Chapter 191

Zhang Yan, the queen, has a good reputation in history, and has even been described by some people as the White Lotus. Of course, this is impossible, if it was really a white lotus, she would not have survived until now.

Even the Emperor of the Apocalypse can die violently, let alone her. In the palace, this place is the place with the most people in the world, and those who can persist are outstanding.

As Zhang Jin explained the beginning and end of the matter, he explained it.

Zhang Yan was stunned.

How stupid would this person fall for this?

Zhang Jin said with an aggrieved face: "Sister, I really didn't want to hurt anyone...... I just want to throw your carriage in Cheng Shijie's courtyard and let Jinyiwei come to search his mansion and disgrace him! ”

Empress Zhang is now very speechless.

Is it Cheng Shijie's face that is lost?

This is a loss of face for Zhang Yan, the queen, right?

This matter is too low-level, what trouble can Cheng Shijie cause?

Even if you have to deal with Cheng Shijie, how simple it is, let the coachman drive the carriage and directly hit Cheng Shijie's carriage, or a runaway carriage and hit the gate of Cheng Mansion, as Empress Zhang Yan, what else can Cheng Shijie do?

Can Cheng Shijie still let Zhang Yan come to apologize?

Don't say whether Cheng Shijie dares or not, even if he does, it is Emperor Chongzhen who wants to apologize, not Zhang Yan.

It's good now, because she's a stupid brother who's made things bigger.

With her disappearance, Emperor Chongzhen couldn't wait to dig into the ground, and now the civil and military officials, everything that should be known has been known, and what should not be known should also be known.

I'm afraid that many people also know the inside story, Zhang Yan, the younger brother of the queen, is jealous of Cheng Shijie's miraculous achievements and retaliates against him.

Let's not talk about how much impact this incident has on Zhang Yan, the queen, the key is how Zhang Yan will gain a foothold in the palace in the future, this is the lack of strict discipline and discipline, this crime, her father Zhang Guoji can't escape.

What to do now, Zhang Yan is also in a big mess, of course, if you tell Emperor Chongzhen directly, Zhang Jin, this bastard, even if he doesn't die, then this life will be over.

But let Zhang Guoji ......

Zhang Yan could only think about how to deal with the difficulties in front of her for a while.

……

Cheng Shijie didn't pay too much attention to the disappearance of Empress Zhang Yan, because he knew very well that this issue was actually very simple, it could be big or small, and it could also make a big fuss.

The key depends on Emperor Chongzhen's attitude, and soon, Emperor Chongzhen's attitude was expressed, first of all, Emperor Chongzhen has not agreed to Cheng Shijie's request to restore the 25th Wei of Liaodong, and now Emperor Chongzhen has agreed.

Since the 25 guards in eastern Liaodong had long been abolished, the military department transferred the five guards in Henan, the five guards in Shandong, and the five guards in the north from the governor's office of the five armies, a total of 15 guards and eight independent 1,000 households, with a total of 100,000 and 8,000 soldiers, and began to be assigned and transferred to southern Liaoning.

Rebuild Jinzhou Wei, Jinzhou Left Guard, Jinzhou Qianwei, Jinzhou Right Guard, Gaizhou Wei, Lushun Wei, Haizhou Wei, Fuzhou Wei, Guangning Wei, Liao Zhongwei, Liaoyang Left Wei, Liaoyang Right Wei, Liaoyang Left Tunwei, Liaoyang Left Tunwei, Anshan Wei.

This holy decree is clear to the world, and Emperor Chongzhen is useful to prove that he still trusts Cheng Shijie, if he doesn't trust it, how can he add more than 100,000 soldiers and horses to Cheng Shijie at once?

Although it is said that the guards are useless, and Emperor Chongzhen does not have the intention of throwing off the burden, the problem is that this signal represents trust.

With the promulgation of this holy decree, Emperor Chongzhen asked officials from the Ministry of Rites to come to guide Cheng Shijie's royal etiquette in case there was a mistake during the wedding.

Regarding the big marriage in the Ming Dynasty, Cheng Shijie is actually quite weak-minded, saying that women are very sensitive, and he is also worried that Xiang Hui will find out the problem.

However, during this time in the capital, Cheng Shijie was not idle.

