The courts of all dynasties attached great importance to the Spring Festival, and the Ming Dynasty was no exception. There are also the most festivals in the New Year, such as the New Year's Day (i.e. the first day of the Lunar New Year)", "Beginning of Spring", "Lantern Festival", "Yanjiu Festival", and "Warehouse Filling Festival". The most important of these are the New Year's Day and the Lantern Festival.

During the festival, there are temple fairs, lamp markets, worship stove gods and other activities, and all the people celebrate together, and it is very lively.

In the palace, the emperor had to pay homage in the ancestral temple, and then held a great court meeting in the Fengtian Temple. The ceremonial activities of the court are solemn, the princes and hundreds of officials are purged, and the honor guards are majestic and magnificent. The emperor drove out of the Qianqing Gate, ascended to the three platforms in the mighty escort procession, passed through the Jinshen Palace, the Huagai Palace, and finally the Imperial Heavenly Palace, sitting on the throne of Jinluan to accept the New Year's worship of the subjects. After the outer court ceremony, the emperor returned to the inner court and accepted the queen to lead the concubines to salute, and the prince's sons and grandsons to salute.

The emperor is so busy, the queen can't be idle, and the prince, princess, marquis and uncle and other noble wives also have to bring their daughters to worship the queen.

The crown prince could not escape, and the ministers also congratulated him.

After the Great Pilgrimage, there will be a 'Great Feast'.

That is, after the official greetings, the palace will hold a banquet, officials, members of the royal family and foreign envoys can participate, followed by the ladies to eat with the queen mother and others in the harem.

The scale of the Great Dynasty Meeting is very large, and the banquets are also diverse, divided into large banquets, medium banquets or small banquets, and different banquets also correspond to different dishes.

In short, on this day, since the fifth watch of the palace to burn incense and set off firecrackers, there is no leisure.

But there is a special situation this year, that is, Emperor Hongzhi is not in good health, and his body is weak and afraid of cold, but this day, sometimes you can hear the terrible sound of the north wind calling immediately when you open the door, and there is goose feather snow on the sky on the twenty-eighth day of the lunar month.

Zhu Houzhao came out of Qingning Palace with a heavy heart, with a big coat on his shoulders, and his hair couldn't suppress the snowflakes, and the palace maids and eunuchs in the two rows behind him didn't dare to come out, because the people in Qingning Palace were in worse condition.

Qingning Palace is the place where the Empress Dowager Zhou lives, and now there are many fewer court affairs because of the New Year, but this family affairs are more and more.

To put it in layman's terms, Hongzhi, the highest-ranking man in the palace, can't get out of bed now, and the highest-ranking woman in the palace, the Empress Dowager Zhou, can't get out of bed either.

Queen Zhang is a woman from a small family, although she has been a queen for so many years, but when she meets such a good husband, she doesn't even have a competitor in the harem, how much can she grow?

Now that her husband is lingering on the sickbed, she is taking care of and worrying, and it is estimated that she will not be able to hold on in a few days.

So this person can't be counted on either.

Counting around, the one who can call the shots of big and small affairs is him, the prince of the East Palace, who is only fifteen years old in the New Year.

Zhu Houzhao didn't think about it, and first ordered: "No one is allowed to spread the news of the Empress Dowager's serious illness to the ears of my father."

In the wind and snow, the meaning of the words made people feel colder, and these eunuchs and palace maids didn't dare to say more, so they could only whisper.

Historically, the Empress Dowager of Zhou died in the seventeenth year of Hongzhi. ….

Emperor Hongzhi suffered sins in his childhood, and the Empress Dowager Zhou took him over and brought him up, such an experience, can the relationship between the two of them be thin?

Now the Empress Dowager Zhou has reached a state of being in a coma for several hours a day, and they all say that seventy-three eighty-four, the king of Hades does not take him, and the old man is obviously seventy-four, but his physical condition is so poor.

