Shaanxi.

After Sun Chuanting coerced the Xi'an officials and gentry to donate 170,000 taels, he recruited 5,000 young and strong people from Yulin, ordered his subordinates to train them, and led Futai to inspect various prefectures and counties.

When he arrived at a post station in the east of Huaxian County, Sun Chuanting sent an order to stay at this post station. This post station is said to be a post station, but it has been abandoned for a long time, and the conditions in the station are extremely poor, and the accompanying officials hurriedly sent people to clean it up. He also sent men to find the local Lizheng.

Just packed up the post station, the court was about to move in, but a general came from Huaxian, but it was the deputy general Luo Xueqi.

"The last general, Luo Xueqi, has seen Lord Futai!"

"No need to be polite!"

Sun Chuanting responded and went straight into the post station. Luo Xueqi saw that the signs were wrong, so he hurriedly followed up, and said: "My lord is tired of saddle horses, rest first, and then go to Zhang Luo for wine and dinner." ”

"You slow down first," Sun Chuanting said, "Ben Fu has something to ask you." ”

"Your Excellency, please speak."

"Benfu has traveled all the way and seen that most of the fields in Huaxian County have been abandoned, let me ask you, how many fields have been abandoned in the territory?"

"This general can't answer, but Futai has to ask someone in the know." Luo Xueqi shouted outward, "Is it possible to be in the locality? ”

The waiting room outside the door was busy opening the curtain and coming in, "Please command." ”

"My lord asks you, how many fields are abandoned in the territory?" Luo Xueqi asked.

"I don't know if it's far away, but I know that there are eight or nine out of ten bad ones near Hongo, and four or five out of ten are better."

"Isn't there a shortage of food?" Sun Chuanting asked.

"It's all anointed land, how can there be no bad food?"

"Then why don't you plow?"

"There are no cows."

"No cows? Why don't you have a cow? ”

"Some of the stolen cattle were either sold or slaughtered and eaten. What wasn't stolen was also sold. ”

"Sell cattle for fear of theft? Don't farm anymore? ”

"What kind of land to plant, the horse household is in a hurry, bitter! The farmer could not bear the hard labor, so he sold his cattle and abandoned the land, and ran away. But people run away, the tax grain is still there, and the rest of the household who did not run will have to sit on the compensation, and the household can not afford to pay, and they run again, so the relatives sit on the compensation, and the relatives also run, so they sit in the book to compensate, so a village abandons the household and flees. ”

"If you have land and abandon your home, why don't you sell your land and run away, and would rather abandon it?"

"It is precisely because of the land that I suffer from the errands, and when I buy the fields, I will come to the service, even if I pay the harvest of the year, it is not enough to pay taxes, not to mention that there are errands, and then in the year of disaster, how can I live? So they all fled, and those who didn't escape had the money to buy it, even the rich ones didn't dare to buy it! ”

Sun Chuanting turned to Luo Xueqi, "Don't you know about this situation?" ”

Luo Xueqi shook his head, "Most of the officials are from tribute, and the life here is sad, and it is difficult for officials to have a chance to be promoted here, so they are either greedy or whipping to force the end of food." Moreover, there are many evils in the yamen, and officials of all sizes know that they are powerless to eliminate their accumulated evils, and they only seek to protect themselves, so how can they have the time to take care of the flight of households and the famine? Therefore, although they knew that the people were complaining, they all pretended to be deaf and dumb. ”

"This is a thoroughfare, and there should be a lot of passages, so no one asks, are they all blind?"

"My lord, the emperor said at the beginning of his accession to the throne, 'The campaign of additional factions is a last resort, and recently there has been a division to knock on the bones and suck the marrow to confirm it!' The emperor knows it in his heart! Every time the levy period arrives, those people who cannot pay on time are shackled by the shackles, and they are constantly being whipped and beaten, and they are called to the court. The emperor wants silver, so he just opens his eyes and closes his eyes, who dares to rap in front of the emperor? ”

"The increase continued, and since a large number of people fled, and the burden was passed on to those who did not flee, the more they fled, the more they fled, and the result was that the imperial court finally lost its tax revenue and had more rebel troops!" Sun Chuanting took a deep breath, "General Luo, not counting the army of Lord Hong, how many troops are there in Xi'an Mansion?" ”

Luo Xueqi smiled bitterly, "The list is 24,000, but in fact it is less than half, and the others are all fictitious, just fraudulently receiving money." ”

Hearing this, Sun Chuanting was silent, and said in a half-loud voice: "This disaster and the fierceness of taxes are still beyond my expectations!" I now understand why Xiang Sheng was appointed prime minister of the five provinces. It seems that Qin soldiers can only be used to defend Qindi, and Qin soldiers can be raised with Qinland, and the suppression of thieves and rectification must be carried out at the same time. ”

Jingshi, it's a lot of trouble.