Because Cheng Shijie knows that the modern army is not only able to shoot guns, artillery is a technical branch, and there are actually a lot of scholars in the Ming Dynasty, Cheng Shijie believes that these scholars who are influenced by the idea of official position, but artillery needs to be calculated, needs a certain level of education, and can train qualified artillery, and there is still a huge gap in the Ning Navy.

In the past, there were more people and fewer guns, but now with the increase in the production capacity of the Gun Bureau, the production of three-inch guns has reached 36 guns a month, and an average of more than one gun can be produced a day.

This speed is obviously enough for the artillery development of the Ning Navy, but the problem is that there are too few qualified artillery, in order to solve this problem, Cheng Shijie had to retire the original Franc machine gun, in fact, the Franc machine artillery, in this era, is still very advanced, it is a pity to retire.

In the future, the Ning Navy will need to deal with the Liukou, who are not like Jiannu, they do not have a strong will to fight, they only need a cannon bombardment, dozens of casualties, tens of thousands of horses, and they will collapse when they say that they will collapse. In this case, the Franc machine artillery must be retained, and the kind of flowering shells that kill dozens or hundreds of people in one cannon must not be allowed to fight the rogues.

No matter how the Liukou are all ordinary people who can't survive, Cheng Shijie is not willing to kill a lot of Liukou, so even if Ning Haijun has produced enough artillery, he still wants to keep the Franc machine artillery and a large number of crossbow machines.

Unlike firecrackers, lead contains highly poisonous, once shot, in the era of lack of antibiotics, once shot, basically hopeless, but crossbow machines are different, even if there is no armor target, as long as you don't shoot the vital part, an arrow through the thigh or arm, as long as it does not hurt the bone, there is still a chance to survive, and it will not be disabled.

But the problem is that even if a musket hits the limbs and other non-critical parts, it is not easy to survive, when dealing with Jiannu, Cheng Shijie is afraid that the weapon is not poisonous enough, and when facing the rogue in the future, he is afraid that the weapon is too vicious.

This is Cheng Shijie's typical double standard.

For this reason, recruiting manpower, recruiting people with a certain level of education, has become Cheng Shijie's imminent problem, Cheng Shijie does not consider recruiting from traditional scholars, there is only one group of people who can meet the demand, that is, the guys trained by businessmen, these guys can be literate and can read and count.

Of course, these people also have problems, such as tricky and cunning, this is actually not a big problem, throw it in the Ning Navy for training, you will get rid of their bad habits, slowly cultivate, have a certain cultural foundation, it is easier to start from scratch.

Even if the training is started from scratch, Ning Haijun is facing a serious shortage of teachers.

This matter is done by Sun Zhixi, for Sun Chengzong's grandson, Cheng Shijie is quite satisfied, knows how to advance and retreat, has eyes, and is also very capable.

"Meet the Prince!"

"Yongyan, you're outside!"

"Don't waste your courtesy!"

Sun Zhili also knew that Cheng Shijie liked to start seeing mountains and talking about things, so he said directly: "What Guogong asked me to do has been done, after this period of recruitment, a total of 857 people have been recruited, these people can read more than 2,000 words, understand certain calculations, if some conditions are relaxed, more than 2,000 people can be recruited, this is the roster!" ”

Cheng Shijie held a thick roster, and couldn't help but sigh that the demographic dividend of the Ming Dynasty was indeed unmatched, if the Tang Dynasty had the population of the Ming Dynasty, it was estimated that Europa was still speaking Tang Yan.

According to a special study conducted by Evelyn Sakakida Rawski, she concluded that in the mid-to-late nineteenth century, about 30 to 45 percent of men and 2 to 10 percent of women could read and write. Thus, the low limit averages 16.6 to 20.5 per cent and the upper limit is 24 to 28 per cent.

Luo Youzhi's main reasons are: first, the lower-level clerks can read and write, and such clerks have at least more than 100 in small cities, and at most more than 3,000 in large cities, so there are about 3 million grassroots civil servants in the country (the term of office of grassroots civil servants is five years, and the number of conservative alternates is about twice the number of positions), and this does not include officials who serve in counties, provinces, and the central government, as well as officials hired by the government to assist in handling government affairs.

Secondly, most businessmen are also literate, because basic literacy skills are required in business activities, such as bookkeeping, keeping historical records of transactions, and reporting to the government. Thirdly, the workers at the port and the shipowners who traveled from place to place were required to sign contracts in the trade, so they could also read and write. Finally, the general public needs a contract, or at least a ghostwriter, to buy, mortgage, lease land, hire labor, borrow money, and even buy and sell children.