If Emperor Hongzhi knew about this, maybe something would happen, so he could only hide it first. If there is really any consequence in the end, he, the prince, will bear it.

At this time, a little eunuch came over against the wind and snow, "Your Highness, the three elders of the cabinet are here, waiting to be summoned in the East Palace."

Zhu Houzhao probably knew what was going on, so he put on the hat behind the big hat, "Go back to the palace."

The day after tomorrow is the big court meeting, but as a result, Emperor Hongzhi is still lying down and can't move, and there are many occasions where the emperor is needed.

If the emperor doesn't participate in the banquet, forget it, sacrifice,

Courts, these are all very important things.

In the east palace, the teacups in front of the three pavilion elders Liu, Li, and Xie were all emitting light smoke, but they didn't dare to sit because the prince had just entered the door and was untying the big cloud.

Then he walked to the central charcoal basin and stretched out his hand.

"It's cold enough on a snowy day, isn't it?"

Li Dongyang said, "Your Highness has to take care of yourself, and we people are out of the way."

"Let's bake together. You all know about this palace, and you know that the joints that this palace cares about the most are not in these false rituals."

The three pavilion elders looked at each other, still stretching out their stiff hands, feeling a trace of warmth.

Zhu Houzhao sniffed, "Maybe it's the illusion of the palace, this winter is getting colder and colder every year, and after the year, the cabinet will have more provinces, and those who have disasters will report it early." Also, it is even colder on the grassland, and when their food is eaten in the spring of the next year, the cattle, sheep, and horses will eat the fresh grass of the last month to fatten up, and the people of our Daming border pass will be exposed to their scimitars again. Hongu shouldn't have mentioned this at the threshold of the festival, but he still couldn't help it."

"Your Highness cares about state affairs, which is a blessing for the court and the people. But there is a lot of luck in the matter, and Your Highness must not work too hard." Liu Ge Lao's lips were also a little hard from the cold, and his speech was not good, and he said several words, "Besides, the New Year's Day is the day after tomorrow, and His Majesty said that he was exempt from illness before, should the Great Dynasty be the same?"

Zhu Houzhao didn't reply at first, but asked, "What about the cabinet's opinion?"

Liu Jianzhi said, "The three ministers all thought that His Majesty's dragon weight was more than everything, and His Majesty should not be allowed to support his sick body. And His Royal Highness has the posture of heaven and man, even if some foreign envoys know that the dragon body of the Ming Emperor is occasionally slightly ill, the Quartet will not dare to act rashly."

Yes, the idea of the cabinet this time came to his heart.

"Yes. All kinds of sacrifices, court meetings, banquets and other activities, the crown prince of this palace replaces his father, and ......" Zhu Houzhao pointed out, "Call the Ministry of Rites to use his brains, this palace is the prince, and it is still different from his father, don't copy the previous rules and procedures, turn over the history books, if this dynasty does not have it, look for the previous dynasty, and see what the prince should pay attention to when presiding over similar ceremonial activities on behalf of the emperor, there must be a difference."

"That's nature, please rest assured."

"Okay. Is that all?" ….

The three of them all nodded, even if there was anything on the side, there was no need to talk to the prince on the twenty-eighth day of the lunar month.

Seeing this, Zhu Houzhao rubbed his hands, "I've worked hard all year long, and I'm still very fierce on weekdays, so stay today and eat with me." Just now, Liu Ge Lao said that there is Zhang and Chi, I think it is needed, and no matter how much work there is, it will have to be done in a few years. While there's nothing to do today, let's eat and talk?"

Xie Qian thought to himself, you also know that you are usually fierce. Now the three of them were a little afraid and waved their hands again and again to refuse.

But Zhu Houzhao felt a little like catching ducks on the shelves, "It's today, you just want to stay on the twenty-ninth and thirty, but you don't want to stay in the palace!" Liu Jin, pass the meal."

"Yes."

In this way, the three old men left him in this way.

