The Grain Gang, also known as the Ship Grain Gang, or the Cao Gang!

When Kangxi was in power, he wrote down the three major events of "three feudatories, river affairs, and Cao Yun" under the main hall of the Qianqing Palace, and later, the "three feudatories" were solved and replaced by "salt class". This also formed the three major policies of the Qing court.

Cao Yun is also known as the policy of Cao Rice, which is to collect rented rice from eight provinces in the south and central China, and then transport it to Beijing to support the court members and nobles of the Jingshi, and store it in warehouses to be distributed in the north. This system of collection and transportation had its own authority, which paralleled the formal provincial bureaucracy and overlapped with the yamen of the governor of the river. The supervisor is called "Governor of Caoyun", and the government office is located in Huai'an, Jiangsu Province. Under the Governor of Caoyun, there are provincial-level Cao officials, and each province responsible for Cao Mi has one person, and these Cao officials are directly responsible to the Governor of Caoyun, and are not responsible to the governor of the province where he is stationed. Cao Guan is responsible for supervising the collection of Cao rice, and then transporting it north. Most of the people who transported grain were hereditary boat owners "Qiding" who lived in Tuntian along the canal, and these people were also called "Yunjun".

For generations, Cao Yun has been related to national fortunes, and Emperor Yang of Sui will not order the excavation of the Grand Canal just to want to play in Jiangdu. Although most of the Qing court's cao transportation was in charge of the "flag ding", that is, official ships, as the cao transportation became more and more busy, some of the cao boats owned by the people were temporarily hired to transport grain. The owners and boatmen of this kind of boats supported each other and formed a gang of land, and they became a "grain gang" whose strength should not be underestimated in the countryside.

However, due to the uneven categories of people in the boats in the previous days, they fought for power and profit, fought bravely, and often made trouble; Even in order to fight for the sluice gate and the river, abandoning the boat, it is simply common to go ashore to fight. This has caused a deep headache for successive Caoyun officials. Later, three people with some skills, Weng Yan, Qian Jian, and Pan Qing, began to organize and restrain the helmsmen and sailors of the boats at the wharves of the canal, establish formal gangs, and set up gang rules to restrain the people in the boats, which greatly changed the situation.

Later, in the eight provinces, a total of "one hundred and twenty-eight" grain gangs appeared. Although Anhui is a poor province, because it guards the main roads of the Yangtze River and the Huai River, there are a total of 28 grain gangs, in addition, Jiangsu is an important place for Cao Yun, there are 30 companies, Zhejiang has 21 companies, Jiangxi has 13 companies, Shandong has 10 companies, Henan has 10 companies, and Hunan and Hubei have a total of 16 companies. Each province has a general gang. At the same time, these gangs all took the Anqing Grain Gang in the capital of Anhui as the first general gang, so the Anqing Gang became another name for the Grain Boat Gang, referred to as the Qing Gang. (There is another theory about the origin of the Green Gang)

The grain gangs of the eight provinces, each with tens to hundreds of people, and the total number is tens of thousands, which has a great influence on Caoyun and is a force that cannot be ignored.

When Ma De first took office, Feng Zhiren pointed out to him the five major problems of Anhui's "industry, agriculture, business, and 'soldiers'". And after he took office, he also co-opted or coerced various forces, and at the same time began to deal with various matters, but he did not encounter any major trouble, but he missed a grain gang.

Therefore, after hearing Zhang Kai's report, Ma De immediately felt a trace of regret. The rules of the grain gang are very strict, and they flaunt righteousness, if they can have a good relationship with these people in advance, with the identity of the Anqing gang ranking first among the one hundred and twenty-eight grain gangs, at least a lot of trouble will be removed. However, now is not the time to regret it, all that needs to be done now is to figure out what is going on.

"My lord, the grain gang sent out a gang to help people, and contacted some people in the four provinces along the Yangtze River to buy salt at a low price. Although their people did not buy much every time, because of their large number of people, the price of salt in the four coastal provinces rose again. Zhang Kai looked at the inquiring eyes of Ma De, Lu Longqi and others, and immediately said the results of his investigation.

