"Eh, call daddy......"

"Daddy—"

"Oh, yes!"

In the palace of the Han King in the capital, the twenty-three-year-old Zhu Gaochi held the three-year-old Zhu Zhanji, playing idle and having nothing to do.

It's just that his happy appearance didn't last two seconds, and the sound of hurried footsteps came from outside the hall.

When he hurriedly hugged his son back into his arms, Zhang also walked in in a hurry.

"What's the matter, it's blazing."

Zhu Gaochi hugged Zhu Zhanji, but there was a kind of indifference that he didn't listen to what was going on outside the window.

"The third child and the prince are fighting in the Spring and Harmony Palace!"

As soon as Zhang spoke, Zhu Gaochi was frightened: "Is the third child still alive?" ”

"I was taken to the big teaching field by a few guards, saying that I was going to participate in training in it to introspection."

Zhang sat down and poured himself a cup of tea, and Zhu Gaochi hurriedly hugged his son and sat aside.

"The second child took the initiative to fight the third child?"

"No, it was the third child who did it to the prince first." Zhang took a sip of tea and moistened his throat before saying:

"I heard that this time it was the third child who told Changshi Gu Sheng in the palace of King Zhao that he had the spirit of the son of heaven, and then the prince knew about it, and then the prince called him to the Chunhe Palace."

"I said why did the third sister go to the East Palace yesterday to delay the decision, it turned out to be this idea."

"Yes!" After listening to Zhang's explanation of the cause and effect, Zhu Gaochi stood on Zhu Gaochu's side.

"Aren't you distressed? Aren't you the most distressed about the third child on weekdays? Zhang looked at Zhu Gaochi in surprise, but Zhu Gaochi hugged Zhu Zhanji and handed him over to the female official next to him.

Shaking off his sour hand, he chatted with Zhang: "If the third child really rebels, do you think our family can be fine?" ”

"When the time comes, the walls of the temple will definitely fall down and everyone will push them, and a bunch of people will say that I have secretly wanted to rebel for a long time."

"When the time comes, don't care whether the second child believes it or not, in short, our family will definitely be turned upside down."

"Humph!" Zhang snorted, and said to Zhu Gaochi dissatisfied: "If you want me to say, the third child is used to being with Your Majesty, how many times has my mother said about him, every time I say that he is you and Your Majesty to protect him." ”

"I think the prince did the right thing, if he was a little more ruthless, the third child's head would have already rolled all over the ground."

"Eh, eh, eh, ......" Zhu Gaochi hurriedly stopped, touching Zhang's little hand and laughing: "If the third child is really dead, then even if the second child doesn't kill me, sooner or later I will have to scare myself and scare myself to death." ”

"What are you afraid of, he will kill the third child and not you." Before Zhang could figure it out, Zhu Gaochi taught:

"Look, if the second child really kills the third child, will the people under him think that the third child has been killed, and it is nothing to kill the boss?"

"Tell me, how many people in the world want my life at that time?"

Zhang listened carefully, and at the same time asked a question: "According to what you say, we have to be targeted when we go to Yunnan?" ”

"Not really, if we do leave, it won't be long before the people in the temple forget about us." Zhu Gaochi waved his hand, leaned back on the chair at the same time, and said comfortably:

"The second brother is generous, we have Zhuangtian and Yulu in Yunnan, and when the time comes, find an opportunity to hand over the guards in hand, maybe Yulu can rise again."

"Are you all the guards?" Zhang was surprised: "I think those uncles and brothers protect the guards as if they were treasures." ”

"If others can keep it, what can I do if I keep it?" Zhu Gaochi stood up and turned around in front of Zhang.

"I'm not good at riding, I'm not in good health, it's impossible to fight."

"The place where we are in Kunming is again, and the imperial court has stationed 30,000 people there, if there is really a Tusi who can fight Kunming, then I would rather believe that the Hu people in the north have entered the customs and surrounded Beijing."

