When Min Yuanzhong was far away, he saw many vehicles heading towards the Fucheng, most of which were unicycles. Dozens of cars followed by people who looked like Lijia Bao. A large number of convoys were dozens of people riding horses from afar. These horsemen were obviously traveling from Shandong. Most of them were wearing foam nails, cotton armor, iron helmets, and long swords. The weapons were taken out and carried in their hands or were horizontally in front of their knees, or gathered in groups of three or five, or more than a dozen riders scattered to drive away the people passing by, and even rode their horses to drive away the passers-by. When they saw the pedestrians in a mess, the cavalry laughed and their madness was revealed.

The visiting troops were stationed in Huai'an for a short time, but these Shandong travelers from Linqing had already had a very bad reputation. In addition to urging grain to collect wages to kill many lives, open looting also happens from time to time. It is still the case in broad daylight, and it is often heard of stealing chickens and dogs plundering houses in the middle of the night, or raping women. Originally, Huai'an Prefecture was considered a Taiping area, and the canal transportation center was still rich, unlike Xuzhou and Suining, where there were once wars. There were many thieves in the mountains, and there were many horses near Shandong. There were many bandits. Huai'an was generally still peaceful. After the large number of visitors arrived, it seriously increased the burden on the local area, and it also caused a sharp turn in public security. Everyone hated the visiting troops to the core.

Min Yuanzhong knew that the frequency of grain harvest has slowed down recently and has not expanded the scope. At least, no passenger troops to go to the countryside to collect grain were seen near the military households of the garrison.

The main reason is that Liu Zeqing and his generals had a natural attack, but considering that the summer harvest will be in more than two months, and the harvest will be much more than the current harvest. This is the spring famine. Even if you are forced to death, you cannot get more grain. It is better to slow down for two months before collecting grain.

Moreover, since the visiting troops conscripted grain, they have looted several wealthy families, obtained hundreds of thousands of stones of grain and more than 100,000 silver. Liu Zeqing's troops have not only not been weakened in Huai'an, but have grown a lot, which has given Liu Zeqing a long-term entrenchment and serious management of the Lianghuai region's territory.

Compared with Shandong and Henan, which are constantly war-torn, the two Huaihe Rivers are not as good as Jiangnan and are much richer than Shandong and Henan.

Min Yuanzhong entered Wangyun Gate with the grain team. As soon as he entered the city gate, he felt extremely prosperous. A steady stream of people rushed into the city. There were many signs on the street, and the shops of the shops could not see at all. A large number of cars and horses were parked on both sides of the street, waiting for the goods to be loaded and set off...

From paper and candle shops to grocery shops, cloth shops, silk shops, hat shops, ready-to-wear shops, shoe shops, antiques, tea shops, restaurants, inns, pawn shops, money shops, silver shops... There are all kinds of things, from the cheapest and most valuable bamboo weaving to creating exquisite gold and silver jewelry shops, the so-called five elements, namely the five elements of the foot teeth of the car and ship shops, the eight things are gold, silver, copper, iron, tin, wood, tile, tile, tile, stone, etc. Although this division may not necessarily make it clear that hundreds of shops on the long street... For example, the ready-to-wear tailor and hat shop

There are many shops, each with specialized, and the paper shops also have different emphasis. There are also porcelains divided into kilns and there are dozens of types of cloth. In addition to the top large shops, there are only a few types of shopping. There are many kinds of porcelain, raw silk tea, including various service industries, such as bicycle shops and inns. The entire West Street is about two miles long, and various shops are almost one after another, dense. If it is the first time that the unknown foreigner who came here, he will probably not be able to take his eyes off for a long time after this!

Jiangbei is actually the two prefectures. At this time, Huai'an Prefecture was Xuzhou, Suqian and Lianyungang, plus the entire Yancheng and Yangzhou. Its area is large, population is large, and commercially developed, which is difficult for future generations to imagine. In addition, it is the canal transportation center, it is also the largest canal shipbuilding base established by the Ministry of Industry of the Ming Dynasty, and the north-south trade center, plus a certain political, military and economic status. At this time, Huai'an Prefecture was a major city, completely different from that of later generations.

