Chongzhen Daming: Starting from Coal Mountain

Chapter 125
When Kang Wanwan, Fang Wenzhen and Zhang Han went back and forth, they saw that Meixianglou was quite different. The biggest change was that it became brighter, almost as bright as day.

Originally, there were only a few red lanterns hanging in the prostitutes' houses along the Qinhuai River.

Dim lights can easily create a first-class ambiguous beauty, and can also cover up the flaws on the girls' faces, making it more difficult for patrons to find out. This is the case when looking at beauties under the lights.

But at this moment, the inside and outside of Meixiang Building are full of brightly colored lanterns.

In addition, from Yanqiaotou to Meixianglou, there are full of Yiding in armor.

The three of them walked to the gate of Meixiang Building, and just as they handed over the name card, the little eunuch who was in charge of welcoming the guests immediately shouted out in his characteristic high-pitched voice.

"Yangzhou Jinshen Kang Shao Jing Gong,"

"Mr. Fang Wenzhen, a gentry from She County,"

"Mr. Zhang Han, the gentry of She County, is here!"

Kang Wanwan and the others were immediately flattered.

Although the three of them have already bought the official positions of foreign officials, they can be regarded as gentry from a reasonable point of view, and they can barely put on the airs of gentry in front of ordinary people, but they really dare not call themselves public, and the real gentry He never looked at them directly, but just regarded them as merchants and philistines with a stinky body.

So this will suddenly be honored as a father-in-law by a father-in-law of the inner court, and the three of them are really flattered.

Standing behind the little eunuch "welcoming guests", Gu Gao and the other four sons and brothers even ate a mouthful of shit, not to mention how uncomfortable it was, how many merchants are worthy of the title of lord?
But no matter how uncomfortable you have to bow your hands.

"Mr. Kang, Mr. Fang, Mr. Zhang please upstairs!"

A smile that was more embarrassing than crying appeared on Gu Gao's face.

Gu Gao was really sad, not only that he had to stand like a boy at the gate of Meixiang Building to receive customers, but what made him even more sad was that there was Kang Wanwan among the businessmen insulted by them?
Now the matter of Na marrying someone else's daughter as a concubine is out of the question.

Sure enough, Kang Wanwan didn't give them a good face, and walked away.

Watching Kang Wanwan and the others go upstairs, Chen Zhenhui complained in a low voice: "Your Majesty, it's true, why did you specially invite such a group of philistines who smell like copper? It's annoying."

"That's right." Mao Xiang echoed in a low voice.

"We should be entertaining us scholars and students."

Wu Yingji also said: "That's right, it will be the scholars of my generation who will support the backbone of the Ming Dynasty in the future, not merchants and market thugs such as Kang Shaojing and Fang Wenzhen."

……

An elegant room on the second floor of Meixiang Building.

Chongzhen said to his two sons: "The future taxation and industry of my Ming Dynasty will be supported by these merchants. In this regard, it is impossible to count on those scholars. No matter how strict regulations you make, it is useless, because the methods It's more difficult than difficult, no matter how strict the regulations are, these people can find loopholes."

"So professional things have to be done by professional people."

"Anything that deals with money should be boldly entrusted to merchants."

"These merchants are born to deal with money. When it comes to profit calculations, no one is smarter than them. With them watching, every penny of the court can be used for practical purposes."

Speaking of this, Chongzhen gave another example: "For example, the water transport, Emperor Taizu Gao sent Xu Da to the Northern Expedition, and Emperor Chengzuwen successively conquered Mongolia five times. At that time, there was no governor's office for water transport, but Taizu and Chengzu have always been there. There is no shortage of food!"

"What did you rely on? It relied on the development of China and France, and it relied on merchants. It is because of these salt merchants that our Ming Dynasty was able to transport the most grain to the border towns with the least financial resources, ensuring the Northern Expedition to the Central Plains and the Five Expeditions to Mongolia. ration supply."

"Later, because of the extravagance of the nobles and the abolishment of China and France, the capital and border towns could only rely on water transport for grain. Since then, the grain of my border town and capital in Daming has never been rich! Why is this? This is because water transport is inefficient It’s so outrageous that the imperial court spends the same amount of money to deliver less than half of the grain that the merchants can deliver!”

Zhu Cihong said: "The malpractice of water transportation is indeed serious. The emperor also suffered from it in Xuzhou before. Lu Zhenfei also couldn't bear the inefficiency of water transportation, so he bypassed the Nanzhi government to buy grain directly from the grain merchants, but in the end Instead, he angered those people, if not for the timely help of the father, I am afraid that he would have been dismissed and returned to his hometown at this moment."

"That's why." Chongzhen said, "When the Northern Expedition arrives in the future, it is definitely not possible to rely on water transportation for the procurement and transportation of food, salaries and supplies. It is more reliable to rely on merchants to bear the burden."

This point has been fully proved by history.

It is indeed more efficient than the government to use red-capped merchants to pay for food and salaries.

Hu Xueyan is to Zuo Zongtang, and Sheng Xuanhuai is to Li Hongzhang.

Since there are ready-made successful examples, Chongzhen has no reason not to learn from them.

Immortal battles like Sidu Chishui can't be learned by ordinary people, but it's not difficult for officials and businessmen to do it.