The literacy rate in the cities, the centers of written communication, was of course high, but the literacy rate in the countryside was also higher than we think, and the main driving force for the spread of literacy was the development of printing after the thirteenth century. This view is almost the common conclusion of most cultural historians, and the reasoning process is that because the Ming Dynasty not only continued to develop book printing, but also had a high degree of commercialization of publishing, popular books were published in large quantities.

Southern Liaoning is a special phenomenon, and the main sources of this group are two aspects: first, the soldiers and soldiers of the Dongjiang Army, who are mainly the surviving people of Liaodong, and the displaced people who cannot survive, mainly from Henan and Shandong. The third part comes from Dengzhou Wei.

As Cheng Shijie's old foundation, the Dengzhou Weizuo Thousand Households, more than 10,000 people, have now become a minority group in southern Liaoning.

Cheng Shijie put down the roster and said lightly: "Yongyan, I want these people, the selection in the army adopts the elimination system, and the unqualified people can be brushed down, now it is not only the artillery that is short of people, but also the baggage troops also need a large number of talents who can calculate and write, so let's relax, the conditions are relaxed, and people who can read and write 1,500 words, and those who can add and subtract within 10,000 are recruited." ”

"More than 2,000 people eat, drink, and Lazar is not a small number!"

"If you don't have enough money, then ask Zheng Qi for it!"

At this time, Zheng Qi followed Cheng Shijie to the capital, mainly responsible for Cheng Shijie's accounts, but what made Cheng Shijie very angry was that Zheng Qi looked sloppy.

In addition to the first time under the recommendation of Yang Yunniang, Zheng Jian and Zheng Qi's father and daughter came to see Cheng Shijie, but Zheng Qi had already married, and he was still recruiting a son-in-law.

Following Yang Yunniang's side to do things had no effect, but when he came to the capital, Zheng Qi suddenly became sloppy.

Of course, Cheng Shijie understood what she meant, and pointed at Zheng Qi and said angrily: "I said you can't comb your hair?" Can't change into clean clothes? Wearing a man's clothes all day long, wearing a man's clothes, his face is not washed, and his face is smeared with soy sauce, right? You deliberately smeared it yourself, right? Who are you guarding against? If I wanted to bully you, would you be able to hide until today? ”

Born in troubled times, being beautiful is a sin for a woman.

Zheng Qi must understand this, so when he stayed by Cheng Shijie's side, he was sloppy and unkempt all day long, his clothes hadn't been washed for an unknown amount of time, and his body still smelled a little moldy.

It's good for women to have a sense of self-protection, but to that extent, it's a bit excessive.

Not to mention anything else, Zheng Qi is also Cheng Shijie's bookkeeper now, not only to deal with Cheng Shijie's boss, but also to deal with various gods and Buddhas in the future, and his own people have to say that if outsiders see Zheng Qi, they may not say it, maybe how to complain about Cheng Shijie's alternative fetishes in their hearts.

What's more, an originally beautiful woman tosses herself into this ghost all day long, does this reflect that Cheng Shijie is a pervert?

Quite possibly!

Zheng Qi was dumbfounded.

"Zheng Qi, listen to me, Ben Shuai pays you a salary of six hundred taels of silver every year, just for your professional knowledge, not because you are beautiful, here, no one can bully you, you better make a little bit of your own money, or you resign!"

Cheng Shijie said angrily: "Do you know how many women you can buy for six hundred taels of silver?" And you're still a married woman? Ben Shuai is not Cao Cao! ”

Sure enough, although Cheng Shijie's words were a bit heavy, Zheng Qi quickly changed into a men's dress, a cyan Confucian shirt, and his hair was freshly washed, which was much more pleasing to the eye.

Although Cheng Shijie is very rich, when he came to the capital, he also brought 100,000 taels of silver, but the problem is that when he recruits artillery, when recruiting, he needs to pay a settlement fee, some people are willing to go to southern Liaoning, and they also need to arrange for them to go to southern Liaoning, and he is about to get married, and he needs to renovate the house, and he also needs to purchase fireworks, colorful silk and various supplies necessary for the wedding.