"Master Zhang, you did a good job." Ma De nodded and praised Zhang Kai, motioned to his subordinates to hand him a cup of tea, and asked everyone, "Why did the grain gang suddenly help those salt merchants?" Aren't they afraid that I won't be able to settle accounts with them? ”

"My lord, the food gang is very difficult to deal with. It's not that they are powerful, no matter how powerful they are, they can't compare to the officials and soldiers. However, they are in control of the Caoyun Department. So, we have to throw a rat at them. Because, if there is a problem with Caoyun, it will definitely cause turmoil in the capital and the northern provinces, and at that time, there is no need to wait for us to find grain to help settle accounts, and the imperial court will have to trouble us first. Zhang Kai said again.

"Hmm!" Ma De certainly understood what Cao Yun meant to the Qing court. Not to mention other provinces in the north, Beijing alone is enough to make any official honestly dare not mess around. So that those people in Beijing can't eat? It's better to go home and hang yourself first, at least you can leave a whole corpse.

"My lord, what shall we do? Do you want to bring the leaders of the Anqing Gang and ask? Shi Shilun asked. He is familiar with the Taoists on these rivers and lakes.

"Anqing Gang? ......" Ma De hesitated, "Master Shi, who are the leaders and faces of the Anhui Grain Gang now?" I just need the ones who say the talk! ”

"My lord, the twenty-eight grain gangs in Anhui, generally speaking, will listen to the words of the head of the Anqing gang, that is, Wan Yanfang, the head of the grain gang. In addition, there are a few more well-known ones, but I think that it is difficult to say who is interfering behind this incident. Without waiting for Shi Shilun to answer, Liu Yingxia said first. He is a grain road platform, and he is also familiar with the head and face of the grain gang.

"Why? Since that Wan Yanfang is the chief leader of the grain gang, it is impossible for him not to know these things, right? Mader asked.

"My lord, what you know is what you know. However, interfering or not is a different matter. If other people from the grain gang want to do this, they must not forget Wan Yanfang, because he is the chief master. If you do this kind of thing, you have to report it to him no matter what, otherwise, if you offend the government and cause a big disaster to the grain gang, you may be labeled as 'deceiving the teacher and destroying the ancestors'. Tong Wan Yanfang, as the chief master, whether he interferes or not, it is completely up to his own will. Shi Shilun explained.

"I understand." The first thing is to have degrees of freedom. Ma De put his hands behind his back, thinking about how to deal with this gang of "triads".

"My lord, it's better for you to come forward and find that Wan Yanfang and ask him what he wants to do." Zhang Kai felt that he was "volunteering".

"Lord Zhang has never had anything to do with the people of the Food Gang, so it's better to leave this matter to the lowly position." When Liu Yingxia saw Zhang Kai come forward, he immediately came to a "Mao Sui self-recommendation". The eyes of the two looked at each other, and a slight spark stirred up. They all have the same mind...... Ma De is very valued by Kangxi, this is clear to anyone now, no matter what happens this time, he will definitely have a bright future in the future, if he is good, he will be able to make a fortune with his promotion in the future.

"Humph! Dealing with a bunch of small rivers and lakes recklessly, if I have to send you two four-grade officials to come forward, where will this face be left in the future? Mader snorted lightly and shook his head.

"What are you going to do, my lord?" Xing Ming asked.

"What should I do?" Ma De sneered, and then asked Shi Shilun: "Lord Shi, I remember that these people from the grain gang have always been not honest, right?" ”

"That's true, although the grain gang also helps the government to undertake the Cao Yun, but because it is a Jianghu gang, it often causes some trouble!" Shi Shilun replied.

"Okay. A group of gangsters in the rivers and lakes didn't eat well, and they dared to mix indiscriminately, and stabbed me in the back with the two Huai salt merchants. In that case, I don't have to be polite to them. They play yin, I also use a few black hands, dare to provoke me, I will play with their heads! Give them a 'bureaucracy'. ”

********

Mader was provoked by the grain gang, and the leader of the grain gang was not very peaceful.

