New Year's Day of the second year of Kangxi, Chongqing.

The waterway outside Chongqing is now probably the busiest in East Asia, with a steady stream of ships coming and going between Xuzhou-Chongqing and Chengdu-Chongqing, as well as a large number of passing ships. Even with the New Year just around the corner, the hard-working people of western Sichuan have not all stopped working and gone home for the New Year, and many choose to go back a few days later to reunite with their families, as long as these hard work can be exchanged for enough reward, they are willing.

In the past, the soldiers could rest before the Spring Festival, but not this year, most of the soldiers worked until the sun went down and were released from the jade processing camp. Today, the Chongqing generals reluctantly gave the soldiers a day off, but they will resume their work from tomorrow.

Since October, Chongqing generals have become more and more interested in jadeite processing, mainly because of the positive feedback from the rear market. More than a decade of war has brought the jewelry processing industry to a standstill, many jewelry stores have closed down, and the rest are struggling to support. If the war does not stop, a large number of vehicles will be requisitioned for military use, and no one will actively engage in jade mining, and it will be impossible for a large number of jewels to enter the luxury market. At the same time, the war has made the common people poorer, and the price of jewelry has remained high, but the average affluence of society has decreased, and this contradiction has doomed the luxury market to decline.

Deng Ming's failure to produce food when the world was undecided was to sell jewelry for money is of course unique in history; The Qing army in Chongqing was neither able to defeat the Sichuan army nor immediately wiped out by the other party, and was forced by life to unite with the enemy to produce jewelry, which was also unprecedented. In this way, Deng Ming and Gao Mingzhan Group have created an unprecedented situation. The jewelry stores in the rear of the Qing court warmly welcomed the new type of jadeite jewelry into the market, which was relatively cheap and acceptable to consumers, and was a good substitute for the industry when other sources of goods were exhausted, and many jewelry merchants regarded it as a lifesaver; It doesn't matter if Chongqing's produce is crudely processed, and the jewellers themselves can process it further – they were previously reluctant to spend their time on this cheap stone. But now that the industry has been in decline for more than a decade, the remuneration of craftsmen has become very low, and even those experienced masters, in order to have a bite to eat, do not feel that processing this stone is an insult to their craft.

In addition to the private market, jadeite is also very popular in Beijing. It has been less than 20 years since the Manchus entered the customs, and when they were in the Chongzhen Dynasty, the Manchus who entered the customs and plundered did not know how to appreciate jade at all, and they only needed gold and silver without stones when robbing. As the Manchurian Eight Banners began to enjoy happiness in Beijing and gradually moved away from the life of conquest, the new generation began to be vassally elegant and began to learn to play with jade. However, it is clear that the Manchurians have not yet learned how to distinguish the quality of a stone - the quality of gold and silver is very simple, just look at the purity, but according to the quality of the stone, the standard is much more complicated.

Therefore, when jadeite flowed into Beijing, many Manchurians immediately accepted it. Obviously, this stone is harder, brighter, and can shine brightly in the sun, and it is more beautiful than traditional jade no matter how you look - in fact, Wang Mingde and his gang also think so, compared to warm jade, jade is undoubtedly more in line with their nouveau riche vision. It's just that Li Guoying's evaluation of "fake jade" made the generals in Chongqing pretend not to understand, and brag to each other in a matter-of-fact manner, saying that they have always thought that the Wutu Tutu stone is more beautiful - "Wu Tutu" is the opinion of these soil buns on the restrained brilliance of jade.

The most decisive blow came from Auxiliary Minister Sony. In early August, after Deng Ming and Gao Mingzhan held peace talks, a copy of the "native products of western Sichuan" including ivory, precious stones, and jadeite was delivered to the desk of the chief auxiliary minister in early September. Sony thought it was good, so he asked people to create a few pieces of jewelry with gems and jadeite, and sent them to Ouchi with two pairs of ivory chopsticks and a set of jade chopsticks, and gave them to the Queen Mother.

The Empress Dowager, who was trying to learn the royal tastes of the Han people, felt that these gems and jadeite were more pleasing to the eye than all the jade she had ever seen, and she fiddled with them for many days, and rewarded them with a little bit of grace.

All of a sudden, this kind of "native products of western Sichuan" became popular in the upper echelons of the Eight Banners aristocracy, and almost after Li Guoying left Chongqing, Beijing suddenly became unusually concerned about the war situation in Sichuan. In October, Chongqing received three urgent letters of 800 li, inquiring in detail about the current situation in Chongqing and the movements of the Ming army in western Sichuan. Since Li Guoying was not there, of course these concertans were all played back by Gao Mingzhan, and after seriously reporting the determination of the Chongqing soldiers to live and die with the great Chongqing, Gao Mingzhan also prepared a copy of the "native products of western Sichuan" for several auxiliary ministers, and of course these native products were also sent back to Beijing together with the 800-mile expedited concerts.

Soon Beijing sent again a message full of approving words and further inquiries about Chongqing's needs, which by November were far more concerned than ever. In the past, when Li Guoying was full of enthusiasm and worked hard for the Manchurian Taijun, Beijing's concern for Chongqing was not even one-tenth of what Gao Mingzhan is now.

