Qing Yao

Chapter 17: The Iron Rice Bowl of the Yamen
The county still has strict rules for doing things. Although Zhao An was temporarily seconded here, his "file" was still sent by the Household Affairs Office to the Personnel Office for safekeeping.

If Zhao An is returned to the Taxation Bureau in the future, this file will definitely be extracted and returned together.

Just like the tax department, the graduation certificate that Zhao An bought for the student status was not checked by the household department, nor by the official department which was responsible for personnel.

It may not be due to carelessness at work, but it is likely not worth checking.

Well, who would have the time to make a fake primary school diploma?
Zhao An was secretly delighted by the superficial work attitude of the Household and Personnel Departments in Ganquan County. He figured if the government above him also did things in this way, then there wouldn't be any problem in getting a fake scholar certificate.

Of course, the prerequisite is that he cannot work in the county where his diploma was issued. Zhao An still has this risk avoidance awareness.

The farther the better. For example, if you get a fake scholar certificate in Ganquan County, you can go to another county under the jurisdiction of the prefecture and spend money to buy an official job.

If conditions permit, it would be best to go further, to neighboring provinces.

In short, the safest place is where no one knows you.

On the contrary, if you get a scholar certificate in Ganquan County, you will be employed in the Ganquan County Government. Over time, relationships with classmates and teachers and students will become a big problem.

You can't say that you were the only one who passed the examination in the whole county that year.

It just so happened that all my classmates and teachers at the village community school and the county official school died young.

There's no way to cover up this lie!

The price of forcing a cover-up is that the lie will become bigger and bigger, and it will definitely explode in the end.

What are the consequences of the explosion?
According to the laws of the Qing Dynasty, losing one's head was the lightest punishment. If one was not careful, the person would be caught and taken to Caishikou in the capital and subjected to a torture of several thousand dollars.

Who dares to take this risk?
You can only show your talents in places where no one knows you.

However, the Ministry of Personnel asked Zhao An to provide some additional information, such as his grandfather's name, his father's name, the year of his birth and the year of his death. They even had to state whether these two generations had any criminal record.

Hey, this addition finally gave Zhao An the feeling of a regular team. The Taxation Department seemed too sloppy.

Fortunately, it was just a random form. Who would really send someone to conduct a detailed investigation into the file of a temporary worker?

Master Ji must have informed the clerk's office, so after Zhao An filled out the required information, the people in the clerk's office did not make things difficult for him and directly issued him a work permit for working in the yamen.

It is also a wooden badge. It would be more accurate to call it a pass, because with this badge one can enter and exit the yamen freely. Otherwise one has to register at the issuing office at the door and explain the situation.

It was similar to what Zhang Quan, the accounting manager of the Taxation Bureau, said. The county government did not arrange accommodation for Zhao An, a seconded personnel. They only provided food but not accommodation, and there was no sign of other welfare benefits.

Zhao An, who had been mentally prepared, didn't care about it. He just wanted to gain a foothold in the household as soon as possible, and then look for opportunities to contact higher-level people, from Comrade Zhao to Secretary Zhao, Mayor Zhao, and so on.
Bring honor to the family, bring honor to the family.

Similar to when he first joined the Taxation Bureau, Zhao An was also assigned a master on his first day at the Household Affairs Office. His main job that day was not to understand the specific business work, but to familiarize himself with the environment of the county government office.

Zhao An's mentor was a clerk named Sun Rui, a native of Yangzhou. He had a cheerful, almost joking demeanor, and looked more like a street thug than a government official.

Zhao An guessed that Sun Rui had probably paid to enter the household office. He had previously learned some things about the government office from Wu Laoer when he was in the Taxation Department. He knew that there was at least one clerk in charge of the six departments of the county government, and usually two.

That means one director and one deputy director.

Under the two directors are the clerks who handle the specific work. The number of people varies depending on the division of labor in each room, but there are at least fifteen or sixteen people.

These clerks, who are similar to section clerks, are considered regular employees. Below them are temporary errand runners like Zhao An, with hundreds of them and dozens of them at the least.

I heard that some large counties have six offices and three shifts of servants with over a thousand people, while small and poor counties have only two or three hundred people. Otherwise, it would be impossible to maintain the normal operation of a county.

Officially, clerks have formal salaries, while clerks who do the actual work do not receive any salary, but they are exempt from corvée and taxes. In addition, they often receive extra money from their actual work, and the county magistrate also receives dividend subsidies every year, so if they do a good job, it is not a problem to make a few hundred taels of silver a year.

Some wealthy families in the local area would spend money to buy books and get positions for their sons and nephews in the government office. This way, they could avoid labor service and get a stable job in the government office. If they were successful, it would play a big role in the prosperity of the family.

