"The amount of the fine? Shibo gave 2.5 million taels of silver. Wang Chunyun looked at Huang Wanyu, whose face was flushed, and immediately added: "This is not the fine of the Shibo family, but the fine of the salt merchants who follow Shibo, the general merchant." ”

Huang Wanyu was not in a hurry, but he still said painfully: "2.5 million taels, it's too much, can't it be less?" The merchants were all very shrewd, and they were willing to give the money. ”

Wang Chunyun smiled and said: "If you are not willing to pay a fine, Shibo doesn't have to worry about it, just let the procuratorate go to them for questioning."

Now, the little nephew might as well tell the truth. These eight general merchants will not exist in the future, and the current eight general merchants, in addition to Shibo, will also ensure that three people come down, and the remaining four general merchants, and the salt merchants who follow them, will be driven out of the two Huai salt industries.

In the future, the Lianghuai Salt Farm will set up a salt company based on the Changlu Salt Farm as an example. The four general merchants and affiliated salt merchants accounted for a quarter of the company's shares, the imperial court held a quarter of the shares, the Inner Government, the Four Seas Commercial Bank and our three banks accounted for a quarter of the shares, and the other quarter of the shares were issued to the public.

The fine you pay is actually the qualification to subscribe for the shares of the salt company that will be formed. The remaining three general merchants, except for Lin Shishu's one, there are two places that have not been decided.

Shibo has to pay 2.5 million taels, but Lin Shishu has to pay 3 million taels. And the remaining two places, each worth 5 million taels. The six general merchants, whoever offers this price first will be counted as landed.

The remaining 4, even if they finally wake up and want to pay the fine, they will not have this chance. Shi Bo still thinks that this fine is very high? ”

Huang Wanyu was silent for a moment, the fine of 2.5 million taels of silver, if he was allowed to go out alone, he would not be able to get it even if he was bankrupt. But if it is apportioned, it is just an additional burden on him, the salt merchant who should be in charge of the "salt cerificial wine".

As long as the bribes that were supposed to be paid to the officials of the Salt Transportation Division this year are taken out, and then some extra money is paid, even if this account is wiped out.

The eight salt merchants under the name of "Yance Sacrificial Wine" are 4 or 50 people at the minimum, and 6 or 70 people at the most, even if the fine is calculated according to 5 million taels, it is only a maximum expenditure of 100,000 taels per person.

The salt merchants who can be managed by the "salt ceremonial wine" have a capital of more than 200,000 taels. Those small merchants who are tens of thousands of taels are not even qualified to be called salt merchants.

Of course, a fine of 100,000 taels at once is also a great burden for small and medium-sized salt merchants. But if this can keep their right to market salt, even if they are reluctant, they will eventually put up with their noses.

For example, this Huang Wanyu, although he is still in pain on the surface, he has already begun to think about how to distribute the share of the fine.

Wang Chunyun gently sipped the tea, waiting for this uncle's calculation. The fine of 15.5 million taels paid by the four general merchants, of which 7.5 million taels will be the shares of the imperial court in the salt company.

Half of the remaining 8 million taels was given to the Ministry of Households to supplement the purchase funds of the Food Bureau. The remaining half, 2 million taels will be used for the establishment of Yangzhou Yicang, schools, roads and water conservancy facilities, and the other 2 million taels will be used for the special funds for disaster relief of the imperial court this year.

The punishment of these fines has nothing to do with the internal government, and even public opinion will not criticize it too much. However, for the three banks, these silver pairs will eventually become deposits for the banks to issue banknotes, and they are also the last straw that has broken the gold market and supported the price of gold.

It seems that the Inner Government has not benefited significantly, but the Inner Government, which has shares in the Bank and the Four Seas Trading Company, is in fact the biggest profit. Not to mention, the confiscated property of the salt merchants who were exiled from their homes would not be made public.

When Wang Chunyun and Huang Wanyu were drinking tea and talking in the courtyard, the salt merchants outside finally began to have some organizations after the initial chaos.

Some businessmen finally remembered that there was one official of the Salt Transportation Division who had not yet been taken by the procuratorate, and that was the Salt Transport Envoy. They hurried to the Salt Transportation Division, wanting to ask to see Men Chen Xin, hoping that the Salt Transportation Envoy would give an idea.

However, Men Chen Xin was obviously prepared, and after the officials from the Yunsi Yamen were taken away, he ordered the door of the Yunsi Yamen to be closed, and then asked a few officials in the Yamen who had not yet been taken away to take out all kinds of account books stored in the Yamen for a comprehensive inspection.

Several salt merchants naturally ate a closed door, and the two salt merchants who took the lead, Wu and Wang, were so anxious that they simply took more and more colleagues to Yangzhou Mansion, wanting the Yangzhou prefect to come forward and explore what the investigation institute wanted to do?

Although Liu Weiding, the prefect of Yangzhou, was reluctant to step on this troubled water, there were more and more salt merchants gathered in the palace, so that he had to reluctantly run to the procuratorate.

When he arrived at the gate of the procuratorate, he found that the gate of the procuratorate, which was cold and deserted on weekdays, was crowded with people today. After receiving the news, the families of the arrested officials ran to the gate of the procuratorate to cry, and they had to meet the arrested family members.