After Zhou Yanru was restored, he excluded dissidents, reused Donglin Party members, and dismissed non-Donglin officials, and for a time there was a dispute between the north and the south in the DPRK and China. In the south, there are Donglin Party members, and in the north, there are non-Donglin officials. Later, the "24 Qi" case broke out, and the so-called "24 Qi" was actually a mockery of the 24 officials, and the "murderous spirit", "stick spirit", "evil spirit", "yin spirit", "demonic spirit" and other fixed words were added to the names of those Donglin officials listed among them, and nicknames such as "two-headed snake" and "gray ground snake" were added to the back. The concoctors of the list took great pains to deliberately muddy the waters, attacking both the "northern party" and the "southern party" figures, and stirring up mutual suspicion among them. Chongzhen has always opposed ministers forming parties and fighting each other, so after the 24 gas case was discovered, he specially issued an edict to severely condemn the speech officials, and must not promote this kind of atmosphere.

In the matter of Like, Jiang Yun was an official, thinking that the emperor's condemnation of them was influenced by the "twenty-four qi", so he impassionedly criticized the emperor. He said: The emperor has been cultivating himself recently, and he warned the officials that he would not be disgusted with thinness, right? Because of the special importance of the spokesman, the requirements are also very high. There are also loyal figures such as Jia Yi of the Han Dynasty among the speech officials, perhaps they are too impatient to make speeches and do not understand the emperor's intentions, which is of course the fault of the speech officials. As for what the emperor said, the speech officials "get rid of others", the ministers dare not say that there is absolutely no such thing, but most speech officials are not like this. Did the emperor hear what to say this? Maybe it's something you see in the recital, or maybe it's the occasional speculation that makes you say that? Recently, the "24 Qi" gossip has been very loud, and it must be that the traitors who hold power hate the officials who are unfavorable to them, deliberately spread rumors and slander, and try to use exaggerated statements to arouse the anger of the emperor, and use the anger of the emperor to clamp down on the mouths of the officials. If the emperor can't see through their conspiracy, then in the future, the officials will not dare to speak, who will discuss the world's major affairs for His Majesty?

Chongzhen is still blaming himself for the burning of the ancestral tomb in Fengyang, the purpose of his "guilty edict" is to hope that the minister will share the responsibility with him, work with one heart and one mind, and tide over the difficulties together, so that Zhou Yanru also wants to improve the government, by no means hoping that the court will continue to fight the party as before, you attack me, I attack you, and it is the Ming Dynasty that will be destroyed after the most ruin, and it is he who is the son of heaven!

Jiang Yun's groundless speculation and wanton criticism naturally made Chongzhen, who was already in a bad mood, angry, and couldn't help but issue a holy decree, condemning Jiang Yun for daring to question the emperor's edict, and contempt for the imperial court to the point of intolerability, and should be arrested immediately, and not handed over to the criminal department, but for the interrogation of Jinyiwei, who had been silent for five or six years.

In order to crack down on this kind of atmosphere of forming a party for personal gain, chasing after the wind and catching shadows and attacking each other, Chongzhen clearly instructed Jin Yiwei: Jiang Wei's crime is particularly serious, and when he sees anonymous documents such as "Twenty-four Qi", he should immediately destroy it. He had to be honest about his motives.

At this time, Xiong Kaiyuan, a member of the Donglin Party who served as the deputy director of the Pedestrian Division, also presented a note to the emperor, echoing Jiang Yun, and vainly accusing the Son of Heaven of attacking them.

After Chongzhen saw Xiong Kaiyuan's recital, he ordered him to be imprisoned in Jinyiwei Zhenfusi Prison without saying a word, and asked Jinyiwei to command Luo Yangxing to quietly kill Jiang and Xiong in prison. Since he ascended the throne, whenever he went to the court, there were always so many people who helped the officials to find trouble, either the party was the same as the disagreement or criticized him indiscriminately, in order to fight for fame, and asked them to do a good job but they couldn't do anything, and they were like a group of crows. Chongzhen had endured a little enough, and he decided to take advantage of this time to make a good effort to rectify the officials.

He discussed countermeasures with a group of colleagues of Jinyiwei, but his colleagues reminded him that the former commanders of Jinyiwei, Tian Ergeng and Xu Xianchun, ended up dying because of the killing of the Donglin Party. In case the Donglin Party counterattacks, with the current Jinyiwei foundation, they are not their opponents, and Zhou Yanru, the first assistant, is the leader of the Donglin Party, if he is really ordered to kill these two Donglin officials, can Zhou Yanru let Jinyiwei go?

