Eighth year of Chongzhen

Chapter 115
The Changlu salt transshipment envoy was abolished by the court the next day. The reason given by the cabinet was that it would only harm the power of the people and would not help the court.

As for the more than 1 Dingkou in the salt field, Chongzhen deliberately kept them for use when Gong Fanwu went to Changlu to dry salt.In his later generations, he saw a map of the Changlu Salt Field, and the area it covered was too large. According to later generations, it covered hundreds of square kilometers.Although it is not yet developed to the area of ​​later generations, manpower is indispensable in ancient times when mechanized tools were lacking.

In a small salt shop in the southern part of the capital, there was a long line up to the street. There were hundreds of people, all of whom were people from nearby who came to buy salt.

The shopkeeper Li Cunzhi, who is in his fifties, is too busy to drink saliva.There are only three people in the salt shop, he and his son plus a waiter.On weekdays, the business is not bad. After a year, after excluding all kinds of expenses, the shop can have a balance of more than 1000 taels. He is already very satisfied.

He is the distant cousin of Li Huaipu, Yin of Shuntian Mansion. After Li Huaipu was promoted from Minister of Criminal Affairs to Yin of Shuntian Mansion the year before last, Li Cunzhi, who was far away in Fengxiang Mansion, Shaanxi, brought his son to this nephew in order to find a job.

Li Huaipu lost his father when he was young, and his widowed mother relied on washing, sewing, and mending for a wealthy family to support him in his studies and scientific examinations.Li Huaipu was talented and intelligent, and because of his poor family, he studied very hard, and his road to scientific examinations was also very smooth.In the 42nd year of Wanli, he was a Jinshi and ranked first. Since then, his official career has been smooth. In the fifth year of Chongzhen, he has sat in the high position of the third-rank minister of the Ministry of Punishment.

In the seventh year of Chongzhen, he got through the door of Wen Tiren and was promoted to the post of Yin of Shuntian Prefecture.

Although the Minister of the Ministry of Punishment and Shuntianfu Yin are of the same grade, they are both the third rank, but Shuntianfu Yin is a feudal official who is equivalent to a governor of a province, and his authority and influence are greater than that of a local governor.Just being able to directly face the holy one is worth ten streets to the local governor.Once the border is closed, you can only see the emperor during the majesty's speech, and it will be extremely difficult to see each other afterwards, unless you can be promoted to the position of the cabinet or the head of the six ministries.

When Li Huaipu first started studying, he didn't get much help from other relatives. There was a lot of cynicism, and no one thought that a poor family could produce dragons and phoenixes.

Although Li Cunzhi and Li Huaipu's family have been married for five times, but seeing his family's orphans and widows is not easy, he often helps their mother and child.Li Cunzhi was engaged in a small grocery business, and he had relatively ample money on hand. In addition, he had not yet married at that time, so he bought some rice, flour, grain and oil from time to time, which was a great help to Li Huaipu's mother and son who were extremely poor at that time.

Later, Li Huaipu won the Jinshi examination, and he went straight to the top, and the official became bigger and bigger, but he never forgot his uncle, and his mother often talked about how this uncle helped them back then.

He wrote to the local government, asking them to take good care of Li Cunzhi, and often asked people to send money to repay the kindness of the year.

Later, the Fengxiang Mansion was attacked by thieves, and Li Cunzhi's savings for many years were robbed. His mother-in-law also fell ill and passed away a few months later.Coupled with successive years of severe drought, the living conditions have become very harsh.In desperation, Li Cunzhi thought of this nephew, so he brought his teenage son to the capital to join him.

The arrival of Li Cunzhi made Li Huaipu's mother and son very happy.Li Huaipu always felt that he could not repay Li Cunzhi's kindness back then. After hearing that Li Cunzhi only wanted to find a job to save money for his son to marry his mother-in-law and carry on the family line, he used his power to open a salt shop for Li Cunzhi. The stable income of this shop was enough to repay him. The grace of the year.

After Jin Yiwei posted a post to Li Cunzhi's salt shop last time, Li Cunzhi couldn't make up his mind, so he went to Li Huaipu to explain the matter clearly.Some of Li Huaipu's responsibilities and authority are the same as those of Jin Yiwei, and he has already noticed the rise of Jin Yiwei in the past two years.As a civil servant, although he doesn't like Jin Yiwei, he knows that without the support of the emperor, it is impossible for Jin Yiwei to become a tiger with sharp teeth again. A thorn in the side, so there is no need to contend with Jin Yiwei on some things.

He told Li Cunzhi that it doesn't matter whether the salt is good or bad, and don't care what other people think, just buy it with money.At the Salt Merchant Conference that day, Li Cunzhi, who saw such good salt, bought a hundred stones at a time.This kind of high-quality and cheap salt, not to mention the support of Jin Yiwei, even if the King of the Bandit Mountain came to sell it, he would dare to buy it. Isn't the purpose of doing business to make money?

