Lu Chengyuan and Mao Yujian sat in the waiting room in the side hall of the Wenhua Palace, waiting for the end of the cabinet meeting, and there were three or four officials also waiting in the waiting room.

But the officials, apparently unfamiliar with them, sat on the other side of the room, whispering something together. Lu Chengyuan stared at the tea cup in front of him, which was no longer hot, in a daze, not knowing what he was thinking.

Mao Yujian finally couldn't bear the loneliness anymore, and he said to Lu Chengyuan, who was still in a daze beside him: "What is the cabinet discussing with Your Majesty today, if it continues like this, I'm afraid a morning will pass." ”

Lu Chengyuan looked at the tea leaves in the teacup, and said with an unswerving face: "No matter what you talk about, the cabinet ministers are now deviating from the right path. Since ancient times, it has never been a good thing for kings and courtiers to discuss matters in secret rooms.

Since His Majesty changed the rules on the affairs of the court, his attitude towards participating in the court meeting has become more and more perfunctory. Not only did the princes not dissuade them, but allowed His Majesty to abandon the government so that they could hold on to power. Aren't you going to do something as a royal historian? ”

Mao Yujian suddenly showed embarrassment, and he naturally knew what it was for for the resentment brought out by Lu Chengyuan's words. After the new emperor ascended the throne, Lu Chengyuan and his low-level officials originally thought that the eunuch party led by Wei Zhongxian would fall, so they wanted to rely on the Donglin party to occupy a place in the court when they rose again.

But no one expected that Wei Zhongxian would fall, but the Donglin Party did not come to power because of this, and Huang Liji and other eunuch remnants firmly controlled the government.

Lu Chengyuan did not get the power and status they expected, and although the newly enthroned young emperor was not as lazy as his grandfather and brother, he was very disgusted with the formalism of the Great Dynasty Meeting, and creatively invented two ways of discussing politics: the cabinet meeting and the state meeting.

The Cabinet meeting has fewer than 10 participants, while the National Council has more than 20 to 5 or 60 people. What was originally attended by hundreds of people has now become a formality.

The most powerful weapon in the hands of the original low-level officials, especially such low-ranking and powerful officials as the Metropolitan Procuratorate and the Ministry of Affairs, was to directly impeach a certain powerful minister in front of everyone at the court meeting, thus influencing the power structure and political direction of the imperial court.

However, now the emperor has greatly reduced the time and frequency of court meetings, and even many of the information that used to be made public to ordinary officials is now mostly limited to the level of the cabinet and the main officials of the six ministries according to the level of secrecy.

The asymmetry of information has greatly reduced the status of the imperial history and the matter. I don't even know what happened, and how do you say yes or no?

Just like Lu Chengyuan's ridicule of his question now, Mao Yujian can only pretend not to understand. Now the structure of the Imperial Court is different from the past, although the thirteen imperial histories in the past belonged to the institution of the Imperial Procuratorate, but each imperial history is very independent, even a few imperial histories of the Imperial Procuratorate, can not control these imperial histories.

But now it is different, after His Majesty ascended the throne, he not only formulated the method of reward and punishment evaluation for the Metropolitan Procuratorate, but also rebuilt the organizational relationship within the Metropolitan Procuratorate. Although the status of the Imperial History, the Deputy Imperial History, and the Imperial History of the Metropolitan remains unchanged, the relationship between them has been established, and the original Thirteen Supervision Imperial History not only limited the scope of work, but also established the position of section chief to manage the Imperial History of the Province.

Mao Yujian is now just an ordinary Yunnan Provincial Imperial Historian, if he listened to Lu Chengyuan's words, the previous criticism of the emperor and the cabinet ministers held a closed-door meeting to hinder justice, then it is not doing his job.

This blatant challenge to Chongzhen and the cabinet may bring him some prestige, but without the support of follow-up, it is pure death.

Mao Yujian is naturally not the kind of stunned young man, he can't be provoked by Lu Chengyuan, so he stupidly proves something, and finally uses his net worth and life to test Chongzhen's bottom line.

Lu Chengyuan's words suddenly made Mao Yujian dispel the intention of continuing to talk with him. The two of them became quiet again, but the silence seemed to make him feel a little more uncomfortable than before.

But soon the peace in the room was broken, because the cabinet secretary Lang Yao Shiheng lifted the cotton curtain and walked in. In the originally warm room, a burst of cold air suddenly poured in, which made Mao Yujian shiver.

Before he and Lu Chengyuan could react, several officials on the other end had already quickly approached Yao Shiheng and enthusiastically made friends with this upstart.

After Yao Shiheng returned the salute with a few people one by one, he said with a smile: "The meeting between Your Majesty and several adults in the cabinet will probably not end in the morning. I'm here to inform you, please come back in the afternoon or tomorrow..."

Lu Chengyuan and Mao Yujian followed everyone out of the room slowly, the two of them knew Yao Shiheng, and they really couldn't pull their faces, so they learned from these officials to pat Yao Shiheng's ass.

And Yao Shiheng was obviously busy, although he saw the two of them, he just nodded, turned around and left, and did not come forward to greet him.

