Chapter two hundred and eighty fourth wall wet is to mend
"He sent envoys to patrol the country to ask for relief from the people and guests who had no place to stay and no food." [Corpse·Volume 2]
This man's name was Ma Bi, a direct descendant of Ma family in Fufeng. He studied Confucianism when he was young and served as a doctor in the imperial court. After the emperor reset and reorganized Taixue, he recruited great Confucians and wise men from all over the world. Many forces wanted to have influence in Taixue.
, all rushed to put their own people in, and Ma Rixi was no exception. In addition to Ma Rixi, the Ma family also had many descendants who inherited Ma Rong's mantle, but Taixue only had so many Ph.D.s in Ming Jingke, and Ma Bi finally
He was only given the post of teaching Ming Jing. Although this position was idle, it was of great importance and had been unknown for several years, rarely attracting attention. Now, following Ma Rixi's instructions, he went out of Beijing to report his illness, just to give Ma Fang a heads-up.
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"Zimou!" Ma Bi said sharply: "Have you read the letter Ma Deheng wrote to you?"
It was a long time ago that Ma Rixi sensed an abnormality in the emperor's attitude towards the delays in relief orders from various counties and counties, and specifically asked Ma Yu to send a message to Ma Fang, asking him to restrain himself during natural disasters and not to send any messages to the court.
Take it and set an example.
Of course Ma Fang had seen it, but he had never taken it seriously. At this time, facing Ma Bi's aggressive question, even though he was unhappy, he still did not dare to say: "I have seen it."
"How long ago did I ventilate you, why haven't you calmed down at all?" Mabi knew that this would happen, otherwise he would not be willing to take the risk to come to Fufeng to speak. He said angrily: "Instigating the place
It's just a matter of delaying disaster relief. There is always a system in front of it, which can be used as an excuse. But this time, it is your idea to drive up food prices and annex wantonly? Guanzhong is the foundation of the imperial court, and there is absolutely no room for any disturbance.
The country has been keeping an eye on the price of goods in Guanzhong, what is the intention, you still don’t understand?”
"Things that are few are expensive, and things that are plentiful are cheap. This is the law of nature." Ma Fang frowned and retorted: "If the court wants to sell grain at a low price, just let it go. Anyway, there is only so much grain. Guanzhong has hundreds of thousands of grains."
If everyone affected by the disaster wants to buy it, won’t the price go up? If the court wants to punish you for this, who among the merchants in the world will dare to do business?”
"Do you really think that the imperial court can't equalize commodity prices?" Ma Bi frowned and said earnestly: "Jun Shu Ling Mi Zhu's huge fortune in the East China Sea relies on business. Doesn't he understand the truth here better than you?"
Ma Fang hesitated for a moment and then said to himself: "Taicang does not have enough grain. No matter how powerful Mi Zhu's methods are, there is nothing he can do. Moreover, Fufeng is not as good as Jing Zhao. Even with Fu Rui's ability, he will not be able to use 300,000 shi of grain."
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The reason why he said this is that he has a certain degree of confidence. You Fufeng and Fu Rui tried several times to come forward to regulate prices on behalf of the court, but they always ended in failure. On the one hand, he was of mediocre ability and there were a group of local officials and officials around him.
On the other hand, because You Fufeng had previously been responsible for most of the grain and grass transportation work for the recovery of Yizhou, the remaining grain in the government treasury was very reluctant to provide relief to the people, and it was impossible to stabilize prices at all.
But what Ma Fang didn't know was that Fu Rui was facing a situation where the local clan was in great difficulty. Although he was not very capable, he had the habit of telling his superiors frankly and not hiding his faults. He had already put this situation into perspective.
The situation was truthfully reported to the emperor in the form of a seal. However, Fu Rui originally thought that the emperor would uphold justice for him. Unexpectedly, what he received was a seal returned with the words "Understood" in three small red letters at the end.
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This shocked Fu Rui at that time. He was only awarded the official position because of Fu Xie's legacy and did not understand the emperor's character. With these three vague words, he could not understand the emperor's mind.
Knowing what to do, he was frightened and frightened, and became restrained in doing things. On the contrary, he indirectly condoned the arrogance of Ma Fang and others.
Ma Bi sighed. Although he did not know Fu Rui as well as Ma Fang did, he came with another bad thing at this time: "Guanzhong has been suffering from a prolonged drought, the streams have dried up, and there is insufficient irrigation of mulberry trees. The imperial court learned of this
In addition, manpower has recently been mobilized to dig deep ditches in Kunming Pond, Ding Lake and other forbidden lakes and lakes, and to release the water into the canals to irrigate tens of thousands of hectares of fields near Jingzhao."
"What does this have to do with me?" Ma Fang suddenly felt guilty.
Ma Bi looked deeply into Ma Fang's eyes, as if he wanted to see the depths of the other person's heart at a glance. He said slowly: "As soon as the edict was issued, Kong Rong, the envoy of Dushui, was followed by Taichang Chen Gong.
A report was made saying that some local tyrants in the vicinity of Sanfu indulged their arrogant slaves in clogging up the water, dug local ditches, and diverted water for private use, regardless of whether the common people lived or died. The country was furious after hearing this, and ordered the commander-in-chief Pei Mao to conduct a thorough investigation, saying that he wanted to investigate the private companies.
Those who damage ditches will be severely punished." After saying that, Ma Bi glanced at Ma Fang again: "Although we are far away in Chang'an and are not familiar with family affairs, according to your temperament, you should do this kind of thing frequently."
"I, I..." Ma Fang was completely panicked. He had started working on this as early as March and April when the drought first appeared. He was not the only one to do this. Many powerful people in Sanfu also did this.
However, the scales vary, and some are even done by people below under the banner of the family. They do this to ensure that when drought comes, there will be sufficient irrigation water in their fields, and then
The idea was to make it difficult for those people to survive, and eventually they had to sell their fields at low prices and turn them into hidden houses.
Ma Fang turned a blind eye to the people under him doing these things. After all, the Ma family has a huge business, and even he can't control all the close relatives who are pretending to be powerful. He thought that he had established a good relationship among the petty officials, which would be enough to hide them from others.
In the past, who would have known that the imperial court still knew about this matter, and if they hit Qicun directly this time. If they don't think carefully about how to deal with the subordinates sent by Sili Xiaowei to question them, I am afraid that before prices stabilize, people like myself will have to
It was leveled first.
"It will take some time for Sili's assistant officials." Ma Bi came as soon as he got the news from Ma Rixi in advance. Sili's captain Pei Mao also needed to spend money to send people to various places in Sanfu according to the imperial edict.
After some effort: "Here, you have to send people to restore the ditch to its original state. As long as the county officials don't say anything, even if the assistant officials arrive, they won't be able to find anything."
The Ma family's influence in Maoling is huge and deep-rooted. Nearly half of the Li people depend on the Ma family for their livelihood. As long as things are done cleanly, this matter will not harm the family.
"Also, let me lower the price of grain in Fufeng." Ma Bi said to Ma Fang in an almost commanding tone: "Whatever price the imperial court sells, my family will follow closely behind!"
"What?" Ma Fang said reluctantly: "We don't want to sell it, and it won't be at a low price!"
"You still don't understand!" Ma Bi shouted sternly, thinking that no wonder the other party had only been a county magistrate for half his life: "The imperial court sells grain at low prices not only to stabilize prices, but also to win the reputation of benevolence and righteousness!"