Chapter 194: The Great Qing's Duke for Perpetuating the Sage (Seventh Update Complete)

On the first day of the seventh month of the seventeenth year of Chongzhen, a crowd of officials in python robes and black gauze caps had already gathered at the East Gate of Yanzhou. Inside and outside the gate stood soldiers in mandarin-duck battle jackets, holding long spears, swords, and shields, on strict alert.

The Ming official world saw no shortage of comings and goings, but a grand occasion like today's was rare even in a major city like Yanzhou, seat of the Prince of Lu's estate. Clearly, some truly extraordinary personage was arriving!

Because Shandong had been rather unsettled of late, anyone with property or status had fled to the larger cities. And Yanzhou, closest to the Southern Metropolitan Region and near the Grand Canal, was the best refuge for Shandong's gentry. Even though Yanzhou had been breached by Qing troops on a raid in the fifteenth year of Chongzhen and slaughtered to the last soul — not even Prince Lu'an, Zhu Yipai, had escaped — by the seventeenth year of Chongzhen, with the situation even more chaotic, the city still sheltered crowds of officials and gentry who had fled from Jinan Prefecture, the Eastern Depot Prefecture, Qingzhou Prefecture, and even the Northern Metropolitan Region and Henan.

Most of these officials and gentry gathered in Yanzhou had already made up their minds to serve a second master, or a third. They had not expected the Great Ming to produce a Crown Prince who was "the Founding Emperor reborn." Whether he could bring a restoration was hard to say, but a prolonging of the dynasty's life was certain.

Moreover, Shi Kefa, Minister of War at Nanjing, had summoned a great host to rally to the throne, and it had marched in imposing array to Yanzhou — a display that the Great Ming still possessed real strength.

Since the Great Ming still had real strength, then for the time being everyone would refrain from serving a second or third master, and instead give serious thought to how to ingratiate themselves with the high officials gathered in Yanzhou.

That was why such a scene had been staged at Yanzhou's East Gate. Well-informed refugee officials and gentry swarmed over, crowding both sides of the official road and asking one another for news.

"Look, look! His Excellency Shi has arrived! And he's smiling — that's no small thing! Who is being received today? Could it be His Majesty and the Thousand Years himself?"

"No. If His Majesty and the Thousand Years were coming, would they be received at the city gate? They'd have to be met thirty li outside the city."

"Could it be that His Highness the Prince of Lu has returned?"

"No, no. The Prince of Lu fled his fief, so he must first beg His Majesty's pardon. Only after receiving an edict may he return."

"Then some Grand Secretary has come."

"It must be a Grand Secretary. I wonder which one?"

Among these refugee officials and gentry were some with thick enough skins not to mind striking up conversation with rough military men. They sidled over to make acquaintance and asked in low voices, "Which Grand Secretary is being received?"

The military officer thus questioned did not bother to hide anything. Grinning, he said, "What Grand Secretary? It's the Sage of Qufu who has come."

"The Sage of Qufu? Ah, the Duke for Perpetuating the Sage!"

"That can't be right. I heard the Duke for Perpetuating the Sage surrendered to the roving bandits."

"Your news is long out of date. The Duke surrendered to the eastern barbarians back in the fifth month. He's the eastern barbarians' Duke for Perpetuating the Sage now."

"So today — is this a welcome, or a battle?"

"That I don't know. Perhaps one order will come down, and then it's kill or be killed!"

The man who had come was none other than Kong Yinzhi, sixty-fourth-generation descendant of Confucius and Duke for Perpetuating the Sage of the Great Qing.

Qufu, the hometown of Confucius, lay within Yanzhou Prefecture, very close to the prefectural seat of Ziyang, yet it formed a world of its own and was not under Yanzhou Prefecture's jurisdiction. Since the Yuan dynasty, the county magistrate of Qufu had always been appointed from the Kong clan, generation after generation. Qufu County had in effect become the fief of the Duke for Perpetuating the Sage!

Compared with the Prince of Lu in Yanzhou, the Prince of De in Jinan, and the Prince of Heng in Qingzhou, the Duke for Perpetuating the Sage in Qufu seemed more like a true feudal prince. Not only was his status lofty and inviolable, but he controlled a county's land and tens of thousands of subjects. Moreover, the Duke's family possessed a stout-walled city first built in the Zhengde era — the original Qufu city, being insufficiently strong, had been breached by a peasant rebel force in the sixth year of Zhengde. The Zhengde Emperor had therefore ordered the Governor of Shandong to rebuild Qufu at the southwest corner of the old Lu capital, centered on the Confucian Temple.

The project to rebuild Qufu was immense. It spanned two reigns and more than ten years, and cost thirty-six thousand taels of silver before completion. The city wall was about ten li in circumference, over two zhang and three chi high, and over one zhang and one chi thick. The city had five gates, each with a barbican. Outside the wall ran a moat, more than one zhang wide and more than one zhang deep.

