Because of the Han Jiang clan, Cheng Mengxian's relationship with the Cao family is relatively close.

But Cao Hao knew that the Cao family was not Cheng Mengxian's backer. can take over the affairs of the Cheng family as a side branch, and Cheng Mengxian is definitely a figure that the Cheng family is afraid of.

Although Cao Hao is the governor, he is a county official who is not as good as the current management, and he may not have such a great deterrent effect on the Cheng family in Jiangnan.

Cao Hao sneered and put the letter aside.

A few years ago, I knew that Cheng Mengxian secretly threw himself into Prince Yong's Mansion when he was in the capital and met Li Wei, and it is not unusual for him to start receiving rewards now.

Perhaps in Yongzheng's eyes, he was unwilling to let the salt merchants in Jiangnan go to support the obedient head of the family; But for the clan, the side branch overpowers the branch of the grandson, which is eye-catching.

How easy is it for a big family like the Cheng family, which has gone through two dynasties and flourished for a hundred years, to control it?

Cheng Mengxian's life will definitely not be easy, but he didn't ask for Han Jiang's head, and Cao Hao naturally won't have much to do.

After all, he is an old friend of Cheng Mengkun and Cheng Mengxing of the Cheng family, so there is no need to participate in Cheng family affairs......"

Cao Hao said well, Cheng Mengxian's life is indeed not easy.

After Cheng Mengkun's death, the salt farm made mistakes every now and then, and the stewards were also passive and slacking off, and the elders of the clan tried to find fault with him.

He knew that he had committed the anger of the people, but he was not angry, only helpless.

Although he is young and has some ambitions, if there is no arrangement made by Cheng Mengkun before his death, he will not be pushed to this position.

The Cheng family had privately worshiped the prince of the capital in his early years, and Cheng Mengkun was afraid that the emperor would chase after him, so he chose Cheng Mengxian, who was friendly with the royal family and had a relationship with the capital, to take charge of clan affairs.

But everyone has selfish intentions, even if Cheng Mengkun cares about his clansmen, he will not really want to hand over the rights and interests of his children and grandchildren to the clan. Therefore, Cheng Mengxian is just "acting for the head of the family", and when Cheng Mengang's sister-in-law becomes an adult, he will return the head of the family.

Cheng Mengxian knew Cheng Mengkun's plans, and he also knew that he had privately met several clan elders on his deathbed, but he didn't feel resentful. After all, he can have today, but he still relies on Cheng Mengkun to take care of him.

He is also arrogant, and he is not uncommon with the Cheng family's family property, and wants to take advantage of the opportunity to take charge of the Cheng family to create another foundation.

Who thinks, but it is so difficult.

Before he started to prepare, these Cheng family properties began to drag him back.

Cheng Mengxian really had no choice but to ask Li Wei for help.

Li Wei is not only the governor of Zhejiang, but also in charge of the Liangjiang Salt Administration, and is the top boss of the Cheng family.

The day before Cheng Mengkun's "Qiqi" funeral, Li Wei went to Yangzhou on official business, and the next day when the family was funeral, Li Wei came to Cheng's house in person and worshiped one or two in front of the funeral seat of Cheng Mengkun, the late head of the Cheng family.

The Cheng family is the first salt merchant in the south of the Yangtze River, the funeral of Cheng Chengkun, the major salt merchant families in the south of the Yangtze River, the Caoyun wharf, and the local gentry in Yangzhou.

Cao Song, as the representative of the Cao family, also came to Yangzhou to send the funeral.

Li Wei's arrival added a lot of grief to the Cheng family and showed Cheng Meng's face.

The Cheng family, who was originally indignant and thought of various ways to oppose Cheng Mengxian, remembered Cheng Mengxian's personal relationship with Li Wei, and Cheng Mengxian's affinity with the Cao family in the capital.

After the funeral, Cheng Mengxian went to Jinyuan to see Li Wei.

This is the old residence of an official gentry, because he was convicted in the early years of Kangxi, and the family property was confiscated into the palace, and this place was temporarily used as a temporary office for the salt tax of Liangjiang. Someone from the imperial court, or this is an official from Jiangnan who is also a salt tax officer to Yangzhou on business, and this is the place to stay.

Li Wei's side was talking to Cao Song.

The two are now in Hangzhou and Jiangning, hundreds of miles apart, and it is not easy to see each other.

Because there were no outsiders, the two talked a little taboo and talked about Nian Qianyao, who was escorted back to Beijing.

"What will the emperor do?" Cao Song asked.

Although he has been a guard with his predecessor in Yongzheng for two years, he still can't figure out the cold-faced emperor.

Li Wei thought for a while and said, "I won't deal with it before the Wanshou Festival, but after the Wanshou Festival, it's hard to say."

"Kill?" Cao Song asked in a low voice.

Yongzheng came to power, although he thundered at officials, but rarely asked for people's lives. Even if he is sentenced to beheading, most of them can avoid death.

Cao Song is not troubled, but worried about his cousin.

After all, the Nian family is the cousin's in-laws, and if Nian Qianyao involves the family, it will have some impact on the Cao family.

"If after the Wanshou Festival, the sin of Nian Qianyao will be discussed, and there may still be a glimmer of life: if there is no movement, then the emperor will have no intention of forgiveness......" Li Weidao.

Cao Song was a little puzzled and said, "Is this case still dragging?" Don't you say that the imperial historian has already set forty or fifty major sins for Nian Qianyao? It's still inconclusive, what's the delay? ”

Li Wei is the minister of Yongzheng Qiandi, and he has settled more royal affairs than Cao Song, a palace guard?

"Let's drag the concubine to breathe...... If you dispose of the Nian family before the concubine is alive, even if there is room for it, it will embarrass the concubine......" Li Wei said.

