As the autumn pond grows longer, the leaves turn from dark green to brown and yellow. Blown by the autumn wind, they float down and disappear into the bushes.
In fact, compared to the vibrant spring and summer, Zhang Fei prefers this elegant, aloof autumn that is full of sad beauty.
In the autumn sunshine, everything in front of you seems to become clear and bright, and this beauty is even more unforgettable.
At this time, Zhang Fei was sitting at the open-air dining table, with his two charming wives sitting beside him.
"ah--!"
Zhang Fei stretched and looked at his two wives. "Today is a sunny day. Would you two beauties like to go for a walk in the city with me?"
Gao Wenyin was surprised and said, "Going to the city? At this time of year, people in the city will go out to play."
Zhang Fei hesitated, "Then let's not go to the city, let's go play in the suburbs."
Gao Wenyin added, "Speaking of the suburbs, is there any place with more charming scenery than here? I heard from Xiaotao that many literati come to play near us."
".?"
...
...
“Puff!”
Xu Zhiqian couldn't help but laugh when she saw Zhang Fei's deflated expression.
Zhang Fei tilted his head to look at her and said pitifully, "Miss Xu?"
Xu Zhiqian hurriedly shook her head and said, "We still have a lot of things to do right now. We already have the petitions filed by the people, and now there is also the Public Security Administration Penalty Regulations. How can we have the time to go out and play?"
"Even if you hang yourself, you need to take a breath."
Zhang Fei said: "You know, autumn is the season of harvest, you may encounter surprises."
"surprise?"
Xu Zhiqian glanced at him curiously.
"Um."
Zhang Fei smiled profoundly.
Just as Gao Wenyin said, in this season, the suburbs are full of literati and poets, who stop to visit and climb up to see the distant views.
Outside the southern suburbs, two older scholars in plain clothes came to a roadside teahouse to rest.
"call."
The scholar in the blue gown sat down, exhaled lightly, and said to the scholar in the gray gown beside him: "Now the official business of the Transportation Bureau is so busy, Brother Yuan is still interested in inviting me to go hiking here."
These two scholars were Cai Yanqing and Yuan Jiang.
"You have to go out and take a breath!" Yuan Jiang chuckled, "Besides, working in isolation will only backfire."
Cai Yanqing thought that he seemed to have something else in his words, but he had no clue after thinking about it carefully. He looked around, but there was no scenery that could inspire him.
At this time, the shop owner came up with some wine and food, "My two guests, please enjoy your meal."
"Thank you for your help!"
Yuan Jiang nodded with a smile and said, "Shopkeeper, your shop is doing good business!"
"It's OK! It's OK!"
The shop owner nodded happily.
Yuan Jiang said: "You are so happy that you can't even close your mouth. I wonder if you are okay?"
The shop owner chuckled and said, "My dear customer, I am not happy because of the good business. Usually, the business is pretty good during this season."
Yuan Jiang said, "Why is that?"
The shop owner said excitedly: "It's because we have the public security, procuratorate and court in Hezhong Prefecture."
Cai Yanqing frowned, "Public security, procuratorate and court? What does this have to do with your business?"
“It’s a big deal.”
The shop owner said, "In the past, we had to give out at least 30% or 40% of the money we earned each year. If we were unlucky and had a few customers who we dared not ask for money from, our business for the day would be wasted.
But it’s different now. Now that we have the public security, the procuratorate and the courts, we can do business with peace of mind. If anyone dares not to pay, we will go to the imperial court to sue him. If the business is not good, it’s because we are incompetent. We admit it, but many shops closed down, not because of incompetence, but because they had no other choice. "
Cai Yanqing nodded and said, "I see."
Just then, a customer called out from inside the room. The owner greeted him and went back inside the store.
Cai Yanqing looked at Yuan Jiang and said, "I guess this is why Brother Yuan asked me to come here today."
Yuan Jiang nodded: "This public security, procuratorial and judicial system is more conducive to business, which is obvious. Since the last time the police arrested some people, not only has the public security improved, but those small vendors can also come and go easily."
Cai Yanqing said: "The purpose of the Ministry of Revenue is to make money with money, and money can attract merchants. Brother Yuan plans to make more use of merchants in the future."
Yuan Jiang nodded and said, "That's right. As for the salt law, our dynasty first implemented the salt monopoly law, and the corruption was so shocking that the court had to use money to subsidize the salt monopoly law. So there was the trade law, but the merchants colluded with the border generals to sell inferior products as good ones and profit from it.
Finally, Fan Xiang came here and switched to the salt-note system, and things gradually got back on track. Although there were drawbacks, overall, relying on merchants could save the court more money than forcing the people to work.
Now that the public security, procuratorial and judicial organs are very favorable to businessmen, why don’t we take advantage of this opportunity and choose to spend money to hire businessmen.”
Cai Yanqing hesitated for a moment and said, "Indeed! Every year, when trading salt, as many as 30% of the ships get wrecked on the way, and as few as 10%. Most of them are intentional. Therefore, Xue Xiang had already used merchant ships for transportation, or merged merchant ships and official ships to let them supervise each other.
This will indeed reduce a lot of losses, but businessmen are always seeking profits, and they will try every means to get more profits.
Moreover, this only applies to peacetime. In times of war, merchants are more reliable than soldiers in transportation."
Yuan Jiang immediately said, "Merchants are not as effective as soldiers in transportation, that's just because there's not enough money. If there is enough money, merchants will definitely be more useful. Moreover, soldiers only rely on a large number of civilians to work along the way. But after the war, even inland counties that have not been ravaged by the war often need several years to recover, resulting in a sharp drop in tax revenue. The loss is much lower than hiring merchants!"
