Chapter 250: Surveying Shandong, Opening the Datong Market

Although the Chongzhen Emperor himself slept soundly on the Soft Consort's couch, the group of ministers in the Grand Secretariat's signing room could not rest for even a moment.

People of this era had no concept of oppressive labor—after all, the entire realm belonged to the Emperor alone; if you did not want to serve as an official and work, there were plenty behind you eager to trample you down and take your place.

This was like Zhou Yu beating Huang Gai—a willing partnership where one did not need to worry about whether it felt good or not.

His Majesty the current Emperor had approved four locations with his vermilion brush: the capital, Jining, Nanjing, and Datong. Before year's end, the granaries of all four places had to be filled to the brim, to prepare for possible major actions by the court in the coming year.

Every minister present was a shrewd operator, and from these four locations alone, they could roughly discern Chongzhen's intentions.

The capital's granaries naturally had to be full—speaking broadly, this concerned the altars of state and the welfare of all under heaven; speaking narrowly, it was tied directly to the bellies of the civil and military officials inside and outside the capital, so they could not afford not to take it seriously.

Nanjing was a vital point in Jiangnan and also the auxiliary capital; all waterways passed through it, and one could even sail directly out to sea from there. Naturally, its granaries had to be filled to prepare for unforeseen needs.

Moreover, the Jiangnan region had always been the stronghold of the Donglin Faction; even setting aside the Donglin Faction, it was the so-called cradle and prolific birthplace of the realm's literati and scholars.

Nanjing's granaries ought to be filled, whether for public or private reasons.

Next came Datong, which was even easier to understand—after all, Xuan-Da was truly a land of four-front warfare at present. Resisting bandits and suppressing bandits both depended on Xuan-Da, and if the Mongols attacked from beyond the frontier, the Xuan-Da border troops would have to hold them back.

With the addition of the court's new Northwestern Camp, tens of thousands of new mouths suddenly needed feeding; added to the soldiers under various regional commanders, if Datong's granaries were not filled, within a few years a mutiny would likely erupt again.

But when Jining was mentioned, many people could not understand why.

In truth, once these shrewd court figures thought it over briefly, they understood—between the capital and Nanjing lay the vast expanse of Shandong, and the six prefectures of Shandong had never been a peaceful, stable place.

Even though the Regional Commander had now been changed to Mou Wenshu, the various warlord-like generals, while not daring to defy him openly, all paid lip service while acting otherwise. To avoid major chaos, Mou Wenshu could only divide and rule them—he could hardly do what Liu Zeqing had done and directly march his army to attack cities when they disobeyed.

Jining's geographical position was unique—it was the hub of the Grand Canal. The court had even established a customs house and a River Administration office there; even the original Manufacture Bureau had a branch office in this location, and the River Administration had set up its headquarters here, specifically managing the Grand Canal and the various complex intersecting waterways large and small.

This was both a grain storage point and a grain transport point. At the same time, other court goods such as silk, porcelain, and silver, traveling north and south, all had to pass through Jining.

Due to its geographical position, Jining had also gathered merchants great and small, financial magnates, and landowners; added to the foreign merchants and missionaries arriving by sea, it had genuinely developed into one of the largest towns within the six prefectures of Shandong.

Mou Wenshu had already submitted a memorial at the start of the year, saying he wished only to lead troops to station at Jining—from there, sailing downriver he could assist the Divine Martial Army in pacifying Jiangnan; going up, he could reach the capital directly via the canal to reinforce the capital region; and he could even march overland straight to Gu Pass to join the Central Plains campaign.

Chongzhen had still not approved Mou Wenshu's request to this day, precisely because the situation at Jining was too complex, and also because the remnants of the Liu faction in Shandong had not yet been fully pacified around Caozhou.

Chen Qiyu had long ago advised that, no matter from which direction one looked, Jining was truly a place every military power must contend for, even though it remained nominally under court control.

But in reality, it was almost entirely controlled behind the scenes by the major financial magnates.

At this moment, the Grand Secretaries and various Ministry Ministers in the signing room sat with eyes watching their noses and mouths watching their hearts, each holding their own views, yet none spoke them aloud. On the surface, these senior court officials seemed merely to be discussing how to fill the granaries.