The newly built Qufu was of a suitable size, and with five barbicans to rely on, it did not require many troops to defend. The walls were of rammed earth faced with brick, extremely sturdy. Moreover, there was a gap of about three zhang between the wall and the moat, leaving room for further strengthening.

Besides his unattainably lofty status and the strong city of Qufu, the Duke for Perpetuating the Sage was no less wealthy than any princely house. The sacrificial fields of the Confucian Temple alone amounted to several hundred thousand mu!

And over the past two hundred-odd years, the Duke's family had used its privileges to swallow up or shelter millions of mu of land through encroachment and fraudulent registration. Kong clan estates spread across every prefecture, subprefecture, and guard post in Shandong, making the family the foremost great landowner in Shandong and indeed in all the Great Ming!

And the Qufu Kongs, possessing a fief, subjects, a walled city, farmland — wealth — and a supreme, inviolable dignity, seemed even in this age of chaos to be a power that stood unshaken.

Not only had the Manchu Qing refrained from attacking Qufu when they raided Shandong, but even Li Zicheng of the Shun, on the verge of seizing the empire, was unwilling to make an enemy of the Qufu Kongs. As for local rebels in Shandong, they had once besieged Qufu during the great famine of the thirteenth year of Chongzhen. But they had not dared to attack in earnest. When Kong Yinzhi himself mounted the wall, the besieging rebels prostrated themselves before him one after another, then lifted the siege and departed!

From this siege incident, the towering prestige of the Qufu Kongs in Shandong could be seen at a glance.

Kong Yinzhi, however, was a Duke for Perpetuating the Sage who very much understood the times. Although his family had received incalculable benefits from the Ming court, he had never once thought of dying for the Ming's sake. His family had stood for a thousand years without falling, and not by the golden signboard of Confucius alone. Their skill at abandoning darkness for light in great contests for the realm was unmatched under heaven.

They had submitted to the Great Jin, surrendered to the Mongol Yuan, bestowed upon Kublai Khan the honorific of Grand Master of Confucian Learning, and then surrendered to the Great Ming when Zhu Yuanzhang's troops marched into Shandong.

One might say every surrender had hit its mark!

Yet this generation's Duke, Kong Yinzhi, was not his ancestors' equal in the art of surrender. In the fourth month, he had hastily sent a memorial of submission to Li Zicheng, who had entered Beijing, and had raised banners atop Qufu's walls proclaiming welcome to the Shun's heavenly troops.

Li Zicheng had casually enfeoffed him as Duke for Perpetuating the Sage of the Shun dynasty!

It had all seemed settled — but who could have expected that the Shun would merely take a turn about the capital, and in the blink of an eye their million heavenly troops would be sent scurrying by the Eight Banners' heavenly troops, with even Beijing changing hands.

But that was no great matter. After all, serving a second master or a third was all the same! So when Kong Yinzhi learned that the Shun had been defeated, that war had broken out between Ming and Qing, and that Beijing had fallen into the Great Qing's hands, he wrote another "First Memorial of Submission" and sent it to Dorgon in Beijing — expressing his willingness to submit to the Great Qing.

Without even waiting for the Qing to send someone, he had his men take down the "Chuang" banner from Qufu's walls and hoist the "Qing" banner in its place.

But then things went wrong again!

Shi Kefa, Minister of War at Nanjing, had assembled more than a hundred thousand troops from the four garrisons and marched to Yanzhou, right next door to Qufu, and had announced he would resist the barbarians!

This frightened the Great Qing's Duke for Perpetuating the Sage half to death! At present, Shandong was mainly a jumble of Ming and Shun forces. The only place flying the Great Qing's banner seemed to be Qufu — home of the Great Qing's Duke for Perpetuating the Sage, Kong Yinzhi!

Did "resisting the barbarians" mean troops would be sent to attack Qufu? That would be fatal!

Fortunately, what the Duke feared never came to pass. Shi Kefa did not know what to do with the Great Qing's Duke for Perpetuating the Sage either. And when Kong Yinzhi heard that the Great Ming had returned, he swapped the Qing banners back for Ming banners — from the fourth month until now, Kong Yinzhi had changed allegiance three times, and who knew whether there would be a fourth?

But not long after Kong Yinzhi declared that he had been a loyal subject of the Great Ming all along, unexpected bad news arrived from Dengzhou and Laizhou.

The temporary court at Dengzhou issued an edict confiscating part of the Kong family's estates in Dengzhou and Laizhou!

That was tens of thousands of mu of land! Confiscated entirely by a single decree — even the roving bandits had not been so ruthless!

Moreover, the confiscation order had been issued under the authority of the Crown Prince's command as Commander of the Pacification Army. Would it later be carried out across all of Shandong? Would all the land held by the Duke's line be confiscated?

This was no laughing matter!

So "Kong Yinzhi, Duke for Perpetuating the Sage of the Great Qing," could sit still no longer. He hurriedly had gifts and visiting cards prepared and sent to Yanzhou, set a time, and would personally call upon Shi Kefa and the other Ming grandees.

(End of Chapter)