As a result, all the people working in the county government became "pawns" of the wealthy gentry, forming a complex network with the local people. Even the most capable county magistrate could not escape this big network.

What's more, the Qing Dynasty inherited the Ming system, which stipulated that local officials must serve in other places. The starting point of this move was good, but the problem was that after taking office, local officials could not even understand what the locals said. How could they do their job as officials and govern the local area for the court?

In the end, they have to rely on the petty officials who have already formed their own sphere of influence in the local area.

A more astute county magistrate can barely intimidate the petty clerks, but an honest one will be fooled around by them, and the official will be worse than a dog.

Of course, the latter situation is rare. No matter what, the county magistrate represents the imperial court. If the county magistrate is forced into a corner, no one will have a good life.

When the Qing Dynasty first came to power, it only cost fifteen taels to buy a clerk position in the government office. Now the starting price is at least five hundred taels, and the price has increased by dozens of times.

Of course, there is the factor of rising prices, but it also indirectly shows how lucrative it is to work in a government office, otherwise these people would be crazy to spend so much money to buy a job.

This is the price for a temporary clerk. If you want to be a registered clerk in the Ministry of Personnel, you will need even more.

Didn’t Ambassador Ding Zhenglong of the Taxation Department only spend five thousand taels?

I heard from Wu Laoer that some people who paid for positions never went to work and just hung out outside all day.

At that time, Zhao An was curious whether the government would not care if he didn't go to work.

As a result, Wu Laoer said that cats have their way and dogs have their way, so the person who paid for a job does not work, but others can pay to hire someone to work for him.

The employees are temporary workers among temporary workers.

Zhao An was stunned after hearing this. It took him a long time to understand why there was such a "fool". He was not really stupid, but really smart.

Because those people are not interested in the actual job position, but the identity of representing the official family.

With the hat of an official, you can do anything well, especially if you are doing business.

The county couldn't possibly be unaware of this situation, but as long as someone was in charge, the county officials would turn a blind eye.

Zhao An couldn't figure out whether Sun Rui was filling in for someone else, so he followed him around the county government office.

"Our household office, official office and ritual office are all on the east side of the lobby. To the west are the barracks, criminal justice office and workshop. Over by the main gate is the Chengfa Office. If the common people come to the yamen to do business or file a complaint, they must first register at the Chengfa Office. Come on, I'll take you to the barracks." Although Sun Rui looks nonchalant, he is quite capable. He took Zhao An on a random tour of the various offices and introduced the functions of each office.

In fact, Zhao An knew what the six rooms did without Sun Rui's introduction.

To put it bluntly, the six local departments are smaller versions of the six central ministries of the imperial court. The Household Department is in charge of money, the Personnel Department is in charge of people, and the Rites Department is responsible for organizing imperial examinations and sacrificial activities. The main contact unit is the Confucian Academy under the charge of the county instructor, which is equivalent to the Education Bureau in later generations.

As soon as we hear the name of the barracks, we know that it is definitely responsible for soldiers, but they are not regular Green Camp soldiers, but local militia. It would be more accurate to call them militia.

The barracks also has a direct connection unit, which is the Inspection Department, which is on par with the Tax Department. This Inspection Department not only has the responsibility of catching thieves, but also has the function of combating smuggling.

Similar to armed yamen runners.

Not to mention the criminal department, the agency responsible for assisting the county magistrate in trying cases, which also has a contact unit, which is the county prison.

The workshop's responsibilities were much simpler. It was responsible for everything related to the project. It was also responsible for recasting the loose silver collected from the people every year into silver ingots.

After going around, it was basically consistent with Zhao An's own understanding.

Not to mention, this cheerful fellow Sun Rui is very popular in every room. No matter where he goes, people will greet him, and they don’t call him by his name, but “Sun Lao Si”.

Some people asked who Zhao An was. When they learned that Zhao An was seconded from the Taxation Department to the Household Affairs Office to help, some politely nodded as a greeting, while others were impolite and didn't even look at Zhao An.

Zhao An always had a smile on his face and didn't take these little things to heart at all.

Sun Rui smiled at him and patted his shoulder: "Don't worry about them. Come on, I'll take you to visit Captain Li."

Without waiting for Zhao An to speak, he pulled him straight to the classroom located in the northwest corner of the yamen.

The class room is where the three shifts of the yamen work. The so-called "three shifts" refers to the yamen runners who stand on both sides of the hall and shout "mighty" when the county magistrate is in court, as well as the constables responsible for arresting criminals, and the strong squad who are responsible for daily patrols, cell guards, and guarding the county yamen.

