When Dong Weiguo led the Jiangxi Cao boat downstream, Deng Ming still stayed in Jiujiang and did not move.

Since the end of the Ming Dynasty, the magistrate has always wanted to drive the rogues to neighboring provinces, and as soon as they leave their own jurisdiction, the local governor will ignore them, because no matter how vicious the rogues are in the neighbor's house, it has nothing to do with him, and the only thing they need to do is to strictly guard the border to prevent the rogues from returning - if the territory is empty in order to reinforce the neighbors, wouldn't it be self-inflicted on the rogues to return?

Even if Chongzhen granted many people the position of "supervisor", the situation did not improve. For example, when Zhang Xianzhong made a big fuss in Huguang, Jiangxi's orders to levy grain and conscription for the superintendent were disobeyed, and Henan did not want the Shaanxi guest army to cross the border; After Zhang Xianzhong entered Sichuan, it was Huguang's turn to lose interest in the pursuit, and the precious manpower and financial resources should be used to help Sichuan solve the troubles as well as strengthen the province's self-protection ability.

Therefore, although Chongzhen's supervisor can nominally control the soldiers, horses, money, and food of several provinces, there are many factions under his command, and the civil and military forces have their own abacus, and only the strength of this province is the most reliable. The position of Inspector is still a temporary assignment, but it is only granted temporarily by the Imperial Court as needed, and all the magistrates know that as the situation improves, this position will definitely be canceled by the Imperial Court, in this case, it is very uneconomical to offend the Governor in order to obey the orders of the Governor - even if the Inspector is nominally greater than the Governor, the Governor will not be able to keep you safe. Therefore, the subordinate officials of each province will still choose the latter without hesitation before the interests of other provinces and the orders of their own provinces, and the governor can give orders to the governor of a province, but if the governor Yang Feng yīn violates the governor, there is actually no way.

After the Manchus entered the customs, a stricter system of accountability was adopted for local officials, which would undoubtedly greatly strengthen the self-preservation of officials, and in order to counteract this harm, after studying Chongzhen's gains and losses, the Manchus strengthened the power of the governor. Governor of Liangjiang, Governor of Zhejiang and Fujian, Governor of Huguang, Governor of Liangguang, Governor of Sichuan and Shaanxi...... Under the rule of the Manchu Qing Dynasty, these governors held the military and political power of the two provinces, and the power was not under the superintendent of the late Ming Dynasty, and unlike the superintendent of the late Ming Dynasty, this was no longer a temporary dispatch, but a permanent position - the position of the governor of Sichuan and Shaanxi was later abolished, because the Manchu court pondered for a while, and felt that the power of having the governors of Sichuan, Shaanxi, Gansu, and Ningxia at the same time was so great that it was too big to frighten people to death, so they divided Sichuan and set up a special governor of Sichuan.

In this way, if one province is attacked, it can at least count on the full support of another neighboring province, the strength of the two provinces is very considerable, and now Deng Ming is going out with all his strength, and he may not be able to seize the entire Huguang, so he can only be satisfied with threatening Wuchang and taking advantage of Zhang Changgeng's selfishness.

On a larger scale, there were still contradictions between different provinces in the late Ming Dynasty. It's good that the enemy's strength is weak, and in order to compete for credit, the two governors may compete to send troops to attack, but when the enemy is strong, such as the current Deng Ming group, the governor of Liangjiang and the governor of Huguang will not be able to cooperate with Jīng Cheng, but hope that Deng Ming will stay in the neighbor's house and not come to his own place to cause trouble.

However, it is much less likely that an enemy will make two governors feel jealous than two governors, after all, the strength in the hands of each governor is about one-sixth or sevenths of the strength of the whole country. But if the strength of an enemy can make the two governors feel uneasy, then how can his strength reach a quarter of the national strength of the Manchu Qing Dynasty, he must be the number one enemy of the Manchu court, and the opponent will definitely not be the local governor.

So far, the only people who forced the Manchus to send higher-ranking officials to deal with it were Sun Kewang, the king of Qin in the Southern Ming Dynasty, and Li Dingguo, the king of Jin, who had been forced to resist their attacks, and in order to resist their attacks, the Qing court used Hong Chengchou as a strategy, not only conferring military and political power on him in the five provinces, but also letting him coordinate the Qing troops in other theaters. Of course, this position cannot be a permanent position, in fact, the power of the governor of the Qing court is already unprecedentedly large, although the governor of Huguang and the governor of Liangjiang do not have the name of vassal kings, but their actual power has surpassed Geng Jimao, Shang Kexi, these vassal kings who only have military power and no governing power, although Wu Sangui has a veritable vassal state, but the wealth of Yungui Cheng dù obviously cannot be compared with Liangjiang and Huguang.

