Chapter 552: Men of Considerable Thought

"The Huguang campaign has dragged on to this day. Though the government troops have gained the upper hand, the lands of the two Hu provinces have still been ravaged by the roving bandits. In Hubei they carried out land distribution by headcount, and the officials refuse to set things right. Hubei's gentry and merchants are finished — without Hubei's gentry and merchants, we don't even know who to buy rice from anymore!"

"Hunan isn't much better. The two prefectures of Yuezhou and Changde have both seen some fighting, and in many places small bands of rebel troops still roam about. In some areas the unruly commoners have even stirred up trouble — eating up the great households, robbing the great households, burning land deeds, burning debt contracts. Utter chaos."

"What worries me now is that the Huguang troubles will spread to Jiangnan!"

"Spread to Jiangnan? How is that possible? The roving bandits are already on the back foot in Huguang."

"But haven't we also received very little Huguang rice? Without Huguang rice being shipped to Jiangnan, what will the people of Jiangnan eat? And Jiangnan now holds more than just Jiangnan people — there are also many refugees from the north, every one of them suffering terribly. If they have no rice to eat, won't they keep stirring up trouble?"

"There are also many bondservants in Jiangnan itself who are getting restless, and they're suffering badly too. If they really start making trouble, it will be terrible!"

"Ah, what can be done? If we can't collect it, we can't collect it. More than half the Huguang rice merchants who did business with us in past years have gone under, and the rest are badly weakened. They have no way to collect enough white rice for us."

"What can they do? Soldiers and chaos are everywhere, and the farmers are holding back their grain."

"It seems to me this realm is still going to see more chaos!"

In a wine house by the Qinhuai River, a group of rice merchants who had returned from buying rice in Huguang were gathered together, drinking and discussing current affairs.

The Great Ming had long since relaxed restrictions on speech, and the common people spoke without taboo, daring to say anything aloud — so news and rumors alike spread very quickly.

But what these rice bosses were talking about now was the plain, hard truth!

The Huguang troubles had grown rather serious — though of course, for Zhu Cilang, the situation in Huguang was still quite ideal.

Hubei's gentry and unscrupulous merchants had been crushed by Li Zicheng, leaving them powerless to stop Zhu Cilang from seizing the fruits of the land reform Li Zicheng had left behind — Li Zicheng had once again played the fool! He had toiled away in Huguang for so long, carrying out equal land distribution by headcount, and in the end it all benefited Zhu Cilang.

Now, through a redemption policy, Zhu Cilang could have the farming households who had received land in Hubei pay tens of millions of shi of grain over the next five years!

Moreover, since Hubei's land was now fairly evenly distributed, with no local tyrants or evil gentry monopolizing and controlling things, after five years Zhu Cilang's court would still be able to collect a relatively large amount of land tax. Levying one or two dou of rice per mu, Hubei alone could yield no less than ten million shi!

Hunan's situation was of course somewhat worse — it had merely been raked over once by Li Zicheng, without any land distribution. But the local tyrants and evil gentry around the Dongting Lake plain had also suffered heavy losses, making it hard for them to resist Zhu Cilang's land surveys and inspections. Though it couldn't be done as thoroughly as in Hubei, there would be no problem in rooting out more than ten million mu of military colonies and official fields in the three prefectures of Changsha, Yuezhou, and Changde.

If one added the military colonies and official fields in the three prefectures of Wuchang, Huangzhou (also not occupied by Li Zicheng), and Hanyang, that would be twenty million mu secured! Renting out these twenty million mu according to the methods of the Southeastern Military Colony Office would bring in another eight million shi a year (with another two million shi counted as "expenses"). The remaining private fields in the other Hunan prefectures and in Wuchang, Hanyang, and Huangzhou could still make up a bit more — the whole of Huguang could easily bring in twenty million shi a year in the future. And that's not even counting commercial and industrial taxes!

Additionally, Zhu Cilang had also gained a Jiangdu-Wuhan prefecture, giving him a foothold in the middle reaches of the Yangtze from now on.

So although the Huguang campaign looked "frustrating," and even let Li Zicheng pretend to be alive, the actual gains were enormous.

But these enormous gains were all long-term, and would require a great deal of effort to digest — yet a grain crisis was about to erupt in the southeastern half of the realm!

The people idly chatting in this wine house were all rice merchants who traveled back and forth between Huguang and Jiangnan, and no one understood the southeastern grain shortage better than they did.

In truth, the southeast had been short of grain for quite some time now. The shortage had begun when Li Zicheng and Zhang Xianzhong took turns ravaging Huguang, and had eased slightly after Zuo Liangyu recovered most of Huguang.