Zhu Cihong frowned slightly and said: "But merchants value profits over righteousness, will they pass off inferior ones as good ones? For example, military rations, will they buy mildewed rice and wheat to make good rice? Another example is firearms, will they steal iron in secret? Materials? The bird guns or cannons that are built are in danger of exploding? My son thinks it must be guarded against."

Chongzhen nodded: "Lang'er, you are right to worry, so you still need to set standards for merchants."

Zhu Cilang said: "Setting standards? Does the emperor's father mean setting rules?"

"It's not the same." Chongzhen said, "Rules are for people, and standards are only for goods. For example, in the procurement of military rations, you can agree on a very clear standard for the rations. There must be no impurities such as stones and mouse feces, and there must be no mildew. Deterioration and so on, such as firearms, can also set clear standards. The inner and outer diameters of the gun barrels must be the same, and the blasting rate of the same batch of firearms must not exceed a certain number. money."

Zhu Cijiong said: "We can set standards for merchants, and we can also set standards for officials and craftsmen. In the same way, we can also set a clear standard for the Governor's Yamen and the Yunjun. Then all the problems will be solved?"

"It's useless." Chongzhen shook his head and said, "Let the affairs be handled by merchants. After the standards are determined, you only need to inspect the goods, and you don't need the court to manage people. You also need to manage people, and talent is the most difficult to manage, so it is often difficult to manage well, so the efficiency of doing things is low.”

In the final analysis, this is actually the difference between purely government-run and government-supervised private-run.

The biggest difference between the two is a profitable driving force and a non-profit driving force.

In order to pursue profits, businessmen will try their best to save costs and improve efficiency, but the government does not have this driving force. Officials will pay more attention to saving trouble, safety, and harmony among colleagues, and they will be in harmony with each other.

Therefore, Zhu Yuanzhang’s Northern Expedition and Zhu Di’s Five Expeditions to Mongolia did not lack food, but since the establishment of the Water Transport Yamen, the food supply in the capital and the northern border towns has not been abundant, so the quality of firearms purchased from merchants is quite good, but since the Inner Court War Bureau and the After the Weapons Bureau of the Ministry of Industry built the Tiger Crouching Cannon, Frang Machine Cannon and Hongyi Cannon, the quality became very worrying, and as time went by, the quality became more and more worrying.

Zhu Cihong said thoughtfully: "So, it's all due to human factors?"

"Yes, in the final analysis, it's all about human factors." Chongzhen nodded and said, "It's the same with governing the country. As long as the problem of government officials is solved, all other problems will not be a problem."

"For example, drifting. If the Ming Dynasty had a large team of honest, self-disciplined and capable officials, would there be such a thing as drifting?"

"Another example is tax collection. If there is a huge team of honest, self-disciplined and capable subordinate staff, will they still be unable to collect taxes?"

"If every penny of the Ming Dynasty's tax revenue can be fully collected, if every penny of the Ming Dynasty's tax revenue can be used for real purposes, there will be absolutely no such thing as people being displaced and forced to rebel, and there will be no chance of building slaves. Sit big!"

Zhu Cijiong scratched his head and said, "As long as the officials are managed well, the country can be governed well? It doesn't seem so difficult?"

"Oh, isn't it difficult?" Chongzhen patted Zhu Cijiong's little head lightly, and said, "People's hearts are like water, and people's movements are like smoke. Talents are the most difficult to manage! Now you are still young, when you grow up You will understand."

While the father and son were talking, Wang Chengen came in and reported, "My lord, most of the merchants have arrived."

"Okay!" Chongzhen immediately stood up, and walked out of the private room with his two sons to the back corridor on the second floor.

Meixianglou is considered the most upscale brothel in the entire city of Nanjing, and it has a large yard facing the side of the Qinhuai River.

This courtyard occupies quite a large area, and there is a stage in the middle of the courtyard. It is usually very lively during opera singing, but the most lively time is when the oiran is being elected.

At this time, hundreds of merchants had gathered in the backyard of Meixiang Building.

Seeing the three Chongzhen father and son appearing in the corridor, the merchants hurriedly avoided their seats and kowtowed: Cao Min waited to kowtow to the Holy Majesty.

"Pingshen!" Chong Zhen raised his hands and said with a smile, "You are all specially invited by me, and you are distinguished guests, so don't kneel down, and sit down."

Merchants heard the news and took their seats one after another, but they all sat on half their buttocks.

Chongzhen said to Zhu Cihuang again: "Lang'er, I will leave the rest of the matter to you."

"My son leads the decree." Zhu Cihong's face flushed red, first he gave Chongzhen a deep bow, then turned around and stomped down the stairs to the stage in the backyard.

The "General Han" with a loud voice quickly took his place.

"It's not too early, let's get straight to the point."

Not to mention anything else, Zhu Cihong has learned Chongzhen's style of doing things a lot, no matter what he does, he will never do those meaningless tricks, and the meaningful tricks are another matter.

"Presumably you have already guessed some clues before."

"Yes, that's right, the reason why Father invited everyone here,"

"It's just for one thing, to raise wages, or to raise wages."

"Right now, my Ming frontier army is fighting against Jiannu in Xuzhou. It is a time when we are in urgent need of money, so we still have to rely on the generosity of everyone present. Of course, everyone can rest assured that you will never let you donate for the court in vain."

(End of this chapter)