In Kaiping, Gao Pragmatic saw the regular army of the Ming Dynasty for the first time - if the palace guards are not counted - the Southern Army of the Ming Dynasty, which was called the Qi Army by later generations.

Although Qi Jiguang came in the name of inspecting defense this time, he only brought five hundred musketeers and cavalry, and did not put out a neat military formation during the parade or battle when he entered Kaiping Town, but the high-spirited momentum of the soldiers of the Southern Army even reminded Gao Pragmatic of the spirit of the soldiers when he watched the National Day parade.

This is the Qi family army that was formed in the Jiajing period, crisscrossing the north and south of the land and water, shining in the hands of three generations of emperors, and being called?

Standing on the city tower, looking at the Qi family army coming all the way from a distance, Gao Pragmatic was in a trance for a while.

The three generations of emperors of Jialong Wan in history, Jiajing was considered a faint tyrant, Longqing was regarded as the lord of mediocrity, and Wanli was even more miserable, and he was directly forcibly put on a big hat of "Ming Shi died in Wanli". It seems that when these people evaluate the three emperors of Jialongwan, they directly ignore the increasingly better life of the common people under the great reform of Jialongwan, as well as the successive emergence of famous ministers and generals in these three dynasties and the careers they have made.

Especially in the Longwan period, the ancients themselves regarded it as a glorious and prosperous era, and they didn't know how, but in later generations, it was actually reversed as a precursor to the death of the Ming Dynasty.

There is no need to cite those overly obscure examples, just look at how Feng Menglong described the Ming Dynasty in the Longwan period in "Warning to the World":

"Sweeping away the remnants of Hu Li Diji, the dragon and the phoenix are dancing Cui Wei; The left ring is the sea and sky, and the right is surrounded by Taihang Mountain. The nine sides of the halberd are overwhelming, and the clothes of all countries hang down; Taiping people are happy to be in the world, and Yongyong Jinou is full of sunshine.

This poem only praises the prosperity of the capital of Yanjing in my dynasty...... Since the ninth generation of Yongle Ye to Wanli Ye, this is the eleventh generation of the Son of Heaven in my dynasty.

This son of heaven, clever and martial, virtuous and prosperous, ascended the throne at the age of ten, reigned for forty-eight years, and leveled three rebellions. Those three?

Japan's Sekibaihei Hideyoshi, Xixia Bi Chengen, Banzhou Yang Yinglong.

Ping Xiuji invaded North Korea, and Bi Chengen and Yang Yinglong were local officials who plotted rebellion and were leveled successively.

Yuanyi is not afraid to obey and compete for tribute. The real one is: one person has the happiness of the people, and the country is peaceful in the four seas. ”

Of course, there are always people who do not believe the Chinese's own records, but believe in the so-called foreign scholars, believing that their accounts are trustworthy.

Well, let's not argue about this for now, let's take a look at how foreigners recorded the Longwan period according to these people.

Ricci Letters, IV. Letter from Ritchie to Mr. Roman, Director of the Spanish Tax Department, written in Zhaoqing in September 1584 (the 12th year of Wanli):

"The fertility and beauty of the Chinese land, the wealth and Chinese of intellect and ability, are truly remarkable, too high and too big. If he were to be written out in detail, it would require several large volumes. ”

"In China, although people are frugal in consumption, it is very common to wear silk. In addition, there were clothes made of hemp and other things, which we generally do not have, and all kinds of liquor made from sorghum and rice; Therefore, even the very poor can buy five cents of wine for a day, and they are not accustomed to drinking water. The "five cents" here is probably Matteo Ricci's own conversion.

You see, in the eyes of foreign scholars, during the Wanli period of the Ming Dynasty, the people were so rich that they drank wine instead of drinking water.

That's not all, let's look at Matteo Ricci's next statement:

"In particular, I have seen that the yield of wheat and rice and other vegetables is much higher than that of Spain...... Thanks to the good relationship between the sowing and the cultivation of the land, they seem to be able to cultivate better than we do. ”

"China is inherently curious and optimistic, it looks like a big garden and has an indescribable serenity and serenity. …… In short, land and water, at your own disposal, like a big Venice. ”

"The whole of China seems to have been planned by a mathematician, measured by a compass, and each village and town has its place,...... Because there are so many small farms and small cities, I can say that the whole of China is like an incomparably large city. ”

"They were said to be as beautiful as the work of the Romans. These little things I have seen are truly beautiful, with straight streets, tiled floors, and archways everywhere, more than in the city of Rome; As a result of these memorial arches, the city has become more solemn, showing that the country is well governed, and the engineering is great, and the inscriptions on them with marble and the beautiful words engraved on them seem to be much better than ours. ”

"The land in China is very clean and healthy, and there have been no plagues or infectious diseases there, so there are gray-haired old people everywhere, although we can owe this to the good government...... Throughout the year, there are places for dancing and music, places for making music, ponds for fishing, and other places for recreation. ”

"The peasants always have one or two nice clothes for meeting officials or friends, or for receiving customers; I usually collect it. If you don't have nice clothes, it's not convenient to pick up customers or meet officials. …… The costumes of ordinary people and nobles are different, but they are all good-looking in appearance and have many ornaments in their hair. ”

“…… I confess to you that what I am about to recount cannot be believed unless I have seen it with my own eyes: all the way to the port, if you go to Canton, and then to other markets, even the two major ports of Lisbon and Venice do not have such a large throughput, and here, in a word, you can buy what anyone wants. Some neighboring countries such as Japan, Cochinchina, Siam, Malacca, Java, Moluccas, and others all come to China for trade. ”

"This cannot be regarded as the happiest land, rich in abundance of gold, silver, and precious stones, with rivers and lakes, and fruit trees and flowers; So the people of this land neither believed nor wanted the Garden of Eden, and they regarded the land they possessed on earth as heaven on earth. ”

Just as he was distracted, Gao Pragmatic suddenly found that his arm had been touched, and he came back to his senses, and heard Gao Mo reminding in a low voice: "Young Master, the one wearing a big red silk python robe in front should be Qi Nantang Qi Zongrong." ”

Gao Shi stared intently, and saw a tall, steady and fast red-robed general walking towards him, and several generals and colonels around him followed, and at this time, he also waved his hand and left behind.

At this time, Gao Pragmatic was wearing a cyan civil official uniform, and on his chest was a white pheasant complement - this was according to the standard given by his "fake bachelor" from the fifth rank. As I said earlier, the "fake" here means "agency" or "temporary", although the emperor made it clear that he was too high and pragmatic regardless of the grade, but the Hanlin Academy itself also wants to save face, you are pretending to be a bachelor, which is equivalent to acting as the second and third position of the Hanlin Academy.

And the python robe worn by Qi Jiguang is logically said to be super-grade, and in terms of level, it is higher than the fake five grades of high pragmatism, but it is actually 108,000 miles higher.

However, Qi Jiguang strode forward, Gao Shishi just stepped forward to greet him, but before he could give his hand, Qi Jiguang had already stood still from a distance, raised his hand high, and shook it to the end: "Qi Mou, the chief military officer of Jizhen, has seen Gao Shixuan." ”

Gao Pragmatic originally had a smile on his face, but when he saw this scene, he froze directly.