Jiajing Chengming

Chapter 62 This eunuch is looking for death!

May 25th, the 16th year of Zhengde.

The Ministry of Rites posthumously named the late emperor Emperor Yi, and his temple name Wuzong.

Zhu Houcong agreed.

After all, Zhengde respected Wu, so the temple name of Wuzong was given to him, which was in line with his wishes.

Therefore, Zhu Houcong specially dispatched Wuding Hou Guo Xun to offer sacrifices to heaven and earth, Hui'an Bo Zhang Wei to offer sacrifices to the ancestral temple, and Fuma Duwei Cui Yuan to offer sacrifices to the country.

Zhu Houcong himself personally informed the late emperor and attended the banquet, and respectfully presented the document of his posthumous title.

At this point, it means that the posthumous title and temple name of Emperor Zhengde have been determined.

People all over the world will no longer call Zhengde the late emperor, but will instead call him the late emperor.

On the same day, the Cabinet issued an edict in accordance with the imperial order, promoting Left Vice-Censor-in-Chief Wang Jing to the position of Left Censor-in-Chief.

Yang Tingyi, the right vice minister of the Ministry of War, was promoted to the left vice minister of the Ministry of War.

Wu Wendi was promoted to Right Vice Minister of the Ministry of War for his merits.

Ningxia Lieutenant General Zhou Shangwen was transferred to be the Lieutenant General of the Eastern Official Office of the Beijing Camp.

The above officials were all appointed by recommendation, not by imperial recommendation or special appointment.

There have always been three ways to select officials in the Ming Dynasty.

They are special selection, recommendation, and imperial recommendation.

All three are compliant customizations.

Among them, court recommendation evolved from recommendation, which is a system formed after the emperor asked a group of people to recommend candidates for a certain official position.

However, the special simplification may be difficult for some court officials to accept.

But I won’t recommend it.

After all, denying the recommendation is equivalent to denying the imperial recommendation.

In fact, even the special instructions cannot be said to be inconsistent with the system of the country.

Now that Zhu Houcong has expressed his trust in the cabinet, he will naturally follow the cabinet's recommendations.

However, because the cabinet, headed by Liang Chu, had been persuaded by Zhu Houcong and was willing to cooperate with him, the so-called recommendation was actually a special appointment by him, the emperor.

He can tell Liang Chu who he wants to use, and then Liang Chu will complete the recommendation procedure afterwards.

Among these personnel appointments, Wu Wendi and Zhou Shangwen were the officials that Zhu Houcong asked Liang Chu to immediately promote to Beijing.

There is no other reason.

Zhu Houcong wanted to restore and strengthen his control over the imperial military power.

Whether it is to arrange a grand ceremony or to be able to punish with an iron fist those corrupt officials who only know how to extort money from the court and threaten the court to make concessions, it is impossible for the emperor to do so without a strong army.

The civil servant Wu Wendi was Wang Yangming's right-hand man in suppressing the rebellion in the south, and he was both civil and military.

The military general Zhou Shangwen was a famous general of this era. He fought against the invasion of the northern Tatars without a single defeat. He was also good at farming and training soldiers. Historically, he reclaimed more than 40,000 hectares of land in the border towns and trained more than 13,000 soldiers. He was also very loyal, so he was promoted to the Three Dukes by Jiajing. History records: "Throughout the Ming Dynasty, Shangwen was the only general who was promoted to the Three Dukes."

Zhu Houcong transferred these two people to Beijing with only one purpose, which was to select the best and strongest men from the six guards of the emperor and re-train them into the elite troops of the emperor's personal army.

However, Zhu Houcong could not do it too obviously, so he just let Wu Wendi go to Beijing in the name of being promoted to an official of the Ministry of War, and Zhou Shangwen go to Beijing in the name of being promoted to a military general of the Beijing Camp.

Therefore, the outer court was not surprised by this, and thought it was just a normal promotion by the cabinet chief Liang Chu, allowing the emperor to use good official positions to win over loyal and brave people among the civil and military officials.

Although Zhu Houcong nominally intended to use the rent and tax income from the fields cultivated by more than 200,000 soldiers and civilians in Gyeonggi Province and the interest income from the silver loaned to the Ministry of Revenue after three years to support an elite force for the emperor's personal army, Zhu Houcong did not really want to wait until the silver appeared before organizing such an elite force.

Zhengde left him a lot of treasury.

Adding to that the confiscated proceeds from Qian Ning, Jiang Bin and others, as well as the two million donated by Wei Bin, even if five million was loaned to the Ministry of Revenue, there would still be a lot left.

Therefore, Zhu Houcong has begun to rebuild his elite troops and build a basic base.

Just as Zhu Houcong said to Liang Chu, he would temporarily entrust the major affairs of the country to the cabinet on the grounds of lack of experience, while the affairs of the Gyeonggi Province would be directly managed by him.

Therefore, while issuing an imperial edict to summon Wu Wendi and Zhou Shangwen to come to Beijing to take up their posts, Zhu Houcong also met with Xia Yan, Fan Jizu and Dai Yi in the Qinzheng Hall in the Western Garden.

Zhu Houcong used the Xiyuan Qinzheng Hall as his temporary place to handle government affairs in Gyeonggi Province.

The reason for choosing the West Garden was that in this way, Xia Yan and others could bypass the outer court and take orders in front of the emperor.

“How many households in Gyeonggi Province have been allocated land now?”

After Zhu Houcong summoned Xia Yan, Fan Jizu and Dai Yi to the Qinzheng Palace, he directly asked about Xia Yan's land distribution.