Wan Yanfang has some regrets now.

Challenging the government with a gang of rivers and lakes, the consequences are unpredictable. Although he claims to be the chief leader of the 128 grain gangs, what is he really worth? And this time he provoked the governor of a province.

"Brother Huaizhi, you will make me miserable this time!"

Wan Yanfang is directly in charge of the Anqing Grain Gang, and the place where he lives is also in Anqing. The house is not big, in the south of Anqing Mansion City, relatively close to the Yangtze River. This is also the helm of the Anqing Grain Gang.

"Brother, what are you afraid of? Didn't I tell you everything? Then Mad he can't move you! "The person who talked to Wan Yanfang was a short, thin, dark-faced man named Wang Huaizhi. As mentioned earlier, the grain gang has a general gang in every province, and this Wang Huaizhi is the big boss of the Jiangsu general gang. There are a total of 30 grain gangs in Jiangsu, and the general gang is not in Yangzhou, not in Nanjing, and even more not in Suzhou, but in Jiaxing, called "Jiabai Gang".

"Everything is calculated in advance, but when the time comes, it may not be!" Wan Yanfang sighed.

"Brother Wan, don't you suddenly want to take regret medicine now, do you? Hahaha......" Wang Huaizhi asked. When he asked, he burst out laughing.

"I want to eat, I want to eat, but unfortunately it's late." Wan Yanfang sat on his tiger skin chair and said with his eyebrows locked.

"You, you...... I said, dude, you're so boring. Now that you've done it, what do you regret? Wang Huaizhi shouted.

"Huh...... Wang Dangjia is right, Wanda Boss, why is he so unambitious? You are the helmsman of our 128 grain gangs, and at the first order, the eight provinces will have a problem. That Ma De is just the governor of a province, how dare he treat you casually? After Wang Huaizhi finished speaking, a chuckle also sounded, and the source of the voice was a woman opposite Wang Huaizhi.

"Boss Chen, don't make fun of it. You are hand-eyed, up to the six powerful people in the capital, down to dozens of grain gangs in Jiangsu, everyone sells your face. Although I have the name of the head of the grain gang, how old am I in front of you? Wan Yanfang looked at this woman and said with a wry smile.

Wan Da said with a smile. How can Chen Guer be so powerful? The woman smiled and said.

Chen Guer!?

Three years ago, I had a relationship with Ma De in Yuanyang County, Henan. At that time, she was reselling human beings with a group of traffickers in official uniforms, but unfortunately she was unlucky and planted in the hands of Ma De. However, it is clear that she has not suffered any harm from the crime enough to cause death, on the contrary, she is still living a very good life. This can be seen from the face of her now.

"Boss Chen, don't be modest. Who doesn't know how good you are? It's just that someone doesn't understand, you have nothing to do with this matter, how can you think of intervening? Wan Yanfang asked Chen Gu'er.

"Nothing. I just made an appointment with a benevolent brother at the beginning, and this time I was tempted to come to the appointment. Chen Guer said with a smile.

"Going to an appointment? When did Boss Chen come forward to welcome guests? Wang Huaizhi listened to Chen Guer's words and said with a smile. Chen Guer's net worth is huge, there are nearly 20 painting boats on the Qinhuai River, this is not counted, she also runs pawnshops, restaurants, embroidery villages, everything that can make money, relying on the good relationship between the painting boat, she can almost get a foot, and the annual income is rumored to be hundreds of thousands of taels. It's a little more powerful than the average salt merchant. And a person of this level like him, Wang Huaizhi, usually doesn't want to have anything to do with Chen Guer, but this time when he came to Anhui together, Chen Guer also ignored him, which made him very unhappy. So, now when I hear this, I can't help but take the opportunity to be sarcastic. However, because Chen Guer's relationship network was too powerful, he still didn't dare to directly say "picking up customers", but changed it to "welcoming guests".

