Chapter 261: Dividing Fields and Land, Putting Down Roots (Part 2)

"My prince, that little Crown Prince of the Zhu family is formidable! He truly has a thunderous hand. The meritorious nobles and meritorious officials of the southeast are all finished! Just waiting to have their homes confiscated and their clans wiped out! Over two hundred years of wealth — tens of millions of taels of silver can be seized, to say nothing of the land. Now his position in the southeast is secure."

At this moment Fan Wencheng was in the East Warm Pavilion of the Hall of Martial Valor within the imperial palace at Beijing, reporting to his master Dorgon the secret intelligence that had just arrived concerning the "Nanjing eunuch-faction disturbance."

As for the eunuch faction and the like, the Qing court did not believe it. In Fan Wencheng's view, what Zhu Cilang had done was simply to seize the wealth the southeastern meritorious nobles and meritorious officials had accumulated over more than two hundred years. With that wealth, the Crown Prince's rule in the southeast would be secure!

"He is secure in Jiangnan. What about us in Northern Zhili? How do we become secure?"

Dorgon's somewhat pale, long face showed no expression; he seemed to have little interest in Zhu Cilang making a fortune in Jiangnan.

Because at present he could not move against Zhu Cilang, and he did not even have the leisure to deal with Li Zicheng in Shanxi.

For the Great Qing, there were two urgent matters. The first was moving the capital. Only by moving the capital from Shengjing beyond the pass to Beijing within the pass could they then use Beijing as a great base to further swallow up the lands of the Central Plain.

The second was enclosing fields and seizing houses!

This was something of a case of heroes' deeds being alike. The Great Qing's foothold within the pass also depended on "putting down roots" — namely the infamous land-enclosure edict and house-seizure edict!

"My prince, this slave has already had men investigate." Fan Wencheng understood Dorgon's meaning and answered at once, "In the prefectures and counties around the capital, the Han people have an enormous amount of ownerless land — tens of millions of mu — all of which can be enclosed and distributed to the princes, soldiers, and other men coming from the east!"

"Is there really that much?" Dorgon was somewhat doubtful. "The vicinity of the capital is densely populated. How could there be so much ownerless land?"

"There truly is!" Fan Wencheng said, counting on his fingers. "First, there are the guard-station lands of the Southern Dynasty. Guard-station land is government-owned military colony land, not private land. Now, of course, it is ownerless!

Second, there are the lands of the Southern Dynasty's meritorious nobles and meritorious officials who fled or were wiped out by Li Zicheng. These lands are now ownerless as well, and just right for us to enclose."

Dorgon nodded. "With these tens of millions of mu, the princes, soldiers, and other men coming from the east can put down roots!

But the soldiers and other men of the eastern princes all have to fight. Will there be anyone to farm this land?"

"There will!" Fan Wencheng smiled. "We can let landless Han commoners offer themselves as bondservants!"

"Will the Han be willing to offer themselves?" Dorgon was somewhat worried.

"They must be willing whether they like it or not!" Fan Wencheng said with a savage grin. "Han offering themselves as bondservants is our Great Qing's old method. If they do not offer themselves, let them be driven from their homes, hungry and cold, until their bellies can no longer bear it — then they will naturally offer themselves. If that truly does not work, let the estate managers in charge of the manors force them!"

"Will that work?"

"My prince, is that not exactly what our Great Qing has always done beyond the pass?"

"But now we have entered the pass!" Dorgon was somewhat hesitant.

Seeing Dorgon's hesitation, Fan Wencheng reminded him: "My prince, if we do not do this, we cannot put down roots.

Tenant farmers are never as useful as banner bondservants. These banner bondservants are the slaves firmly held in the hands of each banner!

Only with this batch of slaves can our Great Qing firmly control the territory of Northern Zhili. If we allow them to remain tenants, our Great Qing will not be secure in Northern Zhili."

At the beginning of the Great Qing's establishment, its method of controlling land and population was even sharper than the Crown Prince's — directly forcing Han people to offer themselves as bondservants! Being a bondservant was far harsher than being a tenant. A bondservant was in himself a piece of wealth, to be beaten, killed, or sold. Moreover, with these newly attached serfs, the old booi brought from beyond the pass were elevated — even without being raised to banner status, they became half-masters, and naturally of one heart with the Great Qing. Thus the Eight Banners' base was expanded in a disguised form.

Dorgon nodded and said, "That is the logic of it! But our foundation cannot be laid only in the countryside. This city of Beijing must also become the root of our Great Qing!"

Fan Wencheng was taken aback. "My prince, Beijing is in our hands!"

"Is it?" Dorgon glanced at Fan Wencheng. "There are a great many Han in Beijing, and they are utterly unreliable! When the Roving Bandit came, they welcomed the Roving Bandit; when our Great Qing came, they still knelt in welcome. What use are such people? They must all be driven out! Only then can one be at ease!"

"This..." Fan Wencheng thought for a moment. "How about a house-seizure edict? Seize all the houses within Beijing and distribute them to the Eight Banners' soldiers and booi bondservants, and forbid Han from living there."

"Right, that is exactly what must be done!"

What Dorgon was now preparing to carry out was what later history would call the third of the six great misgovernment policies of the early Qing: land enclosure, forced bondservice, and house seizure!