At the end of the Ming Dynasty, the border between the two provinces was not the safest place for the peasant army, but rather dangerous, because both provinces would do their best to drive the rogues into each other's territory, and both provinces would provide good food and drink at this time to entertain the border troops who came to support. And as long as you enter the hinterland of one province, the other province will breathe a sigh of relief, and the pressure of the rogue will be reduced by half.

It's the same now, the junction of the two governors' jurisdictions will be an even more dangerous place than the end of the Ming Dynasty, because at this time, they will have to face the pressure of not two provinces but four provinces - if they really have the strength to single out the four provinces, there is no need to wander around.

Although he had a tacit understanding with Zhang Changgeng, if he was always hanging around in Huguang, the governor of Huguang would be very dissatisfied, and Deng Ming's hurried departure from Hubei was also a way to release goodwill to Wuchang. After leaving Huguang, Deng Ming immediately went deep into Jiangxi, did not stop at the border areas of Hubei and Jiangxi, and assured the Wuchang side that when he returned in the future, he would not only give advance notice when he returned, but would also cross the border at full speed without making unnecessary stops.

The solemn promise and friendly actions alleviated Wuchang's worries about Deng Ming, and after Deng Ming left the country, the governor of Huguang quickly transferred all the troops from eastern Hubei to western Hubei. Previously, Deng Ming had reached an agreement with Zhang Changgeng, acquiescing that Zhongxiang and the east of Yuezhou belonged to Wuchang's sphere of influence, and Zhang Changgeng was anxious to recover these lost lands and establish some buffer zones for Wuchang to prevent Li Laiheng and He Zhen from disturbing Wuchang - now Zhang Changgeng and Zhou Peigong both think that Li Laiheng is a more dangerous enemy than Deng Ming, because the generals in Yudong do not know how to win and are bent on swallowing the whole of Hubei - well, Zhang Changgeng knows that Deng Ming will eventually try to annex Huguang, but as long as Huguang is not Zhang Changgeng's sphere of influence at that time, Then he doesn't care.

Theoretically, in order to get rid of the court's questioning, the Liangjiang Governor should mobilize Anhui and Jiangsu troops to fight in Jiangxi, annihilate Deng Ming on the spot or drive him back to the territory of the Governor of Huguang, and at the same time mobilize the financial resources of Anhui and Jiangsu to fully support the war. But...... Wait, who is the current Governor of Liangjiang?

Now there is no governor of Liangjiang, only Governor Jiang Guozhu and Jiang Guozhu, who acts as the governor of Liangjiang and Yamen, and his biggest rival for the post of governor of Liangjiang is the current governor of Jiangxi, Zhang Chao.

Therefore, Deng Ming stayed very comfortable in Jiujiang, and did not feel the slightest pressure at all, and he would definitely not see a single soldier or ship in Anhui and Jiangsu. In fact, it is also very suspicious whether there are warships in these two provinces, when Lang Tingzuo was in power, Nanchang was in the same direction as Nanjing, and he could reduce his military spending to provide Nanjing - after all, Anhui and Jiangsu were facing military pressure from Zhang Huangyan, while Jiangxi had always been very peaceful. At that time, Nanchang provided much more money to Su Song's sailors per year than the money allocated to Jiangxi sailors, and the scale of Jiangxi's own water divisions was very small, and like the water divisions of Anqing and Suzhou, they were all local government-level water divisions.

But after Zheng Chenggong and Deng Ming joined forces to make trouble in Nanjing last time, Nanchang also had its own plans, and the losses of Anhui and Jiangsu provinces, which were severely affected by the war, were far heavier than those of Jiangxi, and then they also needed to bear the logistics of Dasu. Jiang Guozhu had hoped that Zhang Chao would continue to reduce Jiangxi's military expenditure to subsidize Nanjing's finances, but this time Zhang Chao came up with a lot of reasons and refused to hand over the province's military spending to Nanjing for unified disposal. Nanchang first used the excuse that Deng Ming had fought with Jiangxi soldiers on the way home, so they could not help Jiang Guozhu bear Dasu's military expenses; Later, he did not hesitate to invest a lot of money to build the Jiangxi Naval Division into a provincial fleet, but he refused to spend a tael of silver to help Jiang Guozhu rebuild the Susong Naval Division. The general of the Jiangxi Naval Division, Zuo Ye, was full of hope that Zhang Chao would be able to enter Jiangning, and then they could become the direct troops of the Governor of Liangjiang, which was also convenient, as long as the banner of Su Song's Naval Division was beaten.