Lu Chengyuan still had a straight face, and he couldn't see any expression. But Mao Yujian's face was a little unpleasant, in his opinion, when Yao Shiheng saw him, why did he come up to greet him, after all, he can be regarded as Yao Shiheng's senior.

After watching the officials around him disperse, Mao Yujian couldn't help but say four words in his mouth: "The villain has a will." ”

Lu Chengyuan didn't seem to hear the complaints of Mao Yujian beside him, he stood under the porch and looked at the sky outside in a daze, the miserable white sky didn't seem to see anything, but when he stretched out his hand to pick it up, he felt a cold palm. Lu Chengyuan couldn't help but say without a head: "It's snowing." ”

"It's snowing." The surprised voice of her adopted daughter Ida Thomas, now renamed Xu Miaoyi, came from the yard. Xu Xinsu, who was discussing things with his left and right hands in the study, suddenly stopped discussing, he walked to the glass window and looked out, and sure enough, snowflakes began to fall in the foggy sky.

Xu Xinsu glanced at her adopted daughter who was quite excited in the small garden, and couldn't help but smile a little. He quickly turned to several subordinates and said: "This is the first winter we have moved to Beijing, and the north is not as good as Fujian, and our clansmen and men may not know the benefits and disadvantages of the northern winter.

When you go back in a while, let people go to each house to check and see if there is anything that keeps them warm or rice and grain, and if there is anything that anyone else lacks. If there is a shortage, send it to someone as soon as possible, and the money will go to the account office in the house to receive it.

They followed me out of my homeland and came to the north, and that was my heartfelt siblings. They must not be wronged in their lives, otherwise how will I take you back to your hometown to meet people in the future. ”

Xu Xinsu's henchman, Xu Congshan, who was also a servant of the Xu family, an old man with gray hair, suddenly replied to him: "Back to the eldest young master, just two days ago, the old servant had ordered someone to give each family 200 catties of briquettes, one stone of rice, one catty of sesame oil, and one catty of white salt of long reeds. I don't think there will be any shortage. ”

Xu Xinsu suddenly put his mind at ease, smiled at him and praised: "With Shanbo by my side, I really don't have to worry about everything." Then let's discuss the trade routes between Japan, Taiwan, Tianjin, and Korea. ”

"Put the total... Ao, the patrol made the adults and the villains think that Taiwan's special deerskin and sugar can be directly transported to Japan, and then copper, sulfur, volcanic ash and other goods from Japan can be transported to Tianjin, and then from Tianjin to transport ironware, *, and population back to Taiwan, which is just a reincarnation. A shopkeeper under Xu Xinsu said.

"In fact, Taiwan's deerskin and sugar can also be transported to Tianjin first, and then porcelain, mirrors, silk, cotton cloth and other goods from Tianjin to North Korea and Japan, and then copper, sulfur and volcanic ash from Japan to Shanghai and Ningbo, and then from Shanghai and Ningbo to transport ironware, *, and population to Taiwan, so it is also a reincarnation..."

Xu Xinsu's shopkeepers, who managed the trade routes, quickly sorted out several feasible triangular trade routes for him. With the support of the newly started workshops in the capital, the duplex trade routes developed by these shopkeepers are obviously much more flexible than the previous single-route trade routes of raw silk and porcelain from Fujian to Japan.

After listening to the calculations of these shopkeepers on the trade profits on these routes, Xu Xinsu finally put his mind at ease. Moving his foundation from Fujian to the north still made him very anxious to be honest.

If it weren't for Zheng Zhilong's power on the coast of Fujian, which had been completely overwhelmed, they, the maritime merchants of Zhangzhou. Even if they continue to stay in Fujian, they may not be able to compete with Zheng Zhilong, and Xu Xinsu is still a little reluctant to leave his hometown.

No matter how you look at it, the trade profits of raw silk, tea, and porcelain are definitely the highest on the Japanese trade routes. Before Xu Xinsu opened up the northern route, he was really a little worried, and what goods he wanted to take as the main item of his own business.

After all, once he leaves Fujian, in addition to porcelain, the channels for raw silk and tea will inevitably fall into the hands of Zheng Zhilong. If you can't take out bulk goods as the main item of trade, then even if the northern route is opened, you can't see any future. And the power gap between him and Zheng Zhilong will be farther and farther.

However, after several trips to test the water route trade, the maritime merchants around Xu Xinsu found that the profits of cotton cloth, glass mirrors, ironware and other goods produced in the capital were not as good as those of raw silk and tea, but the sales market was much larger. And if it weren't for the lack of cement supply, they all believed that the profits of cement could even exceed the profits of raw silk and tea.

Compared to existing building materials in Japan and North Korea, cement can meet the requirements of almost every form of construction, from ports and roads to houses. It's a pity that Daming himself is also in short supply for this new product, and he can't sell it to foreigners with a surplus. But they all agree that this will not be the case forever.

Xu Xinsu asked a few people to write down the designs of these routes and prepare to report to Chongzhen. While they were busy, a steward of the Xu Mansion hurriedly ran in and interrupted them.

"The Dongshan and the Haicheng are back together? That's really good, hurry up and send someone to Tianjin, let Xu Linhu and Uncle Huang Yong come to the capital first, I want to know what they found at both ends of Japan..."Xu Xinsu stood up suddenly, and said with a rather excited face.