The so-called "land enclosure" and "forced bondservice" were in fact simply treating the land and peasants around the capital as rewards, to be distributed to the Eight Banners' warriors.

And through "land enclosure" and "forced bondservice," the land and population the Eight Banners organization could control greatly increased. Around the capital, they had thus put down roots.

As for "house seizure," it was to turn the fortress of Beijing into the territory of the Eight Banners and the booi bondservants.

In history, the city of Beijing remained a city of bannermen until the late Qing. Most of the bannermen of the whole country and the booi bondservants of the Upper Three Banners lived within the city of Beijing!

Only with the three great policies of land enclosure, forced bondservice, and house seizure could the Great Qing gain a firm foothold around Beijing.

As for talk of "misgovernment" and the like, that was merely the Kangxi Emperor's rhetoric after he had moved with the times.

Of course, for the Han commoners of the capital and Northern Zhili, an incomparably tragic era was just beginning!

"Well? Are you eating your fill now?"

"Imperial Lord, we are eating our fill now."

An old man, his face and head covered in wrinkles, knelt at the feet of the Shun Son of Heaven, Li Zicheng, already in a state of tearful gratitude.

Outside this village near Taiyuan, peasants dressed in their best clothes knelt in full, each gazing with grateful eyes at their new lord, Li Zicheng.

From a certain angle, among the several forces now contending for the realm, Li Zicheng truly was not bad to a portion of the poor and lower-middle peasants.

Of course, only a portion, because the Shun dynasty's policies were erratic.

In the late autumn of the first year of the Shun Yongchang reign, the poor and lower-middle peasants of Taiyuan Prefecture were certainly bathed in the Yongchang Emperor's benevolence.

The imperial grace was truly overflowing!

Unlike Zhu Cilang and Dorgon, Li Zicheng was an emperor who came from the bottom. He sympathized with the laboring people, and he genuinely wanted to bring the laboring people some benefits.

Although the passage of his great army often caused enormous destruction, as long as there was no fighting, his "three years without levies," "equalizing land and remitting grain taxes," and "cutting from the rich to aid the poor" could still bring some benefits to the poor within his territory.

Do not think Li Zicheng was merely putting on a show. In fact, his policies really could be partially carried out. For example, the three years without levies was still being enforced up to now. And equalizing land and remitting grain taxes had also actually been carried out — although there was no "struggle against landlords and division of land," on the territory the Shun regime truly controlled, landlords already found it very difficult to collect rent.

If rent could not be collected, was that not equal to equalizing the land?

In any case, the poor and lower-middle peasants around Taiyuan Prefecture were quite happy now. All the grain harvested this autumn was their own!

No need to pay imperial grain tax, no need to pay gentry grain, and even usurious loans need not be repaid.

And the gentry near Taiyuan, because they had earlier taken advantage of Li Zicheng's defeat at Beijing to launch a rebellion, had either been suppressed or had tucked their tails between their legs, not daring to use force to collect rent and interest.

"Imperial Lord, the people's hearts have turned to us!"

"Yes, the people's hearts can be used!"

Li Zicheng's military adviser Song Xiance and his nephew Li Guo were both accompanying him on an inspection tour around Taiyuan, and had witnessed many scenes of the people's hearts turning to them.

Li Zicheng stretched out his large hand, helped the old farmer kneeling on the ground to his feet, and said gently, "Old sir, eating your fill is good enough, good enough... Come, take me to see your family's grain store!"

"As commanded!" the old farmer answered, and, supported by a youth, walked into the village.

Only then did Li Zicheng say to Song Xiance and Li Guo, "It seems the people's hearts are still with the Shun! Since ancient times, he who wins the people's hearts wins the realm!"

This Shun Son of Heaven, it seemed, still did not understand even now that winning people's hearts and winning people were not the same thing!

He had won people's hearts in certain respects; otherwise he would never have achieved those earlier victories that swept everything before them. But his regime had not gained control of population and land, and so it had never been able to put down roots.

If on the territory ruled by Zhu Cilang there had now appeared a temporary balance between imperial power and gentry power, and on the territory of the Great Qing imperial power had overwhelmed gentry power, then on Li Zicheng's territory the situation had arisen in which imperial power and gentry power had vanished at the same time.

Those peasants who wept with gratitude toward Li Zicheng were in fact not under Li Zicheng's rule at all; rather, because of Li Zicheng's arrival, they found themselves in a state of "anarchy." No one governed them, no one collected taxes or rent, and they could be self-sufficient — how could they not be happy?

But the problem was that their strength had not been brought under Li Zicheng's control, and so Li Zicheng had no ability to defend this "anarchy."

Li Guo frowned slightly and said in a low voice, "Imperial Lord, the brothers of the old camp below are still a little dissatisfied!"

Li Zicheng only remained silent and said nothing.

He knew as well that the old-camp brothers had some grumbling about their present treatment, but he had already done his utmost to reward everyone.

As for distributing the population and land of Taiyuan Prefecture to his old-camp soldiers as prizes, the Great Emperor Li always felt that doing so would cost him the people's hearts.

After a moment of silence, Li Zicheng finally answered Li Guo in a low voice: "The matter of managing territory — let us wait until after this battle is fought."

(End of Chapter)