On the third day of the ninth month of the twelfth year of Shunzhi, the first moment of the hour. The lights of the inner city of Jingshi have been turned on, but they are sparse and sparse, and there is a bit of desolation.

Zongren Mansion Zong Ling, Anjun Wang Yuele hurriedly stepped out of the gate of Zongren Mansion, and did not sit on the shoulder that had been waiting for a long time, but stood on the platform and looked around left and right for a long time. Looking at the Forbidden City in the north of the Thousand Step Corridor, although it is dark and strict (in the middle and late Ming Dynasty, the Forbidden City no longer has street lamps at night, and the Qing Dynasty follows this system, so at night, the southern part of the Forbidden City is basically dark), but in front of Tiananmen Square, the palace lights are hanging high, bright as day, and many guards guard the forbidden place and the honor guard is majestic. Looking at the imperial city beyond the palace city, although there are lights on it, it is disorganized and sparkling, which is not the same as the Forbidden City as a royal courtyard.

Finally, Yue Le let out a long sigh and said, "That's it!" He shook his hand and strode down the steps, and said to the slave who came forward: "Go to the Yuhe Bridge!" ”

"Huh!" The slave responded respectfully, and then waited for Yue Le to sit in the sedan chair with his hands and feet, lowered the sedan curtain, and called "up", leading the group to disappear in the shadow of the gauze lamp in front of the Zongren Mansion.

The sedan chair did not take the Thousand Steps Corridor of Yujie [1], but went east and south, turned onto Jiangmi Lane [2], and went straight to the Zhongyuhe Bridge [3].

Yue Le sat in the sedan chair, recalling the scene of personally interrogating those dog minions who didn't know the height of the sky in the sect's mansion just now. Shen Shi left the palace by himself at three moments, opened the hall and ascended to the throne at the beginning of the unitary time, and figured out the original uncomplicated case at three moments-

It turned out that the owner of the white flag, the thirteen-year-old Prince of Heshuoxian, did not know, but his younger brother Xingbao took a group of domestic slaves to the mule and horse market to purchase horses, saying that he wanted to learn bow horses diligently, and learn from his father Haoge in the future, so as to ensure that his ninth uncle, the current long live lord, sits firmly in the Qing Dynasty!

Who thought of the mule and horse market, this kid disliked the rough trade of the horse market, and he took a group of family members to find a wine shop, learned the drinking orders of others, and appointed his cronies Zhang Gouzi to run errands. It's not good to send anyone! But you even sent this dog!

Zhang Gouzi has no name, he was messing around in the street market in that area in the late Ming Dynasty, doing evil, bullying women and children, and having a very bad reputation! When the Qing Dynasty entered the customs, he saw the opportunity to surrender[4] to the Hauge Gate and turned into a house slave. Now he is serving Xingbao very nourishingly, maybe he is just taking his nephew, who is not a weapon, to do some things like a chicken and a dog thief!

Zhang Gouzi took a few subordinates to patrol the Luoma City, but was bumped by an elderly scholar, and they actually made it difficult in every possible way, and they also extorted money! If it hadn't been for Xiao Xuanye, who was ordered to leave the palace, he didn't know what the result would be! But he was blind and kicked Xuan Ye, who is now the most precious second son of the emperor and Dorobelle Xuanye! He will not escape this capital crime! Even the rich days may not be easy!

Before the time came, he took the confession into the palace and returned to the emperor, who knew that his emperor's cousin actually pulled himself and said for more than half an hour, and he actually wanted to ......

"Lord Wang, it's here."

Hearing the house slave softly reminding outside the sedan chair, Yue Le realized that the sedan chair under him had already landed firmly at some point. It is estimated that he was blindly distracted just now, and when he was delayed, this minion kindly reminded him.

Yue Le reluctantly got out of the sedan chair and was already waiting for someone. When I looked closely, it was the Minister of Parliament, the Minister of the Guard, and the first-class male Gualja Baha. This person also has an identity, which is Aobai's own brother.

