Chapter 851 940 Assassin

"Sir, this is what Zhang Shoufu sent to his room. It is said to be the Datong Calendar of the First Year of Wanli written by Qin Tianjian. Please take a look at it.

It has reached the end of September in the sixth year of Longqing, and the imperial court is expected to issue next year's calendar in October.

As early as June, the young emperor Zhu Yijun issued the Wanli Amnesty Edict after he ascended the throne. Now that it is approaching the end of the year and is about to enter the first year of Wanli, the approval and issuance of the Tatong Calendar must be implemented as soon as possible.

In fact, in the Ming Dynasty every October, the first thing the emperor had to do was usually to determine the Tatong calendar for the coming year.

Some people may think that it is just an almanac, but it is of little use. Wei Guangde had this view before, but when he realized the great role of the T&T calendar, he gave up his original idea.

China has been a major agricultural country since ancient times, and people live on a few acres of land, so spring plowing is the most important time.

And how do ordinary people know such an important season?

Naturally, it can only be the Datong calendar issued by the imperial court. By consulting the Datong calendar, you can know what time it is and what to do in the fields.

To put it bluntly, in addition to keeping time, the most important function of the Tatong calendar is to tell the people about the solar terms and let them know what to do.

One of the most important tasks of Qin Tianjian is to observe and predict the future farming season, compile a Datong calendar, and then print and distribute it in large quantities to farmers to help with planting and harvesting.

Some even say that the demise of the Yuan Dynasty was related to the fact that the imperial calendar was not issued to the people for about ten years at the end of the Yuan Dynasty, which caused a lot of land in the world to be barren. People did not know the seasons, did not dare to farm, and starved to death everywhere.

At that time, the emperor of the Yuan Dynasty spent all his energy on wiping out peasant rebels everywhere, so he naturally did not think about compiling and promulgating the imperial calendar to guide farming.

It is said that Zhu Yuanzhang was influenced by Liu Bowen. When he was still King of Wu, he asked people to compile a new calendar based on the astronomical data and calculation methods of the Yuan Dynasty's "Time Calendar", and this almanac was named "Datong Calendar" by Zhu Yuanzhang. 》.

Liu Bowen deeply analyzed the importance of the imperial calendar to Zhu Yuanzhang. He said that the people of the world did not care who became the emperor. What they really cared about was whether the emperor cared about the life and death of the people. If the imperial calendar was released before the emperor proclaimed himself emperor, Then the people know in their hearts that you care about them, and they will definitely support you.

After hearing this, Zhu Yuanzhang thought it was reasonable, so he ordered Xu Da, who was conquering the north, to set out with the Datong calendar. Whenever he arrived at a place, he distributed the imperial Datong calendar to the villagers.

As a result, the effect of this could not be better. With the imperial calendar, the people could live in peace and engage in agricultural activities under its guidance, and the society was stable.

At this time, Wei Guangde immediately put down the memorials he was reading and took over the Datong Calendar of the First Year of Wanli and quickly browsed it from beginning to end.

Although he didn't understand how to compile it, and certainly didn't know how to study it, he still understood the important parts of the imperial calendar, so naturally he had to check it in this new imperial calendar to see if there were any omissions.

Later generations looked at the T&T Calendar and mostly focused on its accuracy in predicting solar and lunar eclipses, but in fact its most important role was to predict solar terms and guide farming.

After reading it quickly, there was nothing missing. Wei Guangde immediately signed Zhang Juzheng's signature at the back, and then called Lu Bu and asked him to send the memorial to Lu Tiaoyang's room, and ask Mr. Lu Ge to take a look at it.

"By the way, wait a moment."

Just when Lu Bu was ordered to go out with the memorial, Wei Guangde suddenly stopped him again.

"I heard that the ministers in the Ministry of Rites are seriously ill and have asked for leave. Do you know what's going on?"

Wei Guangde accidentally learned about Zhu Dashou's illness yesterday, but he forgot to ask Zhang Ji if he knew the inside story. When he saw Lu Bu, he naturally stopped and asked.

There may not be rumors about some things in the market, but the scribes in the yamen are very well-informed.

"In August and September, after Empress Xiaoyi's Li family's coffin and the late emperor's coffin were buried in Zhaoling, all the ministers fell ill. They all said that they were tired from running around for funerals day and night. There is no other news."

Lu Bu thought for a while before answering.

Hearing that he collapsed from exhaustion, Wei Guangde didn't ask any more questions. He just thought about whether he should go over to see him in the evening. After all, he was the number one scholar in his own year and he was still the top scholar in that subject.

While Wei Guangde was still thinking about it, he saw Lu Bu standing in front of the check-in door without going out. After being surprised, he realized that Lu Bu didn't know if he had anything else to ask, so he could only stand at the door and wait. He spoke.

