Good son-in-law of the Ming Dynasty

Su Mu didn't know what happened when the secret book between himself and Mr. Wu was handed over to the emperor?

The time was pushed back ten days or so, and the prison was locked in the inner courtyard, and the supervisor of the ceremony was on duty.

It has entered late autumn and October, and the 16th year of Hongzhi in the Ming Dynasty is about to pass.Turning the new year is the year of Zhengde.Changing the Yuan and changing the Edict, the most important code of the country.After the new year, Emperor Zhengde will get married. ,

The emperor's wedding is a distinct political symbol in feudal society, which means that the reign of Empress Dowager Zhang will come to an end, and Emperor Zhengde will be in charge.

Even if there are still two months, according to the words of later generations, the major yamen in charge of ideology, such as the Ministry of Rites and Qin Tianjian, will continue to write letters, either proposing what procedures should be followed for the wedding ceremony in the coming year; The list and etiquette of the Hajj in Beijing;

The politics of the Ming Dynasty practiced a system in which the cabinet drafted votes and the supervisor of ceremonies approved the rewards.That is to say, the papers written by the officials must first be handed over to the cabinet, and the three ministers of the cabinet will read them first, put forward their opinions on how to deal with them, write them on a small note, attach them to the papers, and hand them over to the emperor. Call for a ticket; the booklet is handed over to the emperor, and the emperor makes a final decision based on the opinions of the cabinet.Because the emperor's handling opinions must be written in cinnabar, all of them are called batch red.

However, most of the ministers' notebooks are empty, and these guys are all Jinshi backgrounds, and they can't stop writing more than ten thousand words.The emperor was also impatient to watch, so he simply delegated the power of approving reds to the Supervisor of Ceremonies, and let the Supervisor of Ceremonies handle it himself.After all, nominally speaking, the supervisor of ceremonies belongs to the emperor's domestic slave, which is equivalent to the personal secretary of later generations.

There are usually five eunuchs in charge of ceremonies, one eunuch with palm prints and four eunuchs with pens.

After the paper drafted by the cabinet was transferred to the supervisor of ceremonies, the four pens had to read it first, and then put forward their opinions on how to deal with it. After the palm seal eunuch agreed, the verdict was written.

In this way, the cabinet governs all officials, and the supervisor of rituals controls the cabinet.The cabinet ministers are called prime ministers, while the eunuchs of the chief of ceremonies are called inner prime ministers. No one can control the other, achieving a delicate balance.

In fact, the politics of the Ming Dynasty paid attention to mutual restraint and restraint.

Among the five eunuchs of the Supervisor of Rituals, except for Liu Jin and Eunuch Liu, the other four had their own eunuchs, and they all had their own affairs.I just come to read the papers every day, and then go back to the Yamen after processing.Therefore, it is difficult to have more than three people sitting in the room on duty in a day.

Today is strange, there are four of them.

The leader is Liu Jin, and the other three are Ma Yongcheng, Gao Feng and Gu Dayong.

That's right, these four people are all former members of His Majesty's East Palace, besides them, there are also Zhang Yong, Wei Bin, Qiu Ju and Luo Xiang.The eight people were called the Eight Tigers by foreign officials, and this reputation is very bad.However, considering that civil servants are naturally hostile to internal officials, the old people in the East Palace don't think there is anything wrong.

It has been more than nine months since the first emperor died, and Zhengde succeeded to the throne.Although the Empress Dowager Zhang listened to the government behind the curtain and controlled the entire court and state affairs with one hand, because of the Empress Dowager Cisheng, she was gentle and humble.Therefore, Emperor Zhengde intervened in the government as a minor, and Empress Dowager Zhang also turned a blind eye. ,

As a result, the management boards of the major yamen in the entire imperial palace were replaced by Zhengde's own people.

Ordinarily, the group of eunuchs headed by Liu Jin should live a happy life from now on.However, after Princess Taikang left the palace, Empress Dowager Zhang's mood became worse day by day, and even a trivial matter could make her furious.

The entire imperial palace has been shrouded in trepidation for the past few months, for fear of offending the empress dowager and being beaten dozens of times for no reason.

However, Liu Jin and the three Bingbi eunuchs present here today are full of joy.

It rained for a few days, and the weather suddenly turned cold. Standing in the prison, I looked up and saw that the green hills in the distance were smeared with red at some point, presumably it must be the maple leaves of Xiangshan.

"The emperor must still be in Xiyuan." Gu Dayong, who was sitting on Liu Jin's right hand, said with a smile on his face.

"It should be that Long Live Lord is a dragon and a tiger, but he is most afraid of heat and has the habit of swimming. Dragons can't live without water, so naturally they can't bear the blue waves in Zhongnanhai." Gao Feng continued.

Liu Jin: "It's been a hot summer, and it's finally cooling down. Our family just feels refreshed. However, it's going to get colder soon, so let's hang up the door curtain!" That's right, the eunuchs were physically weaker because of the knife. It is a bit weaker than ordinary people.But the summer that just passed was extremely hot, and it is said that Liaodong was so hot that people died.

Due to security needs in the Forbidden City, not to mention big trees, not even a shrub can be found.As soon as the sun shone down, the light was open and unobstructed, and the stuffiness was even worse.

It had been raining for a few days, and it suddenly cooled down. Everyone felt very good, with smiles on their faces.

After listening to Mr. Liu's words, Ma Yongcheng picked up the curtain and went to the door to hang it because of his tall stature.

At this moment, an eunuch rushed into the house panting, carrying a gust of cool wind.Looking at his expression again, his face is full of excitement.

