Chapter 358: The Roving King Turns Bad

Spring was gradually thickening in Xiangjing, the first capital of the Shun regime. Xiangjing was the former Xiangyang Prefecture; in the third month of the sixteenth year of Chongzhen, Li Zicheng had proclaimed himself "King of the New Shun" in this mighty city by the Han River, renamed Xiangyang to Xiangjing, and formally established the Shun regime.

From the founding of the government at Xiangjing to the present, it had been almost two years!

In those two years, the Shun regime had experienced a tremendous rise and fall! The "King of the New Shun" Li Zicheng had set out from Xiangjing, campaigned east and west, marched east, and then fled for his life — truly one climax after another, then a sudden sharp turn for the worse, more thrilling than words could say.

But for the poor common people of Xiangjing Prefecture, an age of peace and prosperity had already lasted two full years!

During these two years, Xiangjing Prefecture, as one of the Shun's two capitals, had always been the most core territory, garrisoned by Yuan Zongdi. The nearby Ming troops did not even dare think of it, let alone attack.

And the policy of "three years' tax exemption," implemented since the sixteenth year of Chongzhen, had now been in effect for almost two years as well. Although the three-year exemption covered only the land tax and not land rent, under the Shun new dynasty's atmosphere of hostility toward the rich, no tenant farmer was foolish enough to keep paying rent to his landlord. Rent and taxes had in fact both ceased to exist, and even outstanding usurious loans no longer had to be repaid!

For two full years, the farmers paid no taxes and no rent, did not repay usurious loans, and moreover lived in peace and happiness, far from the flames of war. Within the borders of Xiangjing Prefecture, it was practically an earthly paradise. And the poor and lower-middle peasants living there, over the past two years, had all been grateful for the benevolence of the Shun's Yongchang Emperor, and all longed for Li Zicheng to unify the realm at an early date, drag the fatuous ruler Chongzhen off the dragon throne, and drive the hateful Tartars out of Beijing.

But the gratitude of Xiangjing Prefecture's peasants could not be converted into fighting strength for the Shun army. After the Battle of Shanhai Pass, the Shun army had fallen into a cycle of defeat after defeat, flight after flight.

Xiangjing Prefecture, which had originally been far from the flames of war, was once again shrouded in the shadow of conflict after the beginning of spring in the second year of Yongchang.

Just after the fifteenth day of the first month of the second year of Yongchang, tens of thousands of Shun army officers and soldiers, bold and high-spirited, marched from Nanyang Prefecture into Xiangjing Prefecture.

At the sight of these Shun heavenly troops, defeated in battle after battle yet still full of spirit, the people of Xiangjing Prefecture at first felt rather reassured — it seemed the Shun dynasty would not collapse for the time being, and everyone could enjoy another year of good days with no grain levies, no rent, and no usurious debt repayment. Even after a year, surely there would be no extortionate taxation?

Xiangjing Prefecture had been Xiangyang Prefecture of Huguang under the Ming. Huguang had over 220 million mu of land, while the regular land tax was only a little over two million shi, which averaged out to barely a sheng of rice or flour per mu — utterly negligible.

As long as the Shun court continued to stand on the side of the farmers and did not let landlords press for rent and debts, a little land tax truly meant nothing.

But the farmers of Xiangjing Prefecture had not been happy for long before the imperial proclamation of "land inventory and land distribution," posted at the gates of Xiangjing city and at the county seats under Xiangjing Prefecture, came down like a basin of ice water, poured over the heads of these Xiangjing Prefecture farmers in the lingering chill of early spring.

Outside the Linhan Gate of Xiangjing Prefecture city, a group of farmers who had brought rice and vegetables into the city to sell were gathered before a newly erected notice board, arguing in a hubbub, their words full of shock and bewilderment.

"What? They're going to divide up all the land in Xiangjing Prefecture among the meritorious officers and men of the Shun army? How can they do this?"

"Th-then, will the rent still be waived?"

"Still waived? Dream on! Won't the Shun army lords cut you down with one stroke?"

"Not paying rent means death? Even in the previous dynasty it wasn't that harsh."

"Ah, it's always the common people who suffer!"

"The good days are over."

"But my family has a few mu of land of our own! Does that have to be taken and given to the Shun army soldiers too?"

"What did the official reading the proclamation say? No matter whether it was official land, military land, private land, or hidden land, it now all belongs to the Yongchang Emperor, buying and selling is forbidden, and it will all be used to reward the officers and men!"