Harvests everywhere were poor; the common people had neither food nor clothing, so squeezing grain from their hands was utterly impossible. Nor was that what the current Emperor intended. So where was the grain to come from? Naturally, one had to go to the landowners and great households.

Originally, the court had twelve grain-purchasing stations in the Two Jiang region, and all twelve were controlled by the Eight Great Shanxi Merchants. Last year, the court issued a thunderous decree and completely eradicated the Eight Great Shanxi Merchants; to this day, those twelve stations had all been forcibly nationalized.

However, the grain quotas set by the court were enormous. The reserves of these twelve stations alone could only satisfy the filling needs of the capital and Nanjing; as for Datong and Jining, other methods had to be found.

The Grand Secretaries and Ministry Ministers each knew in their hearts that this method was as close as what stood right behind them—the financial magnates.

These men's wealth and power surpassed even that of the Eight Great Shanxi Merchants, reaching heights where they could reach heaven with their hands. Court salaries were very poor; even a proper third-rank senior official could not live well on salary alone, let alone anything else.

Last year, the court seemed to have realized that the salaries set by the Old Ancestor were too low, and after dealing with a batch of corrupt officials, it made large-scale adjustments to official pay.

Though the scope of that adjustment was not large, it was nonetheless a huge burden on the Ming dynasty's finances, which were already at the end of their rope.

Chongzhen had originally thought that adjusting salaries would at least let the minor clerks eat their fill, and then they would not take bribes. But he had thought too simply—after the court adjusted salaries, though the total disbursed each year was enormous, in the capital alone the number of officials at all levels was no fewer than one hundred thousand; added to the unstoppable practice of layer upon layer of embezzlement, what actually reached each person's hands was naturally pitifully little.

On one side were salaries like a cup of water trying to quench a cartload of firewood; on the other, the magnates' endless tributes. Among the officials, even a clear-headed man like Jiang Dejing—according to the Eastern Depot's secret investigations—had this year to date accepted no less than fifty thousand taels in paintings, calligraphy, and various bribes.

If even Jiang Dejing was like this, one need not mention the others who had no ability whatsoever yet occupied their posts without doing their duties—the amount each of them took in bribes was on file with the Eastern Depot.

The officials neither wanted to break face with their patrons, nor dared to fail the tasks Chongzhen had assigned. After much deliberation, they finally came up with a compromise before nightfall.

The Grand Secretariat and the Ministries of Revenue and War reached a resolution: on the grounds that purchasing grain in distant regions was difficult to transport and hard to preserve, the grain for Jining and Datong would be supplied by the lands along the Two Jiang riverbanks; if Nanjing and the capital were filled, a portion could be diverted for transport.

Moreover, the Grand Secretariat and the Ministry of Revenue decided to conduct a survey of grain reserves and harvest conditions in all towns across the six prefectures of Shandong. Barring unforeseen circumstances, Jining's grain would be supplied primarily by Shandong's six prefectures.

As for Datong's grain, neither Shandong nor Nanjing could transport it there; Shaanxi and Henan had become the roving bandits' domain and could not be counted on either. Feng Quan, the Minister of Works who had once gone beyond the frontier, proposed trading fine goods from within the passes—such as porcelain and silk—with those beyond the frontier.

The ministers deliberated back and forth: though part of Datong's grain could be made up by Xuan Town and the capital, it was estimated there would still be a large shortfall, and by year's end they simply could not meet the Emperor's requirements. Trading with those beyond the frontier seemed to be a necessary measure.

But this gave rise to a new problem.

Since all the Mongol tribes beyond the frontier had submitted to the Qing, the court had several years ago closed and withdrawn all the market towns and guard station towns originally used for trade. To restart commerce, new trading towns would have to be established.

Indeed, even establishing new guard stations was not out of the question.

The newly appointed Minister of War, Zhu Dadian, was a man of quick eyes and quick hands. At this point in the discussion, he directly spread out a map of the frontier and marked out the locations where he proposed establishing frontier trade markets for discussion.