Unexpectedly, the new salt was snatched up by the surrounding people as soon as it was put on the counter.The original coarse salt and bitter salt were sold for seven yuan a catty, but such good salt only sold for two yuan and four cents. Can you not grab it?People who usually buy a catty or two catties now buy ten or twenty catties. I am afraid that the price will increase in the store after a while. Anyway, the salt is not bad, so just keep it if you can’t eat it for a while.

Li Cunzhi's [-]-shi new salt was sold out in less than two days. After careful calculation, although the selling price was several times lower, the profit was much higher.This is because the price of the original salt quality is high, but the sales volume is not high.

Seeing that Xinyan was so popular, Li Cunzhi was both happy and anxious.Needless to say, I am happy, but I am anxious because the new salt is out of stock, but there is an endless stream of people who come to buy salt after hearing the news.

Li Cunzhi hurriedly hired a carriage and rushed to the warehouse in Beicheng where he picked up the goods last time, wanting to buy more this time.Who knew that when I arrived in Beicheng, the horse-drawn carriages that came to pick up the goods formed a long queue, and there were horse-drawn carriages pulling away salt bags piled up like hills, and more horse-drawn carriages were coming behind me, and the entire square in front of the warehouse was crowded with people. There was constant yelling and cursing.People in front of the queue fought for parking spaces.It's all related to so-and-so, who is afraid of whom?
Li Cunzhi didn't want to cause trouble for his nephew, so he lined up obediently behind.Although my nephew is very powerful, I can't smear him for making money for myself. I and my son are very satisfied with the money earned in the past two years.After having the money, the son's marriage has also been arranged. He is the daughter of a scribe in Shuntian Mansion.The matchmaker said that the daughter is very rich, and she will definitely have several grandchildren in the future.

Several lieutenants from the Thousand Households Office in Beicheng of Jinyiwei sat in the shade, pointing and pointing while drinking tea, watching the crowded scene with a smile.This was sent by Jin Yiwei to maintain order and watch the scene. There were 20 people in a team, each team was given a day, and each person was given a subsidy of two taels of silver per day.There is no way, there are too many captains, except for the captains escorting salt merchants from other places, everyone is vying to come here, so they can only take turns to arrange shifts.

At this moment, there was a sudden burst of angry shouts and painful cries from behind, and a crowd of people neighed.Although Li Cunzhi is old, he traveled around all the year round when he was young, and his skills are still vigorous.He hurried into the carriage and looked back.

I saw the long line behind him keep splitting to the two sides. More than a dozen strong men were driving the people and cars in front to the two sides with sticks in their hands. Those who moved slower or refused to give way were thrown over by the sticks. On the ground, more than twenty carriages followed behind the group of people and moved forward slowly.

Li Cunzhi hurriedly jumped out of the carriage, and ordered the hired cars to drive to both sides to make way for the convoy.Although he didn't know who these people belonged to, he definitely couldn't afford to offend them.

Several captains over there saw the chaotic situation here, stopped talking and laughing, got up and walked over here.

This convoy had passed Li Cunzhi and was moving forward, when several captains in Jinyi blocked the convoy's way.

Jinyi Xiaoqi, who led the team, frowned and shouted: "What a dare! How dare you make trouble here! Throw away the stick! Kneel down!"

Hearing the words, the ten or so strong men not only did not let go, but gripped even tighter, and confronted the several captains eyeingly.

Xiaoqi was furious, and drew out the Xiuchun knife with his right hand, and the rest of them also drew out their knives.Holding the shining Xiuchun knife, Xiaoqi posed in a posture, and shouted: "Abandon the stick within five breaths! Otherwise, I will be killed for resisting an official's appointment!"

The expressions of the dozen or so people holding sticks suddenly changed.They are not afraid of resisting the official sentry, but what they are afraid of is the sharp blade in their hands. After all, the stick cannot withstand the sharp long knife. If they really want to fight, their group will not be able to withstand the knife.

Zheng Laowu parted from the crowd and came out from behind.

After figuring out the ins and outs of the matter, Zhu Gui immediately ordered Zheng Laowu to take people to Beicheng.He also told him that the quantity of new salt could not be large, and the market was so booming, that he could buy as much as he could after he arrived in Beicheng.

When Zheng Laowu arrived at the scene, he realized that he was late, and the wide field in front of the warehouse was already full of carriages.

Not to mention buying all of them, when it's the Duke's turn, there is no question of whether there is any salt.If things go wrong again this time, the butler will not be able to get around him.

So Zheng Laowu ordered the servants he brought to use sticks to open the way and squeeze to the front as soon as possible.

Zheng Laowu came to stand in front of Jinyiwei Xiaoqi, gently pushed aside the Xiuchun knife that was shining in front of his eyes, and said with a smile on his face: "Someone is the steward of Cheng Guogong's mansion, Feng Guogong Please come here to buy salt. Please make room for this little brother, don’t delay the important affairs of the Duke’s Mansion, otherwise the Duke of the Kingdom will blame you, you can’t afford it!”

(End of this chapter)