In the Hongzhi Dynasty, the status of the cabinet was actually not as good as that of the six ministries. But in Zhu Houzhao's heart, in fact, the cabinet is quite good. It's just that there is a problem with the structure, for example, they are all civil ministers, which leads to the lack of voice of some other forces at the top leadership level of the country, of course, this is all a later story.

Zhu Houzhao has been dealing with political affairs for so long, in fact, there is a lot of routine work, and it should not occupy a lot of the emperor's time. As far as he is concerned, the kind of work that makes it more efficient to gather relevant personnel to deploy relevant personnel in the form of listening to reports.

But those routine tasks cannot be dispensed with, and this requires the cabinet.

"The treat should look like a treat, and it's going to be the New Year, so the palace will be more generous today." Zhu Houzhao has always been old in his speech, except for his immature appearance in front of several old men, his words, movements, and expressions are as calm as dozens of years old, "Liu Ge Lao, Li Ge Lao, Xie Ge Lao, this year, you have also worked hard!"

The three old men all stood up and saluted, and they insisted on doing so, but they couldn't help it.

"When Hongzhi opened the government in the eighteenth year, this palace wants to think differently, you can also think about it."

"Your Highness, please speak."

Zhu Houzhao said: "From the twelfth year of Hongzhi to the present, I always feel that we are shaking one year at a time, saying that there are some achievements, but it is also God's eye-opening. Can we have any goals of our own?"

"What is the country going to become, the people rich? The country is strong? You have to have a goal to work on, right? After setting goals and then setting measures, some problems, such as the problem of cleaning up empty salaries, are a hundred years of trouble, and it is impossible for the imperial court to scrape them all off with a single will."

"But there is always a rhythm to spend a few years to solve it, maybe three years, maybe five years, the key is to have a process of getting better, you can't see that the problem is too difficult and say that it is too wide, and retreat in trouble, then will it be more difficult in the future? What is the difference between dragging it off from generation to generation, putting difficult problems aside, and being able to drag it out for a day is a day, and being a monk hitting the clock for a day?"

"So I'm also thinking that what the imperial court wants to do in the eighteenth year of Hongzhi must be listed first, and then look at the next three years, and what things will be solved, and it must also be listed. Put the problem first, then put the measures, and then arrange it step by step and plan. At that time, it will not be possible for the palace to clean up people, and there will be no need to be infamous for not being punished."

Liu Jian was 'named', and he surrendered his guilt, but the prince didn't care much about it.

Li Dongyang was still touching his beard and thinking about the prince's words, a little strange, "Your Highness, have you been thinking about these words in your heart for a long time?"

"Sort of, today is not a court meeting or an early dynasty, we just talk about it at the table. I am because of Yang Yiqing's incident a few days ago, the imperial court wants to clean up the empty salary, and he seems to be under a lot of pressure, but I, the prince, have never said that I will solve all these problems in the whole country within three or five months, I mean...... Such a major issue cannot be taken for granted by the imperial court, and it still has to be taken step by step. But the atmosphere of officialdom is not like this, so I thought of writing down the goals that the imperial court wants to achieve, so that everyone knows what measures the East Palace and the cabinet are going to implement."

Xie Qian quite agreed, ""The Mean" cloud: If you go far, you will be inferior, you will be inferior when you climb high, you will make progress year by year, and if you accumulate a small victory, it will be a big victory, no matter how high Huashan is, it will also have a way to go."

Zhu Houzhao's proposal did not infringe on any interests, but also showed a positive and promising spirit, and the three cabinet members did not feel that there was anything wrong with hearing it.

"Then let's wait until after the New Year. You can prepare it yourself first, or you can convey it separately. After the Chinese New Year, the cabinet and the six ministries and nine departments held a special meeting, and spent two or three days focusing on discussions. It is necessary to discuss them in different categories, such as the people's livelihood and the security of the frontiers, and try to make a three-year plan. The plan is certain, just like a military flag planted on the top of the mountain, and as soon as the military flag is erected, you will know where to rush!"

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Royal Mercenary Cat