Chapter 2816 2818 [Falling Flowers and Flowing Water]

Author: Ji Mobai

Chapter 2816 2818 [Falling Flowers and Flowing Water]

Qianlong envoy turned to Jinyiwei, and after turning from darkness to light, his strength expanded rapidly.

The number of people was only 3,000 before, but the number quickly expanded to more than 20,000.

And once the 20,000 well-trained elite soldiers are dispatched, those officials will naturally be no match.

Therefore, they were soon trapped in jail, unable to resist at all.

However, those powerful families still refused to give in.

In the first year of Tianshou, the gentry in the Jiangnan area supported the fourth prince Li Chengyuan and launched a rebellion on the pretext that Xiang Nan was "scheming to usurp the throne and steal the throne."

Within ten days, more than a dozen state capitals were captured, and the momentum was quite terrifying.

At the same time, the noble families of Hedong Road supported the third prince Li Chengwen and also launched an army to rebel in the name of "crueling the rebels and restoring orthodoxy".

In a short period of time, more than a dozen state capitals in Hedong Road were captured, and even Hebei Road and Henan Road were affected.

The situation was extremely critical for a while.

All the ministers wrote to Xiang Nan, asking him to stop implementing the New Deal in order to calm the people.

Xiang Nan didn't care, so he sent Pei Zhao with 30,000 troops to the south of the Yangtze River to quell the rebellion; he sent Zhao Jingyu to pass and led 50,000 troops to Hedong Road to quell the rebellion.

Seeing that Xiang Nan sent so few troops, the ministers thought that they would definitely lose.

Because the number of rebels in Jiangnan has reached more than 100,000, and the number of rebels in Hedong Road has also reached 90,000.

Their backbone is the private soldiers raised by noble families. They are well-equipped, brave and good at fighting, and are even better than the elites of the imperial court.

Therefore, they believed that Xiang Nan was overconfident in sending only these troops to quell the rebellion.

Because of this, the rebels did not take the imperial army seriously and concentrated their superior troops to start a decisive battle with the imperial army.

Prepare to defeat the imperial army in one fell swoop and become famous throughout the country.

…

In March of the first year of Tianshou, two groups of rebels from Jiangnan and Hedong gathered their superior forces and launched a decisive battle with the imperial army.

Among them, the army south of the Yangtze River was 150,000, and the army east of the river was 160,000. Pei Zhao only brought 30,000 troops, and Zhao Jingyu only brought 50,000. It seems that the gap is quite large.

Therefore, as soon as the war began, the armies in the south of the Yangtze River and the east of the river made great efforts to launch a general attack on the imperial army.

Unexpectedly, at this moment, nearly a hundred thunderous sounds suddenly broke out, followed by a violent explosion in the rebel ranks, killing thousands of people at once.

The horses were frightened and ran away, and the soldiers were stunned by the explosion. After two rounds of volleys, the rebels completely lost their morale and all fled.

Pei Zhao and Zhao Jingyu commanded the army to cover up and kill the rebels all the way, leaving no trace of the rebels behind.

In less than half a month, all the rebellion was wiped out.

The third and fourth princes, various noble families, noble families, corrupt officials, and local tyrants who participated in the rebellion were all wiped out.

Such results surprised everyone.

They originally thought that the foundation of the new Emperor Xiang Nan's accession to the throne was unstable, and the rebels were powerful. It was not unusual for the suppression of the rebellion to take several years.

I never expected that it would end so simply and neatly.

Little did they know that Xiang Nan had already known that he was going to fight with the nobles and clans, so he cast a large number of artillery pieces in advance, which were very powerful, comparable to European howitzers in the 18th century.

In comparison, the powerful nobles still used cold weapons. Under the volley of hundreds of cannons, they were completely defeated before they even got close.

Therefore, Xiang Nan was defeated easily.

…

"How will the Emperor deal with Prince Rong and Prince Yun?" the Empress Dowager asked Xiang Nan.

"Three brothers and fourth brothers may have conspired against us, but we are brothers after all." Xiang Nan said to the Empress Dowager, "I have already died, my eldest brother, and my second brother, I don't want to fight against each other anymore.

I am going to deprive them of their titles and place them under house arrest in their original palace. Grandma, do you think I can do this?"

The Queen Mother nodded.

Li Chengwen and Li Chengyuan committed the serious crime of treason, so they were extremely grateful to be able to survive, and she did not dare to expect too much.

"In that case, it's settled." Xiang Nan nodded.

Later, Li Chengwen and Li Chengyuan, together with their families, were taken to the capital and then placed under house arrest in the former residences of Prince Rong and Prince Yun respectively.

The imperial court allocated 20,000 taels of silver every year to support their family's livelihood. In addition, after they reduced their titles to civilian status, their descendants would no longer take the title, but they could participate in the imperial examination.

Xiang Nan is not afraid of Li Chengwen and Li Chengyuan rebelling again.

To be honest, they have no value anymore.

Those noble clans and clans have been completely defeated, and the remaining powerful people, the princes and ministers have no confidence to rebel.

What's more, even if they want to rebel, Xiang Nan can beat them down again.

When the time comes, he will no longer be open-minded.

…

The rebels were easily wiped out, bringing Xiang Nan's prestige to its peak.

No one, whether they were court ministers or local powerful men, dared to challenge Xiang Nan's authority and test the power of cannons.

Therefore, the new policy of "divide a man into an acre" and "officers and gentry work together as errands and receive food at the same time" was successfully implemented.

This move greatly reduced the burden on the people, and therefore made countless people burst into tears of gratitude.

And "sharing the land among the peasants" and "the officials and gentry working as errands and paying the grain as one body" also greatly increased the court's taxes.

Before the Toyo Dynasty, the tax revenue for the year was only 30 million guan, but after the people were divided into acres, the tax revenue exceeded 50 million guan.

Xiang Nan later launched the system of "returning envy to the public" and "raising honest silver".

The so-called "waste" means that when local officials collect money and taxes, they will levy more money on the grounds of "waste", which is also called "huohao" or "waste".

However, the scope of consumption is larger than fire consumption, and consumption also includes bird and mouse consumption. The rice harvested from Yunjing is stolen and eaten by birds and mice, which is called bird and mouse consumption.

During the Han Dynasty, for every one stone of grain paid, the consumption increased by two dou. During the reign of Emperor Yin of the Later Han Dynasty, the cost of sparrows and mice increased from two dou for one stone of grain to four dou. For farmers, this was naturally a huge burden.

After Hu Xian returned to the government, he collected the taxes as a normal tax for the government, kept it in the vassal treasury, and gave it to civil officials in the province to support their integrity.

This reform measure concentrated the power of taxation, reduced the people's extra burden, increased the salary of foreign officials, and had a positive effect on rectifying officialdom and reducing corruption.

In addition, Xiang Nan also introduced the "secret report" system, which stipulated that all central and local officials of fourth rank or above should directly submit the secret report.

The secret fold has special paper, a special box, a special lock, and a special key. It is difficult for ordinary people to open it, ensuring the confidentiality and safety of the memorial.

In this way, various officials supervise each other and restrain each other, which is a restriction for everyone; secondly, the close communication directly reaches the heaven, which also helps to improve administrative efficiency; thirdly, the openness of speech prevents the emperor from sitting in the capital and becoming a blind man.

…

Through a series of means, the imperial power in Xiang Nan's hands was greatly strengthened, which further consolidated his rule.

Even Gao Yuming was afraid of this, worried that Xiang Nan would have to settle accounts with him at some point, so he proposed to retire and return home early.
Chapter completed!