Just as he was about to wave, Wei Guangde remembered what he had been asked to do two days ago, so he asked again: "I asked you to look for pornographic information the day before yesterday, have you completed it?"

Lu Bu breathed a sigh of relief obviously, then bowed and replied: "Master, we have found it and I will send it to you right away."

"No, please send the memorial to Mr. Lu Ge first, and then give it to me when you come back."

Wei Guangde gave the order and got back to work.

After finishing another memorial, footsteps sounded at the door, and Lu Bu came in from the door, holding a letter in his hand.

"Master, this is what you want. I randomly selected a few pieces of yellow book information. If I still need it, I will go look for it again."

While talking, Lu Bu had already sent the note to Wei Guangde.

After reading Chen Tang's memorial a few days ago, Wei Guangde began to care about the household registration and land situation of the Ming Dynasty, so he asked Lu Bu to check the data compiled by the previous court to see what kind of family background the Ming Dynasty had.

Regardless of whether these data are accurate or not, he feels that as a cabinet minister, he should still have access to them, even if the data is wrong.

Just like the statistics of later generations, everyone knows that there is water in them, and it is not small, so we often see the venting words of "being represented" and "holding back", but so what?

In addition to this watered-down data, do you have other data that you can take out?

No.

So, even if you know that these data are false, you can only take them seriously, especially at the level of the group of people who make policies. They also know that the data is wrong, but there is no correct data, so they can only use this wrong one.

Yellow Book and White Book, knowing that the Yellow Book is inaccurate, maybe the White Book is more accurate, but the court administration will still be based on the Yellow Book, and it will never be the White Book.

As for the policy formulation, when it comes to the local level, whether they follow the Yellow Book in the government office or the White Book in the hands of the Lixu, it is not so much.

Wei Guangde unfolded the note and just looked at the data for a few years. He felt a little creepy. The change in data is really hard to accept.

In the 26th year of Hongwu, the results of the national survey showed that there were 16,052,860 households, 60,545,812 people, and 8,576,230 hectares of land.

By the 4th year of Hongzhi, the results showed that there were 9,113,446 households and 53,281,150 people, which was a slight decrease compared with the Hongwu period.

As for the number of land, the land in the country was only 4,228,588 hectares, which was half of the Hongwu period.

The most recent register was in the 2nd year of Longqing, when the number of households and land taxes in the country was 18,805, 62,537,419, and 4,677,750 hectares and 11 mu of land.

Let's not talk about other things. Just the 8.5 million hectares of farmland in Hongwu has been nearly 200 years now. Not only has the farmland not increased, but it has decreased to only 4.67 million hectares. Just think about the newly reclaimed farmland in recent years. It is conceivable how much tax silver the Ming Dynasty lost every year.

Of course, these farmlands will not disappear out of thin air, but they are registered in the names of local princes, dignitaries, and people with meritorious service, thus avoiding the summary.

At the same time, the newly reclaimed farmland is believed to be hidden in large quantities and will not appear in the Ministry of Households' reconciliation data, while the benefits are shared by the landlords and the village officials.

Wei Guangde waved his hand and signaled the reed cloth to go down, while he stared at the note in a daze.

The change in the number of farmlands is so huge. If the person in the room over there is willing to do some rectification, even if half of the hidden farmland is spit out, the number of farmlands that can be taxed in the Ming Dynasty may double.

The court's annual tax revenue is now close to 3 million taels, and it should be possible to increase it by 2 million taels. In addition, there will be a large amount of grain and other in-kind taxes, which will ease the court's financial difficulties.

Thinking of this, Wei Guangde couldn't help but tap the desk lightly. He felt as if he had understood something.

The Ming Dynasty had no money because the money was divided among the local governments.

Taizu set the court framework in stone, and the people below could only find ways to intercept wealth. He thought he could scare corrupt officials by skinning and stuffing them with straw, but he didn't know that corrupt officials would continue to fall.

How much is the tax on millions of hectares of land?

It's enough to support a court, right? This is an extremely huge number.

Wei Guangde thought about this in his heart. No wonder Zhang Juzheng was persecuted afterwards, and in the end he was almost opened and whipped.

Wei Guangde didn't want to do anything now, but wait and see how Zhang Juzheng would promote his reforms.

Now that the Longqing Year is about to end, I think Zhang Juzheng will promote his reform measures from the first year of Wanli.

The remaining two months passed quickly, and it was time to close the office in a blink of an eye.

They could close other offices, but the cabinet did not exist.

With the start of the first year of Wanli, the new era began. Emperor Wanli Zhu Yijun sat on the supreme throne in Huangji Hall and accepted the congratulations of the ministers.

From this moment on, all official documents of the Ming Dynasty will be marked with dates based on the Datong calendar of the first year of Wanli, and the Wanli calendar will be used as the year.

