Chapter 516: The monarch and his ministers divide the spoils

After staggering for nearly a month, they finally arrived in the capital.

With the support of officials, carriages and horses sent by the imperial court, Jia Lian returned to the capital with great fanfare with a large amount of silver and property.

After clearly communicating with the officials of the Ministry of Household Affairs, Jia Lian went directly to the south study room of the Daming Palace to repeat the order.

"Jia Lian, a humble minister, please bow to your majesty, long live my emperor."

"Get back on your feet."

Emperor Ning Kang is still thin With a majestic look, he looked at Jia Lian, who had been separated for three months, nodded with satisfaction, and then said: "This time to investigate the salt administration and punish corruption, I love you for your hard work and great achievements. Thank you for your hard work."

"It is a great honor for a humble minister to be loyal to His Majesty."

After a brief conversation, Emperor Ning Kang picked up several memorials that had been prepared on the case and asked Dai Quan to hand them to Jia Lian. .

Jia Lian seemed puzzled. He picked up two books one after another. After reading them for a while, his expression changed slightly. Then he immediately knelt down and said: "Your Majesty, these people are just slander. I will take it upon myself." Since I went to Jiangnan, I have always kept His Majesty's instructions in mind and worked hard, fearing that I would disappoint Your Majesty.

These ministers relied on these baseless things to accuse the ministers for no reason. They have ulterior motives and are extremely abominable!

Please be warned, Your Majesty, never listen to the words of these villains.

They don’t know how vicious and difficult those salt merchants and salt officials are! If he had known this, His Majesty should have sent these people to Yangzhou, so that they could experience what it was like to rack their brains every day to fight with salt merchants and local officials, and to be on guard against being assassinated at any time. By then, look Can they still make sarcastic remarks and maliciously accuse others?"

Jia Lian said with a hateful face, as if if the person who wrote these memorials were here, he would step forward and give him a fist. appearance.

As Jia Yucun expected, many ministers in the DPRK had already begun to impeach him before he returned to Beijing. Some of these memorials were written even before he left Yangzhou. The content was mostly nothing more than a protest and impeachment against his "arrogant formality" and "disrespect of laws" in Yangzhou.

There are also those who doubt that he took advantage of the opportunity to make money and line his own pockets, but these are all speculations and not worth mentioning.

Emperor Ning Kang looked at Jia Lian's expression carefully. After Jia Lian vented his emotions, Fang said lightly: "I have read every memorial you sent back to the capital. I know you Of course, you will not listen to these people’s speculations about you.

The reason why I show you these is just to let you know what are the shortcomings and inappropriateness of your actions.Fang, we must try our best to avoid doing things for the imperial court in the future.

In addition, although I believe you, I cannot completely ignore the opinions of the courtiers. You go back to rest today, and you will come to the morning court tomorrow. If there are still ministers who are in trouble with you, just tell them in person and clear your name.

Get up. "

"I obey your order, and thank you for your trust and love..."

"As for your reward, I will have it delivered to you after the court meeting. 's house. "

"Thank you, my emperor, for your grace..."

"Do you have anything else? "

Seeing Jia Lian still standing there after thanking him, Emperor Ning Kang seemed a little puzzled and asked.

"Well, I do have something else to report to Your Majesty. Show me..."

Jia Lian said and glanced at the few young eunuchs in the palace.

Dai Quan understood, glanced at Emperor Ningkang, and found that Emperor Ningkang Raising his eyebrows, he waved to the young eunuchs to retreat.

"Go ahead. Emperor Ning Kang's tone was a bit irritated, because few of his courtiers dared to ask him to back away.

But Jia Lian was so sharp-eyed that it was easy to spot the look of expectation in Emperor Ning Kang's eyes.
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So he took out a brocade box that had been prepared a long time ago from his sleeve, and without letting Dai Quan turn it over, he bent forward and presented it directly to Emperor Ning Kang's case, and said with a smile: "Reply Your Majesty, this is what the salt merchants of Yangzhou City asked your ministers to pass on to Your Majesty.

They said that they had lived up to the high hopes of the imperial court and the trust of His Majesty, so in addition to voluntarily donating four million taels of silver to the imperial court to atone for their sins, they also took the initiative to make a special donation of three million taels of silver. Give it to Your Majesty to thank Your Majesty for not killing.

Inside, there are one million taels of silver notes from major banks, and the other two million taels are cash in cash. Wei Chen has already ordered someone to write this for Your Majesty and everyone in the palace. Ladies, the local specialties purchased from various prefectures in the south of the Yangtze River were escorted to the Ministry of Internal Affairs. ”

Even though he had been prepared for it, Emperor Ning Kang was also moved by the number three million taels.

Even for him, this number was too small Not too small.

Excluding the expenses of the Supreme Emperor, the amount of money he draws from the treasury every year will not exceed this amount. Of course, the expenses of the palace are not completely dependent on The supply from the treasury, as well as the income from the various royal estates below, etc.

He is the emperor, and every year he has to reward his ministers, hold state banquets, maintain the expenses of the palace, etc., which costs a lot of money.