"Wang Da is wrong, the slave family didn't come out to welcome guests, this time I just want to come to meet an old acquaintance, so as not to let people say that the slave family doesn't count." Hearing Wang Huaizhi's words, Chen Guer smiled and stared at him. However, although Chen Guer smiled charmingly, Wang Huaizhi still felt a trace of coolness, and he didn't dare to talk nonsense at the moment. Although he is the big boss of the Jiangsu Grain Gang, Chen Guer also indirectly controls the nine grain gangs in Songjiang, and in terms of power, he is only bigger than him, not smaller than him.

"Who is Boss Chen's old acquaintance?" Wan Yanfang asked.

"You don't have to worry about this master." Chen Gu'er stood up, bowed slightly to Wan Yanfang, and said, "The slave family still has some things to do, so I will leave first." After speaking, he didn't care about Wan Yanfang and Wang Huaizhi anymore, turned around and left.

……

"Huh, stinky!" As soon as Chen Gu'er left, Wang Huaizhi spat on the ground.

"Brother Huaizhi, how did you get on a hook with this woman? It's a poisonous snake! Hmph, back then, the Songjiang Nine Gang listened to Zhu Biquan and Brother Zhu, but unfortunately Brother Zhu was killed because he hooked up with her, and he was finally killed and left the country, and he couldn't even keep his grain gang! Wan Yanfang said.

"Phew. Who hooked up with this old bustard? If it hadn't been for Boss Ji who had come forward to invite me to come this time, I wouldn't have come. I didn't come to get bad luck. Wang Huaizhi replied.

"That's good." Wan Yanfang looked at Wang Huaizhi's face and knew that this guy known as the "half-cut iron tower" was just saying that. This guy is rich and lustful, Chen Guer is alone, good-looking, and rich, it would be strange if he was not tempted. As for the background, hmph, Wang Huaizhi was originally born as a gangster in Jiangning Mansion, and he still pays attention to that? Now three of the seven wives in his family are from Qinglou.

……

And so it was, and another three days passed.

In the past three days, the price of salt in Anqing Province has been rising, although the increase is not very large, but it is indeed rising.

Originally, the grain gang was to eat rice, and the water transportation reached the eight provinces, so naturally the relationship with the salt merchants of the two Huai was not shallow. Among them, the 30 grain gangs in Jiangsu are the most. This time, Wang Huaizhi was entrusted by Ji Cangwei in Taixing, and with more than one million taels of silver given to him by Ji Cangwei, he came to buy the leaders of the 28 grain gangs in Anhui, the purpose of which was to play a trick of "black tiger digging out the heart" and "smashing Anhui's head with Anhui's salt".

Originally, Wan Yanfang didn't want to agree to Wang Huaizhi. However, Wang Huaizhi's words moved him. Wang Huaizhi said that Ma De cut off the Yangtze River salt transportation without authorization, although he was competing with the two Huai salt merchants, it was tantamount to kicking the grain gang for no reason, because it made the grain gang lose a lot of business. Therefore, it is not wrong for them to do the salt merchant a little favor, and it is not wrong to fight back against Mader. Moreover, the plan for this operation is to let the grain gang help the people come forward to buy salt, and everyone only buys a little, and the government has nothing to say at all. Could it be that the people of the government can arrest the entire Anhui Grain Gang and tens of thousands of people with their families? So, there's no need to be scared at all. As for arresting him Wan Yanfang, it is even more impossible to talk about, because that will only paralyze Anhui's water transportation, and if Ma De is not stupid, he will not mess around at this moment again. What's more, the people of the grain gang are also ordinary people, and they buy salt, and the amount is not large, and the government may not be able to find it for a while. And as long as the Anhui government can't find a corresponding solution during this time, the two Huai salt merchants will win a game. The grain gang can also make great profits.

So, after receiving 30,000 taels of silver, Wan Yanfang finally agreed to Wang Huaizhi's request. And in response to him, the people of the other 27 grain gangs in Anhui also responded to Wang Huaizhi. Then, the gangs of the Anhui Grain Gang went to the streets to buy salt, a small amount for each person, and bought a few more times, accumulating a lot, so that the price of salt in the four provinces along the Yangtze River began to rise.