Shut down

While waiting for Zhang Huangyan's reply, Deng Ming went all out to train recruits, and after breaking through Jiujiang, the Ming army captured a large number of ships, and the existing sailors were already difficult to cāo long, in addition to trying his best to recruit the captured Jiangxi sailors, Deng Ming also had to recruit Jiangxi people to join the army. The Yangtze River runs from the territory of Jiangxi to Guò, and there is such a big lake as Poyang Lake, Jiangxi has no shortage of sailors, but these people are not qualified soldiers, and after half a month of training, these recruits are still not qualified for the post of sailors.

Of course, this is also because Deng Ming's requirements for soldiers are much higher than those of the Jiangxi Green Battalion, even those captured Jiangxi sailors can meet the standards of Ren Tang and Mu Tan. In addition to the sailors, the Ming army also needed to supplement some auxiliary soldiers, and among the Ding Zhuangzhong who came to sign up for the army, there were some people who simply had the idea of cheating to eat and drink, and these people were quickly blown away after being screened out.

In addition to this kind of people, there is also a kind of Ming army does not need, that is, people who are difficult to leave their homeland, if the Ming army occupies Jiujiang for a long time, or even attacks Nanchang, this kind of soldier will be willing to stay in the Ming army, but if Deng Ming leaves Jiangxi, they will definitely flee in large numbers.

"How are they doing in their culture classes?" After Deng Ming listened to Ren Tang's recruitment report, he asked about Ding Zhuang, who the Ming army did not plan to absorb immediately. For those who came to cheat and cheat, Deng Ming entertained them for a meal, and then politely asked them to leave, these people who were willing to be soldiers, but were not willing to leave their hometowns were more, Deng Ming did not simply expel the matter, but ordered these soldiers to give cultural lessons.

"I'm at least halfway through the numbers within ten." Ren Tang replied that of course, these Ding Zhuang who had joined the army did not have military training, and there were thousands of them, and Deng Ming did not have so many resources to teach them cultural knowledge, so their literacy progress was very slow.

"Well, after they know all the numbers and hundreds, thousands, and thousands, then teach them to know stones, catties, taels, money, and cents, and then you can let them go."

"Yes." Ren Tang was very satisfied with this order, as a Jiangxi person, he was very happy that Deng Ming could treat the people of Jiangxi kindly—Ren Tang, a scholar, also did not take to heart the merchants who were not engaged in production, and Deng Ming was also very careful to downplay the matter of unified purchase and sales.

Keeping these people in the barracks and providing them with food is of course an expense, but Deng Ming can still afford this burden for the time being, and all the current expenses are from the treasury of Jiujiang. In the past, the rebel army liked to open warehouses and release grain, which was used to win the hearts of the people, and explain to the people that the rebels were friends of the common people rather than enemies, and this was also an effective means of recruiting Ding Zhuang, and many poor people joined the army because of the hope that they could eat enough in the army.

According to the descriptions of Yuan Zongdi, Liu Tichun and others, this is a costly method of buying people's hearts, taking Li Zicheng's opening of a warehouse in Luoyang to release grain as an example. After hearing about this, the people of the prefectures and counties around Luoyang came to help the old and the young, and after seeing the mountain of grain in the warehouse, these people who came from afar desperately put it in their pockets until they could no longer carry it. Not long after leaving the warehouse, the people would find that they could not transport so much grain out of the city, so they began to abandon some of it, and reluctantly carried the rest out of Luoyang—they could not walk again, so they had to throw some more pain, and struggled to walk for several miles—and stopped to abandon some of the grain again...... In order to return to their hometown, the people who came to get grain discarded up to seventy percent of the grain they took from the Luoyang warehouse, at that time on both sides of the road around Luoyang, the ground was full of white flowers, which was seen by Yuan Zongdi and Liu Tichun with their own eyes, in Henan because of the disaster and the government's expropriation and fell into the province's famine during the Chongzhen years, this is really a heart-wrenching huge waste.

This time in Jiujiang Deng Ming changed some methods, he knew that many people who came to join the army were just for food, and these people Deng Ming was willing to provide them with enough rations per rì to make ends meet, and in exchange for learning simple numbers and units of measurement in the Ming army.

If the people are allowed to carry grain from the warehouse by themselves, not only will they be regarded as rogue by the surrounding gentry, but the propaganda effect on the people is also questionable; And the rations that Deng Ming provided to a Ding Zhuang for more than ten days would not be more than the amount of food that a Ding Zhuang could take from the warehouse with the strength to eat nǎi, and there was no need to worry about being wasted and thrown away. These people will stay in the camp of the Ming army for more than ten days, and their good opinion of the Ming army will definitely be better than simply going into the warehouse to move food, and these simple numbers and units of measurement will definitely be used by them often, and whenever they use these skills, they will remember that it is the Ming army that gives them benefits.