However, in the past, there were only a few weak sergeants standing guard in front of the gate, but today there is a row of officers and soldiers with a fierce attitude. Liu Weiding paused for a moment to listen to the tone of the officers and soldiers, and he heard that these officers and soldiers were probably from the Gyeonggi area.

This discovery suddenly made him feel a lot of regret in his heart, and he felt that he really shouldn't have come to the procuratorate this time. After this realization, when Liu Weiding met Han Yiliang, he only showed a little bit of a local official's concern for the people under his rule, but he never had any thoughts about the procuratorate's handling of the case.

Seeing Liu Weiding doing such a duty, Han Yiliang didn't care about himself. Although the salt patrol is in charge of salt affairs, he also has the right to correct local illegal matters, not to mention that his current position is the chief of the Independent Commission Against Corruption, and the salt patrol is concurrently.

In front of Han Yiliang, the prefect of Yangzhou also had to pay the courtesy of an official. Of course, if it is a reckless person who serves as the prefect of Yangzhou and uses local governance power to collide with the Salt Inspection Yuan, it is also a relatively ugly thing.

After all, the Imperial History of Patrol Salt is not the Imperial History of Patrol Press, and has no direct jurisdiction over local affairs. However, for today's case, Han Yiliang is completely confident, because the forgery of salt quotations is within his jurisdiction.

Liu Weiding only listened to Han Yiliang's rumors a little, so he didn't dare to ask any more. The case of counterfeiting salt, which implicated the entire Yunsi Yamen and the eight major merchants, must be a major case that has never been seen since the founding of the People's Republic of China.

He had only been in office for one year and four months in the prefect of Yangzhou, and there was really no need to tie up with these salt merchants and transport officials to die. The local government, the county level, and even the Yingtian Governor's Mansion are probably related to this salt case.

Liu Weiding felt that if he got involved in this case, he would really not be able to say it in the future. Therefore, after he understood the seriousness of this case, he simply said goodbye to Han Yiliang and left.

Liu Weiding, who returned to the palace, called several masterminds among the salt merchants, and after relaying the news he had heard from the procuratorate, he invited a dry salt merchant to leave his palace, completely unwilling to pay attention to the case.

The salt merchants, who were forcibly driven out of the government, suddenly fell into a daze and fear. In the city of Yangzhou, the salt merchants used to call for wind and rain, and seemed to feel as if they could do anything.

After all, the imperial court needed two Huai salt taxes to fill the vacancy, and the officials of the transportation department and local officials needed three festivals and four tributes from the salt merchants, and the salt of the people in Hunan, Hubei, Jiangxi and Anhui completely depended on the two Huai.

If there is any problem with the salt merchants in the two Huai, it will involve the shortage of salt for tens of millions of people in the four places. It is precisely because the salt industry is so important that these salt merchants have become accustomed to the example of salt inspectors compromising with them on salt matters.

They never thought that there was such a person who would dare to risk the deficit of the imperial court's salt tax and the anger of his colleagues to directly turn the table with them.

In particular, this salt patrol imperial history was completely unreasonable, and locked up the officials of the Salt Transportation Division and the eight general merchants, so that they did not know how to deal with this situation at all.

But if the salt patrol wants to rectify the two Huai salt administrations, there is no one to catch them all, and there are always some people left to do things.

And the officials who can be transferred to the Lianghuai Salt Transportation Division will not be blank behind them. Once the Salt Patrol Imperial History wants to deal with one of them, he will inevitably be attacked by a group of people, and the weak Salt Patrol Imperial History may not be able to withstand the counterattack of so many officials in the court.

As for the salt merchants below, under the organization of the eight general merchants, they either delayed the delivery of the salt tax, or simply suspended the market, so that the price of salt in Hunan, Hubei, Jiangxi, Anhui and other places skyrocketed, and the people complained.

What's more, although the power of the salt patrol is very great, the people who patrol the salt inspection institute are not manpower, and they are all local servants in Yangzhou. Just by relying on a few cronies brought by the imperial history of the salt patrol when he went to office, how could he deal with the relationship network established by Yangzhou salt merchants from the small officials of the procuratorate to the yamen of the governor of Yingtian.

But now the inspector of the salt imperial history did not use the local errand at all, and the officials of the Yun Division were directly taken out of Yangzhou City, and it is said that they were imprisoned in a military camp half a day's away from the north gate. As a result, the salt merchants, who had lost the leadership of the general merchants, could not find these officials to ventilate.

What made these salt merchants even more embarrassed was that after the incident, they found out that the two Huai salt envoys, the prefect of Yangzhou, and the governor of Yingtian had all been replaced last year. They have not yet established a close relationship with the new officials, and they cannot be expected to play for them.

At this time, the salt merchants found that they could only find which one of the salt inspectors to intercede, or they would just stop the marketing system of the Lianghuai salt industry and let the local officials and people in the Lianghuai salt area exert pressure on the imperial history.

After standing outside the yamen of Yangzhou Mansion for a long time, these salt merchants did not discuss a feasible idea, and they were unwilling to disperse. In the midst of the stalemate, suddenly a salt merchant said: "It's better to go to the Zheng family to see, although Zheng Zongshang is locked up in the procuratorate, but the eldest prince Zheng Yuanxun has an idea, and he is friendly with Shilin, maybe he can ask the imperial historian for a favor." ”

The crowd was quiet for a moment, and someone responded, "Yes, go to Zheng's house." "Ask Zheng Gongzi for an idea..."