Chapter 379: The Grave-Raising Beile

"Would the gentleman like a newspaper?"

Just as Chen Yongxi's attention was drawn to six Hongyi cannons gleaming with a bluish light, the tea-stall owner suddenly thrust a stack of papers of some unknown sort under his nose.

Chen Yongxi looked down. "What newspaper?"

The tea-stall owner did not answer. The Yao family shop assistant accompanying him spoke first: "A newspaper, well, it's a paper that reports the truth!"

"A paper that reports the truth?" Chen Yongxi thought for a moment. "Let me have a look."

"One cash coin." The tea-stall owner smiled.

"You want money for it?" Chen Yongxi did not catch on at once, but the shop assistant who had come with him had already fished out a newly minted cash coin and handed it to the owner, then took the stack of truth-reporting papers and gave them to Chen Yongxi. This coin was one of the new coins Zhu Cilang had authorized the Salt Merchants' Bank to cast, called the "Great Ming Circulating Treasure." It weighed one qian and three fen, was made of fairly decent material, and exchanged at one thousand cash for one tael of silver.

Chen Yongxi did not stand on ceremony. He took the newspaper, unfolded it, and began to read. It turned out to be a collection of "public denunciations," "proclamations," "Capital Gazette" items, and the like, and it even had a masthead: The Donglin Truth Gazette. It seemed to be printed by the Donglin Faction. Who knew what it said?

Chen Yongxi read on. Below the masthead the text was set vertically, and the characters were not all one size; some were large, some small. The large ones seemed to be headlines, the small ones the body text. Chen Yongxi looked first at the headlines. The very first headline to catch his eye startled him, and as he read further down, he could no longer keep his seat.

"What? The Tartar caitiff Prince Regent has made Hooge a Grave-Raising Beile, specially charged with excavating the great tombs of Han people in Northern Zhili, Shanxi, and elsewhere. How can Dorgon do such a thing?"

Dorgon had gone too far. Enclosing land, seizing houses, forcing people into bondservice — that was not enough for him, and now there was a Grave-Raiser on top of it all!

The Yao family shop assistant was also startled by Chen Yongxi's reaction. Once he recovered, he said, "Jishan, have you not heard that the Tartar caitiffs are going to excavate Confucius's tomb in Shandong? This Grave-Raising Beile is probably the one put in charge of that matter."

"Th-this — is there really such a thing?" Chen Yongxi had heard at Li Zicheng's place that the Qing army was going to Shandong to dig up Confucius's tomb. At the time he had not believed it. A scholar like him — how could he possibly believe anything so absurd? There was no treasure in Confucius's tomb anyway. What was there worth digging up?

And if the Tartars really did dig it up, would they not be making enemies of every scholar under heaven? The Tartars were so shrewd; how could they do such a stupid thing?

Besides, could he, a juren gentleman, believe what the roving bandits said?

But now The Donglin Truth Gazette said the same thing, and with such vivid detail. The Donglin Faction people could not be making this up recklessly, could they?

The Yao family shop assistant said, "Jishan, Jishan, do not be alarmed. His Highness the Thousand Years has already sent Supreme Commander Shi to protect the tomb of the venerable Confucius. Nothing will go wrong for certain."

Chen Yongxi glared at the Yao family shop assistant. "Confucius's tomb has someone protecting it. Who is going to protect this official's ancestral graves?"

Ah! Only then did the Yao family shop assistant remember that Chen Yongxi was a native of Dingxiang County in Taiyang Prefecture — and what was more, his family were great landlords!

There was no need to say it: his ancestors must all have been buried in grand style, and the ancestral tombs must be large and imposing. They were surely a target for that Grave-Raising Beile! Who knew whether they had already been dug up?

Seeing Chen Yongxi's agitation, the Yao family shop assistant could only go on consoling him: "Jishan, do not be alarmed, do not be alarmed. There are many great tombs in the north. This Grave-Raising Beile will have to dig them up one by one. Who knows when he will get to your family's!"

"True, true." Chen Yongxi paced around in circles a few steps. "If only the court could launch the northern expedition a little sooner, perhaps they could still be saved!"

By this time the six cannons had all been hauled away, and the martial-law cordon on the dock had been lifted. Chen Yongxi hurried back to Yao Daqiao's merchant ship. Once Boss Yao had finished paying the taxes, he repeatedly urged him to get under way at once. He had quite a lot of information to report to Zhu Cilang, and this journey had already cost him a good deal of time. If because of that his ancestral graves ended up being opened by the Grave-Raising Beile, then even in death he would have no face to meet his ancestors!

"Your Highness the Thousand Years, although the city of Datong Prefecture was besieged for several months, the fighting was not intense. The Tartar caitiffs did not mount any large-scale assaults on the city, and the Datong garrison did not make many sorties either. Therefore the Tartar caitiffs did not suffer any heavy losses. For them to withdraw so abruptly, there must be some deception behind it. And that deception is most likely aimed at the roving bandits!"