The most common business in Xichang Street in front of you is naturally the salt business.

The shops of Yan Store are not big, and they are mostly bungalows with three rooms as storefronts. Unlike some large shops who use five doors to storefronts as shops, and they can be seen from the guise of hanging high and can be seen several miles away.

During the Chongzhen period, after the proliferation of private salt, many salt merchants began to secretly collude with private salt dealers and purchase and sell private salt in large quantities. If the court rules were all followed, not only would salt be needed when purchasing salt, but the sale of official salt also required trade in cities stipulated by the government. At least it would be a county town. If the people in market towns and rural areas had to go to the city, it would be a waste of money.

The salt business in front of us is generally low-key and introverted, but everyone knows that the salt merchant is the richest person in the city.

Min Yuanzhong led the mule to the horse-tie stone in front of the Zhu family's business, carefully tied his mule, and then walked into the store in a dusty manner.

This time, the job in front of the fight was actually a punishment from Min Yuanqi.

Min Yuanzhong was responsible for guarding the village of Baihu. The three arrow towers and mobile whistles were under his jurisdiction. However, Min Qiande, Wang Sanyi and others were directly sent in without any news. Although it was not for outsiders to enter the salt pond, it was also a dereliction of duty. Min Yuanqi did not say it in person, and then detained Min Yuanzhong's food for three days and handed him the errand for the front station, which was also a kind of punishment.

Min Yuanzhong felt quite depressed about this, but whether it was the kinship relationship, the current authority of Min Yuanqi, or the promising good days in the future, all of this made him unable to resist the punishment from Min Yuanqi, and could only ride a mule honestly.

Fortunately, the journey went smoothly, Min Yuanzhong let out a sigh and walked into the store quickly.

...

Min Yuanzhong, wearing a fat jacket and a Fan Yang hat, was rushing to the road, and looked gray, did not attract people's attention or attention.

In the business, Zhu Renzhong and his eldest son Zhu Wanchun and second son Zhu Wanhe were sitting behind the counter talking.

All three were frowning, and Zhu Wanhe complained in a low voice: "I thought Caozhou Liu was just to collect grain and raise soldiers. Now he didn't occupy Yangzhou and wanted to occupy Huai'an. He was afraid that the local money and grain would not be enough to raise soldiers, so he had to extend his hand to the salt industry."

Zhu Wanchun said: "He wants to recruit Yang Shili, but he just needs to master the stove owners and to obtain sales channels. Now it seems that Yang Shili has not agreed to the conditions of Caozhou Liu, and obviously has not taken the position of guerrilla general or general in his eyes. This is not surprising. Yang Shili has at least a thousand subordinates, and at least produces more than 20 million kilograms of salt a year, and has a net profit of more than 100,000 taels a year. My Zhu family has been a salt merchant for more than 200 years and has accumulated only a few hundred thousand yuan in wealth. Yang Shili has been in charge of the salt owl family, and his family capital is above my Zhu family. He is unwilling to wear an official hat and give out his assets to others."

Zhu Renzhong sat with great worries, and then nodded and said, "The boss understood what happened and thoughts of Liu, Yang Shili and others in Caozhou were quite good. However, even if Yang Shili refused to be this official, he would have to take out his territory and benefits to share with Liu Caozhou. He said that a strong dragon would not defeat the local snake, but it depends on how much the difference between the strong dragon and the local snake. Yang Shili could not bear it. Now there are more and more stove households controlled by Caozhou Liu, and each business company had to take out some of their stove households and sell salt to the guest soldiers. In this way, he could get at least tens of thousands of taels of silver a year, plus the main income of land tax, and it would be more than enough to raise these tens of thousands of guest soldiers."