"Xiaguan Baha, please give peace to King Anjun!" Bahá hurriedly saluted.

"Hurry up, please. Do you know what you're doing here? Yue Le stretched out his hand and asked kindly.

"The emperor said, let the servants come according to your wishes, and persuade Prince Xian well."

"Well, you have a life-saving grace with him, and this time it is also a reinvention grace. Let's go inside! After Yue Le finished speaking, he was just about to take a step, but he turned around again, and said to a few of his house slaves angrily: "You park the sedan chair at the base of the wall, and you are not allowed to enter the house to beg for food and drink!" Give me a smart face, if you mistake the big and small things of this king, you minions will be given for nothing even if you have a thousand knives! A bunch of dog minions who don't succeed enough and lose more than they do! ”

"Huh! The minions got it! The slave who led the team was so frightened that he quickly knelt down and agreed, but he didn't know why the prince, who was usually kind, was so angry today.

Yue Le didn't pay attention to them anymore, and turned to look at the mansion in front of him.

The big mansion regulated by the prince looks very desolate today - there is only a lone lamp swaying in the autumn wind at the gate, barely illuminating the Manchu and Chinese characters of "Xian Prince's Mansion" on the door, but it is flickering and faint. At this time, the three gates had long been closed, and the courtyard was also unusually quiet.

Although it is a house slave who causes trouble, the disaster is monstrous! Alas! It's not that my cousin won't help you, it's providential! Remembering what the emperor said just now, he hurried back to the Zongren Mansion, so melancholy, and sat alone for more than half an hour, and then he mustered up the courage to come to the palace of Prince Xian.

"Go, call the door!" Yue Le turned around and said, his tone even more impatient. Now that he sees the house slaves who have followed him for several years, he is disgusted, it is really a relationship between "loving the house and the black".

The house slave who led the team did not dare to delay, and got up from the ground and went to knock on the door. For a long time, the three doors of the mansion did not move, but a small door in the distance used for the entry and exit of the subordinates opened.

"Go in and report, the Zongren Mansion has ordered to visit my brother and sister-in-law." Yue Le was closer to the small door, so he reported it himself.

"Wait a minute, Lord Wang!" The doorman hurriedly retracted his head, squeaked the door shut, and ran away at the sound of footsteps.

"Alas!" Yue Le let out a long sigh.

However, after a while, the footsteps in the courtyard became noisy, and then the left door of the mansion door opened, and a thirteen or fourteen-year-old boy walked briskly to usher. Before Yue Le, who was the king of the county, saluted the prince's nephew, the young man who had just left the gate actually knelt on the platform with a puff, sobbing and said, "Fourth uncle save me!" ”

"Get up quickly, go in and talk!" Yue Le turned around to look at the empty dark alley with no figures, and no longer paid attention to the rich ribbon kneeling on the ground, and directly raised his legs and entered Prince Xian's mansion......

On the fourth day of the ninth month of the twelfth year of Shunzhi, the royal gate listened to the government.

Zongren's Mansion Zong Ling, Anjun Wang Yuele presented the inscription of Prince Xian Fushou, and asked for a demote. Fu Lin asked Yue Le to read it to all the ministers of the king on the spot.

The main contents of the recital are:

1. Chen Shu's own responsibility: ignorance of Tianwei and accidental injury to Qincha (Prince Xuanye); The house slave is inferior, making trouble on the street and beating the court official (Ji Kaisheng); The chess master (Fu Shou) is young and weak; The brother (Xingbao) is stubborn and murderous; The father (Hauge) died early, and the son inherited the title, and the emperor's grace was mighty, but he failed the grace of the saint; The management of the white flag is chaotic, the combat power is decreasing, and it cannot bear the heavy trust of Taizu Taizong and the current emperor, and so on.