Ren Tang's main job was to recruit, screen, and publicize, and those who were considered reliable Ding Zhuang would be handed over to Zhou Kaihuang for training, and from the conquest of Jiujiang to the present, together with the captured prisoners, the Ming army received 6,000 recruits, of which 2,000 were sailors.

"They are completely ineffective in combat, far from being comparable to our standing army, and even if they train for another month, they will not meet the requirements of the Admiral, and they can only be used as auxiliaries until they return to the capital." Unlike the volunteers that Deng Ming got from Zhang Huangyan, these Jiangxi soldiers have much worse fighting will and morale, and they have no combat experience, and in Zhou Kaihuang's opinion, they are even inferior to those Tongxiucai who have participated in military training in Chengdu.

If these people are incorporated into the combat unit, it will definitely drag down the existing Ming army units, but if they are incorporated into the auxiliary troops, Deng Ming is a little reluctant, because he has already begun to implement the policy of preferential treatment of veterans in Chengdu, and more new policies will be implemented in the future. If these recruits enjoyed the benefits of these policies without contributing much to the army, the veterans might be dissatisfied, and even Deng Ming himself felt that this was probably unfair.

"In that case, don't put them in the army, don't call them soldiers, and don't give them ranks." Deng Ming thought for a while, and said to Zhou Kaihuang: "Just tell them plainly, they still can't meet our army's requirements for soldiers, and our army is unwilling to let them go to the battlefield to die." Ask them if they are willing to serve our army as a civilian husband first, except for the status of a soldier, other treatment will not be bad, there will be rations, they will continue to train, and when they meet the requirements of our army for soldiers, they can become official soldiers. ”

Zhou Kaihuang and Ren Tang both thought that this would not be a big problem, these Ding Zhuang did not take the name seriously, some of them wanted to be born rich by fighting in the army, as long as they continued to provide training and opportunities to join the combat army, they would not be disappointed and dissatisfied.

"The task for these people is to drive all our extra ships back to Sichuan," since these people are not of great use for the time being, Deng Ming plans to send most of them back to Sichuan, Sichuan has a gradually standardized military training system, which is cheaper and safer than training here, and can also engage in production in his spare time: "When you pass through Huguang, sell some porcelain and exchange it for silver to bring back to Jiujiang." ”

Huguang and Jiangxi have a large grain output, Deng Ming does not need to worry about the problem of military rations at all, because Deng Ming has long insisted on buying grain with silver, some local gentry and landlords sent letters to Deng Ming very early, hoping to be able to bear a part of the Ming army's grain and grass supply, the price will not exceed the market price, if Deng Ming needs a large amount of silver, they can also give Deng Ming some discounts.

Although Deng Ming, in order to monopolize the trade of local products in Jiangxi, has begun to strictly inspect passing ships and prevent local shipping in Jiangxi, the nearby gentry do not realize that there is anything in this. Since ancient times, scholars have not recognized that circulation has a stimulating effect on production, believing that circulation is unimportant or even worthless, and production is a qiē, and the gentry here in Jiujiang also despise merchants who do not produce anything, and the merchants who used to be here do not have much to do with the locals, let alone buy their grain in large quantities, far from being able to compare with Deng Ming's purchases, so they did not feel that their interests were offended, not to mention that Deng Ming did not rob the merchants' goods, but only forbade passage under the pretext of guarding against jiān - This was not only natural but also quite benevolent to the gentlemen.

No one realizes that commerce is different from agriculture, that circulation is the only means of generating wealth, and that to prevent circulation is to completely kill commerce. On the contrary, because Deng Ming did not coerce the people, did not open a warehouse to release grain, and bought grain at a fair price with real money and silver, now the gentry in the Jiujiang area have a very good impression of Deng Ming, and the matter of teaching Ding Zhuang to read and write has also been interpreted by the gentry as Deng Ming is doing his best to promote education.

There were no newspapers, almost no population movement, and no primary and secondary schools, and the people's understanding of the world in this era almost all came from the gentry, because they had a good impression of Deng Ming, and the people in the Jiujiang area had no fear of the Ming army, knowing that he was not a "murderer, arson, jiānxyín kidnapping" and the West and the like. Now, when the warships with red flags are parked on the riverside, a large number of people will soon row small boats full of river fish, vegetables, and firewood to the Ming army ships to peddle - although they are marching in enemy territory, as if they are in friendly territory, as long as they have money, they do not have to worry about logistics at all.