Chapter 333: Sitting on a Firecracker
Although Meng Gong did not receive enough silver like in previous years, he received enough grain, but grain also needs silver to be purchased. Because of the shortage of grain in Lianghuai and Jiangdong, the price of grain has risen a long time ago, and you may not be able to buy grain even if you have money.
He happily invited Tan Yousan to drink to express his gratitude, and secretly allocated 10,000 dan of military rations to Yu Jie. He spread his hands to Zhao Bing's people and said that the New Song Kingdom had only given him 2 million strings of cash, and no one had any money.
Zhao Bing's imperial envoy saw that his trip would be in vain and he would not be able to complete his mission when he returned.
He tried his best to use his eloquence to persuade Meng Gong, and even forced Meng Gong to hand over 300,000 strings of cash on the grounds that Jiangdong had been given to Luzhou and Jinghu Army.
Meng Gong warned Shi's son's people very seriously: Don't tell anyone, it is well known that Zhao Yulin of the Shenwei Army and the Jiangdong envoy are not on good terms. If Zhao Yulin gets to know, he may not give a penny to his Jinghu Army next year.
The messenger said happily, "Yes, yes, yes." He got on the boat and left in a hurry, fearing that Meng Gong would change his mind and take away the silver he had given him.
At this time, the Central Council in Chengdu was holding a meeting.
The Shunfeng Division immediately verified the criminal facts of the Tongchuanfu Road and Kuizhou Road Pacifiers and had to arrange people to fill the vacancies.
Zhao Yulin said that because of the war in Jinghu North Road, no pacification envoy was appointed. Now that General Meng has withdrawn from Jinghu North Road, our Shenwei Army has almost controlled the entire territory. We can appoint a pacification envoy to take charge of the overall situation. Let's discuss it.
Fan Zhong said that Lanzhou and Xining had been surrendered for a long time, so they could set up a new route. Qingong, Fengxiang, Chang'an Prefecture and Yan'an Prefecture were too large, so they should be divided.
Zhao Yulin saw Yang Jin looking at him proudly, knowing that it was her idea, and nodded to let Fan Zhong elaborate. This guy kept it a secret, saying that he would ask Deputy Envoy Yang Jin to elaborate in detail.
The little woman immediately asked the maid to draw back the curtains on the wall, revealing a huge new map of the Song Dynasty. Zhao Yulin saw that the map already covered the borders of Song and Mongolia, but she still said that the map was drawn hastily and was still very incomplete. Please add to it.
Yangjin divided Gansu and Shaanxi into Xingyuanfu Road according to the administrative divisions of later generations, and cut out Hanzhong and merged it with Ankang to form Xingyuanfu Road, on the grounds that Hanzhong's economic strength and large population were enough to form a road. Xining Prefecture and Qamdo were still in the war zone, so it was proposed that Gansu should temporarily take over.
No one had any objection, and the next step was to discuss the candidate for the pacification envoy. Zhao Yulin proposed that Wu Sicheng from Lanzhou be the pacification envoy of Gansu Road, and Hao Xiaoming be in charge of military affairs, in order to separate military and political affairs.
Everyone had no objection to this. Gao Jia was directly used in Xingyuan Prefecture Road, his father-in-law Chen Yun was used in Lizhou Road, and the pacification envoy of Jingxi South Road was used in Shaanxi Road. As for the remaining places such as Tongchuan Prefecture, no one could be sent.
Fan Zhong, Du Fan and others nominated several officials from Lin'an, but they all had too little qualifications and no experience in working at the provincial level, let alone governing the country with the new social concepts of the New Song Dynasty.
Lao Cao disagreed and ordered You Xianzhong of Fengxiang Prefecture to be transferred to Tongchuan Prefecture and Yu Dayi to Fengxiang Prefecture, and Yang Zhishan to be sent to Kuizhou Road to take over as prefect and acting pacification envoy.
Some people questioned whether Yang Zhishan was promoted too quickly?