Cheng Shijie must make a good decision, he doesn't want to hurt Xiang Hui, but he also doesn't want to hurt Princess Le'an, a princess he has never seen, this marriage is actually a political marriage, and he and Princess Le'an can't talk about any harm.

However, as Cheng Shijie, the procedures and etiquette that the wedding should have must have, so spending money is like running water.

"If the running water seat is not done, the money is still enough!"

"No, the flowing water seat will do it!"

Cheng Shijie thought for a while and said, "I'll figure out a way to deal with money!" ”

……

"Borrowing money? Hai Guogong, don't joke with our family! ”

When Cheng Shijie asked Gao Qiqian to find him, and when he talked about borrowing money, Gao Qiqian seemed to have heard the best joke in the world, will Cheng Shijie be short of money?

The answer is no, in later generations, someone will describe who has money, and they will say that your family has a mine?

Cheng Shijie now has mines, four copper mines, and dozens of gold mines, silver mines, iron mines, and coal mines, otherwise, the expenses of the Guangning Navy will be enough to crush Cheng Shijie to death.

Of course, Cheng Shijie is still building roads, digging ditches, and repairing city walls on a large scale in southern Liaoning, as for the taxes in southern Liaoning, although the commercial tax is collected, in fact, it is far from enough to make up for Cheng Shijie's expenses.

Cheng Shijie said with a smile: "Brother, settle the accounts, I am short of money now, you lend me 100,000 taels of silver, and after half a year, I will repay you 110,000 taels of silver with interest!" ”

Gao Qiqian shook his head and said, "Qian Zhuang is more than that!" ”

One-tenth of the interest in half a year, put it in later generations, properly drop usury, in the Ming Dynasty, this is already a human debt, the interest is too low.

"How much interest does Grandpa Gao want?"

Gao Qiqian shook his head and said: "It's not a matter of how much interest, it's that our family has no money!" ”

"How can you have no money, don't tell me, you copied ......"

Without waiting for Cheng Shijie to finish speaking, Gao Qiqian said with a resentful face: "General Cheng, you don't want to think about how much silver Your Majesty's inner treasury has, and during this time, it is a reward for the army and a reward......

Cheng Shijie understood that Gao Qiqian's silver was confiscated, but it was not confiscated, but forced to donate. Gao Qiqian guarded Cheng Shijie, and there was no shortage of silver, and there were many people in the palace who were jealous of Gao Qiqian.

For example, the heart of the king of the admiral of Dongchang, this goods is eyeing the position of Gao Qiqian, when Emperor Chongzhen had no money to reward Ning Haijun, he used the silver he had made over the years to donate 300,000 taels of silver to Emperor Chongzhen.

Emperor Chongzhen was also curious about where Wang Zhixin came from, thinking that he was corrupt, so he was very displeased, Wang Zhixin told Emperor Chongzhen that he was learning from Liaonan and began to collect health fees in the capital, and in more than half a year, he collected more than 300,000 taels of silver.

In fact, where did this more than half collect more than 300,000 taels of silver, at first it was okay, and it was okay to collect 70,000 or 80,000 taels of silver every month, the people were afraid of being fined, and everyone developed the habit of paying attention to hygiene.

In more than half a year, a total of less than 200,000 taels of silver was collected, and Wang Zhixin lost more than 100,000 taels of silver from it, and some of the money was obtained by him from corruption and bribery.

Because he gave Emperor Chongzhen the silver, Wang Zhixin was from the Central Association of the Supervising Army, this Central Association of the Supervising Army, and the prime minister of the supervising army who was high and had a slightly lower level, so Wang Zhixin also became the general manager of the supervising army, responsible for supervising the Dongchang and serving as the prime minister of the Guanning Army, that is, he has the right to transfer all levels of generals of the Guanning Army.

This time, the high dive is on wax.

He donated most of it by taking advantage of the reason of raiding his family, and he and Wang Zhixin pooled nearly half of the military expenses, and the wine and meat that the officers and soldiers of the Ning Navy drank, ate meat, and included the rewards they received, most of which were Gao Qiqian's hard work.

Cheng Shijie didn't say that he gave interest on 10,000 taels of silver, even if he gave interest on 100,000 taels of silver, he didn't have any money.

Seeing that Gao Qiqian had no money, Cheng Shijie didn't care too much.

He suddenly remembered a classic scam in later generations, the Ponzi scheme, which is the name given to investment fraud in the financial field, the ancestor of the pyramid scheme.

