Chapter 619: This Is a Beginning

The merchants who first came here didn't have this feeling at all. Wherever there was a lively place with crowds gathering, people from all walks of life would always come to make a fortune — pickpockets eyeing purses, kidnappers luring children, thugs staging accidents and throwing their weight around, and those scheming to set traps and swindle. Although the Zhao Camp had a fierce reputation, plenty of people still lacked sense, or came to try their luck.

So in the first few days after opening, it was truly a bloody storm. Many were seized on the street and had their limbs broken on the spot. Then at night, in this area of Qingjiangpu, there were also households raided, entire families vanishing without a trace — word was they'd gone to the stockade over in Pizhou to pay off their debts.

The local and out-of-town merchants were terrified out of their wits, but soon realized this brutality wasn't aimed at them. The local riffraff were equally terrified out of their wits, and immediately understood that this Qingjiang Great Market was a place you couldn't mess with. After killing the chicken to warn the monkeys, and even killing the monkeys too, the great market instantly became safe.

People utterly astonished also included Ruhui and Zhou Xuezhi. They had never imagined the Qingjiang Great Market could generate such vitality. During construction, it was still running at a deficit, yet immediately large sums of income came into their hands.

When the local merchants saw the benefits of this Qingjiang Great Market, many paid three years' rent in advance, and a few bold ones paid for five. Moreover, the merchants paying rent in advance weren't just those already doing business inside — it also included those whose shops and warehouses weren't yet complete and hadn't moved in.

Seeing the booming success of Qingjiang Great Market, everyone feared their own shop or stall would be transferred to someone else. Everyone also knew that the Zhao Camp kept its word, so they first handed over the silver in advance and had the paperwork drawn up. Given these Xuzhou men's way of keeping promises as good as gold, there was nothing to worry about.

The large sums of rent coming in turned the situation around in an instant. Xuzhou had only been sending silver to Qingjiangpu for a few months, and now Qingjiangpu was already about to send it back.

But this act of sending silver back to Xuzhou was quickly stopped by Zhao Jin. Repaying Xuzhou's support was enough — they mustn't let the locals of Qingjiangpu think the Zhao Camp didn't intend to stay long.

The autumn mood grew heavier. The boats on the Qingjiangpu canal finally became fewer. In less than a month, the canals in Northern Zhili and Shandong would freeze over one after another, and by then Qingjiangpu would reach its quiet season.

After returning from Clam Harbor, Zhao Jin didn't stay long in Qingjiangpu either. As September was drawing to a close, Zhao Jin and his companions set out on the journey home. There was a major event to attend to in Xuzhou — specifically, Zhao Jin's daughter Zhao Feng was about to celebrate her hundredth day.

This major event wasn't just for Zhao Jin himself, nor just for his companions and the Zhao Camp's related circles — even every facet of Qingjiangpu began paying attention.

If you want to build good relations, you find out the birthdays and important dates of the other party's family, and offer extra greetings during holidays and such occasions. This is the infallible recipe for drawing closer. Everyone now knew full well what status Zhao Jin held in Qingjiangpu. Seeing an opportunity to curry favor and ingratiate themselves, why wouldn't they hurry to get close?

Every quarter of Qingjiangpu also bustled into action. Preparing gifts was naturally easy, but wanting to follow the horse convoy to Xuzhou and actually attend this "hundredth-day" banquet was a bit more troublesome.

This time, however, Zhao Jin did not remain aloof. Anyone who expressed this intention was received with smiling hospitality by designated people, who pointed out the route and explained where to stay once there.

This showed that Young Master Zhao also had the inclination to grow closer with everyone. If you didn't hurry over at a time like this, then you'd have done business all these years for nothing. All of Qingjiangpu, high and low, bustled into a frenzy — those who could go were beaming with joy, and those who couldn't entrusted others to deliver gifts. It was only September, yet somehow there was already a New Year's atmosphere.

Amidst this noisy festivity, news arrived in Qingjiangpu — developments from the capital.

The Liaodong Military Commissioner Yang Gao was still mustering troops. Since Qinghe Fort could no longer be relieved, a major battle would have to be fought against the Jianzhou Jurchens, to drive these death-defying barbarians back to their homeland.

