Chapter 21: Belt Laden with a Hundred Thousand Strings, Riding a Crane to Chang'an

A Duan kept two cormorants, named Da Hei and Xiao Hei, that often went fishing together with cormorants raised by other Liao people. But every time, his two cormorants could return smoothly, find their own master, and would not eat fish fed to them by others.

They were like two little dogs, very intimate with their master.

In this not-so-cold winter, Fang Chongyong watched A Duan's cormorants fishing together with those raised by other Liao people, and several cormorants actually cooperated to lift a large fish weighing several dozen jin.

Had he not seen it with his own eyes, Fang Chongyong would not have dared to believe that a group of waterbirds raised by different households could actually employ military tactics to cooperate in hunting.

"Why put a ring around the Wu Gui's neck?"

Fang Chongyong and his party stood on the riverbank, and he asked A Duan with great interest.

"Big fish, no eat, eat small fish."

A Duan gestured and explained.

The cormorants all wore rings or cords around their necks, so they could not open their mouths fully to swallow those large fish. But because the rings were still fairly loose, they could swallow small fish.

The brilliance of this design lay in the fact that it neither diminished the cormorants' enthusiasm for fishing nor turned them into pets. In other words, for the cormorants to survive, they had to catch fish—surrendering the big ones they caught and keeping the small ones.

Beyond that, the relationship between master and cormorant was rather similar to that of a pet, and quite intimate. The cormorants could fly out and return on their own, and would never go to the wrong place.

"Can only eat small fish and not big fish—the more you look at it, the more it seems like a black-hearted boss shouting that labor is glorious."

Fang Chongyong could not help but remark with a sigh.

Cormorants fishing reminded him of those loyal ministers and fine generals under Li Longji's command—were they not themselves "cormorants" that merely lacked wings and could not dive into the water to catch fish?

Fang Chongyong had now settled into leisure. The first batch of Red Lotus Spring had already been delivered and, as expected, caused a sensation in Chang'an—upon its release, it sold out within just a few days. What Fang Chongyong had not anticipated was that the nobles did not buy the wine by the dou; moreover, the brothels and pleasure houses were also major consumers of liquor.

Pingkang Ward, where Li Linfu resided, alone purchased several hundred dou—nearly one-third of the first batch of Red Lotus Spring!

The second batch of Red Lotus Spring not only did not drop in price, but due to the shortage, the price per dou rose by ten guan. Fang Chongyong truly could not understand how these Chang'an nobles could be so wealthy; when it came to luxury consumption, they were simply utterly unrestrained, describable as spending money like flowing water!

A beverage with an ex-factory price of thirty thousand yuan yet a volume of only two liters—what kind of thing would that be? Would that eternal, never-selling '82 Lafite from Fang Chongyong's previous life count?

And at this price, it was still in short supply! Absolutely absurd!

Thinking of these matters, Fang Chongyong felt a profound sense of absurdity.

The extravagance and debauchery of the ruling class, that so-called "Chang'an lifestyle" series of food, clothing, shelter, and transport, all made one feel that this country was cooking over open flame and pouring oil—already not far from collapse.

Actually, what Fang Chongyong did not know was that the reason nobles were called nobles was that they not only held power, but could also easily use that power to make money, and had estates as backing.

They not only bought luxury goods but also sold them; vast sums of money circulated within their own circle, and the so-called "deficits" were merely imagined by those ignorant of the inside story.

What Fang Chongyong took for squandering money like dirt was in fact merely their everyday behavior. If one truly took these people for brainless spendthrifts, one would be vastly underestimating them.

"What's so interesting about Wu Gui catching fish? If you want to eat fish, this prefect's villa has plenty—whatever kind you want to eat, there is."

Zheng Shuqing's voice came from behind him. The prefect had someone holding a parasol canopy beside him, cutting an imposing figure.

The second batch of Red Lotus Spring had not yet been fully delivered, but Zheng Shuqing was already starting to swagger, because Wang Yuanbao was very generous and directly made up the advance payment in full—a total of one hundred and fifty thousand guan. Deducting costs and the one hundred thousand guan given to Li Longji, there remained ten thousand guan surplus.

Wang Defu said this money was stored in the Wang clan's trading house in Chang'an (a prototype bank that accepted deposits and issued high-interest loans), and if Zheng Shuqing wanted it, he could send someone to collect it at any time. Fang Chongyong and Zheng Shuqing split it at a three-to-seven ratio.

Fang Chongyong received three thousand guan, already making him a minor wealthy man.

Though this was of no use whatsoever—a wealthy man without power to protect himself was nothing but a fat sheep in the eyes of the nobility.

Zheng Shuqing pocketed a "legitimate" seven thousand guan and had also completed the task Li Longji had assigned him, feeling his backbone had grown much sturdier than before.

"Has the Prefect's transfer order still not arrived?"

Fang Chongyong gazed out over the river and asked.

