell the Queen Mother in person during this New Year's Festival, which was naturally a great event. But what's the big deal lately?

"No, there is another demon incident on the Korean side, the king of North Korea has been in frequent contact with those Enlightened Party members recently, and Yuan Weiting sent a telegram saying that if the imperial court continues to act, I am afraid that the situation will be irreversible in the future."

Li Hongzhang said, took out the telegram from his sleeve pocket, and handed it to Yi Su.

"This is a telegram from the comfort pavilion, please take a look at it."

Yiyi took the telegram, read it carefully, and then returned it to Li Hongzhang, picked up the tea bowl, sipped it slowly, and didn't say a word. Korea is the last vassal state of the Qing Dynasty, especially since the loss of the vassal state of Vietnam, Korea, a vassal state, is the last fig leaf for the Qing State to maintain the "Heavenly Empire", and it is precisely because of this that in the past few years, the imperial court will change its past state and do everything possible to control it, so as to save the last face of the Great Qing State.

Li Hongzhang asked humbly.

"Look, Lord Wang, how to deal with this matter in North Korea now?"

Yiyi was silent for a while before speaking.

"The matter of North Korea, Zhongtang, you have either already made a decision, or you are "not a false name and really have the effect of suppression", the arbitrariness of the Comfort Pavilion in North Korea, although if people criticize it, but the court does not know the pain of the Comfort Pavilion. ”

From the Renwu Mutiny, the Jiashen coup d'état and the later Juwen Island incident, the imperial court became more and more involved in Korean affairs at that time, especially after the second "Korea-Russia Secret Treaty", Li Hongzhang even believed that what North Korea did was a move of "betraying China and getting rid of the Qing Dynasty", that is, this kind of distrust made the court realize the importance of strengthening the management of Korean vassals, but what was faced with a variety of choices back then, one was to aid the Zhou example, set up a prison state in North Korea, and the other was to accept North Korea as a province and place a county, but whether it was a county or a prison country, However, the situation in North Korea cannot be handled by the Qing Dynasty. However, North Korea is related to the border defense of Manchuria, and it is also related to the image and face of the Qing Dynasty, so it is categorically unable to give up, which is why Li Hongzhang's "person who does not have a false name and really has the effect of suppression", and these years have indeed been effective.

"The prince is serious. It's just the duty of a courtier, but Lord, now that the Japanese and North Korea are eyeing each other, they can't help but guard against it. ”

Yiyi heard the words in Li Hongzhang's words, so he said.

"It's not a year or two since the Japanese have run a sailor, Lao Qi, this naval yamen, hey......"

He said that the old seven-fingered prince of alcohol, when the water master was founded by his sixth hand, but in the end Beiyang became a teacher, but the seventh only took ten days to pick the peach, even if it was five years, every time he mentioned this, it was still difficult to swallow that breath, but there was no way, who made the emperor the son of someone.

"Allowing Changshu to do it brutally, there is no reason not to strengthen armaments in peacetime, so do you have to wait until the war with France was like that year, when it was difficult to buy weapons and ammunition, and then buy them at a high price?"

"The prince is very right!"

Yiyi's words really went to Li Hongzhang's heart. Not to mention that the Navy Yamen agreed to allocate 2 million taels of funds every year to Zhang Zhidong to repair the thousands of miles of north-south railway, it was the household department that threw out that "clumsiness" and asked Nanyang to stop purchasing weapons and ships. is full of resentment and grievances.

This is an errand for the Qing Kingdom......

"They don't want to do so much, we can't help but think about it, take this North Korea as an example, the Navy Yamen doesn't want to do this, but Lord Wang, we can't help it! Although this North Korea is a small place, it is the face of our Great Qing Kingdom, but now Russia is staring, the East is greedy, and the Americans are also watching, as for the North Koreans themselves, they also have the idea of "leaving China and betraying the Qing Dynasty", if North Korea loses it again, the face of our Great Qing Kingdom will be lost! ”

Li Hongzhang's words were understood as soon as he heard them. Whether it is in foreign affairs or foreign affairs, the two of them are completely identical.

"Yes!"

Yi Su said in a long tone.

"Now this business is tight, but Lao Qi and Changshu are ...... Besides, I'm not asking anything now, hey! It's hard to do this foreign thing! It's hard for them! ”

Yiyi picked up the tea bowl, and the sound was embarrassing, and Ji said that it was embarrassing, but it was more like a sneer.

"If it is in the hands of the people who will do it, it is estimated that it will not be difficult at all!"

Li Hongzhang smiled, then looked at King Gong and said.

"Shaoquan, what do you mean......"

Yi Su dragged out his voice, looked at Li Hongzhang, and knew that he still had something to say.

"I remember, aren't the ministers of Western countries talking about that book of "Tai Xice" these days!"

Li Hongzhang laughed unconsciously.

"You mean Tang Ziran, from his book "Tai Xice", it can be seen that he has a bit of talent, when Zhang Xiangtao promoted him, didn't he also say that he was proficient in Western studies, foreign affairs, business and military affairs, and he made the method of banning smoking a while ago, I also saw it, and it can get millions of dollars without spending people's labor, I think, if the court employs people, he must also let him try, so as not to leave the virtuous township."

Yiyi lifted the lid of the tea bowl, a sneer appeared at the corner of his mouth, didn't he know that Li Hongzhang knew that Zhang Zhidong was Lao Qi's person, Lao Qi and they supported him to do foreign affairs, didn't they still slap him in the face in the end? Since instead of letting Tang Ziran help him succeed, it is better to cut off his arm.

"Isn't Zhongtang going to hand over the sign to the Queen Mother tomorrow, you think about it, you should appoint an envoy to a talent like Tang Ziran, as for what messenger is appropriate, I will propose it to the Queen Mother tomorrow, the Queen Mother has always valued you, and I think it will not violate you."

(The new book is being uploaded, and I hope you will continue to support the speechless, ask for recommendations, and ask for collections!) The Rising Sun of the Empire Readers: 150536833)