Chen Yongxi had at last reached Nanjing, now the foremost capital of the Great Ming. The day after his arrival, officials of the Office of Transmission — which now also handled receptions — took him to the Hall of Literary Splendor in the imperial city for an audience with Zhu Cilang.

After he had performed the grand rite of kowtow, Zhu Cilang granted him a seat and then began listening to his report on the "First Siege of Datong."

When Chen Yongxi said that the Tartar caitiffs' deception was very likely aimed at the roving bandits, Zhu Cilang's eyebrows lifted slightly, and he asked, "What do you think the Tartar caitiffs will do?"

"This subject has thought it over carefully and believes the Tartar caitiffs may cross the southern Gobi steppe and make a surprise attack on Yulin Garrison."

Zhu Cilang nodded. "I have already received secret reports from the Embroidered Uniform Guard. The Tartar caitiffs made a surprise attack on Yulin Garrison in late March or early April! The main force of Li Zicheng's army withdrew from Tong Pass on the third day of the fourth month. On the fifth, the great Tartar caitiff army led by Dodo began its assault on Tong Pass, and on the tenth they broke through!

Chen Yongxi, what do you think Li Zicheng will do next?"

The information Zhu Cilang received was always delayed. Relying on the "Ninth Great Imperial Merchant," his Embroidered Uniform Guard had laid an intelligence network across Northern Zhili and Shanxi, but it had no way of penetrating Shaanxi, which Li Zicheng ruled.

So he could only obtain secondhand information through the Qing court, and the Great Qing of this era was no leaky sieve. Thus news from Shaanxi always reached Zhu Cilang fifteen to twenty days late.

Moreover, because the information was all secondhand, it was not necessarily accurate. It was therefore very difficult to use such inaccurate information as a basis for deducing Li Zicheng's movements.

So Zhu Cilang could only make his dispositions according to the history he knew. Transporting the precious bronze Hongyi cannons to Anqing was precisely to guard against Li Zicheng moving east, or Zuo Liangyu being forced eastward by Li Zicheng.

In addition, the Yangtze River Fleet had been steadily reinforced over the past several months. Apart from the rigorous "997"-style training, Zhu Cilang had also ordered six centipede ships from the Haisha Gang shipyard at Liujia Harbor in Suzhou Prefecture and the Zheng family shipyard at Shijing Town in Quanzhou! He had also commissioned Alfonso Lopez to continue purchasing Western galleons.

Two centipede ships had now been completed by the Liujia Harbor shipyard and delivered to the Yangtze River Fleet, bringing the fleet's number of centipede ships to six. Each centipede ship was armed with two 12-pounder bronze Hongyi cannons produced by the Bocarro cannon foundry in Macau. Counting the six 12-pounder bronze Hongyi cannons already deployed to Anqing, Zhu Cilang's fleet could completely seal off the Anqing stretch of the river!

However, the deployment of as many as eighteen bronze Hongyi cannons and six centipede ships to the defense of the Yangtze was very likely superfluous, because Li Zicheng was already a rooted, settled bandit.

"In reply to Your Highness the Thousand Years," Chen Yongxi said, "this subject believes Li Zicheng will move his capital to Xiangjing — that is, Xiangyang Prefecture."

"And then?" Zhu Cilang asked again.

"And then?" Chen Yongxi understood. "Is Your Highness the Thousand Years worried that Li Zicheng will enter the Yangtze via the Han River and press eastward all the way down?"

Zhu Cilang nodded.

Chen Yongxi, however, shook his head. "This subject does not think he will."

"Why not?"

Chen Yongxi said, "Because Li Zicheng has already put down roots in Xiangjing Prefecture. The roving bandits are roving bandits no longer!"

"I have heard of that." Zhu Cilang nodded. Li Yan, the military adviser directing affairs at Runing, had long since reported this. "Li Zicheng has shown a bit of sense, after all."

This was a variable, one that very likely had not existed in history!

"Your Highness the Thousand Years!" At this moment Chen Yongxi suddenly rose to his feet and with a thud dropped to his knees before Zhu Cilang. "Now the Divine Land stands in peril of overturning, the realm in danger of ruin, and the Confucian teaching faces catastrophe. All Chinese and Han people ought to unite as one and together resist the Tartar caitiffs. We must absolutely not remain half-hearted or keep undermining one another! This subject presumes to offer himself as an envoy of the court, to go once more to the Roving King's camp and discuss with Li Zicheng a grand plan to jointly attack the Tartar caitiffs and recover the Central Plain! I also beg Your Highness the Thousand Years to join sincerely with Li Zicheng and together drive the Tartar caitiffs out of the Central Plain!"

(End of Chapter)