Chapter 671: Not Good — Snared!

"Governor-General Ma," Zhu Cilang said, weighing his words, "should this Sichuan campaign be fought? And can it be won?"

Hearing this question, Ma Shiying felt a surge of emotion — he had truly met a benevolent sovereign! In the past, with crimes as grave as his, he would have been locked up in the Imperial Prison of the Embroidered Uniform Guard no matter what. How could he ever have been given the chance to answer such a question?

"Your Majesty," Ma Shiying paused, "this subject believes the Sichuan campaign must still be fought, but it will be very hard to win — unless the court resolves to settle Sichuan first, and only then launch the northern expedition against the Central Plains."

Ma Shiying was no fool. He could of course see that Zhu Cilang intended to "take the Central Plains first, Sichuan later."

And in truth, there was no choice but to do it that way!

Because the roving bandits who had entered Sichuan were easy to contain. The Ming army was currently advancing smoothly on Sichuan's eastern side and had already taken the prefectural seat of Guizhou, completely sealing off the route by which the Shun army in Sichuan could descend along the river.

And in Shaanxi, Wu Sangui held Dasan Pass and Mount Qi. It would be extremely difficult for the Shun army to fight its way back into Shaanxi. In history, even Zhuge Liang had not succeeded — let alone the likes of Li Guo and Sun Kewang.

Besides, Sichuan was such a comfortable, pleasant place. Who would leave it to go fight in Shaanxi? Those roving bandits were so fond of Shaanxi — after fighting and dying there for so many years, what were they after? Why not just stay put and starve to death in Shaanxi?

So the routes eastward and northward out of Sichuan were both sealed tight. The only route that could not be fully blocked was the one southward from Sichuan into Yunnan and Guizhou.

But even if the Shun took the Yunnan-Guizhou region, it would not matter much. It would not shake Zhu Cilang's Southern Ming regime in the slightest.

As long as Zhu Cilang's northern expedition succeeded, what could Sichuan plus Yunnan and Guizhou do? However they distributed land by headcount, could they withstand an attack from all of China?

Moreover, if Zhu Cilang now launched the northern expedition against the Central Plains, he need not worry that Li Guo — cooped up in Sichuan enjoying the good life — and his "Eight Council Fathers" would come out through the Sichuan gorges or Mount Qi to make trouble. They could not get out, and they had no motivation to get out. Sichuan was so fine; they could just stay cooped up inside and exploit it. Come out looking for a beating?

But if Zhu Cilang threw his full strength into attacking Sichuan, then even if Dorgon was too ill to rise from his bed, he would crawl over to strike Shandong, Huaibei, and Huainan — even if he could not take them, a quick raid and plunder would still be worthwhile!

Furthermore, Zhu Cilang was now preparing to spend a fortune on harnessing the Huai River and the Yellow River (its lower reaches). With a project that large, could he afford not to guard it carefully? If Dorgon wrecked it, how much money would be lost?

If the Yellow River and Huai River flooded once more, the whole excellent situation would be ruined.

For this reason alone, Sichuan could not become a priority for Ming military operations for a very long time to come.

"Sichuan is indeed very hard to take," Zhu Cilang nodded lightly, "but we cannot simply not fight! We cannot let the roving bandits get too comfortable. And Yunnan is unstable as well. If we do not open a front in Sichuan, I fear the roving bandits will free up their hands to ravage Yunnan!"

Zhu Cilang spoke in high-sounding terms, but in reality it was still about the princely bonds. Without fighting Sichuan, how could the second tranche of bonds be issued?

And how could an emperor as great as Zhu Cilang use a fake project to swindle investors' money?

Even if there was no securities commission to oversee him right now, he still could not do such a thing!

"Governor-General Ma," Zhu Cilang continued, "We intend, following the precedent of the Pingxi and Shuofang commands, to establish a Western Sichuan Military Governorship and an Eastern Sichuan Military Governorship. The former shall administer the Sichuan Regional Military Commission, Mafu Prefecture, Wumeng Prefecture, Zhenxiong Prefecture, Dongchuan Prefecture, and Wusa Prefecture; the latter shall administer Zunyi Prefecture, the Chongqing Guard (that is, the Shizhu, Youyang, Pingcha and other native chieftain offices), and Sinan Prefecture and Shiqian Prefecture in Guizhou.

The Eastern Sichuan Military Governor shall be Qin Yiming. As for the Western Sichuan Military Governor — would Zeng Ying be suitable for that post?"

"Zeng Ying is young, but he has the talent of a commander and can indeed bear great responsibility." Ma Shiying frowned. "However, the territories of the Western Sichuan and Eastern Sichuan commands are all overlapping mountains with little flat land, insufficient to support tens of thousands of loyal and brave troops. They urgently need the court to support them with pay and equipment."