To establish his authority, Commissioner Yang had used the imperial sword to execute two fugitive officers from Qinghe Fort, displaying their heads in Shenyang city as a warning to all commanders and to boost morale for the coming great battle.

The Director-General of Granaries and Minister of Revenue Zhang Wenda submitted a memorial: the granaries were empty. The most critical capital granaries around the capital region held less than two years' supply, and the equally vital Tongzhou Granary held less than half a year's. For the strategic capital region, such a situation constituted grave danger.

The Supervising Secretary of the Revenue Section, Guan Yingzhen, submitted a memorial: the Imperial Treasury at the time of the Son of Heaven's accession could be considered full. But since the three great campaigns — the punitive expedition against Yang Yinglong in Bozhou, the eastern expedition against the Japanese, and the campaign against Bobai in Ningxia — had expended over twelve million taels of silver, shortfalls had begun to appear. In recent years, the death of Empress Dowager Li, Prince Fu's departure to his fief, and the weddings of Princes Rui, Hui, and Gui had together cost over seven hundred thousand taels. The Imperial Treasury's annual income was no more than three million seven hundred thousand taels, the principal sum originally meant to supply border pay. Now, all manner of expenditures across the realm were paid from it. With disaster relief and tax reductions added, income fell short and the national treasury was utterly empty. Yet now a great army must be mobilized, with no money to support it — this too was a great calamity.

The memorial about granary stores was one thing, but the one about the Imperial Treasury was tantamount to pointing directly at the Wanli Emperor and saying that things had been fine when Zhang Juzheng was in power, and the years since had fallen far short. Had anyone dared speak like this between the tenth and twentieth years of Wanli, they would long since have been thrown into the imperial prison and beaten to death, with confiscation of property and extermination of the clan considered a light punishment. Now, the Wanli Emperor simply ignored these censors and purists — let them say what they would.

Now, all military pay and expenses for the Nine Border Garrisons had to come from the Ministry of Revenue's national treasury. The Ministry of Revenue raised a heaven-shaking clamor about its difficulties, even hitting upon the idea of borrowing money from the Ministry of Works and the Court of the Imperial Stud — five hundred thousand taels from each. For the august Ministry of Revenue to need loans from other departments was truly an absurd joke. Even more amusing was that the Ministry of Works and the Court of the Imperial Stud refused to lend. Later, the Wanli Emperor intervened, and only then did the two each contribute two hundred thousand taels, barely meeting the emergency.

Officials at every level of the Ministry of Revenue and the Revenue Section came forward one after another to submit memorials, all saying the same thing: the Ministry of Revenue had no silver. Yet the military affairs in Liaodong were urgent. Without pay and funds, the great army could not possibly march, let alone engage the Jurchens. Mutiny on the spot was a real possibility, and then the situation would be even more beyond salvaging.

In recent years, not only had vast sums of silver been spent, but silver could not be collected from various regions. Famines were frequent, and governors and grand coordinators would often use disaster relief as an excuse to delay and withhold payments — this was adding frost to snow for the empty national treasury of the Ministry of Revenue.

To address this, the Ministry of Revenue's first proposal was to sell official posts to outstanding Imperial Academy students; the second was to dismiss supernumerary runners and assistants in the government offices who lacked formal status, and to halve the wages of those who remained. These two proposals were laughable, yet both had been implemented during the disaster relief and the Korean campaign, so there were established precedents to follow — a last resort, but a resort nonetheless. Once proposed, Wanli immediately approved their implementation.

Next, to meet the emergency, the Ministry of Revenue asked the Nanjing Ministry of Revenue to provide grain and silver. Nanjing also had a great granary, which could make up the shortfall to some extent. But the Nanjing Ministry of Revenue flatly rebuffed them. Though the Nanjing Six Ministries were sinecure offices with understaffed ranks, their official grades were equal to those of the capital's Ministry of Revenue. When they dug in their heels, the capital's Ministry of Revenue was helpless. In the end, the Wanli Emperor again stepped in to smooth things over, and the Nanjing Ministry of Revenue only contributed one year's worth of funds and grain to support the border garrisons.