From autumn to the following spring was the peak season for cormorant fishing. Right now one could see these fish hawks hunting in flocks all over the river; fishermen could even judge where fish were more abundant by the areas where cormorants circled.

With nothing left to do, Fang Chongyong could not be bothered to chat idly with Zheng Shuqing.

"The transfer order still hasn't arrived. I don't know whether we can make it in time for next year's Lantern Festival."

Zheng Shuqing said with a sigh, gently waving his hand to signal the attendants to withdraw.

"A Duan, you and Laique, take Da Hei and Xiao Hei back."

Fang Chongyong gave instructions to A Duan beside him.

A Duan nodded, called out toward the riverbank, and the two cormorants rushed over swiftly. A Duan then took them, carrying the fish basket on his back, and headed toward the prefectural city with Fang Laique.

After all the unrelated people had left, Zheng Shuqing leaned in and asked in a lowered voice: "The court's post of Revenue Director is very difficult to manage, but if managed well, a few steps forward would lead to the position of chancellor. If I were Revenue Director, how should I best manage finances?"

Zheng Shuqing asked with humble sincerity.

Fang Chongyong grunted twice and replied, utterly bored: "Prefect, I'm still a child; this kind of state affair, let's just forget it."

Manage finances, indeed! Damn it, I'm not selling mutual funds!

Fang Chongyong deeply despised Zheng Shuqing's hypocrisy in his heart.

"To tell you the truth, the court's finances are already in a very bad way. If I were Revenue Director and achieved no results, when trouble arises in the future, I would surely be thrown out as a scapegoat. I fear there would be no chance of reinstatement ever again."

Zheng Shuqing suddenly lowered his voice and said gravely.

Fang Chongyong looked at Zheng Shuqing in puzzlement and asked: "What kind of financial management?"

Zheng Shuqing began to explain to Fang Chongyong what financial management at the Tang court's center was really all about.

The concept of financial management actually existed as far back as the Western Han dynasty under Sang Hongyang. However, Sang Hongyang's methods were somewhat crude and heavy-handed, and his reputation in the historical records was quite poor. Moreover, with the changing of eras, the concept of court financial management had become broad and deep, long since impossible to explain in a few words.

The court's annual tax revenue was a fixed amount—more or less, it could not expand indefinitely. How to use this money, how to use it well, was in fact a very great discipline of learning.

It could not simply be glossed over with the four characters "exploitation and oppression," leaving its substance and details unexamined.

The court's tax revenue actually mainly consisted of: grain, cloth (including silk), local specialty goods, and copper coins. How they were sourced, what their composition was, and how they were used, allocated, and transported—all were great disciplines of learning requiring the coordinated management of financial officials at the court's center.

For example, if Lingnan's tax revenue—cloth, grain, and copper coins—were transported to Chang'an, the transport costs might far exceed the tax revenue itself. So how should this portion be collected, and how should it be used?

Therefore, the Tang court's collection of taxes was far from being as simple as transporting all the nation's tax revenue to Chang'an and then distributing it according to need.

After this concept was explained, Fang Chongyong no longer dared to brush him off, so he asked with a serious expression: "Where is the problem?"

"Actually, the Tang's money is already insufficient. The shortfall is enormous—so enormous that you wouldn't dare to imagine it, and I wouldn't dare to say it."

Zheng Shuqing's expression was solemn, without the slightest hint of joking.

The fiscal revenue had already collapsed during the Kaiyuan era?

Fang Chongyong was taken aback, not understanding what Zheng Shuqing was really trying to say—by all accounts, it shouldn't have come to that yet, should it?

"Much of the cost of grain transport is covered by local government offices issuing high-interest loans, using the interest to fund operations. The principal comes from government-owned land—the so-called public office fields—and from years of accumulated public office funds lent out at interest. The localities have long been unable to bear the burden."

Zheng Shuqing said with a sigh, explaining to Fang Chongyong the origins and workings of the public office funds and public office fields.

Emperor Wen of Sui, Yang Jian, to reduce government expenditures, devised a method of "providing public office funds to capital officials and all prefectures, to be traded for profit to cover public expenses." The system stipulated that each level of government be issued a set amount of operating capital as principal—the so-called public office funds—to be lent out at interest, with the interest earned used as operating expenses.

It can be understood as the government having deposits that it handed over to merchants to manage, with the interest earned used to pay officials' salaries. Although the Sui dynasty did not last many years, this system was adopted in its entirety by Li Yuan, the first emperor of the Tang dynasty.

It was implemented starting from the Wude era, initially only in major cities like Chang'an, and later its scale and role grew ever larger.

It once made a great contribution to the Prosperity of Zhenguan.

By the Kaiyuan era, the use of interest from public office funds had become the single greatest indispensable aid in subsidizing fiscal expenditures.

The "public office funds" system was originally intended to reduce government spending and lighten the people's burden—so how did it end up perversely burdening the people?