Xia Yan immediately replied, "The land has been distributed to 51,863 households."

Zhu Houcong nodded after hearing this: "It seems that the division has been almost completed."

“Yes, there are still more than 20,000 households left.”

Xia Yan replied.

He is now very familiar with the number of newly organized households and the distribution of land in Gyeonggi Province.

Because he dared not neglect it.

After all, it was the emperor who had direct control over Gyeonggi Province.

He did not want to leave the impression of being lazy, disloyal, or incorruptible in the emperor's mind. Zhu Houcong then asked, "What is the living situation of the people now?"

"They all live in simple huts. According to your majesty's order, they are organized into six guards and live in different villages."

Xia Yan replied.

Zhu Houcong asked again: "How to prevent the epidemic?"

"They all had drainage ditches and manure pits dug, and were far away from wells. Mulberry and willow trees were planted along the roads in each village to block the wind and sand and store water, and also to raise silkworms and make baskets."

Xia Yan replied.

Zhu Houcong nodded: "The shed is still too simple. It is not winter yet, so we are not afraid of the severe cold, but the housing needs to be improved in the future. However, it is too early to talk about this now. School is the most important thing. Education is the most important. Since we are all members of the capital's personal army, we should have a unified language, customs, and cognition."

"Your Majesty is right. But when the people first got the land, from children to the elderly, they were busy with farm work during the day."

Xia Yan replied.

Zhu Houcong smiled and replied, "You can have night classes! Each guard will resume guard school. Guard schools will have three classes, namely enlightenment class, accelerated class, and literacy class. Children with small horns will go to enlightenment class, teenagers will go to accelerated class, and adults will go to literacy class. There will be genders in each. I will organize the Imperial Academy officials to compile the textbooks. You just need to divide the classes and select the teachers. Those who don't go will be punished, and those who go and learn well will be rewarded."

Xia Yan couldn't help but stand there in a daze.

"Xia Qing!"

Zhu Houcong called out, and Xia Yan replied, "I'm here!"

"Do you remember it?"

Zhu Houcong asked.

"Your Majesty, I have remembered it."

Xia Yan replied hurriedly.

Zhu Houcong then asked Xia Yan: "How many were placed in the military academy?"

"Your Majesty, 3,257 households have been resettled."

Zhu Houcong nodded: "Not bad!"

Each military academy has one household per person.

The resettlement of more than 3,000 military schools means that more than 3,000 military schools that had been laid off were called back and did not return to the border towns or become thieves.

then.

Zhu Houcong looked at Fan Jizu again and asked, "What is the situation of illegal and evil deeds in Gyeonggi Province?"

"Your Majesty, not much."

Fan Jizu replied.

Zhu Houcong nodded. As he had become a hungry refugee but had not turned into a thief, he was naturally a relatively law-abiding person with little tendency towards violence.

Fan Jizu continued, "But just like on the way to Beijing, there were still a few sporadic cases of evil, mostly molesting or raping female relatives. This is because most of the people who were resettled were widows or unmarried young men, and there were very few women, so it was inevitable that some of them would become evil because of love or sex."

"Those who go too far should still be dealt with according to the law, but it is better to ease the situation than to block it. We should still recruit more women from outside and marry them to start families. This will also help the population to grow."

Zhu Houcong started talking and asked Xia Yan: "How much surplus is expected to be left after clearing the farmland in the capital, and whether it can accommodate the new population."

"Your Majesty, adding another 50,000 people will not be a problem."

Xia Yan replied.

Zhu Houcong nodded and said: "Then send people to the disaster-stricken areas to recruit women."

Xia Yan bowed and said yes.

"Each guard shall compile a guard agreement as a supplement to the court's laws and regulations. At the end of the year, an examination shall be held to select capable and shrewd people from the literacy class to serve as supervisors of each guard and experience officials."

Zhu Houcong began to give instructions to Fan Jizu again.

Fan Jizu bowed and said yes.

Then, Zhu Houcong looked at Dai Yi and instructed, "During the slack season, organize the military schools that have been settled, and select the civilians to form patrol teams to be responsible for suppressing the invaders and bandits. They will conduct regular drills and study. I will select the teaching officers from the experienced officers of the Jinyiwei. In addition, I will allocate weapons from the treasury, and I will also provide silver for the patrol teams."

Dai Yi bowed and said yes.

When Zhu Houcong said this, he put his hands behind his back, walked out of the hall, smiled into the wind and said:
"I know that all of this will cost money, so you should think about it and give me a list of the estimated amount of money to spend. I will calculate it at the end of the year and strive to make Gyeonggi Province self-sufficient as soon as possible without my spending money from the treasury, and even start paying taxes and grain."

"That's it for today."

Zhu Houcong waved his hand and rode back to Qingning Palace in a sedan chair.

"So hot!"

As soon as Zhu Houcong returned to Qingning Palace, Wang Chunjing came over with a fan to fan him, saying, "The Empress Dowager just sent Madam to invite you, Your Majesty, to come over when you have time."

"What's it about?"

Zhu Houcong couldn't help but ask after hearing this.

At this time, Huang Jin came over and said, "Your Majesty, I have inquired and learned that according to the ladies around the Queen Mother, it was Eunuch Qiu who instigated the Queen Mother to ask for 2,000 hectares of farmland for the two uncles-in-law."

"It's to see if the emperor really wants to treat the Zhang family well. Eunuch Qiu said that the emperor has ordered the clearing of farmlands this time, and a lot of farmlands have been cleared. It's not too much to ask for one or two thousand hectares."

Zhu Houcong was furious after hearing this: "This eunuch is looking for death!"

(End of this chapter)