Someone also proposed reopening the sea route. Funds and grain supplying Liaodong Garrison would set sail from Dengzhou, heading from Dengzhou toward the northwest mouth of Tieshan to Yangtouao, passing Zhong Island and Changxing Island to reach Beixin Mouth, then passing Tu'er Island to Shenjing, to Gaizhou, with a lighterage transport of one hundred twenty li, landing at Niangniang Temple — one hundred eighty li to Guangning, one hundred sixty li to Liaoyang. The cost per shi would be no more than one tael of silver. By contrast, overland transport through Shanhai Pass into Liaodong Garrison cost over five taels per shi — a saving of several times the expense.

The people in the Ministry of Revenue, the various powers involved in grain transport, and even the officers of Liaodong Garrison — none of them wanted to use this cost-saving, efficient method. The less spent, the less there was to skim off.

Yet in the present circumstances, the situation in Liaodong was unstable. The entire line from Shanhai Pass to Guangning, from Guangning to Haizhou and on to Shenyang and Liaoyang was fraught with trouble. There was not only the threat of the Jianzhou Jurchens, but also harassment from Mongol tribes. Even the local troops and those outside reinforcement units were a huge problem — when grain and fodder passed through, outright theft was a real occurrence.

Fewer perks, but perks nonetheless — better than coming away empty-handed. Once this sea transport proposal was raised, no one spoke anymore of the perils of the sea route or how grain ships were prone to capsize. Everyone praised its convenience, and the Wanli Emperor approved it. Shandong's situation became somewhat better than before. No matter what, when grain and military supplies passed through, something could always be skimmed off.

Yet despite all these measures, everyone — from the Emperor to the Grand Secretariat, to the entire Ministry of Revenue, high and low — knew these were stopgaps, not cures. The national treasury's deficit over these years was a gaping hole, not something that could be patched up by scraping together bits of silver here and there. And now Liaodong was clearly shaping up to be another enormous money pit. A way to generate revenue had to be found.

When silver ran short, squeeze it from the common people — this method had worked splendidly since ancient times. During the Jiajing reign, to suppress the Japanese pirates, a "levy surcharge" was imposed in Southern Zhili, Zhejiang, and Fujian, totaling over four hundred thousand taels. With this precedent, after the Wanli Emperor consulted with the Grand Secretariat and the Six Ministries, they resolved to impose a Liaodong surtax. The very first levy was over a million taels — equivalent to suddenly increasing the tax burden on farming households across the realm by forty percent, while those with examination degrees and tax exemptions still paid nothing.

Once this Liaodong surtax was announced, the entire court breathed a sigh of relief. Levied for three years, any shortfall would be easily filled. The localities and the common people would suffer some hardship, but they'd endure it for a few years and it would pass. A trifling Jurchen tribe — could it possibly not be pacified within three years? Some were even more optimistic, believing that once Military Commissioner Yang Gao led the army beyond the pass, the pacification of the Jianzhou Jurchens was just a matter of days. When the time came, they'd simply cancel the Liaodong surtax.

Toward this surtax, all of Qingjiangpu, high and low, showed no reaction. The surtax was on land tax — it was the business of those miserable wretches who tilled the soil. What did it have to do with those in trade? Throughout the Ming dynasty, commercial taxes had never been taken seriously. Merchants never considered paying taxes their burden. Those without powerful backgrounds might be extorted by officials under fabricated pretexts, but once your business grew large, who didn't have a patron behind them? Why worry about this?

"... Back in the day, Zhang Jiangling's Single Whip Law was thought to benefit both state and people — grain tax and corvée labor converted to silver and paid as one... Now, the grain tax and corvée cannot be reduced one bit, the silver conversion cannot be reduced one penny. I fear this surtax will end up the same..."

Editor-in-Chief Nonsense came looking for me and said with earnest gravity: Old Bai, updating must be continuous. Miss one day and you'll grow lazy from then on. You must be diligent — well said indeed.

Nothing else to say — it's double monthly votes. Everyone, cast the ones you're holding. Keeping them would be a waste.