But this time the matter had blown up — previously, Li Zicheng's and Zhang Xianzhong's ravaging of Huguang had only been superficial, looting a few large cities and being done with it. But this time Li Zicheng had carried out land reform, which could be said to have dug up the very roots of the landlord class — and he had been digging for over half a year, and still wasn't finished!

So Zhu Cilang's headaches were far from over!

In the imperial city of Nanjing, the two great imperial merchants Huang Jiang and Su Sheng were at this moment also reporting to Zhu Cilang on the grain shortages across the southeast.

"Thousand Years, even if some Huguang rice does arrive, it won't be enough to stabilize rice prices in the major southeastern cities and towns. Coarse rice on the market has generally risen to four or five taels of silver per shi, and it's still climbing!"

"Thousand Years, there truly is no way — there is simply no rice! Jiangnan imports no less than twenty million shi of white rice from Huguang every year, but from last winter until now, I fear not even ten million shi has arrived."

"Yes, yes! This year we certainly cannot count on Huguang rice! Next year will be somewhat better, but not much better. Because this year's spring planting has already been missed, and the autumn harvest will certainly fall short of last year's. Moreover, small farmers are less willing to sell their rice than the gentry landlords."

Zhu Cilang was somewhat puzzled by this. "What do you mean? Why are small farmers less willing to sell rice than the gentry?"

Su Sheng, nicknamed Old Rice Su, came from a family of grain merchants and knew this matter better than anyone.

He said: "When small farmers grow rice, every grain is hard-won. When the gentry collect rent, they merely flick the beads of an abacus. How can the two be equated? Moreover, the gentry have many places to spend money and need to sell rice for cash. Small farmers are frugal — they'd sooner split a single copper coin into several pieces to spend — so they'd rather store their rice away.

Furthermore, the gentry households all have ample grain stored up and don't fear famine. Small farmers are different — in the past they always had to eat next year's grain this year. Now that they've finally managed to have surplus grain, of course they want to store some away. It's human nature. What can we do about it?"

Indeed, what could be done? Surely they couldn't send troops to seize the grain by force? That would be the officials driving the people to revolt.

What could be done?

Zhu Cilang found it a headache just thinking about it!

Seeing that both imperial merchants were at their wits' end, Zhu Cilang could only wave his hand and dismiss them for the time being.

If the merchants had no solution, then he could only turn to the officials.

So in these days since returning to Nanjing, Zhu Cilang had lost all mood even to discuss abdication with the Chongzhen Emperor, spending every day in consultation with the grandees of the two offices trying to find a solution.

But the problem of feeding the people was simply too great, and solutions were not easy to come by!

"Hmph, lifting a rock only to drop it on one's own foot!"

At this very moment, in a rather elegant little building by the Qinhuai River, there was a talented scholar who saw through the Crown Prince completely, commenting on the troubles the Crown Prince now faced.

This scholar was none other than Ji Kun, the Left-Bureau Supervising Censor who had returned with Zhu Cilang. He had just bought a residence in Nanjing and planned to settle there long-term. Today happened to be his housewarming celebration, so he had invited a few close friends over for drinks. Those who came included Huang Zongxi (though he was about to take up his post in Wuhan, he still had many handover tasks to complete, and since the superior office of the Land Survey Bureau was the Ministry of War, he had to return to Nanjing to set it up), Wang Fuzhi, and Gu Jiang (that is, Gu Yanwu) — all men of considerable thought!

The reason the three of them had been brought together was actually Zhu Cilang's arrangement. He did not want these men hiding away in some corner, which would be too much trouble. At the same time, he did not want them becoming an opposition faction outside the system — which would be even more trouble!

So he had arranged an official post in Nanjing for Gu Jiang, while Wang Fuzhi, a native of Hunan, had found a position in Du Yinxi's staff and was later recommended by Du Yinxi to Zuo Mengmei, becoming the Moral Mentor to the Prince of Chu, Zhu Cizhao.

Zhu Cilang had discovered this man while reviewing the roster of the Prince of Chu's household officials, and so had brought him to Nanjing. On the road to Nanjing, Wang Fuzhi had become acquainted with Huang Zongxi and Ji Kun.

Hearing Ji Kun's comment, the somewhat gaunt Wang Fuzhi stroked his beard and sighed as well: "To bring peace to the realm is simply to equalize the realm. The Crown Prince could not equalize the realm himself, but he plucked the fruit of Li Zicheng's equalization — he can still be counted a wise lord."

Gu Jiang laughed at this: "Simply equalize the realm? If it were really that easy, Li Zicheng would be sitting on the throne by now!"

(End of Chapter)