The three shifts of personnel in Ganquan County have a total of more than 300 people, and they are the only armed force that the county magistrate can mobilize besides the inspection office.

In the event of an emergency, the third shift is often the first to arrive at the scene to deal with it.

Therefore, the head of the third shift had a very high status in the yamen, lower than the legal advisor hired by the county magistrate, but higher than the manager of the sixth room.

With so many staff, the third shift naturally needs more public housing, and the houses they occupy account for about one-third of the county government's buildings.

Sun Rui did not take Zhao An to visit the lobby, nor did he take him to the county magistrate's living area behind the lobby. Zhao An naturally understood the reason.

He originally thought that Sun Rui was bringing him to the classroom to visit and familiarize himself with the situation, so that he could come directly if he had any work dealings in the future. However, he didn't expect that Sun Rui actually took Zhao An to one of the rooms and started playing with several constables who were gambling inside. Zhao An was speechless watching this.

After playing a few rounds, Sun Rui remembered that Zhao An was watching on the side. He turned around and asked Zhao An with a grin if he wanted to play a few rounds.

"I can't, just go ahead and play."

Zhao An shook his head and made an excuse to go to the toilet because the house was full of smoke.

Sun Rui and the other detectives were having a great time gambling, so they were too lazy to care about Zhao An.

After coming out, Zhao An first took a casual look at several adjacent duty rooms. There were people working in the rooms. When they saw Zhao An, a stranger, some people asked him what he was doing.

Zhao An hurriedly told the truth. When they learned that it was Sun Laosi from the Household Department who brought him there, the constables and runners ignored him.

After walking around for a while, Zhao An went to the toilet to relieve himself, and then headed towards the room where Sun Rui and his friends were gambling. When he turned a corner, he came towards a few officers with the word "Yong" embroidered on their chests. They walked past Zhao An, talking and laughing.

This is nothing surprising, but after those people passed by, Zhao An's face was still filled with shock.

Because he found that two of the officers were holding pipes.

It's not a pipe for smoking dry tobacco, but a pipe for smoking opium.

Zhao An was very familiar with the history of the Opium War, but that happened during the reign of Emperor Qianlong's grandson, Emperor Daoguang. Therefore, he always thought that the British dumped opium into China on a large scale during the reigns of Emperor Jiaqing and Emperor Daoguang. He never expected that opium had already appeared in China and appeared openly in a county-level government office.

I was naturally shocked.

What they didn't know was that opium had already become a disaster in China. In the 13th year of Emperor Qianlong's reign, opium exports accounted for only one-eighth of Britain's exports to China, but now it accounts for more than one-half.

In the 45th year of Qianlong's reign, because there were too many opium smokers, Qianlong had to reiterate the ban on opium smoking during the Yongzheng period and issued an order strictly prohibiting the import and sale of smoking utensils.

But like many other bans in Qianlong's later years, this ban on opium smoking became a dead letter.

Not only was opium smoking a disaster among the people, but the number of people smoking in the army and government offices was also terrifyingly large. Zhao An had never seen anyone smoking opium in the Taxation Bureau before, because the ambassador of the Taxation Bureau, Ding Zhenglong, was an anti-smoking advocate.

There are no opium dens in Yangzhou city because they are all hidden "underground".

Zhao An knew the harm of opium better than anyone else, but he knew that he could do nothing now. He could only sigh and shake his head slightly before going to find Sun Rui.

Sun Rui happened to be looking for him. Maybe because he had just won some money, this guy was in a particularly good mood. He said that he would treat Zhao An and several other good colleagues in the room to a drink after work.

As a result, after the shift ended, this guy seemed to have forgotten about this matter and went straight home.

Zhao An was not assigned any work in the afternoon. He was just asked by the manager Zhang Qingting to copy some notices to be sent to various townships.

The content is about this year's summer tax collection.

Zhao An had some difficulty copying the notice. It was not because he could not recognize the characters, but because he was used to simplified Chinese characters and suddenly had to write in traditional Chinese characters, which was as difficult as using an abacus for the first time.

Fortunately, he had practiced calligraphy for several years when he was in school in his previous life, so his handwriting was pretty good, at least he won the recognition of Zhang Qingting, the household manager.

Manager Zhang said with some regret, "Your handwriting reflects your personality. Xiao Zhao, your handwriting is quite good. Why didn't you try harder to become a scholar in the imperial examination? With the title of a scholar, you could have stayed in the government for a long time."

What could Zhao An say but to smile at Han Han.

His family was poor and he had no virtuous wife to support him, so he had to support himself and try to get a bachelor's degree through correspondence courses to secure his iron rice bowl.

(End of this chapter)