The two were talking, and a little girl came to report, and Cheng Mengxian arrived.

Cheng Mengxian came to thank him, no matter how powerful the Cheng family is in Jiangnan, a businessman is a businessman, and people in the officialdom dare not offend the Cheng family, but they also look down on the Cheng family.

Li Wei and Cao Song are both local civil and military officials, and they made a special trip to Yangzhou to worship, but they were just for Cheng Mengxian.

Cheng Mengxian knew that today's coercion from Li and Cao, even if it couldn't make the family elders completely stop, it could make them think twice about what happened.

He solemnly thanked the two.

Li Weidao: "If you really want to thank you, don't say these empty words, next year there will be a few more stones of salt, so that the court can collect more silver, which is better than anything else." ”

Cao Song also said: "I'm just making up the numbers, so I don't really deserve anything." ”

Cheng Mengxian was especially grateful on his face, but he was a little embarrassed in his heart.

For his sake, let the two civil and military officials go around, and they can't help but express their hearts. He had already prepared two silver tickets to show his gratitude.

But after more than half a year of dating, he also saw that these two were tight-handed, and they would never accept money without a suitable name.

He pondered for a while, looked at Li Wei and said, "I heard that there is a great drought in Shandong this year, I don't know how many people are waiting to be fed?" Jiangnan salt merchants, although they are humble, do not dare to forget the lessons of the imperial court for a day. Here is 20,000 taels of silver, which is a little bit of the Cheng family's strength to the imperial court. As he spoke, he took out a silver ticket and presented it to Li Wei with both hands.

Li Wei restrained his expression, looked at Cheng Mengxian and said, "This is what you really want?" ”

You must know that the Cheng family is the head of the salt merchants, and Cheng Mengxian did this, not only to donate silver to the treasury, but also to give Li Weixun a good reason for the salt merchants to donate.

If the matter is handled well, Li Wei may be able to open the gap of salt merchants, which is conducive to the development of salt affairs: even if he can't receive the above results, he can collect a lot of silver and alleviate the dilemma of the imperial court without silver, which can be regarded as a great achievement: Cheng Mengxian, who can be used as the first donor, also has to bear the pressure of his fellow salt merchants.

Cheng Mengxian nodded without hesitation and said, "That's right." ”

Li Wei did not accept the silver ticket, but said: "It is a good thing to donate silver to the imperial court, but it can't be so unclear: wait a few days, with the charter, I will accept your silver ticket." ”

Cheng Mengxian couldn't help but smile bitterly when he heard this.

Now that I have "donated" in private, others can still support me when asked. After all, it is already the norm for officials to ask for bribes from salt merchants, and it is not normal not to do so.

If it is really a donation, not to mention the outside, the elders of the clan will make a fuss.

However, he does not regret it, since he wants to use Li Wei as a backer, he always has to pay for it...... Cheng Mengxian donated silver, which was not related to Cao Hao, who was directly under the government.

But he didn't know that this small proposal to curry favor with Li Wei was played by Li Wei before and after the royal palace, causing a turmoil in the capital.

That is, in the event of natural and man-made disasters, in addition to the relief of the imperial court, whether to raise funds from the private sector for relief.

The atmosphere in the imperial court has been suppressed for a long time, and it is rare to have a topic to debate, and everyone has to express their opinions.

Those who support Li Wei's proposal are endlessly talking about the general interests of the country: those who oppose Li Wei's proposal are worried that there will be man-made disasters after natural disasters, and that the government will harm the local people in the name of donations.

The debate in the court was lively, but Yongzheng saw that it was clearly different from the courtiers who were arguing, and most of the officials who supported Li Wei's proposal were officials from poor families: those who opposed Li Wei's proposal were mostly from noble families.

Although he mentioned this matter to several princes, they all said that Li Wei was whimsical: but in the end, he still chose to support Li Wei.

So, two days before the Wanshou Festival, Cao Hao received a letter from the thirteenth elder brother.

That means that since the governor of Zhejiang, Yamen, advocated donations for the great drought in Shandong, other provinces can also do this.

Seeing this, Cao Hao couldn't help frowning.

It is true that Shandong is early this year, but the drought has also affected the territory of Zhili, and there are two prefectures and 16 counties in the east of Zhili that have also reduced grain production or even failed to harvest due to drought.

In the first two months, Cao Hao reported to the household department the excerpts that asked for instructions on reducing money and grain and selling money to the disaster-stricken prefectures and counties, and the thirteenth elder brother was in charge of the household department, so he should also remember this matter.

Immediately, Cao Po understood.

The meaning of the thirteenth elder brother is that there is no silver in the imperial court, and the silver in the sixteen counties of the two prefectures is different from the official donation of the imperial court. spent hundreds of thousands of taels of silver, donated a background, and life was cheap, maybe the rich gentry still took advantage of it.

The local fundraisers have no fame to sell, and they are purely taken out of the pockets of the rich gentry.

Cao Hao could think of a way, or he could come forward for this matter, but it was not good to bypass Tang Zhiyu, who was in charge of the finances of Zhili, so he sent someone to send the political envoy Tang Zhiyu to come over and speak.

To Cao Hao's surprise, when Tang Zhiyu, who was born in a scholarly family, heard this proposal, his face was full of disapproval: "Ridiculous, how can the imperial court discuss this proposal, isn't this just robbing the rich and helping the poor, it's really not advisable!" ”

Cao Hao nodded and said, "If the operation is not good, it is easy to resent, so you must think of a way to make them willing......

Tang Zhiyu did not give up, and had already begun to list the harms of advocating donations with Cao Hao.

It is nothing more than easy to breed malpractices, increase the burden of the local people, make the imperial court have no worries, and it is easy to slack off local agricultural politics.