Good son-in-law of the Ming Dynasty

Duan Jiong has always been cautious in his life and doing things, but when he saw Wu Shiqi and Su Mu, he felt an indescribable irritability and contempt in his heart, and he didn't know where this emotion came from.

After leaving the imperial city, he stood by and waited quietly.After the colleagues grabbed the sedan chair and left, they managed to stop a car.

The handlebar of the car: "Where are you going, sir?"

"Go forward, and I will tell you naturally when the time comes."

The driver of the car didn't dare to ask more questions, so he had to drive the car forward slowly.

But Duan Jiong sat there with a gloomy face, his fingers were still uncontrollably drawing on the car wall, writing one word after another.

I don't know how long it took.

"Damn it, stop!" Duan Jiong gritted his teeth, yelled viciously, jumped out of the car, threw a bunch of money over him, went into a grocery store on the side of the street, and bought a lot of mountain goods.

At this time, he realized that he no longer had a penny on him.

But at this time, he didn't care about that much.

Just holding the burden like that, he strode forward.

The sky has gradually dimmed, lights are lit everywhere, in the dim light, the heavy snow that is flying is shining in the light and shadow, there is an indescribable beauty.

The wind blows like a blow, cold to the bone, but Duan Jiong's heart is hot, as if he has a high fever in his bones, and his blood is almost boiling.

Just like that, after walking for an unknown amount of time, a tall courtyard appeared in front of it, and two red lanterns were hung on the gate, with a big burnt character written on it.

Seeing that he had reached the ground, he let out a sigh of relief, Duan Jiong only felt that his limbs were all soft.

Because of the long walk just now, my feet and body were sweating, and I was blown by the cold wind, and I fell into an ice cellar.

He walked forward tremblingly, and a porter had already come out to greet him. Seeing Duan Jiong in a mess, he opened his mouth in surprise: "It's Mr. Duan, it's so late, why did you do this?"

Duan Jiong's voice was trembling: "I didn't get in the car... Is Jiao Shilang here, sir, please go and inform me."

As he spoke, he handed over the gifts and films at hand.

The concierge sighed: "Master Duan, it's not that you don't know the old man's temper, he has prejudice against you, I'm afraid he may not be willing to see you."

Duan Jiong looked at the concierge fiercely, his eyes glowing green: "Please inform me."

For some reason, the concierge was a little scared: "Master Duan... Hey, everyone is not an outsider, let me try it."

Saying that, he took the things and ran in hastily.

Not long after, the concierge came out shaking his head, returned the gift box to Duan Jiong, and sighed: "Go back, the elder is already asleep, no guests."

Duan Jiong raised his voice, "Please report again, and just give the boss a sentence. Just say: Duan Jiong was not successful before, but when he encountered problems, he knew that he blamed others and disappointed everyone. But now he understands a truth, It is better to save people than to save oneself, the movement of heaven is healthy, and a gentleman strives for self-improvement.”

"It's a good day, and a gentleman strives for self-improvement. I finally heard your words." A loud voice came.

The concierge and Duan Jiong looked back at the same time, and saw an old man in his early fifties standing in the gate standing upright in the snow.

He has an ordinary appearance and is extremely thin, like a benchmark in front of the wind: "Duan Jiong, people can be poor, but they can't be without ambition. When you came to the capital, you wrote to the old man and asked me to find you an official position. Said To be honest, the old man is very disappointed. You don’t even have to go and see who the officials are in the court. Most of them are useless waste of the imperial examination. You are in it, but people think you are greedy for power and give up the imperial examination. It makes people look down on one end."

This person is Jiao Fang, the newly appointed right servant of the Ministry of Officials.

Jiao Fang was a Jinshi in the eighth year of Tianshun. Speaking of which, she was the same year as Duan Jiong's father.

Unlike Governor Duan's father's bumpy official career, Jiao Fang has been going smoothly in officialdom.After coming out of the Imperial Academy, he became the magistrate of Huozhou, promoted to the deputy envoy of Tixue in Sichuan, and transferred to Huguang.Soon, he moved to Nanjing Youtongzheng.A few days ago, he was transferred back to Beijing from the post of Nanjing You Tongzheng.From an idle official, he became a court upstart.

After Duan Jiong came to Beijing, he had no food and clothing, so he left Jiao Fang's door before joining the Secretary of General Administration as governor.

Duan Jiong is very talented in his studies and essays. According to his standard, he is still very sure of being a Jinshi.Now there is an official selection for the eighth rank, and Jiao Fang, who has always valued him, is very disappointed, thinking that he has given up Chunwei, willing to degenerate, and wants to directly enter the officialdom.Therefore, I have always ignored this classmate's son.

However, when Duan Jiong came to visit late at night, Jiao Fang was still a little worried, so she walked to the gate, and she was very relieved to hear what he said, so she let Duan Jiong into the yard.

"My lord, I know I was wrong."

"You know you're wrong, it's not too late, come in!" The old man waved his sleeves, turned around and left.

Duan Jiong hurriedly followed.

The ground dragon in the study was burning hot, and as soon as Duan Jiong entered the room, the snow on his head, face, and body melted, and he was very wet and uncomfortable.

After taking a few sips of hot tea, he regained his senses.

Jiao Fang: "Duan Jiong, you came to this old man in the middle of the night, what's the matter?"