Regarding Jia Lian’sFirst hand, Emperor Ning Kang was still very satisfied.

Although he is the emperor, the difference is not particularly big whether the money flows into the treasury or into his internal funds. After all, the money in these two places is his money.

It’s just that he has to discuss the money in the treasury with the courtiers, and he will be restricted. If he uses too much, he will be accused of wasting state assets by the courtiers.

In contrast, money from internal funds is much more casual. He can use it however he wants, and no one can control it.

Looking through the brand new banknotes, Emperor Ning Kang looked at Jia Lian with increasing satisfaction.

Regardless of whether the money was really paid filial piety by the salt merchants, or Jia Lian withheld it from the treasury, in short, Jia Lian could fully understand what he meant at the time, and solved his dilemma of lack of money. , he is a capable minister who can take care of your worries!

Well, things are done very safely. Although no one dared to intercept and check the money even if it was transported directly to his Ministry of Internal Affairs, Jia Lian was able to think of a way to pay tribute to local specialties and transport it to the Ministry of Internal Affairs for him, which even avoided the suspicion of the courtiers. .

But while he was happy, Emperor Ning Kang frowned and asked Jia Lian: "Those salt merchants, are they really so rich? Can they just give out millions of taels of silver?"< br />
After all, Emperor Ningkang was a peaceful emperor. After ascending the throne, he never left the vicinity of the capital.

In his opinion, the amount that Jia Lian had submitted to the Ministry of Household Affairs was already quite large. Including various rare antiques, calligraphy and paintings, the value of the money was between seven and eight million.

If we add these three million taels, wouldn’t it be more than ten million taels!

Even he could not help but be stunned by this amount. After all, Jia Lian had only been in Yangzhou for three months, and he had only really stayed in Yangzhou for more than a month. Regardless of whether his methods were cruel or brutal, the fact that he was able to collect more than 10 million taels of wealth from Yangzhou in one month was still impressive to Emperor Ningkang. I feel incredible.

Jia Lian immediately replied: "It's not just rich. Your Majesty doesn't know that although Yangzhou is a state capital of Jinling Province, in terms of prosperity, it is not far behind Jinling City." Ah.

Not to mention those big salt merchants, which family doesn’t have seven or eight luxurious manors? Take the Zhao family and the Wang family who dared to assassinate the ministers, their money is really It was piled up like a mountain, and when Wei Chen and others went in to check it, they were almost shocked!"

Emperor Ning Kang's face wrinkled when he heard it, but he dispersed immediately.

Firstly, he has not focused too much on the salt policy yet, and secondly, the profits of the salt bank are there. Even if these people are killed and a new group is replaced, it may not be possible.Better than the current batch.

So Emperor Ningkang looked at Jia Lian and said with a pointed smile: "Oh, since these salt merchants are so rich, why don't they show anything to you, the imperial envoy?"

When Jia Lian heard this, he seemed unhurried and glanced at Dai Quan.

Dai Quan immediately turned to Emperor Ningkang and said: "Your Majesty, forgive me. When Marquis Zhenyuan entered the palace just now, he said that he wanted to donate some treasures to the Emperor. I thought that since he was Marquis Zhenyuan, I must have wanted to give His Majesty a surprise, so I didn’t tell the Emperor first.”

Emperor Ning Kang glanced at him and said noncommittally: “In that case, I won’t let anyone present it to me.”< br />
After a while, the little eunuchs filed in and unfolded a total of four calligraphy and paintings.

As soon as Emperor Ning Kang saw it, he knew that Jia Lian was in his favour, and he did not pretend to be reserved. He walked out from behind the Long Case and began to observe and comment on everything.

Although Emperor Ning Kang was not as fond of playing with utensils in his old age as the Supreme Emperor was, he was more interested in calligraphy and painting because he was good at calligraphy.

Emperor Ning Kang looked at the first few paintings and just nodded slightly, thinking they were pretty good. No wonder Jia Lian dared to present them to him in such a mysterious way.

Until he glanced at the fourth picture, Ning Kangdi's eyes quietly froze, and he immediately took two steps closer and started to caress it carefully.

Dai Quan, who was standing next to him, saw him and quietly gave Jia Lian a thumbs up.

As a person close to the emperor, Dai Quan certainly knew that in serving the emperor, sometimes it was more useful to donate something that the emperor liked than to make many great contributions to the court. !

Looking at Emperor Ning Kang’s performance, we know that Jia Lian succeeded.

Emperor Ning Kang bent down and looked for a long time before raising his head. Then he seemed to feel that his performance just now lacked the emperor's majesty, so he coughed lightly and asked Jia Lian in a low voice: "This, is it?" Authentic?"

"Replying to your majesty, Weichen doesn't know much about calligraphy and painting, so he can't answer your majesty accurately. However, this was indeed donated to Weichen by someone when Weichen was in Yangzhou.< br />
I also asked people to identify one or two, and most people said that it should be authentic.

