Chapter 568: The Great Detective Ji Kun

In Qufu, within the yamen of the Governor-General of the Seven Provinces, a few cups of clear tea sent up a soothing fragrance. Zhu Yihai, Kong Yinzhi, Shi Kefa, Gao Hongtu, Zuo Maodi, Huang Degong, Li Huajing, and the other great and small overlords of Shandong and Huaibei sat according to rank and office, keeping company with the Imperial Censor Ji Kun, who had just arrived from Xuzhou, in pleasantries and laughter.

Ji Kun's official rank was not high, only a principal of the sixth grade. In the old days, when civil officials were esteemed and military men slighted, he might still have put on airs before a few Regional Commanders. But now it was a chaotic age in which the sword outweighed the brush! Moreover, the Crown Prince had divided the censors into left and right benches, and Ji Kun, as a left-bench censor, had no authority over military affairs at all. And here in Shandong (excluding Denglai, where there was another left-bench inspector), there were hardly any proper civil officials to begin with; they were all warlords' aides. So Censor Ji was essentially a figurehead, not worth all these warlords great and small flattering and coaxing him. However, he also had another open, temporary assignment: to come to Shandong on behalf of Zhu Cilang and solicit everyone's views on the Memorial Proposing Feudal Governance and Political Discussion.

With this assignment, Ji Kun was an imperial commissioner dispatched by Zhu Cilang!

Being fawned over by a crowd of mighty men who each dominated a region, the ruthless official Ji was quite pleased. This was what it felt like to stand at the pinnacle of power! At this moment, he had already secretly resolved to carry out his mission well, strive to leave the ranks of the ruthless officials as soon as possible, and then push forward toward the Grand Secretariat and the chief ministers!

Once Ji Kun had finished the pleasantries with the warlords great and small, he finally turned to serious business. Ji Kun's face was grave: "Prince of Lu, Duke Yansheng, Governor-General Shi, Governor Gao, Militia Commander Zuo, Commander Huang, Commander Li. The Memorial Proposing Feudal Governance and Political Discussion, which this humble official jointly wrote with Huang Taichong, Gu Ningren, and Wang Ernong, has surely been read by all of you?"

By order of Zhu Cilang, the Memorial Proposing Feudal Governance and Political Discussion had been published in the daily Capital Gazette by the Gazette Bureau of the Left Office of Transmission, running for seven consecutive days, and always on the front page.

So these warlords great and small of Shandong and Huaibei could not possibly have failed to read so important a memorial.

Shi Kefa smiled. "I have read your great work. Well written! It strikes at the heart of the matter, cuts to the bone, and points straight at the abuses that have existed since the founding of the dynasty! Brother Chunfan truly has the talent of a king's counselor; sooner or later he will be recommended to the two offices and take his place among the chief ministers."

Although Shi Kefa sat only in the third seat of honor in the great hall today, his leadership in Shandong and Huaibei was beyond dispute. By office, he was Governor-General of the Seven Provinces!

By territory, the Qufu he controlled was already the "holy land" of the anti-Qing cause, the place every scholar in the realm yearned for, and also the foremost stronghold in Shandong — the place where the eastern-route tomb-raiding Prince Dodo had broken his lance and met defeat!

By military strength, the thirteen or fourteen thousand Qufu trained troops under Shi Kefa had been organized and drilled into chariot, infantry, and cavalry battalions according to Qi Jiguang's methods, a force that existed specifically to counter the iron cavalry of the Eight Banners!

By wealth, the old family reserves of the Kong clan of Qufu were all held in Shi Kefa's hands. In addition, in the name of the Duke Yansheng's household, he had sent fund-raising commissioners to the southeast to openly "sell" the right to be enshrined alongside the sages in the Qufu Confucian Temple — anyone who donated money to the cause of protecting the faith and defending Confucius could have the spirit tablet of a relative, or of themselves (placed after death), installed in the Qufu Confucian Temple!

What a great honor! Confucius himself would personally bless them! No matter how many crimes against heaven and reason a person had committed in life, after death his soul would be sheltered by the Sage Confucius — would the eighteen levels of hell dare demand a person, or rather a soul, from Confucius?

The southeast of the Great Ming under Zhu Cilang's rule was simply full of wicked men! Warlords, corrupt officials, unscrupulous merchants, evil gentry, and pirates — all of them feared falling into hell after death!

And these wealthy wicked men were all filial sons and worthy grandsons; they not only wanted to "donate" a spirit tablet for themselves, but also had ancestors to save (the ancestors of wicked men were mostly not good people either, since many wicked men had inherited the capital with which they did evil)!

So although Shi Kefa had no large territory and occupied no trade hub, the silver in his hands could never be spent!