Duan Jiong let out a long breath: "My lord, next March will be the spring season, Wansheng wants to give it a try. But in the past few months, he has been supporting his family, but he has not seriously prepared for the exam, and only [-]% of the Jinshi department Be sure. The boss is a late-born senior and was born in the Imperial Academy, so Duan Jiong wants to come and ask for advice."

As he spoke, he stood up and bowed to the ground.

"Okay, okay, you are finally thinking about making progress. If the old man knows, he will be very happy. [-]% sure, yes, yes, already very good." Jiao Fang happily helped him up: "let's sit down and talk Speaking of which, a while ago, when I was in Nanjing, I received a letter from you, saying that you wanted to find a job in the capital. I thought you were unwilling to be born in the right way, and I was quite displeased. I didn’t intend to pay attention to it. Yours, however, for the sake of the old man, I still wrote a letter to Mr. Hua of the General Secretary and several adults of the Ministry of Officials, asking them to take care of you. Since you intend to take the imperial examination, why do you want to choose officials?"

Duan Jiong was a little embarrassed, he was arrogant, so he naturally refused to say in front of Mr. Jiao that he was too poor to let go, and that's why he wanted to become an official.

Fortunately, Jiao Fang didn't delve too deeply into it, and rubbed her chin: "Actually, the difficulty of this Jinshi subject is lower than that of the provincial examination. If you want to learn Chinese style, it's not difficult."

Duan Jiong asked curiously: "Also ask for advice."

Jiao Fang said slowly: "First of all, compared with the provincial examination, the number of people who take the Jinshi examination is much smaller, and the admission rate is also higher. Thousands of troops cross the single-plank bridge, which refers to the college examination and the rural examination. The college examination is related to It is very important for an ordinary person to change from a civilian to a scholar. As long as he passes it, he will be a master. As for the rural examination, it is related to a scholar who can obtain the qualification to be an official. Therefore, there are many candidates, and the questions are particularly difficult. Try to pass [-]% of the candidates, and then pass the rural examination to [-]%. Many people are blocked behind these two thresholds and have no chance of official career for life."

"Secondly, the questions in the Jinshi section are not as difficult as the courtyard examination and the township examination. The imperial court selects scholars, and the most important thing is virtue. Therefore, it pays special attention to the students' mastery of the scriptures. Speaking of it, it is as different as the first two rounds of the boy's examination. However, there are more basic things, and there will be no strange problems, such as going up and down the tower, and putting it in the examination room will cause a joke."

Duan Jiong was puzzled: "Dare to ask my lord, why is this?"

Jiao Fang: "The reason is very simple. Anyone who can enter the Chunwei examination room is not a top person who has been killed all the way up in the imperial examination field. For ordinary people, strange questions are nothing at all, and they may not be able to pass the exam. hold them."

"That's right." Duan Jiong thought about it for a while, and said with deep reason: "But, my lord, since the only ones who can enter the examination room are the top ones, it's certainly not difficult for everyone to be wrong. Years or even decades, everyone can do very well on general questions, how can you distinguish between the top ones. The boss is from the Imperial Academy. As far as I know, the exam questions are all issued by the Imperial Academy. .”

"Are you trying to make a question?" Jiao Fang was displeased.

After pondering for a moment, he said again: "What you said is not right. It should be said that the scholars of the Imperial Academy wrote the questions, and the emperor finally judged them. Generally speaking, the bachelors of the Imperial Academy will produce three papers before the exam. The emperor After the review, one will be randomly selected as the topic of this issue. Of course, the emperor can also change it at his discretion. For example, in the Jinshi section of the old man, the topics given by the Imperial Academy were not used, and the emperor made a temporary one."

"Late students are educated."

Jiao Fang: "Instead of guessing the questions, it's better to think about what style of essay the examiner likes. Therefore, in the Jinshi examination, the questions and the scriptures are not the key. The charm of the essay is the key to determining whether you can be Chinese."

"Nowadays, the few people in the Imperial Academy who have the qualifications to write questions and review papers are all scholars from the south. Southerners like beautiful writing and advocate gorgeous rhetoric." Speaking of this, Jiao Fang looked disgusted and said fiercely: "At the beginning When the old man was in the Hanlin Academy, he saw a lot of the faces of those southerners."

"A self-conceited, unrestrained, unrestrained, national pillar, and the appearance of taking the common people as his own responsibility, it makes people bored." Jiao Fang probably recalled the unpleasant experience before, "I also said that the old man is crude and uneducated, with a vicious personality, It’s good to talk about people behind their backs, but I don’t want to think about how they treat this old man. Three years in Hanlin, but no one wants to have a deep friendship with this old man, it’s very annoying.”

Hearing Jiao Fang's anger, Duan Jiong lowered his head, not daring to speak again.

Finally, Jiao Fang said: "Although it has been two or so years since Tianshunnian, the Imperial Academy has always been controlled by southern scholars. And such things as culture and context also have their inheritance. Duan Jiong, in your Talent, as long as you pass the exam and work hard on diction, with your talent, it shouldn't be difficult to be a Jinshi."

Duan Jiong's eyes brightened, and he bowed to the ground: "Thank you, sir, for your guidance."

He is full of confidence in the future of Chunwei.