Because this post is so famous, I don’t dare to be arbitrary. I remembered again. I had the honor to witness His Majesty's superb calligraphy skills during my previous visit, so today I specially present it to Your Majesty for your appreciation."

Jia Lian said with a smile. In fact, this copy of Wang Xizhi's "Peace Note" was copied from the Zhao family. But, since it was said to be copied, he withheld the donation and presented it to the emperor. Naturally, he was suspected of borrowing flowers to offer to the Buddha. It would be better for someone else to give them to him, and his "loyalty" to present them again is commendable.

Emperor Ning Kang nodded, feeling that what Jia Lian said was pertinent. After all, even he, a fan of Wang Xizhi, dared not confirm at a glance whether it was an authentic work, because there were too many imitations of this famous post.

There are many high imitations, which are of high value.

But the picture in front of him, he felt, was probably true!

If this is the case, it would be considered a treasure to him.

Emperor Ning Kang, who asked Dai Quan to accept the four calligraphy and paintings and sat back on the throne, looked at Jia Lian with a look that he no longer knew how to describe.

"Wei Chen did not dare to hide from His Majesty. After everything was settled in Yangzhou, the salt merchants did give Wei Chen a lot of benefits in order to let Wei Chen speak good words for them in the court and in front of His Majesty.

Among them, there are one hundred thousand taels of silver and more than ten pieces of various antiques.

Wei Chen thought that if he didn’t accept it, the salt merchants would be uneasy. It is easy to cause trouble, so I accepted it.

However, the ministers did not dare to keep these things for themselves. In addition to the four calligraphy and paintings just presented to His Majesty, the others included one hundred thousand silver and various All the treasures were put into the two million taels of silver and sent to the Ministry of Internal Affairs."

Emperor Ning Kang heard this and said with a smile: "Oh, if that's the case, this time you Isn’t it just a wasted trip, with no benefit at all?”

“Your Majesty, don’t make fun of me. I am serving your majesty and serving the court. As long as it is done, there is no saying that I ran in vain. .

Furthermore, I know that as long as I do my best to serve His Majesty, His Majesty will not treat us meritorious ministers badly!

If it is because of some petty gains, If you lose your mind and do something that hurts His Majesty's trust, that is the real gain outweighs the loss.

I can still figure this out clearly."

Jia Lian said , actually showing that he thinks he is very smart.

When Emperor Ning Kang saw this, he couldn't help but curse: "pedantic!"

Although the curse was a curse, the look on Emperor Ning Kang's face all showed that he had this kind of attitude toward Jia Lian. The satisfaction of enlightenment.

So he raised his hand and handed the brocade box presented by Jia Lian just now to Dai Quan and ordered: "Give him one hundred thousand taels."

Emperor Ning Kang's words But he said it very generously.

Jia Lian said quickly: "Your Majesty, this is impossible. Your Majesty is connected with the country and the country, and there are many places where money is needed.

You don't dare to accept mediocre ministers. Besides, mediocre ministers How can we use so much money..."

Emperor Ning Kang snorted: "It's calledIf you take it, take it. This is not completely given to you. I heard that your family has almost emptied the treasury to build a garden for the imperial concubine. This can be considered a special trip by me to make up for your family. "

Dai Quan also promptly counted out one hundred thousand taels of silver notes and stuffed them into Jia Lian's hands, and said with a smile: "Master Zhenyuan, just take it when the emperor tells you to take it." Haha, this old slave has been with the Emperor for so many years, but this is the first time I have seen the Emperor give such a heavy reward to a minister alone, and the Marquis of Zhenyuan is the first person. "

So, Jia Lian "reluctantly" accepted the banknote and thanked Emperor Ningkang.

But he knew it very well in his heart.

Don’t look at Emperor Ning Kang scolding him for being pedantic. If he really openly admitted that he had profited from helping him, even if Emperor Ning Kang would not blame him, he would still have a knot in his heart.< br />
As the old saying goes, the emperor is always hungry. Therefore, most of the ministers below will take the opportunity to make some money when doing things. How could the emperor not know?

Even this is It is a matter of acquiescence from top to bottom.

However, acquiescence is one thing, knowing that you are secretly greedy is another thing!

After all, the whole world is not the land of the king. What the emperor rewards you is yours. If you take it yourself, it is called disloyalty.

A reward for loyalty.

As for whether one hundred thousand taels to reward a minister would be too much...

It must be too much. If we change the situation, unless Emperor Ning Kang is crazy, then Would you reward your ministers with so much cash!

But it’s easier to understand if you put it another way.

The younger brother helped the boss get more than three million in "stolen money", and divided it into Isn’t it too much to give one hundred thousand to this younger brother who will be reused in the future?

It even seems a little stingy.

After Jia Lian received the banknote, Emperor Ning Kang’s His attitude was obviously much warmer than before, and he even personally cared about some of the things mentioned in Jia Lian's memorial. Especially when it was mentioned that someone dared to assassinate Jia Lian one after another, Emperor Ning Kang also expressed his anger.

However, because the culprit had already been confiscated and executed by Jia Lian, Emperor Ning Kang expressed concern and asked him to step down.