However, three days passed, but Wan Yanfang and Wang Huaizhi did not inquire about the major reactions of the various yamen in Anqing to the current situation, as if this matter did not attract the attention of these people. Both of them have a weird feeling about this.

"I'll just say, the government can't think of a way to deal with us." Although he was slightly uneasy, Wang Huaizhi still didn't care.

"Something's wrong, I always feel like the government is using some kind of trick against us." Wan Yanfang is not as "free and easy" as Wang Huaizhi, after all, this time it was his 28 grain gangs in Anhui, not the Jiangsu grain gang, Wang Huaizhi is none of his business, he can't do it.

"Brother Wan, look at you, it's always okay to worry. Look at me......" Wang Huaizhi patted his thin chest that no longer had a few pieces of meat, and was about to continue, but he saw a grain gang outside, and he seemed to be running over here, running and shouting: "The big boss, Gu Dangjia, Guan Dangjia, Guo Dangjia, Han Dangjia, as well as Chizhou Mansion Liu Dangjia, He Dangjia, Sun Dangjia, Luzhou Zhao Dangjia, Hu Dangjia They came together." ”

"What?" Wan Yanfang listened to the shouts of this gang, his heart jumped, and he cried out in a lost voice. What this gang is shouting from the mouth is the leader of other grain gangs in Anhui, although it is not complete, but so many people come here together, something must have happened.

……

"Brother Wan, this time it's troublesome. The government suddenly issued a notice, saying that the wharves along the river were chaotic in the past and needed to be rectified. It is also necessary that all those who live on the docks must be registered and kept in order to be managed. Wan Yanfang's feeling was not wrong, as soon as the nine grain gang leaders who came saw him, they began to pour bitter water.

"Registering?"

"That's right, it's registering. The government also said that if there is no name on the register, you are not allowed to go to the dock! …… They only gave us seven days, saying that we had to explain it within seven days. Brother, our brothers don't know what to do, so we have to come to you after thinking about it. What do you think we should do? The head of a grain gang in Chizhou Mansion, named Liu Yujian, said.

"Huh, registering? After that, the government will see that our grain gang is not pleasing to the eye, and it will be arrested one by one according to the roster? Damn, the big guy can't say yes. Wang Huaizhi said on the side.

"Not bad. Brother Wan, you must not make a book. Which of our gangs doesn't have a bit of a secret on it? If we really hand over the roster, if the government looks at us at a time that we are not pleasing to the eye, they will catch a few brothers and ask, where else can we run? There's nowhere to hide. The head of the family surnamed Hu in Luzhou agreed with Wang Huaizhi.

"Of course you can't hand in the roster of your brothers. But this time, the government obviously wants to retaliate against us, do you have any ideas to deal with it? Wan Yanfang said.

"The big guys are united, but they don't pay, as long as we dominate the dock, no one will dare to come to grab business. It's just that you have to nod your head for this matter, Brother Wan, otherwise, our twenty-eight grain gangs can't be together, and it won't be good to be broken by each other! Another master said.

"Hmm. That's it! Later, I will send a message to the brothers of the other gangs. However, everyone must make it clear to the brothers below, don't be tough with the people in the government, so as not to provoke them. Wan Yanfang said with a calm face. The move of the Deguan Mansion would not be so simple, but he couldn't think of what the other party would do for a while, so he had to use this method to deal with it temporarily.

……

"The big boss, someone from the government is here."

When Wan Yanfang and the leaders of the Dry Food Gang were discussing, another subordinate came to report.

"People from the government? …… Who is it? Wang Huaizhi hurriedly asked, and after him, Wan Yanfang and the other nine leaders of the grain gang also turned their eyes and looked eagerly at the gang.

"Yes...... It's a patrol inspection. Timidly looking at the leaders of the grain gang, the gang replied.

"Inspection?!"

……

"The prefect heard the rumor that the grain gang had something to do with heaven and earth, so he sent his official to ask if there was anything in charge of Wanda." This inspector was invited in, and the petty official of Jiupin, with a slight word, made a group of grain gang leaders who usually boasted that they could "stomp their feet and shake the three rivers" jump up.