Zhu Renzhong stopped and sighed and said, "No wonder Caozhou Liu is like this who doesn't obey the emperor's orders. The emperor is not alone in hungry soldiers. Our Ming Dynasty is so poor that these soldiers can be plundered and raised by the people at will. Who can still listen to the court? It's such a strange thing, a big strange thing!"

As Zhu Renzhong said, the finances of the Ming Dynasty were completely bankrupt at this time, and the financial income during the Chongzhen period had twists and turns, and overall it was still in a downward state.

Strangely, in addition to the intention of reducing some taxes in the first year of Chongzhen, the Chongzhen Dynasty was also on the road of additional taxes and additional taxes for most of the time. However, due to the continuous decline in control, the more the increase, the more the collection, the less the collection. From miscellaneous income to the main property of land taxes, annual income was sharply reduced every year, and many taxes could not be collected at all. The additional Liao salary, training salary, and suppression salary, the tax revenue was still not enough to support the army. By the seventh year of Chongzhen, the finances had been bankrupt for many years. In addition, the poor emperor had even used up all his own treasury, and even used up the artifacts in the palace. In addition, the location of the construction of the imperial tombs was determined around the seventh year of Chongzhen. After ten years of the year of the Ming Dynasty, the emperor had no money to build the tombs for himself. This was the first time that such a situation occurred among the emperors of the Ming Dynasty... For emperors like Chongzhen who had been in power for more than ten years, the tombs of the imperial tombs should have been repaired and repaired many times.

This made Emperor Chongzhen no longer have the tomb to settle after he hanged himself. The emperor's body was first placed on the door panel and carried outside the palace gate. The ministers and eunuchs and officials did not dare to go forward to kowtow to sacrifice. Only Xiangcheng Bo came forward to kowtow to worship. Later, Emperor Chongzhen and Empress Zhou put together in a willow coffin. After rinsing the red paint, Li Zicheng decided to send the emperor and Empress to the repaired empress to the Tian Guifei Mausoleum for burial and to solve the problem in Shuntian Mansion.

Shuntian Prefecture and Changping County had no money and grain, and the treasury was poor and was very miserable. Judging from the various records at that time, the national capital had no money, and the county where the imperial tomb was located had no money and the national treasury had no money. The last record was around early April, when Shuntian Prefecture advocated that several people raised hundreds of taels of silver, built simple spiritual sheds, and built mausoleum walls. Each family had as many as dozens of taels, as few as few as two, or even dozens of coins. They gathered up silver and burial the emperor and empress...

On March 25, 17th year of Chongzhen, Li Piao, an official from Shuntian Prefecture of the Dashun regime, ordered the officials of Changping Prefecture to "get the official silver to urge their husbands to open the concubine Tian quickly, and bury the coffin of the late Emperor Chongzhen and the Empress Zhou.

The third day of the fourth month was launched, and the burial was buried on the fourth day of the first month, so it was not against the time." However, because Changping Prefecture was "baptized" and the burial period was very urgent, Zhao Yigui, the then official of Changping Prefecture, had to discuss with Xu Zuomei, the chief of the funeral supervisor, and brought Feng Chaojin, a worker staff member to Beijing to report to Shuntian Prefecture. After repeated requests, the prefectural official Shi Zhu criticized: "I asked the shops in the state to donate and apply for it, and I will discuss it after the matter."

After Zhao Yigui returned to the state, he immediately organized the fundraising. Ten people donated a total of 350,000 papers (about 233 taels of silver). Among them, Liu Rupu had 60,000 papers, Wang Rupu had 50,000 papers, Bai Shen had 30,000 papers, Deng Ke had 50,000 papers, Xu Kui had 30,000 papers, Li had 20,000 papers, Zhao Yongjian had 20,000 papers, Liu Yingyuan had 20,000 papers, Yang Dao had 20,000 papers, and Wang Zhengxing had 20,000 papers.

Almost this little money was the entire funeral of Emperor Chongzhen.
Chapter completed!