I, Liu Bian, Sanxing Han Dynasty

Chapter 85 Q&A

With Cao Song on the side, the situation never cooled down. As they were chatting, Cao Song suddenly felt that the problem was gradually getting out of control.

For example, when talking about scholars in Beijing such as Tai students, Cao Cao directly commented: "Now people outside are worried that His Highness will be deceived by the eunuchs."

Cao Song wanted to grab Cao Cao's ears and ask, is this what you should say? Can't you see that Guo Sheng next to you is gnashing his teeth?

Liu Bian asked in return: "If I replace the people around me with imperial students, will I definitely not be deceived?"

He also talked about the rampant lawlessness in the local area.

Liu Bian asked: "When Mengde held office, did he find that the eunuch's children caused more trouble, or the powerful and evil officials caused more trouble?"

Cao Cao did not answer directly, only said: "I see that the children of powerful people rely on power and bully the weak. Whenever local officials cannot control it, the people will suffer."

Later, some issues were discussed, but these issues were superficial and did not touch on the most fundamental land issue. Liu Bian decided to say one more sentence.

"I have seen in the accounting books of previous years that since the decline due to the Yellow Turban bandits in the early years of Zhongping, the population and farmland have also been decreasing year by year. As a result, national taxes have been halved. This rate is even more obvious to Ying. I also worry all the time." Although Liu Bian was young, when he said this, no one present felt any difference.

Cao Cao calmly replied: "Your Highness, I believe that the administration of officials should be rectified."

Cao Song, who was sweating profusely, finally breathed a sigh of relief after hearing this.

But he didn't find that Cao Cao was much more relaxed than him. Obviously Cao Cao knew what to say and what not to say.

Cao Song was not that ignorant. He was very aware of the local intrigues, concealing the population and acres of land, transferring the land rent of wealthy families to the head of Guizhou, and so on.

If you want to directly solve these problems, the most direct way is to replant the fields.

But he knew very well the consequences of redeveloping the fields. The last time the country had to redo the fields because the country had doubts about the results of the plan was Emperor Guangwu.

At that time, more than ten governors and county guards were killed, and large-scale rebellions broke out in many places across the country, even in Youzhou, where Emperor Guangwu started.

After this topic, the content of the discussion became peaceful again, such as the difference between Peiguo diet and Luoyang diet? Do people there like to eat corn or rice?

……

When Cao Song and Cao Cao left, Liu Bian was ready to return to the palace.

He had never expected that Cao Cao would show his heart to him as soon as they met, so he couldn't be called disappointed.

There were many reservations in Cao Cao's words, but Liu Bian himself was not honest.

As for the last plan proposed by Liu Bian, it refers to the inherent system that before the end of each year, each county needs to send data such as household registration, population, farmland, money and grain under its control to the central government by a special official.

Land management is the work before the above plan. Each county must survey the acres of land and population data under its control every year, and then summarize it to each county.

When the data is gathered to the central government, the data will be compared with the data of previous years. If there is any inconsistency, at least the planner will be held accountable, and at worst, the prime minister, governor, governor, etc. behind will not be able to escape.

Judging from the data that Liu Bian can see so far, since the large-scale rebellion caused by land control during the Guangwu period was quelled, the most critical changes in land area and population data are basically reasonable.

However, by the first year of Zhongping, these data had a huge gap, and continued to decline with the successive rebellions in various places.

Rebellion, especially large-scale rebellion, is the best reason to lose people and acres of land.

It is easy to lose, but it is not easy to get back the people and acres lost on the books.

Liu Bian thought that the rectification of officialdom mentioned by Cao Cao might be a good entry point.

……

On the way back, Cao Song asked, "Has my son's worries been sorted out now?"

Cao Cao nodded and said, "No wonder Cai Gong praised the prince so much." After returning home, Cao Cao suddenly sighed: "Father, I heard that the prince grew up among the people and was raised by a Taoist named Shi?"

Cao Song was stunned for a moment and asked doubtfully: "You think so?"

Cao Cao added: "Zixiu is a bit older, but Pi'er is only one year old..."

But Cao Song immediately poured cold water on Cao Cao: "Your Majesty wanted to reward Shi Taoist but couldn't find anyone, so don't have any illusions."

Cao Cao then gave up this idea.

On the other side, on the way back, Liu Bian was thinking that it seemed that in the past few months since the establishment of the Eighth School Lieutenant of Xiyuan, there had been no more reported rebellions in various places.

Even the Xianbei people seem to be a lot more honest.

This made him a little uncomfortable.

So Liu Bian thought, if the eight captains built the capital, they couldn't build it in vain.

There is always something to do for the Eighth School Lieutenants, and they spend real money every day!

Then, by coincidence, Emperor Ling thought the same way.

He brought up the tour plan again.

Fortunately, this tour will not start immediately, but will have to wait until the summer heat passes.

……

In the following time, Liu Bian saw two memorials one after another, from Yuan Shao and Ma Rixi.

The Runan Yellow Turban bandits finally surrendered to Yuan Shao. After Yuan Shao settled the surrendered people, if there was any progress, they would definitely have to return to the capital and choose someone from another place of origin to take over as the prefect.

The content of the memorial from Ma Rixi is longer.

Among the seven affected counties, the number of people who were finally willing to migrate to Jingnan was far from the expected 50,000 households. In fact, there were only nearly 20,000 households, and the total number of men, women, old and children was less than 100,000.

In addition, Liu Bian also saw two names he was familiar with on the memorial.

Hua Tuo and Zhang Ji Zhang Zhongjing.

Speaking of which, Hua Tuo still had Zhang Zhongjing's blessing.

Although Ma Rixi did not discriminate against doctors, he would not deliberately write the doctor's name in the memorial. However, Zhang Zhongjing was a county magistrate after all, so when he mentioned Zhang Zhongjing's compilation of the book to express his credit, he explained that a man named Hua Tuo Doctors with very high medical skills believe that the contents in the book are reasonable.

The four counties in Jingnan are considered to be relatively highly developed. At their peak, the population of the four counties exceeded 3 million. Changsha alone had 1.17 million people, but it could not compare with the Central Plains region in terms of population density.

Then, the pandemic came.

自桓帝元嘉元年（151）正月起、延熹四年（161）正月，包括本朝的建宁四年（172）三月、熹平二年（173）正月、光和二年（179）春、五年（182）二月……

The disease first originated in the north and then spread southward, and Jingnan was not immune.

The Yellow Turban Uprising that broke out in the seventh year of Guanghe (the first year of Zhongping) took place against the background of raging epidemics, severe drought, endless taxes, and oppression by counties.

The most recent major epidemic occurred in the spring of the second year of Zhongping after the Yellow Turban Rebellion.

This rapidly contagious disease was called typhoid fever.

(End of this chapter)