After that, Zhu Gaochi sat back in his position, put his hands into his sleeves, and glanced at Zhang's by the way: "Anyway, the imperial court has given us a lot of 15,000 yuan a year, and our family can't eat bear's paws every day, so let's leave it at that." ”

"What about the guards at the gate? Maidservants, female officials, eunuchs, and cooks don't want money? Zhang began to settle accounts for Zhu Gaochi:

"I'll do the math for you, just now the two hundred guards in the palace will have to pay at least 1,500 yuan a year."

"The female officials, eunuchs and maidservants of the palace add up to more than 100 people, at least 2,000 yuan."

"Our family's soup and rice silver, as well as more than 300 mouths in the palace, as well as horses and ploughing cattle, we have to eat 5,000 yuan every year if we don't do anything."

"This is still calculated according to the price of goods in Jiangnan, if you go to Yunnan, maybe the price will be higher, and the guards, female officials, and eunuchs will have to recruit more, and you will have 15,000 yuan ...... at that time."

As she spoke, Zhang suddenly couldn't go on, because no matter how she calculated, the fifteen thousand guan was too much to spend.

Unless you want to raise soldiers, this fifteen thousand guan is really not so easy to spend, not to mention that there are a lot of cloth and spices and 5,000 acres of farmland in the Han Palace.

For Zhuangtian, Zhu Gaoxu's revised system was that Zhuangtian's taxes were handed over to the political envoys, who in turn handed them over to the vassal kings.

That is to say, 5,000 mu of farmland is the additional income of the Han Dynasty after the tax is collected according to each mu of land in each province.

According to the old Hongwu system, the average quota per mu of land in Yunnan is 12 catties of grain, so the grain received from the field is 400 stone under normal circumstances, plus all kinds of miscellaneous items are about 500 stones, and after folding, it is almost 200 yuan.

It's not too much, but with the addition of cloth, satin and spices, it can basically make up 1,000 guan, so the Zonglu income of the Han Wangfu is 16,000 guan.

If Zhu Gaochi is strong enough to give birth to enough county kings, then each county king still has 3,000 yuan.

However, in order to prevent the vassal kings from taking advantage of this to accumulate wealth, Zhu Gaoxu also stipulated that the princes, county princes and other clan clans could not be issued as scheduled until they were given the feudal or crown.

In this way, the idea that many feudal lords tried to have children to collect money was eliminated, after all, the mortality rate in this era was too high, and it is difficult to say how many people could live to adulthood.

"I said the second child was generous, right?"

Seeing that Zhang couldn't say a reason, Zhu Gaochi also took the opportunity to show off, and then said:

"The third child has suffered this time, let's not delay, when the news comes from Yunnan, we will go to the domain as soon as possible."

Zhu Gaochi looked at the palace gate with a little emotion: "This capital is not easy to treat......"

His words were like a gust of wind, blowing directly out of the city.

Outside the Qilin Gate in the outer city of Nanjing, a carriage and more than 20 plainclothes soldiers on horseback stopped on the village road next to the official road.

Although it is already the end of October, there are still many people working on the cultivated land on both sides of the official road.

In the rural areas of later generations, except for a few areas, winter is undoubtedly a time of leisure, especially at the end of October of the lunar calendar, many farmers will be idle at home.

Compared with later generations, the ancient peasants can be said to be all year round.

"Looks like we'll have to be busy until mid-winter......"

Zhu Gaoxu's voice sounded in the carriage, and he was familiar with Jiangnan farming at a glance to know what the people were busy with and how long they needed to be busy.

Winter is the best time for farmers to prepare their fields and plough their cattle, and they often take advantage of the winter solstice to prepare their fields, remove weeds, and plough the soil in preparation for next year's spring ploughing.

At the same time, they will also check the condition of the cattle, mules and horses, and give them proper maintenance so that they can perform optimally in the field operations in the coming year.

Today's fields are full of peasants plowing the land, and judging from Zhu Gaoxu's experience, these peasants will be busy until at least mid-November or even late November.

In Zhu Gaoxu's senses, he felt that the temperature at the beginning of tomorrow would be colder than in later generations, so by mid-to-late November, the area south of the Yangtze River would have already entered below freezing.

At that time, in order to cultivate the farmland, these people will inevitably leave some frostbite on their hands.