This is already a promotion of several levels, and I have to be the acting pacification envoy. This is like riding on a firecracker that is set off during the Chinese New Year, and flying high into the sky.
Zhao Yulin said that now is an extraordinary period and extraordinary people are needed. Yang Zhishan has served in Xuzhou for many years and is quite familiar with the reform concepts of our new society. He is steady in his work and should have no problem controlling Kuizhou Road. Let's do it first.
The officials quickly discussed the vacancies for other positions. As long as they had been reviewed, Zhao Yulin readily agreed, and the court discussion quickly ended.
In the afternoon, he and Lao Cao went to ask Ding for leave. Lao Cao was going to recuperate, and Zhao Yulin was going to send the two ladies back to his hometown in Yibin.
Mr. Ding told them not to be hasty. He called Mr. Li and Du Fan from the Ministry of Revenue together and told them that the new Song Dynasty was going to issue paper money. This was an idea decided by Yulin Ge'er.
This is the old man's character, he always pushes the responsibility away. If he doesn't agree, the banknotes can't be issued for a while.
He called everyone together to discuss the matter only after they all agreed, so why does he always sell out the person who came up with the idea?
Zhao Yulin was very helpless. Seeing everyone looking at him with confusion, he said that the total economic volume of New Song was constantly growing, and a huge amount of silver coins needed for circulation. We use a large amount of silver to mint coins, and the price of silver has shown a rapid upward trend.
Silver coins, like other copper coins and iron coins, are metal currencies. It is inconvenient and unsafe for merchants to carry a large amount of coins while walking.
Cuipingshan had already arranged for the trial production of circulating paper money equivalent to silver coins. He suggested issuing paper money nationwide that could be exchanged for metal currency at an equivalent value to reduce the demand for silver coins.
Zhao Yulin believed that once paper money was issued, the prices of silver and copper would drop rapidly because everyone knew that the court would no longer use these metals to mint coins for circulation.
As silver's role as currency declined, its usage also decreased. With less demand, its price naturally fell.
The three people including Lao Cao still had doubts. Zhao Yulin asked them to think about it again, but they had to keep it secret.
When he went out, he whispered to Lao Cao that the new generation of muskets developed by Cuiping Mountain had been successful and a large amount of copper was needed to make bullet shells. We have to use paper money instead of silver and copper coins, and use the copper from minting coins to make copper shells and bullets.
Lao Cao's eyes immediately flashed with brilliance, and he patted Zhao Yulin on the shoulder and told him to tell him earlier, as he had been kept in the dark.
Zhao Yulin said it was not all because of that little thing. The price of silver was indeed rising fast, and we had to find a way to curb it, otherwise the cost of our coinage would become higher and higher.
Cao Youwen laughed and said, "I won't say any more, as I am going to Xinshi."
In the evening, Yang Zhishan went to Zhao Yulin's house for a drink and said that he had too little experience and was promoted too quickly. He was not capable of pacifying Kuizhou and that his brother had given him too much credit.
Chen Chen picked up some food for Yang Zhishan and said sincerely that everyone knew about Uncle Yang's great talent and strategy , but it had been buried in Xuzhou. Now that he had gone to Kuizhou, it was like a hero finding a place to use his talents.
Yang Zhishan was delighted and raised his glass to toast Zhao Yulin's family.
Zhao Yulin said that places like Kuizhou Road were just right for an old man like Yang Gong who was familiar with the official system of the previous dynasty and knew the rules of the new Song Dynasty to be in charge. Cao Gong had found the right person to recommend Yang Shu to go to Kuizhou Road.
He said that the most important thing for Kuizhou was to maintain stability. A large number of officials had just been purged, which would inevitably cause panic among the people. In the future, if any criminals were found, they would still be arrested, but the most important thing was to maintain stability...
Three days later, Zhao Yulin finished his affairs and took his two pregnant wives, Yangjin and Zhao Feiyan, on board a ship and headed south to Cuiping Mountain to take care of their pregnancies.
