golden scales

The royal family originally had Baohe and other stores, which were responsible for handling groceries from various vendors.There are six stores in total, namely Baohe, Heyuan, Shunning, Fude, Fuji and Baoyan.The offices of the admirals and eunuchs are located in Baohedian, which are all located on Rongzhengfu Street.

Starting from the Jiajing period, the income of these six stores was collected by officials sent by King Yu.During the Wanli period, it was used by the Holy Mother Li Laoniang in the Palace of Compassion.Now it is Yi'an Empress Zhang who uses it as an inner palace expense.

Zhu Cihong didn't intend to intervene in this industry, because there were too few real high-quality assets, and it was completely a resale trade, which could only be used as rouge money for prostitutes, which really didn't fit his status as a prince.As a prince, of course, he must make the most of the existing high-quality assets and divest the bad assets, so as to gain the ability to influence the world, not just the profit of tens of thousands of taels of silver.

The Gunpowder Bureau is an excellent asset with potential, but due to operational problems, not only cannot it generate income for the country, but it also swallows a lot of internal funds.This has been a habit since the reign of Taizu, so much so that the later Emperor Yanjing thought that the money was spent for granted, and never thought of using the power of the Tian family to support the army with business.

"The internal funds were originally paid to the three major battalions for food, equipment, and staff, and they were also paid to the Gunpowder Bureau of the Military Warfare Bureau to supply the three major battalions. Isn't this a piece of goods sold twice for money?" Is it?" Zhu Cihong said: "During the time of the temple, the people below were more honest and did not dare to report it so blatantly. Now I ask for a clear list of various expenses, and they dare to report indiscriminately. If this is the case, I will let them really Just buy it with your own money."

"Your Highness, whether Baohe Liudian or Gunpowder Bureau is the property of the Tian Family, as long as Your Majesty nods, you can do whatever you want." Liu Ruoyu said: "But if the three battalions spend money, it will be touched. The tiger whiskers of those dukes and ministers."

"You old bastard, their tiger whiskers can't be touched, but their lonely dragon scales can reverse it!" Zhu Cihong sneered and said, "I want to see, who dares to make irresponsible remarks on this matter."

……

The weather in mid-July has begun to turn cold, and the chilly air makes it inevitable to walk faster.

Wearing court clothes, Zhu Chunchen walked slowly on the gold bricks outside the East Palace, not too worried about this visit.He had heard about some things about the prince, not many, and he never left the word "smart".Thinking about the status of the prince, does anyone dare to call him "stupid"?

As the No.12 Cheng Guogong, Zhu Chunchen is the grandson of Zhu Neng, the famous general of Jingnan. In the first year of Chongzhen, he supervised the compilation of "Records of Emperor Xi Zongzhang".As the emperor's favored minister, after the country's meritorious officials, he was a first-rank official, he was granted the title of duke, and he was in charge of the country's most "elite" army. It is not an exaggeration to describe Zhu Chunchen as an "extremely talented minister".

However, this duke of the state did not have much loyalty to the emperor. Instead of being loyal and diligent in training the Beijing camp, he even opened the Chaoyang Gate to dedicate the city when Li Zicheng's troops came to Yanjing.No matter how much Chongzhen was smeared, he never treated Cheng Guogong Zhu Chunchen the slightest bit, but this person was able to open his door to sacrifice the city, and afterwards he and Chen Yan led all the officials to persuade him to come in, which can be described as shameless.

It was not easy for Zhu Cihong to be able to smile when he saw him.

"My lord, don't come here without any harm." Zhu Cihong saluted Zhu Chunchen, returned half of the salute, and said peacefully.

"Thanks to your majesty's great blessing, your majesty asks me, I can still live with it." Zhu Chunchen, as the Duke of the state, was crowned king by his ancestors for two generations, so he has nothing to fear when facing the prince.

People's awe often comes from distance. The more people around you, the harder it is to have awe.For the common people, the prince is the star king descending to earth, who will be in charge of Ziwei in the future.As for those noble relatives of the state, they knew very well that the emperor's family was no different from ordinary people, and their lives might not be better than theirs.

Zhu Cihong was not unhappy because of Zhu Chunchen's attitude, and said slowly: "My lord, governor of Jingying, do you know how much gunpowder the Jingying needs to buy every year?"

"I have accounts, but I am old and fading, so I can't remember them for a while." Zhu Chunchen frowned slightly.

——For this kind of thing, it is enough to send an internal eunuch, how can the prince and the Duke discuss it in person?Too disgraceful!

Zhu Chunchen thought to himself.

"But I remember." Zhu Cihong smiled and recited the annual expenses of Jingying since the ninth year of Chongzhen.

Zhu Chunchen's neck felt cold when he heard that, one reason was that the crown prince had obviously come prepared, and the other reason was that the people below were too lazy to cheat, and only added or subtracted one or two hundred taels to the annual amount and it was over.Even a layman can't help but have doubts about such stable data.

"I'm just surprised," Zhu Cihong said: "From the ninth to 11th years of Chongzhen, the Beijing camp didn't move much, and the gunpowder was probably enough to buy. From 11 to 14 years, the Beijing camp sent out all over the country to suppress bandits and captives, and fought one after another. , why do you still use so much gunpowder?"

This is just one item of gunpowder, and it's all based on reason. Zhu Chunchen turned his mind and said to him: "Your Highness doesn't know, because the Beijing camp sent out to fight, the gunpowder was consumed on the battlefield, and the gunpowder used for training There will be less. The gunpowder equipment of each of my three battalions is fixed, and no increase or decrease is allowed, so it has always been stable."

Zhu Cihong nodded slightly: "After the Lord said this, I understand, it seems that it is still the fault of not being familiar with common affairs."

"Your Highness should learn the way of governing the country, and leave such trivial matters to the accountant." Zhu Chunchen relied on his old ways.

Zhu Cihong sneered in his heart.

He had already asked the Second Section of the Attendant to change the cash account transfers of the past seven years in the Beijing Camp to the debit and credit accounting method. Even if the other party evened the accounts, he could still use "Benford's Law" to judge whether someone had tampered with.

According to Benford's law: in a bunch of unmodified numbers, the number starting with "one" has a probability of about 30.00% of the total number; the number starting with "two" has a probability of about 17.00% of the total number; It is the number "three", and the probability of occurrence is about 12.00% of the total number... After that, it decreases successively. The sum of the occurrence probability of the numbers starting with eight and nine at the beginning is at most [-]% of the total number.

As long as the sample is large enough and the numbers are unmodified, this rule will be obeyed.In other words, if the numbers were fabricated, the statistical results would deviate significantly from the law. Auditors 500 years later use it to check whether there is fraud, which greatly improves audit efficiency.

This rule was told by the prince to Queen Zhou in the palace. It is used together with the debit and credit bookkeeping method. It can be seen at a glance whether someone is cheating. People who don't know this rule will be afraid.

Now this secret has been passed on to Yao Tao, and it has become the secret weapon for auditing the accounts of the Eastern Palace.

According to this secret weapon, the fraud in the accounts alone has reached a shocking level, not to mention eating empty salaries and drinking soldiers' blood.

But looking at Zhu Chunchen's attitude now, it is obvious that he does not intend to bow his head and plead guilty.

Zhu Cihong has never been a person who likes to force others. He hopes that everyone can consciously seize the last chance instead of sophistry and resistance.For those who are stubborn, there is only one way to solve the problem.

;