This man's name is Li Neng, and he is Liu Jin's confidant. He is currently in charge of sorting out the papers transferred by the cabinet in the supervisor of rituals.Although the position is humble, it is very important.

As soon as Li Neng entered the room, holding a leather box in his hand, he knelt down in front of Liu Jin with a plop: "Congratulations to godfather, congratulations to godfather, great news, great news!"

As soon as he saw the cowhide box in his hand, Ma Yongcheng naturally knew that it was a secret book written by the chief official of Fengjiang. Knowing that something important was going to happen, he walked quickly to Liu Jin's side without hanging the curtain.

Speaking of secret books, they did not exist in the real world of the Ming Dynasty. It was not until Emperor Yongzheng of the Qing Dynasty that a complete set of strict secret books would be formed.Every high-ranking official at the governor level can be directly delivered to the emperor by a special messenger without going through a post station.No one has the right to open it except the emperor.In this way, the centralization and dictatorship of the Qing Dynasty reached the peak of feudal society.

The early emergence of this secret book system is actually due to Su Mu, when Emperor Zhengde was still in the Eastern Palace.During a class, Zhengde lamented that the power of the Secretary of General Affairs and the cabinet is too great. If a minister wants to tell the truth to the emperor, the scriptures he wrote must first be read by the minister in the ministry, and he nodded. Transfer to the General Secretary.The Department of Internal Affairs and Communications conducted a separate inspection and sent it to the cabinet when it was deemed appropriate.It was drafted by the cabinet and transferred to the supervisor of rituals.

That is to say, for a copy to finally fall into the hands of the emperor, it had to go through the four departments of Gishizhong, the General Administration Department, the Cabinet, and the Department of Rites and Supervisors.However, the civil officials of the Ming Dynasty habitually fought against the emperor. If there was anything in the documents that the ministers were in that did not conform to the interests of the civil officials, any link might be directly stuck.

If you encounter people with bad intentions and block the way of speech, even if the emperor is wise, he will make a misjudgment because of the lack of information.

Hearing this emotion, Su Mu habitually showed off his knowledge, and casually mentioned the Secret Book System.

He just said it in passing, but he didn't want Emperor Zhengde to remember it.

When he ascended the throne, he began to vigorously promote it.

The problem is, other civil servants didn't buy into his promotion. Instead, they remonstrated that a gentleman has nothing to say to others. His Majesty's doing this is to encourage villains to gossip about things, and to inform the Empress Dowager of the Tang Dynasty.Even if you want to listen to Long Live, you will know that the speakers at the Yulitai are all genuine and honest gentlemen.With them here, do we still need to seal the secret? It doesn't hurt His Majesty's reputation.

In this way, the secret book system came to an end without a problem.

In real history, when the secret documents of the ministers of the Qing Dynasty were handed over to the emperor, they had to be filed in the military aircraft department first.

In the Ming Dynasty in this time and space, it was changed to the Supervisor of Rites.

Zhengde has been on the throne for nine months, and there are more than a dozen dense cowhide boxes that have been sent out.But until now, none of them have come back.So much so that the supervisor of ceremonies didn't remember such a thing.

The other two Bingbi eunuchs also realized something, and surrounded them at the same time, looking down.

Seeing this, ecstasy appeared on their faces at the same time.

Liu Jin let out a sigh: "The emperor is blessed and blessed, and Qiantui is coming back."

The cowhide box has been opened, and there are two secret copies inside, one is from sumu, and the other is signed by Princess Taikang.

"It's good to be back, it's good to be back." Ma Yongchang let out a long breath, and couldn't help shaking his head: "Ever since this incident happened, the Empress Dowager Cisheng is in a bad mood, and we slaves are also not very generous. Dare to take a breath."

Gao Feng continued: "The old queen mother is in a bad mood. Can we slaves have a better life? The so-called master worries about the death of ministers. Our family sees the old Empress Dowager Cisheng lose weight day by day. In my heart, it feels like there is Like a knife."

At this point, his eye circles were red, and he couldn't help but reach out to wipe it off.

Seeing Gao Feng's strong desire to perform, Gu Dayong felt bored, and said, "Now, Qiantui has finally received a letter. Since I have a letter, I naturally want to miss the Empress Dowager Cisheng. Eunuch Liu is right, Qiantui is going back to the palace."

Liu Jin also had a happy face: "Today is the day when our supervisor of ceremonies discusses matters, so let's not discuss them. No matter how important the world's affairs are, can they be greater than the royal family? Let's go, I will go to see the Empress Dowager Cisheng and transfer the papers to her old man." hands."

"Eunuch Liu." Li Neng, the eunuch who came to report the letter just now, whispered: "Eunuch Zhang was also there when the papers were sorted just now. He suppressed everyone and went to Kunning Palace to announce the good news."

"Which Eunuch Zhang?" Liu Jin's face was so dark that water dripped out.

Gao Feng, Ma Yongcheng and Gu Dayong also took a deep breath, thinking: This Zhang Yong really does everything he can to compete for favor!In the past, Eunuch Zhang was just an ordinary eunuch who was depressed, but because he married Su Mu, Su Ziqiao, the number one think tank in the East Palace, he made a contribution at a critical moment, and he stepped aside and became the chief pen and supervisor of the imperial horse. card, there is a vague tendency to be the second person in the Ouchi.If he wins the Empress Dowager's favor again, will he get it in the future?

Gu Dayong was originally a bitter and mean person, so he couldn't help but sneered immediately: "That's great, Zhang Yong went to announce the good news this time, maybe the Empress Dowager Cisheng would be happy and say that we are all incompetent people. I kicked everyone out of the Prison of Rituals!"