When the wax moon arrived, they could not rest, so they seized the time to process the harvested grain into finished grain, and at the same time make sauces and other foods.

Some people from poor families will also weave straw sandals, dustpans and other goods at home to earn extra income.

Looking at their situation, Zhu Gaoxu didn't bother, but silently recorded all this, and at the same time took out a book to record.

In this booklet, the number of acres of land in each province, as well as the number of populations, as well as the amount of tax grain that needs to be paid, and the average number of catties of grain per mu are stated.

The land endowment of the Ming Dynasty is a quota, and then the quota of land endowment is evenly distributed according to the status of the upper, middle and lower households of the people.

The advantage of this is that on paper, the burden on the people is not large, but the disadvantage is that once it is implemented, there will be many places where there can be cheating.

Changing the high-class paddy fields into dry fields and changing the status of the upper households to the lower households are all pediatrics, and they directly change the high-class paddy fields into mountainous areas in an excessive way, and even collude with local officials to transfer the taxes that should belong to them to the ordinary people who have no background.

From Zhu Gaoxu's point of view, he hopes not to make it too cumbersome, but to cut it down with a knife and directly set it as one out of ten.

However, the governance of the country cannot be based on individual ideas, but must be changed according to the actual situation.

The policy of giving one out of ten for land and one for ten taxes on commercial tax has already been implemented in Shandong, but due to the insufficient number of officials, the tax situation in Shandong in the first year of Yongle was not as optimistic as Zhu Gaoxu expected.

Zhu Gaoxu turned to the page representing Shandong, in which he wrote a lot about Shandong's taxes, and because Zhu Gaochu abolished Shandong's miscellaneous taxes, the whole page was very clean and short.

[The political envoy of Shandong Province has 57,460,237 acres of land, 4,523,467 and a half stones, and 364,725 yuan and 4 cents of commercial taxes. 】

This year, Shandong has paid more than 452 stone taxes and grains, a direct increase of 1.67 million stones compared with the 2.85 million yuan in taxes and grains during the Hongwu period.

It seems that the burden of the common people has increased, but in fact it has been lightened, because Shandong did not carry out forced labor, nor did it levy miscellaneous items of silk silk for all kinds of people, but only maintained the commercial tax collected at the gates of the county seats, and the amount was also very considerable.

But even so, it did not live up to Zhu Gaoxu's expectations.

Because according to Shandong's per mu yield, the land endowment can receive at least more than six million stones, and the commercial tax should not be so small.

This was nearly 1.5 million stone less than he expected, and the reason was that this time it was completely carried out in accordance with the ten taxes and one tax, and only the people of the three state capitals of Qingzhou, Dengzhou, and Laizhou, as well as all the county towns of the three state capitals.

After leaving the three prefectures with the largest number of officials, the other three prefectures of Jinan, Dongchang, and Yanzhou began to have difficulty implementing this policy.

"Maintaining a ratio of about 1:400 between the government and the people will maintain the basic tax collection, but we still have to consider the issue of government governance......

Zhu Gaoxu muttered, he calculated an account, that is, the number of officials he invested in Shandong, and the number of officials invested in Qingdao, Deng, and Laizhou.

Under Lao Zhu's system, a normal county would have five officials with 20 to 70 officials.

The standard was set in the thirteenth year of Hongwu, and there was almost no major change since then.

Among them, the first and second grade yamen have two stones and five buckets of monthly salaries, decreasing from top to bottom, and the sixth grade yamen is one stone per month, which is not too low.

There are more than 55,000 officials on the register, but there are more than 100,000 people who are not registered, and the money of this group of people is allocated by the local yamen.

Under such a system, there were less than 200 local officials and more than 1,200 officials in the three prefectures of Qingdenglai.

After he took the three prefectures of Qingdenglai, he transferred more than 1,400 officials from Bohai to join them, so the number of local officials was 2,800, and the people fluctuated greatly under the migration, but it also remained at about 1.8 million.

Counting 1,500 of the 3,000 officials in the Taxation Department, a full 4,300 officials were mobilized in this year's tax collection of the three governments.