Yangjin came from the future, and she didn't mind being busy with work while pregnant, but she couldn't resist Feiyan's request for her to accompany her, so the two of them agreed to go back with Zhao Yulin.
It was already winter and the water in the rivers had receded. The group walked and played slowly. They ate the yellow croaker from Xinjin and then went to eat the Dongpo elbow from Meizhou.
Zhao Feiyan was very happy and satisfied, but Yangjin looked unhappy and said that no matter how delicious a dish was, it would be ruined without the seasoning of chili peppers.
Zhao Yulin said that Chili was still in South America and could wait. He had asked Zhou Ping to go to the seaside to receive the sea ship, and in the future he would organize a global voyage to bring Chili back to Yangjin.
Yangjin looked at him with disdain and said it was a "fake fight". Why did she hear Wu Yuqi say: Brother is ordering people to find sweet potatoes and potatoes?
Zhao Yulin smiled and said that these were all foreign species, and he would find them if he asked his subordinates to look for them together. The people were still hungry, so we had to find these excellent dryland crops and plant them first.
Yangjin leaned on his shoulder and said: I knew from the beginning that he liked to smoke. The tobacco leaves were in Mayi Country across the South China Sea. She wrote down the characteristics of the tobacco leaves to Yuqi and asked people to go to Guangzhou and Quanzhou to look for them. Maybe they can find them.
Zhao Yulin said he was sorry for his trouble, turned around and kissed her on the face, and helped her sit down next to Feiyan to rest. They could still walk all the way to Yibin, so he also leaned on the couch and took a nap...
In Shanchan Prefecture of Dali State, Duan Xiaolin was sent here by his father to be the governor. This guy and Zhao Sihan spent three months playing in Kunming and finally figured things out. He learned everything from Zhao Yulin and became the boss of his own territory. He started to make changes just like Zhao Yulin did.
Duan Xiaolin brought his two wives and children to live in Kunming. Zhao Sihan was happy to see that he was determined to be strong and independent, so he boldly contacted Xinshi to do business. The couple was in a very good mood, and seemed to be five years younger.
Like Zhao Yulin, he first established an independent law enforcement team, starting with punishing corruption and acting in accordance with the law. He directly killed the corrupt officials in Shanchan Prefecture, and those he dared not kill were driven away to Dali Prefecture. When the people saw that Prince Zhennan was determined to do it, they praised him.
The Gao and Chai families and his father were concentrating on dealing with the war with the Kingdom of Yue in the south and had no time to compete with him, which allowed Duan Xiaolin to enjoy himself without any worries for two months.
The spy brought news that General Cao Youwen of the New Song Dynasty had arrived in Xinshi Town, nominally for recuperation, but it seemed a bit strange that a general of a country suddenly came to a small border town.
Seeing that he was depressed and silent, Zhao Sihan asked him what was wrong.
Duan Xiaolin handed the secret letter to Zhao Sihan.
Zhao Sihan was surprised, because Duan Xiaolin had never let her handle such secret letters in the past.
Seeing her surprised look, Duan Xiaolin smiled and said that General Cao had come to Xinshi, and Dali did not understand his intention. He wondered what action he would take next.
Zhao Sihan went over and leaned on his shoulder and said that she believed her third brother was a trustworthy man and would definitely not use military force against the Dali Kingdom at this time.
The New Song Kingdom has control over more than a dozen roads. A large country with a population of tens of millions seems to be an invincible existence in Dali's eyes. Now that General Cao has settled down in Xinshi Town, he has to be concerned.
Duan Xiaolin stroked Zhao Sihan's bangs and said that he believed in the third brother, but this was an exchange between two countries. Take this secret letter for example, we have spies in Xin Song to get information, and the third brother also has Shunfengsi working.
Zhao Sihan said that the Shenwei Army entered Dongchuan County after a battle, and now the people there are praising the Shenwei Army for being fair. The people don’t care whether they are from Dali or New Song, they will follow whoever treats them well.
Duan Xiaolin said with determination that he would continue with the reform no matter what the future held, otherwise he would be letting down the people of Dali.