After the first urgent letter in November, the third-ranked auxiliary minister, Sukh Saha, also sent a handwritten letter to Gao Mingzhan, in which Lord Sukh Saha first said that he had long heard that Gao Mingzhan was a first-class capable minister in western Sichuan, and he had long intended to cultivate him, but he had a lot of affairs at hand in the past, and the pressure on the auxiliary government was great, so he did not spare time to write this private letter to Governor Gao until today. At the end of this handwritten letter, which made Gao Mingzhan grateful, Sukh Saha made two understatements, saying that several princes had discussed the local products of western Sichuan......

After reading this sentence, Gao Mingzhan shouted, and without saying a word, he rushed into the jade processing camp, and other Manchu and Han generals from Chongqing also arrived one after another, and got together to study one production problem after another. Two days and two nights later, when Gao Mingzhan came out of the camp with a brocade box of "Western Sichuan Native Products", his hair and beard were covered with mineral powder and stone slag, and behind him were a group of senior generals of the Eight Banners and the Green Battalion whose eyes were red and who had not closed their eyes well for more than 20 hours. On the reply letter to Lord Sukesaha, the list of the producers of this brocade box "Western Sichuan Native Products" was lined up on a full page, and Gao Mingzhan was of course the first, followed by the commander of the Eight Banners stationed in the garrison, and then Sun Sike, Yuan Jiawenbi, Wang Mingde......

Later, not only did the auxiliary minister praise Gao Mingzhan more and more, but even the prince who used to sneer at Chongqing sent Baoyi to Chongqing, and told Gao Mingzhan and others that the New Year was approaching, and several of their princes summed it up, planning to add a little western Sichuan to the Empress Dowager's congratulatory Zhengdan gift this time.

At the end of November, Deng Ming sent a brand new jadeite rough, which was crystal clear throughout, and the color was divided into four sections from beginning to end, from red to green, then to pure white, and finally dyed golden. Although Deng Ming asked for a sum of money fiercely, this stone made Gao Mingzhan and others have to sigh: Deng Ming really has good things in his hands.

The design drawing was given by Deng Mingbai, and Deng Ming also wrote a congratulatory message: "I wish Lafayette a long life." ”

When they saw this congratulatory message, Gao Mingzhan and others couldn't help but scold, Deng Ming, as a nobleman of the Ming Dynasty, just to sell the stones you snatched back from Myanmar, even "Lafayette" and "Longevity Without Borders" came out, can you still be a little shameful and have a bottom line?

While scolding Deng Ming for being shameless, Gao Mingzhan, Sun Sike and others took turns on duty, and hurriedly completed Deng Ming's design in early December. All the Manchurian Eight Banners contributed their treasured mounts that had not yet been sold as "fresh horse meat" to scrap collectors, and let Yuan Jiawenbi and Hu Wenke ride them to send the native products of western Sichuan back to Beijing in time.

After the two of them boarded the last communication boat on the Jialing River, which had not yet had time to "get moldy", they swore together that if they could not rush back to Beijing in time to live up to the expectations of all their colleagues in Chongqing, the two of them would wipe their necks together with swords in front of the Beijing city gate, and they would never be greedy for life and afraid of death.

……

Today, Deng Ming sent a messenger to congratulate Gao Mingzhan on Zhengdan, he first congratulated Governor Gao on his booming business, saying that after hearing that the price of jadeite had increased three times in just half a year after entering the jewelry market, the supply exceeded demand, and he also admired Gao Mingzhan so much that he threw himself into the ground. The envoy reassured Governor Gao that there was a stable supply of goods in western Sichuan, and that he would be able to ensure a steady stream of raw materials needed by Chongqing's jewelry processing army.

Deng Ming's gift to the governor of Sichuan was a very special Zhengdan gift, which was 11 intricately carved ivory balls and a large rectangular table with six holes.

"Bao Guogong is too polite." Gao Mingzhan looked at the table for a long time, and he didn't know what Deng Ming meant by giving him this super big table. Touching the four corners of the table and the two holes in the middle of the long side, Gao Mingzhan felt that this table was probably designed for six people: "Baoguo Gong has even opened the hole where the wine is placed, and he is really careful." ”

Along with the open-hole dining table, several short oak spears were delivered, as well as a mahogany gun carriage for them.

The most expensive is of course the eleven ivory balls, ivory is the raw material that Deng Ming never sells to Chongqing, although it belongs to the same "western Sichuan native product" as jadeite, but Deng Ming sent to Chongqing are all good ivory products, the largest of which is slightly thicker than the thumb - these ivory carvings in Chongqing can only earn a little middle price, Deng Ming's original price is very high.

But the ivory ball that Deng Ming gave to Gao Mingzhan this time was quite impressive, and the polishing was extremely exquisite.

"Ivory, in Beijing, a piece of ivory carving can be exchanged for a piece of gold, right?" Deng Ming's envoy smiled and said to Gao Mingzhan: "But Baoguo Gong thinks that in the hands of Governor Gao, this ivory is worthy of being a thing." ”

……

On the afternoon of the first day of the Lunar New Year, many Qing generals from Chongqing went to Gao Mingzhan to meet their friends with martial arts, and rushed to demonstrate their family marksmanship with an oak short spear on a square table known as a "billiard table".

"Oh, I have today." After playing for two rounds, Wang Mingde sat on the side and laughed, and said to himself: "Ivory is such a precious thing, but in my hands it is a little plaything...... Well, it's still the governor's, but if the jade business continues, sooner or later I can ask Admiral Deng for a set. ”