Eighth year of Chongzhen

Chapter 441 The Dark Side of the Palace
In the Qianqing Palace, Zhu Youjian was carefully checking the documents on the number of people in the palace and the annual consumption of money and food that had been submitted by the Supervisor of Rites.

Wang Dehua, Wang Chengen, Cao Huachun and others bowed and stood aside, waiting for the emperor's instructions after reading it.

Zhu Youjian has a general understanding of the total number of court ladies and eunuchs in the Forbidden City since the Jiajing Dynasty: the sum of the two is about [-] people.

The report of the Supervisor of Rites also confirmed this point.

Now there are 530 palace servants and 420 eunuchs in the palace, for a total of 960.

These more than [-] people consume a total of more than [-] shi of rice and more than [-] shi of firewood every year.

Since the beginning of the tenth year of Chongzhen, Zhu Youjian gave the palace staff a substantial salary increase, and now the monthly salary is 500 taels.

In addition to the food expenditure being basically the same as the Wanli and Tianqi dynasties, the monthly salary expenditure has greatly exceeded that of the emperors since Taizu.

Wang Chengen had complained countless times in front of Zhu Youjian, thinking that his emperor was too generous, so he almost said that Zhu Youjian was suspected of being a prodigal son.

Wang Chengen believes that the money has indeed been a lot more abundant in the past few years, but no amount of money can withstand this kind of spending. Although the emperor's family is more admired by thousands of people in the palace, the price is too high.

Because in addition to these monthly payments, there are too many places where money is needed in the huge palace.

If nothing else, just talk about food and clothing.

The normal monthly food expenses of these more than 40 people amount to more than [-] taels, which is about [-] taels a year. Adding the annual salary expenses, these two alone will cost nearly one million taels a year.

Let's talk about clothes.

The clothes of the eunuchs in the palace are distributed according to one year of summer clothes and one year of winter clothes, and the expenditure for each set of clothes needs to be nearly 10 taels a year.

This is not counting other messy expenses. If you calculate it carefully, just to feed the entire Forbidden City, Zhu Youjian will spend about 200 million taels of silver from internal funds every year.

I don't know, I was taken aback.

It was only then that Zhu Youjian realized the psychology of the Ming emperors desperately trying to make money, and also understood why Wang Chengen kept nagging.

Because the population in the palace that needs him to support is too huge, and there are too many items that need to spend money.

If the emperor doesn't want to make money, he won't even be able to support the people who serve him. What this emperor does is neither face nor interesting, and he will even be insulted and ridiculed by others behind his back.

The emperor is also a human being, and what he faces all day long is a group of domestic slaves who are more greedy than ordinary people. Except for the few big clangs, those who lead horses and pedals, sweep and wash, run errands and deliver letters, and serve tea and water. You also need money to live.

People work so hard all year round for the nobles in the palace, working hard from dawn to dusk, you can't just eat and dress and finish the job, can you?
It is also due to the fact that I have many means of making money, and it is not difficult to feed these more than [-] people. However, the emperors who have been living on the historical track, how can they have the vision and thinking brought by the information explosion generation?How can there be such a means of making money?

Emperor Wanli sent mine supervisors and tax supervisors not for his own selfish desires. When he was in power, the number of people in the palace was at least three to four thousand more than it is now. Even if they don’t raise their salaries, they just feed them. A million taels of gold flower and silver didn't work at all.

After straightening out his thinking, Zhu Youjian didn't think much about the huge annual expenditure in the palace.

Now the amount of money earned by the Four Seas Trading Company is quite astonishing, plus the salt profit and the output of Huangzhuang, the cost of supporting these more than [-] people is not a problem at all.

He had already issued a verbal order to the Supervisor of Rituals, the number of eunuchs and palace ladies in the palace is not allowed to continue to increase, especially the palace maids, unless Zhu Cihong recruits more than a hundred newcomers when Zhu Cihong gets married, and after that, he has to let them go out of the palace, and then How much is called from the people.

Regarding the situation of the palace people, Zhu Youjian has already learned about the situation through various channels. He now has new ideas and plans for these women who have dedicated their best years to the palace.

Once the maids in the Forbidden City were selected into the palace, they lost their freedom. Most of them had meager food and clothing, poor housing, hard labor all their lives, and could not see their parents.The cumbersome etiquette, strict hierarchy, and occasional insults make it almost impossible for them to succeed.

After the maid entered the palace, her status was very low. She had to serve the master to eat and drink, and she was not respected at all.

Taizu once had a special rule for court ladies: "Concubines below the palace have diseases, doctors are not allowed to enter, and medicines are obtained based on evidence."

The starting point of this article is to prevent scandals in the harem, but at the same time, many palace people died due to sudden emergencies without medical treatment.

There is also a very inhumane rule in Daming's palace, that is, once one enters the palace, it is almost impossible to be mercifully released.

To the west of the Jinao Yuqiao, and to the north of the Lingxing Gate, there is the Anle Hall. If the palace servants are sick or old, they should be sent here just like the guilty people. wait to die.

After the death of these self-defeating maids, they cannot be buried in the ground. If they are not serving as female officials in the palace, they will not be given tombs, but cremated. After the fire, the ashes are usually filled into dry wells.

In other words, for more than two hundred years, in this Forbidden City with a total construction area of ​​800 million square meters, countless lives have been buried in pain.

And there is an even more cruel and inhuman rule in the palace: sacrifice.

Many maids of honor appeared on the burial list as soon as they were selected into the palace. Once the emperor died young, it meant that some beauties who were in their prime had to follow.

No wonder that whenever the news of a draft girl in the palace is released, the common people will rush to find a matchmaker to tell their daughter to hold a wedding, and they will no longer care about picking and choosing.

Zhu Youjian, who came from later generations, deeply hates this series of inhumane practices. With all the conditions already in place, it is time for these outmoded practices to be changed and abolished.

"Wang Dehua, I have ordered that the number of people entering the palace will only decrease but not increase in the future, and the rule of prohibiting the distribution of all things purchased in the palace to the folks, has the supervisor of ceremonies ever ordered it?"

Zhu Youjian put the copy aside, looked at the supervisor of ceremonies and printed the eunuch's words.

"Since the old slave received the emperor's order, he immediately assigned relevant people to focus on this matter. Now that everyone has complied with it, please rest assured the emperor!"

Wang Dehua hurriedly bent down and cupped his hands and replied.

"Well, that's good! But I know that whether it's in the palace or the imperial court, there is a saying that the good and the bad are against each other, but those who involve their own interests and are harmed will definitely use this to the extreme! I have ordered the admiral of the Dongchang eunuch to send someone Monitor the progress of the matter, and if anyone tries to defy the law, they will be shot immediately once they are found out!"

After Zhu Youjian finished speaking in a stern tone, he stood up, walked to His Majesty with his hands behind his back, and started walking back and forth in the hall.

Wang Dehua and others hurriedly followed him, waiting for his next instruction.

"I feel that some bad winds in the palace are harmful to the peace of heaven. I want to implement a benevolent government with the palace, so as to ease the hearts of everyone, and make you no longer have to worry about the future!"

Zhu Youjian stopped, turned around, looked at Wang Dehua and others and said slowly.

"This old servant thanked the emperor for his kindness first. I don't know what the emperor's proposal is this time? I hope the emperor will tell you, so this old servant can spread the word of the emperor's kindness!"

Several people who knew all kinds of evil deeds in the palace looked at Zhu Youjian expectantly.

　The number of chapters in the last chapter was typed wrong, it should be 440 chapters.

　　
　
(End of this chapter)