Now that Shi Kefa had spoken, the others naturally chimed in as well, and everyone also felt that the method of "what is official belongs to the officials, what is feudal belongs to the feudatories" was quite good.

The so-called "official" authority, in the final analysis, was imperial power, the great power of the emperor! Whether the emperor monopolized all power, or delegated a portion of imperial power to the Grand Secretariat and chief ministers, in the end only a few people held power. How many affairs could they manage? And how much territory could they govern well?

Had not the Great Ming fallen into its present state, in the final analysis, precisely because imperial power could not manage so much?

Sichuan, the land of abundance, yielded only 1,080,000 shi in land tax; Guangdong only 990,000 shi; and even more absurdly, the salt tax of the Huai region was only a few hundred thousand taels. If even the collection of revenue could not be managed well, what else could be managed well?

Therefore, for imperial power to govern a little less, to hand over the territory it could not manage to enfeoffed lords, while at the same time establishing a legal code to restrain the lords' conduct, was the best choice under unavoidable circumstances.

Of course, the court must maintain its superiority over the lords!

So the people present, after studying the Memorial Proposing Feudal Governance and Political Discussion, had all already made their private calculations.

The territory that the Great Ming court now firmly controlled, or was about to firmly control, they did not dare covet. The southwest and northwest were not places they could reach for either. The southwest had already been enfeoffed to the Prince Who Pacifies the West, and there was also the Duke of Qian, plus a host of native chieftains who had pacified the barbarians and opened up new lands, and in Sichuan there was a group of military bosses fighting to the death against the roving bandits.

And the northwest, it seemed, was to be enfeoffed to Wu Sangui and the Prince of Dai.

So the several men gathered today in the yamen of the Governor-General of the Seven Provinces wanted parts of Shandong (excluding Dengzhou and the seven guards of Denglai), Henan, and Liaodong.

Moreover, everyone was resolutely opposed to the evil policy of equal land distribution by headcount; it absolutely must not be implemented in the north. The land that had been redistributed by the eastern barbarian court must be returned to its original owners; where the original owners could not be found, it could be granted as a reward to meritorious officers and soldiers.

As for the official fields, military colonies, and hidden fields of the northern Central Plains, they could not all be confiscated to the state in one stroke either; they still had to be handled according to circumstances.

In short, before the Qing state had even been conquered, everyone had already worked out how to divide it up!

The court, of course, could take a share too! Otherwise, why should Zhu Cilang send troops? Go fight it yourselves!

Shi Kefa and his group planned to hand over the former Northern Metropolitan Region, as well as the Liaodong Peninsula and the Liaoxi Corridor, to direct court administration.

In the great hall of the Governor-General of the Seven Provinces' yamen, a bunch of fellows who had already become traitors and rebels without realizing it thus, one after another, put forward their opinions on the Memorial Proposing Feudal Governance and Political Discussion — in reality, their opinions on dividing up the territory of Shandong, Henan, Shaanxi, Shanxi, and Liaodong!

Ji Kun, smiling, listened carefully, took out a small notebook, and also asked for a brush and inkstone, recording as he listened.

He had come now to sound things out for Zhu Cilang, so he did not need Shi Kefa and the others to submit public memorials; he would simply send a secret memorial explaining the situation himself.

Time passed slowly. The feudal warlords present all stated their positions and put forward their demands. At last, when everyone had nothing more to say, Ji Kun smiled and said: "By the way, on the road to Qufu, this official heard of another matter. The Fifth Prince, under the protection of Eunuch Gao and Noble Consort Yuan, escaped from the roving bandits at Xiangyang Prefecture and has reached Huaibei and Shandong! Have you gentlemen heard of this?"

What?

Is there such a thing?

Shi Kefa, Kong Yinzhi, Zhu Yihai, and Huang Degong all started, then shook their heads.

"We have not heard of it!"

"If the Fifth Prince really escaped and came to us, he ought to have sought us out to welcome him!"

"Right! There is no such thing. Censor, where did you hear this news?"

"You haven't run into swindlers, have you?"

"Indeed! The ground in Shandong and Huaibei has been unsettled lately, and swindling and fraud are especially common!"

"Censor, you weren't cheated out of any money, were you?"

Watching these people's reactions, Ji Kun felt a little puzzled. Were they pretending, or did they truly not know?

Test them again!

Ji Kun smiled. "Perhaps this humble official was deceived. Let us speak no more of it!" He paused. "Do you gentlemen know that after the new year, the throne is to be abdicated to the Crown Prince?"

"We know!"

"This is a great blessing for the nation!"

"We have all discussed it and intend to go to court together to pay homage to the new emperor!"

"We will go to court together."

What? This official had not even raised the matter, and you have volunteered to go to court on your own? At this, Ji Kun was completely bewildered. Could it be that you truly do not know the Fifth Prince has come?

(End of Chapter)