2. Punishment measures: More than a dozen domestic slaves who make trouble will be handed over to the Shangfang Court for punishment according to law; The person who takes the lead is the star protector, grabs the flag of the clan, and circles the clan's house; Prince Xian was rich and shou, thinking that he was young and ignorant, he asked himself to be demoted to the king of the county, handed over the flag with a white flag, and asked the emperor to receive it himself, etc......

This caused a huge shock at the court meeting!

At this time, except for the flag owner of the white flag who was kneeling on the ground, the thirteen-year-old Prince Xian Fushou, everyone else did not dare to make a sound, and glanced at the emperor on the throne and glared at the rich ribbon kneeling on the platform, and his thoughts were fast.

Fulin Haha smiled and said:

"You don't have to be nervous, I have already personally received the three flags, and you will discuss the matter of the five flags with the Zongren Mansion slowly."

Without waiting for the princes to breathe a sigh of relief, Fu Lin then said sharply:

"However, a bad slave hurts his master, and his crime should be punished! This dynasty has its own rules, I am the co-master of the Eight Banners, and your soldiers and family slaves, although they are close to each other, are all my people's slaves! Dorobelle Xuanye was ordered to go out of the palace on an errand, but was injured by a house slave, what are you all doing! You regard a bunch of dog minions as more important than the Qing Dynasty's national ancestry! ”

"Boom", all His Highness's ministers knelt down in unison and sang loudly: "The ministers (slaves) deserve death!" ”

Fu Lin glanced at his feet with satisfaction, and then said, "Come...... Shangfang Yuan, severely punished according to the law: the slave surnamed Zhang who took the lead will be decided! There are many bad slaves who commit crimes, and all of them are beheaded [5]! Xingbao is stubborn, removed from the clan, and the outcasts are Humar! How to train the slaves of the Eight Banners, you will go to discuss with the Zongren Mansion, and if you can't come up with a way, don't come to see me! Hum! ”

After speaking, Fu Lin left without looking back, only Wu Liangfu knew that the emperor's master, who turned around, was full of joy and expectation......

[1] During the Qing Dynasty, south of Tiananmen Square, north of Zhengyang Gate (commonly known as "Qianmen"), there was originally a three-que Daqing Gate (called Daming Gate in the Ming Dynasty, called Zhonghua Gate in the Republic of China), there are 110 east-west corridor rooms on the north side of the left and right, called "Thousand Step Corridor", and there are 34 corridor rooms to the north in the east and west, the left gate of Chang'an in the east, the right gate of Chang'an in the west, all of which are connected to the eaves and ridges. Facing the north is Tianjie, which is now Chang'an Street. In the old days, the Thousand Steps Corridor was the office of the central government organs, mainly the offices of the six ministries, the five governments and the military aircraft. The office is based on the pattern of Wendong and Wuxi, with civil officials in the East Thousand Steps Corridor and military attaches in the West Thousand Steps Corridor.

[2] It is today's Dongjiaomin Lane and Xijiaomin Lane. At the beginning of the Qing Dynasty, Dongjiaomin Lane and Xijiaomin Lane were originally a street and alley, and the original name was "Jiangmi Lane". During the Yuan Dynasty, the glutinous rice transported from the south to Beijing was unloaded and distributed in this area, because the people of Beijing called the glutinous rice in the south Jiangmi, and over time, it was called "Jiangmi Lane" by the common people. Later, the Ming Dynasty built a chessboard street to cut off the original Jiangmi Lane, the east one is called "Dongjiang Rice Lane", and the west one is called "Xijiang Rice Lane". In that year, there was a "Fuwen" archway at the west entrance of Dongjiang Rice Lane, and there was a "Zhenwu" archway at the east entrance of Xijiang Rice Lane. In 1900, the Eight-Nation Coalition occupied the city of Beijing. The Qing government was forced to sign the humiliating Treaty of Xinchou, and the great powers swallowed the entire Dongjiaomin Lane area in one gulp, which became a "country within a country". The Western powers, according to their own preferences, built a large number of buildings in Dongjiaomin Lane, a stone's throw away from the Forbidden City. The administration here is completely owned by the embassy, and Dongjiaomin Lane has effectively become a forbidden area for Chinese. At this time, Jiangmi Lane has long been unworthy of its name, and Dongjiang Rice Lane has been renamed "Dongjiaomin Lane" because of its homonym.