"That's true."
Cai Yanqing nodded and asked, "I wonder what Brother Yuan is going to do?"
Yuan Jiang said: "The Transport Department will only be responsible for the goods in and the money out, and will not be responsible for anything else. When the Transport Department allocates funds to the government, it will be mainly in the form of currency. Didn't we say before that a lot of finances will be handed over to the local governments? Whatever the government needs, it will spend money to buy it, instead of laboring or hiring people to do it themselves.
This way, the accounts are simple, corruption can be prevented, and losses can be saved.”
Cai Yanqing said: "But Hezhong Prefecture doesn't have that much money!"
Yuan Jiang said: "Don't we have salt notes? Moreover, I will also suggest to the court to increase the coinage of Hezhong Prefecture."
Cai Yanqing said: "But no one has ever done this before. It is not certain whether it can save money or increase expenses!"
Yuan Jiang said: "To be honest, I dare not say what will happen, but we are currently undergoing reforms, not only in finance, but also in the military camp. If we choose to hire businessmen at this time, we can also lay off more people. If we try it out, the cost will be much lower."
Meanwhile, Zhang Fei managed to trick Xu Zhiqian out, and the couple decided to travel on horseback.
The two of them were riding their horses in the suburbs, having a great time.
In fact, Xu Zhiqian is not a stay-at-home girl who can’t stay at home, but she loves working more.
Of course, the cost was also very high, and he was followed by Long Wu, Niu Beiqing, and four other masters.
The group rested for a while at a foot shop along the way, then rode south on horseback to see the surrounding scenery.
"Oh the surprise you mentioned is this businessman."
Xu Zhiqian looked at Zhang Fei with sudden enlightenment.
Zhang Fei nodded and said, "That's right. The public security, procuratorial and judicial organs certainly do more than just provide assistance to businessmen, but it depends on how the public security, procuratorial and judicial organs implement it. It's best to find the answer from the businessmen.
Because no matter how fair the public security, procuratorial and judicial organs are, it is difficult to change the lives of ordinary people, but they can revitalize business, because businessmen have no power and can only rely on contracts, which is very consistent with the public security, procuratorial and judicial organs. "
Xu Zhiqian nodded thoughtfully, "It's a pity that those businessmen are only interested in profit and forget their principles. They are of no use to the country."
Zhang Fei smiled and said, "If it is beneficial to the public security, procuratorial and judicial organs, does it count as beneficial to the country?"
Xu Zhiqian asked: "Is it beneficial to the public security, procuratorate and courts?"
"certainly."
Zhang Fei said: "If merchants rely on the public security, procuratorate and courts to grow stronger, they will naturally become staunch supporters of the public security, procuratorate and courts, but those big landlords will never support the public security, procuratorate and courts.
Because the public security, procuratorial and judicial organs will not only deprive them of some of their power, but will also inhibit their development.”
Xu Zhiqian said happily: "I understand, you want to use the power of businessmen to deal with those big landowners."
Zhang Fei smiled and nodded, "That's right."
Suddenly I heard a noise coming from the front. I looked up and saw that a wooden shed on the street was surrounded by people.
"What happened?"
Xu Zhiqian immediately walked over.
"Hello."
A fast horse suddenly caught up from behind, it was Long Wu.
Zhang Fei was relieved, thinking, this woman is really brave. He immediately rode to catch up.
Just as I got to the woodshed, I saw a man walking out from the side. "Judge Zhang."
Zhang Fei tilted his head and looked, "Ou Jun? Why is it you?"
Albert Ou pointed to the wooden shed, “This is a branch of our Royal Police.”
"ah?"
Zhang Fei was stunned, and then he remembered that at that time, this branch office was promoted to nearby villages by registering military pay for soldiers. In order to prevent people from noticing that these branches would exist permanently, they did not directly buy or build a house, but just temporarily built a wooden shed.
Xu Zhiqian asked: "Officer Ou, why are there so many civilians?"
Ou Jun said: “They are all farmers from nearby, and they came here specially to pay taxes.”
"Pay taxes?"
Xu Zhiqian was surprised and said, "It seems that there is still half a month before the autumn tax collection."
Ou Jun said: "We have told them to pay later, but they refused and insisted on paying now. Later, after Governor Cai gave his permission, we allowed them to pay the tax."
Xu Zhiqian was confused. She had never seen anyone being asked to pay taxes. She couldn't help but ask, "Did Hezhong Prefecture collect very heavy taxes in the past?"
Ou Jun said: "That's not the case. It's just that in the past, the village head, the head of the household, and the yamen runners went door to door with tax notes to collect taxes, and they all looked at the tax notes. But now it's voluntary declaration, and the land deeds are shown, and tax notes are issued. This is very beneficial to those self-cultivating farmers. They are afraid that the government will change its mind, so they are in a hurry to pay taxes."
Zhang Fei said: "So the people coming now are all self-employed farmers."
Ou Jun nodded and said, “They are all self-employed farmers. There is not a single landlord or tenant farmer.”
Zhang Fei asked, "Have you ever inquired about the specific situation in the village?"
Albert Ou looked around and whispered again, “Now they are all moving around, and they seem unwilling to pay taxes according to the land deeds.”
Xu Zhiqian worriedly asked, "Zhang San, if they all play tricks, how should we deal with it?"
Zhang Fei smiled and said, "Then only one can come out alive."
(End of this chapter)
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