This was because after the public office funds system was implemented, government offices lacked public money to carry out their duties, and meager salaries could not sustain honesty. Some greedy and corrupt officials seized the opportunity to use their power for personal gain, exploiting the common people, using coercive forced allocation to lend money at interest, with annual interest rates—including labor costs—reaching as high as one hundred percent.

There were even cases of "drawing up false guarantor contracts, with sons and grandsons inheriting the status of debt households." Behind this, collusion between officials and merchants caused the principles of fair lending to be utterly lost, and the common people were forced to accept extraordinary exploitation.

This was not simply a matter of corruption among local government personnel, but rather an "alternative measure" that had to be adopted because local fiscal expenditures were insufficient to meet needs.

For example, the prefectures along the Tang dynasty's canal routes all had to bear long-term responsibility for maintaining the grain transport. The human and material resources spent on this were not entirely borne by the imperial court—in fact, the greater part was shouldered by the local prefectures.

The local prefectures' tax revenues were all submitted to the central government, or were budgeted as fixed allocations. When the funds transferred from the central government for canal maintenance were insufficient, the local governments could only "find another path."

The wool comes from the sheep—where did those written-off funds come from? The answer is the interest on public office funds—in other words, from exploiting the local populace through usury. These heavy burdens were never recorded in the Tang imperial court's tax ledgers.

Running parallel to this were various miscellaneous taxes and levies, under a multitude of names.

If the people's interests are seized by force of power, it is like a fierce fire attacking urgently, and resistance will surely be intense. If they are seized through commerce, it is like a slow flame gently simmering, eroding them invisibly. These were the "unspeakable secrets" within the government.

Now that Zheng Shuqing had candidly revealed all this to Fang Chongyong, it could truly be called baring his heart.

Come to think of it, if the central government had to pay out all this money, Li Longji would have gone bankrupt and taken to begging long ago!

When there's trouble, of course the common people must bear the hardship—how could the Emperor be made to suffer?

The Kaiyuan Prosperity appeared on the surface as dazzling as oil boiling over a roaring fire, but in reality, crises lurked behind the scenes. What Zheng Shuqing had described was merely the tip of the iceberg.

Without foresight, one will face imminent peril. If Zheng Shuqing were to serve as the Director of the Revenue Bureau, outsiders might still think that the Tang court's treasuries during the Kaiyuan era were full to bursting and solid as a rock.

But as someone directly involved, Zheng Shuqing could not deceive himself into thinking that after his promotion he could slack off and let things rot.

One careless mistake, and people really would die!

"If the capital were moved to Luoyang, there might still be a way. Otherwise, how could such accumulated ills be resolved by a few words from a mere child like me?"

Fang Chongyong said with a sigh. Zheng Shuqing really thought far too highly of him.

The Tang dynasty's situation was plain to see, with both practical and historical factors at play. Among all possible measures, only relocating the capital would cause the least disruption. Yet even if Li Longji wished to move the capital now, the tens of thousands of noble scions in Chang'an would never agree to it.

Sure enough, Zheng Shuqing lamented, "In the middle of the Yellow River at Shanzhou, there is a mound of earth known as 'Rice Mountain.' It was formed by the accumulation of grain from transport boats that capsized there. The white rice within is like pearls, yet no one can retrieve it, forced to watch helplessly as the grain rots in the middle of the river.

Of the grain transported to Chang'an, three out of every ten portions are lost—what can be done?

Move the capital? If it were possible to move the capital, it would have been done long ago. Why suffer until now? Better not to speak of it."

Originally filled with ambition and grand aspirations, the moment he thought of these wretched affairs, Zheng Shuqing immediately felt as though he had swallowed a cockroach, nauseated to the extreme.

But moving the capital was impossible—they couldn't move the capital even if the Tang dynasty perished!

Chang'an was the essence of the Great Tang. Without Chang'an, there would be no Great Tang.

"Your Excellency! Your Excellency! The court's transfer order has arrived! It has arrived!"

Zheng Shuqing's subordinate officer came running in a great hurry, his official cap having fallen off, held in his hand.

"…Appointed as Inspector of Kuizhou, to return to the capital to report on duty and await assignment."

After a great pile of commendatory boilerplate, Zheng Shuqing found the one sentence he had been waiting for all along.

"Leaving Kuizhou, then."

Zheng Shuqing handed the transfer order to Fang Chongyong to examine.

"With a hundred thousand strings of cash tied around your waist, riding a crane up to Chang'an—congratulations, Your Excellency."

Fang Chongyong bowed deeply to Zheng Shuqing and said.

"Would you like to study at the Directorate of Education? I can recommend you for admission."

Zheng Shuqing said with great solemnity.

Fang Chongyong thought about the matters he needed to attend to in Chang'an, and sighed helplessly, "We can discuss it later. Please, Your Excellency, first take me to Chang'an. My registered place of origin is also in Chang'an, so I will indeed need Your Excellency to stand as my guarantor."

"So be it." Zheng Shuqing nodded slightly. After years away from Chang'an, he was going back again!