"The court will give each of the two commands 50,000 taels of silver per month," Zhu Cilang did not refuse Ma Shiying's request. "As for equipment — better to issue it directly to the Sichuan-Guizhou Governor-General's yamen. Governor-General Ma, you will remain a governor-general, but no longer Governor-General of Yunnan, Guizhou, and Sichuan. Instead, you will take the post of Governor-General of Sichuan and Guizhou, responsible for attacking the roving bandits in Sichuan from the southern front. Both the Western Sichuan and Eastern Sichuan commands will be under your control. In addition, you will concurrently serve as Governor of Guizhou. For the province of Guizhou, the court will also provide 50,000 taels of subsidy per month, and the governor's yamen is authorized to levy transit duties on merchant goods on its own to raise military funds."

This time Zhu Cilang did not have Western Sichuan, Eastern Sichuan, and Guizhou issue bonds to raise funds. Instead, he had the court directly provide subsidies — the two commands and one province together receiving 150,000 taels of silver per month, or 1.8 million taels a year. Any more than that he would not give, and could not afford to give.

Right now, Emperor Zhu's court had to give Wu Sangui and Zhu Cijiong's two commands a total of 500,000 taels in fiscal subsidies each year. The bottomless pits of Shandong and Liaodong would swallow several million taels. Now he was adding another 1.8 million for Western Sichuan, Eastern Sichuan, and Guizhou. Just these items added together came to roughly 10 million taels!

To call it burning money would be no exaggeration at all.

Because the burning was so fierce, even the Minister of Revenue, Chen Rui, had been sent out to Zhejiang.

For now, the great pit at the Ministry of Revenue was being temporarily filled by Su Guansheng, but he was not the ideal candidate in Zhu Cilang's mind to fill that pit.

Looking across the whole Ming, there were only two men capable of filling the Ministry of Revenue's pit: Shen Tingyang and Zheng Zhilong.

But both of them were foxes by nature and would not easily jump into a pit. Now it remained to be seen which of them would get snared by the great trap of the princely bonds.

Once snared, they would have to obediently come earn money for Emperor Zhu to atone for their sins.

Someone had been snared!

Just after the second tranche of princely bonds — raising as much as 5 million taels — completed its issuance, and after the Ming court announced the favorable news of establishing the Sichuan-Guizhou Governor-General's yamen and the Western Sichuan and Eastern Sichuan Military Governorships, the previously soaring price of the princely bonds began sliding all the way down.

"Falling, falling — why is it falling again..."

"Falling — down to 60 taels! What, what are we going to do?"

"Don't worry, it'll rise. It's bound to rise! The court is about to send troops to attack Sichuan! Once Sichuan is taken, the princely fiefs can be abolished!"

"But the court has never said that taking Sichuan would lead to abolishing the fiefs!"

"And Sichuan isn't easy to take, is it? The road to Shu is hard — harder than climbing to the blue sky!"

"Bad news, bad news — it's broken below 60 taels!"

"It's over, it's over..."

"Someone's jumped from a building!"

Still the teahouse on Rice Market Street, still about the princely bonds — only now the comedy had turned to tragedy.

The princely bonds had crashed. In less than half a month, they fell from around 80 taels all the way below 60 taels. A drop of a quarter might not seem like much, but it was devastating for anyone who had used leverage.

Because the face value of the bond certificates was 100 taels, that threshold was enough to keep ordinary commoners out. So the participants were all merchants from the Huguang region and down-and-out gentry.

The so-called down-and-out gentry were those unlucky fellows who had lost their land in Hubei and been forced to take "land-redemption rice." Over the past two years, Wuhan had developed quickly and become a center of the rice trade. So these down-and-out gentry holding land-redemption rice had poured into commercial activity in large numbers. They did not engage in any real industry; most made their money through usury and speculation in white rice. Some who did well even opened money shops, imitating the two great banks by taking deposits and making loans.

These money-players, seeing the princely bond market booming, many of them got lured in — and then got trapped!

Those who had bought at the top with their own capital were still all right — Zhu Cilang was relatively conscientious and had no intention of letting the two princely debts default, so these two-bank princely bonds were certainly worth forty or fifty taels. Buying above eighty taels just meant losing half.

But if leverage had been used, then it truly meant ruin and the loss of everything.

Yao Daqiao had used leverage! He had bought 510,000 taels of face value in the two princely bonds at 74.5 taels. On that transaction he had now lost 77,000 taels — still bearable.

But when the two princely bonds broke below 70 taels, he lost his head and actually used his "three-month negotiable princely bond certificates of deposit" to borrow 290,000 taels from the Maritime Merchant Bank, then added to his position by buying another 400,000 taels of face value in the two princely bond certificates (also futures). On this transaction he had now lost a bit over 40,000 taels more. The two together came to a loss of roughly 120,000 taels.

He could not accept it! He thought and thought, and kept feeling that the princely bonds had bottomed out — so he wanted to keep adding to his position and buy more.

(End of Chapter)