Luo Yangxing was scared, ridiculous, he was not afraid of the emperor but he was afraid of the Donglin Party. He did not carry out the secret will of the Son of Heaven, but revealed this secret decree to the official Liao Guolin, who in turn revealed it to his colleague Cao Liangzhi. Both of them were members of the Donglin Party.

Cao Liangzhi did not believe that the emperor would issue such a secret decree, and publicly impeached Luo Yangxing, which was an act of "attributing to the king", and it was impossible for His Majesty to issue such a secret decree, which was obviously framing and slandering; Taking a step back, even if there is such a thing, it should not be leaked. He asked the emperor to immediately execute Luo Yangxing and Xiong Kaiyuan. Chongzhen was afraid of making a big deal out of it, so he withheld this note, did not say anything, and did not issue it to the cabinet, so it was over.

In fact, although Xiong Kaiyuan is a member of the Donglin Party, his conviction has a lot to do with Zhou Yanru. When Xiong Kaiyuan was the magistrate of Wujiang County, he admired Zhang Pu's academic reputation and vigorously supported the Fushe to hold a conference in Wujiang County, and was quite loved by famous people in Jiangnan, praising him for "governing with articles and scriptures" and "knowing people as a corporal". After Zhou Yanru's comeback, he was promoted from a magistrate to a Beijing official.

After all, the pedestrian division is an idle messenger, and he hopes to be promoted. It happened that Guanglu Temple was short of personnel, so he asked Zhou Yanru to "pass through", hoping to get this fat shortage. I don't know what the reason is, Zhou Yanru didn't help him do this, which made his boss unhappy.

It happened that Chongzhen hoped that the minister would give advice on how to encircle and suppress the Central Plains Liukou, Xiong Kaiyuan wanted to take this opportunity to win the favor of the Son of Heaven, enthusiastically signed up, and was soon summoned to the palace to express his high opinions to the emperor. Xiong Kaiyuan originally wanted to impeach Zhou Yanru for being unable to govern, but when he saw Zhou Yanru standing beside the emperor, he was embarrassed to speak ill of him in person, and talked about some military opinions perfunctorily.

Two days later, Xiong Kaiyuan again asked the emperor to summon him. Chongzhen summoned him and the cabinet ministers in the palace of virtue, Xiong Kaiyuan saw that Zhou Yanru was present, and said unceremoniously: "If the king is not secret, he will lose his ministers, and if the ministers are not secret, he will lose his body, please retire for the time being." ”

Zhou Yanru and other auxiliary ministers repeatedly expressed their desire to recuse themselves, but Chongzhen disagreed and asked Xiong Kaiyuan to speak up in front of the auxiliary ministers.

Xiong Kaiyuan was helpless, so he could only bite the bullet and say: "Your Majesty has been trying to rule the world for eight years, but the world is becoming more and more chaotic, there must be a reason." ”

Chongzhen asked, "Where is the reason?" ”

Xiong Kaiyuan said: "The focus of today's advice is to solve military salaries and calm external and internal strife. If the cart is turned upside down, even if you don't eat or sleep day and night, you can't seek the rule of the world. Since His Majesty's ascension to the pole, there have been dozens of auxiliary ministers in the cabinet, but His Majesty said that they were virtuous, and left and right said that they were virtuous, and the feudal officials and the people did not necessarily say that they were virtuous. The emperor appointed them as henchmen, and those mediocre people in high positions have committed adultery one after another, causing natural and man-made disasters, and there is no sign of stopping so far. By the time the officials exposed their crimes, and the emperor punished them, the politics had become hopelessly corrupt. ”

Chongzhen tasted what Xiong Kaiyuan meant, and understood that he was insinuating and pointing at Zhou Yanru, but he deliberately pretended to be confused and asked, "Do you have anyone in mind who wants to recommend?" ”

"No, I didn't!"

Xiong Kaiyuan immediately denied it, but he couldn't hide the secret in his heart, and while talking, he looked at Zhou Yanru at the same time.

Zhou Yanru is such a clever person, he has already seen the signs, and immediately asked the emperor to resign from the post of first assistant.

It's only been a few days since Yanru reappeared this week, can Chongzhen let him go? Then he said: "The failure of the world is all my fault, and it has nothing to do with Qing and others." ”

Xiong Kaiyuan listened, but raised his voice and said: "Your Majesty wants the minister to tell the truth, but the cabinet assistant ministers are standing next to him, who dares to express different opinions and suffer!" Moreover, the former auxiliary ministers levied and extorted violently and attacked the loyal and good, but the current auxiliary ministers pursued moral politics, released prisoners, reduced taxes, and quoted righteous men and gentlemen, but there were only occasional sighs of injustice. ”

This is obviously not true, but he didn't dare to say it in front of Zhou Yanru, Chongzhen knew that Xiong Kaiyuan still had something to say, and after thinking about it slightly, he asked him to step back first, go back and write it as a song.