In China, Ponzi schemes are also known as "tearing down the east wall to make up the west wall" or "white wolf with empty gloves". In short, it is to use the money of new investors to pay interest and short-term returns to old investors, in order to create the illusion of making money, and then defraud more investment. Many illegal pyramid schemes use this trick to amass money.

Cheng Shijie's development in southern Liaoning requires a very huge hole in funds, silver is needed to reclaim wasteland, silver is needed to open factories, and silver is needed everywhere.

However, these people in the capital made Cheng Shijie unhappy, and they couldn't rob the army openly, so there would be a dark one.

Cheng Shijie hurriedly asked someone to send a letter to Yang Yunniang, asking her master Feng Sanniang to come forward, this genius who dared to pretend to be Mrs. Cheng Shijie was the best person to carry out the Ponzi scheme.

The reason is that to develop in southern Liaoning, it will be profitable.

Borrow money now, repay the debt after the autumn, if the interest rate is high, there will definitely be people excited, in order to avoid ordinary people being implicated, then set a threshold.

Most of the ordinary people don't even have silver, so they set it to 1,000 taels, so that they can intercept 99% of the ordinary people, and let them enter the set for the rich and unkind landlords, gentry and officials, honorable people, these richest people in the Ming Dynasty.

Cheng Shijie didn't even set up a game here, so he dived high and returned.

"Grandpa Gao, what's your important matter?"

"Hai Guogong, our family is also entrusted by others!"

"Let me guess, this person should be too Comber!"

"Hai Guogong, you really guessed wrong this time!"

"Oh!"

"This time, our family is entrusted by Empress Zhang!"

Gao Qiqian smiled bitterly and said: "Empress Zhang's order, our family has to obey!" ”

Gao Qiqian knows very well that the Emperor of the Apocalypse has always cherished Empress Zhang. When he was dying, he entrusted Empress Zhang to his younger brother Zhu Youzhen, the king of letters, and said: "The middle palace has been with me for seven years, and I have benefited a lot from the advice of Chang Zhengyan." In the future, young and widowed, good and pitiful, good deeds in the palace. ”

After Zhu Youzhen ascended the throne, he also respected the imperial sister-in-law very much, and called Zhang Yan "Queen Yi'an". In the Chongzhen Dynasty, she was respected and courteous by Ming Sizong.

Once, Empress Zhou said to Chongzhen how Zhou Yanru's character was not good, Emperor Chongzhen was dissatisfied with the harem to discuss the government, and asked Empress Zhou how to know, Empress Zhou was right to Empress Zhang, and Emperor Chongzhen took Zhou Yanru down from the cabinet and kicked him out of the cabinet.

In the matter of the inverted Zhou, although Wen Tiren had merit, it was actually Empress Zhang who finally made Emperor Chongzhen make up his mind, and she could influence Emperor Chongzhen's decision on national policy, which even Empress Zhou could not do.

Cheng Shijie said with a smile: "This is not harmonious with etiquette, there is a difference between men and women!" ”

Empress Zhang disappeared, so she put Cheng Shijie on the fire and roasted it.

Although Cheng Shijie has no idea about Queen Zhang, it is not ruled out that Queen Zhang set up a trap, Cheng Shijie is in the workplace, but he has encountered this situation, in the original Hangang Group, a colleague was calculated, and a female employee flattered him, and after giving the other party a little sweetness, said that the other party was sexually harassed.

If Cheng Shijie meets with Queen Zhang in private, as long as Queen Zhang pulls down her face, Cheng Shijie will be smeared with yellow mud into the crotch of his pants, and it is not but.

People in the rivers and lakes have to be careful.

Especially officialdom, this is a more sinister place than the rivers and lakes, the rivers and lakes, at least talk about the last morality, even if it is false and false, it is also righteousness.

But in officialdom, you don't even want the last face. Just like the great writer Ouyang Xiu, he was calculated, calling him an old man who picks up ashes, and the person who picks up ashes must not be Ouyang Xiu.

"Really?"

"Absolutely not!"

Cheng Shijie smiled resolutely: "If you have something to say, your father-in-law can convey it on your behalf!" ”

In Cheng Shijie's opinion, Queen Zhang, just like that, weasel, weasel can have a good thing to give a New Year's greeting to chickens

(End of chapter)