The Shun dynasty's land distribution differed somewhat from that of the neighboring Great Ming. The Ming Crown Prince Zhu saw far ahead; he knew that the Great Ming, at least the southeastern part of it, already stood on the threshold of capitalism. What blocked the Ming southeast from crossing that threshold was the obstruction of agricultural marketization by the commendation system attached to the civil examinations — in this age, planned economy and the like were out of the question; if agricultural productivity was to be raised, marketization was the only path! And the marketization of agriculture naturally required a relatively fair competitive environment, and also required the means of production — that is, land circulation — to be marketized!

The Ming system of land transfer through the civil examinations could fundamentally never vigorously promote the development of agricultural productivity — land was not concentrated in the hands of farming households skilled at managing land, but was taken by masters of the eight-legged essay.

Therefore the ultimate aim of Zhu Cilang's "land reform" was in fact to turn land into transferable private property (by destroying the commendation system and gradually distributing it to the soldiers of the Overcoming Hardship Corps). Li Zicheng's version of "land reform," by contrast, followed the route of feudal land-for-military-service. Land was nationalized, then distributed to the Shun's military aristocracy in exchange for military service.

For the farmers under Shun rule, this land reform truly placed them in a position from which they would find it hard to rise for generations to come!

"Ah! What can be done then?"

"How has the Yongchang Emperor turned bad too?"

"They promised three years' exemption!"

"No, we must go find the Yongchang Emperor and demand justice!"

"His Majesty is not in Xiangjing. Here in Xiangjing, the Marquis of Bo has the final say."

"Then let's go find the Marquis of Bo!"

"Right, let's go to the imperial city (the Prince of Xiang's mansion) and beat the drum to cry our grievances!"

"Beat the drum and cry our grievances!"

Many of the farmers who had already sold their rice and vegetables did not bother going home, but all surged toward the Xiangjing imperial city, to beat the grievance drum before the Marquis of Bo, Li Guo, and the Prefect of Xiangjing, Gu Junen.

But when they arrived outside the main gate of the former Ming Prince of Xiang's mansion, they found there was no drum for them to beat — only large squads of Shun old-camp soldiers in white caps and blue uniforms, armed with swords, spears, bows and arrows, standing guard with menacing ferocity.

A Shun officer with a Shaanxi accent, seeing more peasants coming to beat the drum, waved his hand and shouted to drive them off.

"Go on, go on, all of you go! We've got no drum here for beating, and don't go crying about grievances either — it's all damn fate! If you don't leave now, the swords and spears in our hands won't be polite!"

What? There wasn't even a place to reason things out?

The farmers looked at the murderous old-camp soldiers, at the brightly polished broad blades and spear points in their hands, and all felt chill after chill.

This was too brutal, wasn't it?

Ah, right — they were roving bandits who killed without blinking!

What reasoning could you use with roving bandits?

The peasants were afraid, and had no way to resist. The Ming troops, bad as they were, mostly lacked fighting strength, and one could still stir up a peasant uprising or something.

But these Shun heavenly troops looked vicious at a glance, their killing intent barely suppressed! Whoever stepped forward would be walking to their death.

At that moment, atop the gate tower of the "imperial city," the Marquis of Bo, Li Guo, watched yet another crowd of commoners leave weeping, and sighed: "If these fellows had shown half this much spirit when fighting the Tartars, how would our Shun have come to this day?"

"My Lord Marquis, if Wu Sangui had been the one blocking the distribution of land to the officers and men, then at the Battle of Shanhai Pass, before the Tartars even entered the field, he would have suffered a great defeat!"

The one who took up the topic was Gu Junen. These days he had repeatedly summed up the lessons of the Shun dynasty's failures, and the conclusion he finally reached was that they had not distributed land and population — otherwise, with the Shun heavenly troops' momentum sweeping the realm, Wu Sangui's few tens of thousands of wretched, panic-stricken Guanning orphans could not have withstood even a single assault!

Li Guo snorted: "Are they satisfied now? By the way, Military Advisor, roughly how much land can be scraped together from Xiangjing Prefecture and Yunyang Prefecture? Is it enough to distribute among my thirty thousand troops?"

"Enough, enough!" said Gu Junen. "Xiangjing Prefecture and Yunyang Prefecture are both conducting land surveys and field inventories now. I estimate there will be seven million mu, most of it top-grade land. Averaged out among the officers and men, each will get over two hundred mu. Xiangjing has much paddy land that can grow two crops a year, which is more labor-intensive, so the population is also larger. On seven million mu of land there are always five hundred thousand households; averaged out, each man can be assigned fifteen households no matter what!"

Li Guo said: "Over two hundred mu of land and fifteen tenant households is acceptable. It does right by the brothers!"

(End of Chapter)