Under such a situation, the three prefectures paid 2.8 million stone for more than 20 million mu of cultivated land, which was close to the tax and grain payment of Shandong Province before the restructuring, while the three prefectures of Jinan, which controlled more than half of the other half of the land, only paid 1.72 million stone.

"You have to change the local officials to become your own."

After roughly calculating the cost of employment and the collection of taxes and grains, Zhu Gaoxu decided to transfer the students who graduated from Bohai to Shandong.

This year, 20,000 students will graduate in Layue, and this is also the peak of the wave of Bohai students' graduation.

When these students who have been studying in Hongwu for 30 years graduate, the average number of graduates in Bohai will drop to 10,000 per year, while the students in Liaodong have not yet completed five years of study.

However, as long as it lasts until the end of the third year of Yongle, and when the more than 100,000 Liaodong students enrolled in the 32nd year of Hongwu graduate, then the people in their hands will be enough.

At that time, it will be enough to educate Shandong Daxing and exchange all the grassroots officials in Shandong.

As for the 20,000 people who graduated this year, Zhu Gaoxu is not ready to devote all of them to the ranks of officials who go south to become officials.

He wants to select some high-quality talents to devote themselves to the research of mathematics, physics and chemistry, after all, science is productivity.

For this reason, he asked Yizha to print his own mathematics, physics and chemistry examination papers and ship them to Bohai two months in advance.

When it comes to the graduation examination at the end of the year, as long as someone can stand out, then they will be put into research by Zhu Gaoxu, and according to the ideas provided by Zhu Gaoxu, they will study in all directions, to improve basic mathematics, physics and chemistry, and at the same time to invent and improve some existing and non-existing scientific products.

Zhu Gaoxu is not omniscient and omnipotent, he can only give the direction he knows for people to study, and he doesn't know whether he can succeed.

His real battlefield still has to solve the shortcomings of the Ming Dynasty, such as the 20,000 students who graduated.

"At present, there are 5,000 officials in Liaodong to maintain the situation, but it is obviously not enough, so let's leave 10,000 in the local area first......"

Zhu Gaoxu muttered, and at the same time recorded this incident in the book.

Later, he calculated a little, if you add the Bohai officials and tax officials in Shandong, plus the 10,000 students at your disposal, it will be 14,400 people.

Today, the population of Shandong is about 5 million, so if this group of people is fully applied to the grassroots, it can basically achieve bottom-up control of Shandong, and Shandong can also be used as a pilot for the new policy, and after success, it will be promoted.

Thinking of this, Zhu Gaoxu also finished writing the last word, put down the booklet in his hand, and pushed open the door of the carriage.

"Your Highness......"

Two hundred household officials surrounded him, but Zhu Gaoxu waved his hand: "Follow me to the fields and call me the master." ”

"Yes!" The two returned the salute, and then followed Zhu Gaoxu down the path into the field, but they were driven away as soon as they arrived.

"Those three over there, they don't have long eyes, what are you stepping on in my field?!"

In the distance, an old peasant shouted at Zhu Gaoxu and them, and at the same time raised the old iron hoe in his hand.

"Don't be angry, I am the lord of Jiangning County, and I am here to ask about your difficulties."

With more than 20 men on horseback, Zhu Gaoxu could only pull the official body for himself.

Although he was only the main official of Jiangning County, it was still the old farmer who was shouting hurriedly dropped his farm tools, knelt in the field and knocked his head a few times.

"The grass people didn't know that the Lord Bo was coming, and they dared to shout at the Lord Bo, asking the Lord Bo to forgive their sins!"

The old farmer kowtowed hard, covered with mud at the same time, but also let the surrounding farmers know the arrival of the Jiangning County Lord Bo, and they put down the farm tools in their hands one after another, kneeling down like lambs waiting to be slaughtered, at a loss.

"Get up, I'm also a peasant's child."

Zhu Gaoxu stepped forward to help the old farmer and shouted to the people around him, and then called them up.

But even when they stood up, they were still resigned and restless.

It was at this time that the old farmer saw that Zhu Gaoxu was tall and couldn't help but shrink his neck.

If others are shouted at by him like this, it doesn't matter if this is his field or not, let's beat it first.