[3] Zhengyi Road, south of East Chang'an Avenue, was formerly known as Yuhe Bridge. In the early years of the Ming Dynasty, after the imperial city went south to the south, it gave up the old road of the Tonghui River, went straight south along a newly opened river, passed through the east water pass of Zhengyangmen, and entered the south moat. On this newly opened section of the river, three stone arch bridges were erected in turn, the North Yuhe Bridge on East Chang'an Street, the Middle Yuhe Bridge in Jiangmi Lane (now Dongjiaomin Lane) and the South Yuhe Bridge close to Chenggen. In the late Qing Dynasty, this section of the river was included in the boundaries of foreign embassies. In 1901, the South Yuhe Bridge was demolished in the embassy boundary and replaced with a culvert to serve as a parking lot for the Rokkoku Hotel. In 1926, the Yuhe River from the north of the Middle Yuhe Bridge to Chang'an Avenue was changed to a culvert, and the middle of the road was opened up as a green isolation belt, and the original east and west riversides were still used as the passage. When the tram was first opened in 1924, there was a stop at the "Yuhe Bridge" here. In the 30s of the last century, after the south river was changed to a culvert, the North Yuhe Bridge was also demolished and changed into a road. After the victory of the Anti-Japanese War, the east side of the Yuhe Bridge was named Xingguo Road, and the west side of the road was Zhengyi Road. After the founding of the People's Republic of China, both sides were named Justice Road.

[4] The Manchurian soldiers, from the kings of Baylor to the soldiers of the Eight Banners, all took war as their profession and generally did not engage in social production. After occupying a large amount of land in the Gyeonggi region, they continued to implement the Liaodong system of weaving villages, enslaving slaves and strong men to engage in production. Han peasants took refuge in Manchurians as slaves, which was called "surrender".

[5] The death penalty review system in the Qing Dynasty was divided into two types: hanging, beheading, and hanging. Hanging and beheading is actually a system of suspended execution of the death penalty, while hanging and beheading are a system of immediate execution of the death penalty. The Qing Dynasty had a triage system that dealt with hanging, beheading, and waiting for imprisonment. The first is the autumn trial, that is, every autumn in the right Chang'an Gate in the west of Jinshui Bridge outside Tiananmen Square, the six ministers, the Dali Siqing, the Imperial History of the Metropolitan Procuratorate, the general political envoy and the small three divisions will hear the cases reported by the local government of hanging and beheading; The second is the court trial, that is, the review of the cases adjudicated by the Criminal Department and the cases of beheading and hanging in the Gyeonggi region after the autumn trial. In the cases that have been tried in the autumn and in the court, there are roughly four kinds of outcomes: the facts, the decision is suspended, the decision can be refined, and the cases are retained and enshrined. Facts, i.e., if the crime is true and the sentence is proper, it should be executed; "Suspended sentence" refers to the fact that the circumstances are true and the harm is real, but there are circumstances worthy of mercy, and the sentence may generally be commuted to exile or imprisonment; Retention and worship refers to the fact that although the case is serious, but because the parents, grandparents and other respected relatives have no one to support or inherit the sacrifice, it is necessary to stay for the support and sacrifice, but to take the prisoner home with the rod to fulfill filial piety, and when the father or ancestor dies or someone is raised or sacrificed, then accept the punishment. Because the results of the autumn trial and the court trial reduced most of the death sentences of beheaded and hanged prisoners, and it was also conducive to embodying the principle of "prudence and compassion for crimes", it was regarded as a "great canon" by the Qing rulers. This system has developed to this day as a system of suspended executions. From this point of view, the system of suspended execution of the death penalty is not an original creation of China's current criminal legal system, but is actually a reasonable change in China's criminal law tradition of rule by virtue in modern times.