Although this year is the first year of the new emperor, according to Zhang Juzheng's wishes, the palace has reduced the expenses of organizing the Aoshan Lantern Festival, from 300,000 or 400,000 taels of silver in previous years to less than 300,000 taels.

Although the silver spent has been greatly reduced, according to Wei Guangde's opinion, it seems that it is not much worse than last year, which shows that the eunuchs in the inner court who held the Aoshan Lantern Festival in previous years have embezzled a lot of money.

In a blink of an eye, it was the 19th day of the first lunar month. The emperor held court on the 369th day of the lunar month. Today, Emperor Wanli Zhu Yijun was going to ascend the Huangji Gate.

Zhang Juzheng, Wei Guangde and others and officials attending the court today gathered outside the palace gate waiting for the arrival of the time. The officials below were obviously not out of the New Year atmosphere and were still talking and laughing together.

After a while of murmurs from the three cabinet members, Wei Guangde waved and signaled the Minister of War Tan Lun to come over. Soon, the Minister of Personnel Yang Bo was also called over.

What they were talking about was naturally the official document received by the Ministry of War yesterday. Qi Jiguang, the general commander of Jizhen, reported that the chief of the Wuliangha Duoyan tribe, Dong Huli, had signs of leading his troops to violate the border. Whether Jizhen should take the initiative to send troops to chase him away, please let the court decide.

Yes, in the first year of Wanli, the border troops of Jizhen found signs that the Wuliangha Duoyan tribe had gathered troops outside the Great Wall.

Although the Ming court and Altan Khan had negotiated peace, the peace talks did not include the Doyan Three Guards. After all, in the eyes of the Ming court, these three guards were repeatedly surrendered and rebellious, and they were untrustworthy. In the eyes of the Mongols, the Doyan Three Guards had already surrendered to the Ming court and were no longer worthy of being Mongols.

Well, the result was that the Ming Dynasty only ended the confrontation with most of the Mongols, and the risk of war was reduced to an extremely low level, but the Doyan Three Guards, whose power was not strong, were still possible enemies of the Ming court.

Yang Bo and Tan Lun were both governors of Ji and Liao, and naturally had a clear judgment of the power of the Doyan tribe, so they did not think that Qi Jiguang's request to attack would fail.

However, the Ming court did not want to start a war now, and the court's finances were still a mess. Under such circumstances, launching a war was really an unbearable burden for the court.

"Let General Qi supervise the army to guard strictly. I think that seeing that my Ming Dynasty is prepared, the Doyan tribe will not dare to start a war without authorization."

Yang Bo's opinion was to be on guard strictly and not give any chance, which should make Dong Huli retreat.

"My opinion is the same as Yang Shangshu's."

Tan Lun also supported Yang Bo's opinion, "This is not the time to send troops to the frontier. Even if the Doyan tribe wants to fight, just let them in and fight. There is no need to attack."

"In this case, the Ministry of War will send a letter to Jizhen, asking them to be on high alert."

After Zhang Juzheng and Wei Guangde looked at each other, he said to Tan Lun.

Yesterday's cabinet meeting, Wei Guangde's opinion was similar. It was not a good time to send troops to the frontier to fight. It would be better to wait for the Doyan tribe to fall into the trap.

The current Wei Guangde is not the angry young man in later generations who wants to beat anyone up to vent his anger.

War is a major event for the country, a place of life and death, and a way of survival and destruction. It must be carefully considered.

If you can avoid war, try to avoid it. There is no need to take the initiative to provoke conflict.

Just when the court officials were waiting for Emperor Wanli to enter the Huangji Gate, the time had come, but there was still no sound of bells and drums.

There was no sound of bells and drums, stringed instruments, which meant that the emperor had not yet arrived, so everyone could only continue to wait at the Huangji Gate.

As time went by, everyone became more and more impatient.

"Why hasn't your majesty arrived yet?"

Lü Diaoyang asked Zhang Juzheng.

Yesterday, Zhang Juzheng was the lecturer for Emperor Wanli, and at this time, Lü Diaoyang suspected that Zhang Juzheng had arranged a lot of homework, which affected the emperor's rest and made him stay in bed.

Zhang Juzheng did not answer, but just shook his head, and then looked up at the Huangji Gate.

At this moment, the Zuoye Gate suddenly opened, and a eunuch hurried out of the Ye Gate. After looking around and seeing them, he came quickly.

When he arrived in front of several people, the little eunuch hesitated a little before saying to Zhang Juzheng: "Master, something happened in the palace. Please follow me into the palace first, three elders."

"What happened? Why hasn't your majesty come to the gate to attend the court?"

Zhang Juzheng did not move, but just asked.

The eunuch hesitated a little and looked around.

Everyone understood what he meant. He must have been ordered to summon the ministers. However, they didn't expect that Tan Lun and Yang Bo were standing next to him. After a moment of hesitation, he said, "There is an assassin in the palace."