"Uncle, I came outside the city to ask you, this year there is no exemption, when the officials and grain chiefs sent by the yamen collected grain with you, did they embarrass you?"

Zhu Gaoxu helped the old man to sit on the ridge on the side, and when the officials of the hundred households saw this, they also hurriedly put the horses they brought in the fields, and Zhu Gaoxu also sat on the horses.

It was only for a moment that he felt that this was not right, because he was born tall, and he was much taller than the old peasant who sat on the ridge of the field, so he could not help but feel that an official was trying a prisoner.

He put the horse down and sat down on the fallen horse, and although it was comfortable, it felt right.

"No embarrassment, no embarrassment......"

The old peasant repeated this, but his words and deeds betrayed him, and it was evident that they had said so.

"Don't worry, no one knows about me coming out this time, as long as you don't say it, no one can embarrass you."

Zhu Gaoxu comforted the old farmer, but the old farmer knelt down directly: "Lord Bo, don't ask the grass people, when the news is gone, you can return to the county, but the grass people still have to beg for a living." ”

The old farmer's words made Zhu Gaoxu speechless, and he couldn't help but think of the protagonists in many TVs in his previous life who were in charge of the people or supporting roles, and if he opened his mouth, he could protect them.

But reality is different from TV, no protagonist can always sit in the local area and make decisions for the local people.

They did one thing and left, as if one thing would solve everything.

The same is true of his own inquiry, if he can't protect the villagers, then asking them will harm them.

"That's it, old man, you told me what happened, if there is a lot of trouble with the chief and the chief of the grain, I will send someone to take them, and choose someone from my personal people to be the chief and the chief of the grain, but they will protect you whenever you encounter something."

Zhu Gaoxu made a promise, and the old farmer and the surrounding farmers looked at each other when they heard this, as if they wanted to say what they thought.

"I'm not a trickster, I'm not a liar, I don't believe you look over there."

Zhu Gaoxu motioned for them to look at the carriages and soldiers on the official road, and sure enough, they also became bold when they saw them, and the crowd shouted one after another.

"Zhao Nan and Li Yong's two dogs didn't take the official fight to collect food, and they said that our food is not good!"

"Yes!!"

"Over the years, we have paid 12 catties of grain, and this year, the bucket is bigger, and we have paid 15 catties of rice!"

"And ......"

With Zhu Gaoxu's assurance, the crowd could no longer bear it and expressed their suffering.

"Uncle, are they telling the truth?"

Zhu Gaoxu looked down at the old farmer, and the old farmer also nodded frequently: "It's all true, after collecting the land endowment, we still want us to help them serve the conscription." ”

"Not only did they help them with their conscription, but they also exempted our relatives from conscription and asked us to help them with it, and if we didn't want to, they would take us after us every summer and autumn when the taxes were collected."

"And we have to pay more than a dozen taxes every year, and if we grow 300 catties of rice per acre, we have to pay at least 20%."

The old farmer said the grievances in his heart, and for the people of the early Ming Dynasty who liked to watch the playbook, they all regarded Zhu Gaoxu as the Qingtian master in the playbook.

"Can you give an example of the specific types of taxes that are paid each year?"

Zhu Gaoxu was not surprised to hear this kind of thing, after all, he had always known that the burden of the people was heavy, and what he cared about was that the methods of this group of officials to exploit the people were other than "drenching and kicking", which was convenient for him to clean up other officials who used this method in the future.

"Summer and autumn grain, storehouse, pu basket, bamboo basket, food ......"

Without thinking, the old peasant said a bunch of taxes that Zhu Gaoxu had never heard of, and he could still understand the summer and autumn grain in the front, but he didn't understand the back.

"Eating is what they eat along the way to collect taxes, and these have to be collected from us, and each family collects a pound of rice."

"The warehouse collects the grain into the village grain depot for safekeeping, and each family receives two catties."

"Pu baskets and bamboo baskets collect the money used to hold grain after the grain is collected, five catties each, and the pockets are also five catties per pocket, and there are ......"

The old farmer's thoughts were complicated, but Zhu Gaoxu could hear it clearly.

He only heard four words in the whole story...... exorbitant taxes and levies

(End of chapter)