Li Xiao didn't know what Count Rostovtsev was planning, nor did he know that Neserrodie was unhappy and was trying to do something wrong. His life was becoming more and more leisurely and comfortable.
The Provisional Government of Wallachia or the Revolutionary Committee now regards him as a big benefactor, and are trying every means to hand over the grain in their own granaries to him, hoping that the grain will be turned into cash as soon as possible.
Of course, our protagonist is also ethical. He does not collect all the grains, but gives priority to the grains in the state-owned granaries under the name of the Provisional Government of Wallachia. Because these grains are the bulk of the profits.
After all, although other private grains can be obtained nominally through the grain-for-arms agreement, even if they are turned into money, you can still earn price differences and rebates, but they are not as fun as the state-owned grains, right?
What!
Therefore, Li Xiao, who has integrity, only gave priority to helping his own people realize cash, such as the Bretianu brothers, such as Jan Jika. Piles of food under their family's name soon filled the port of Constanta.
Waiting to be shipped to Izmail.
In less than half a month, Duke Mikhail Gorchakov, who was bald because of the food supply before, has now put his heart firmly back into his chest, and even issued a commendation order to a certain grand duke.
A certain archduke was promoted to a military rank and awarded the "Order of St. George, the Great Martyr and Invincible" to a certain archduke.
Despite the long name of this medal, in fact, the status of this medal is not particularly high. According to the order and level of Russian medals, it is a seventh-level medal. That is, it is still 1848, and the Order of St. George still only has one level.
By 1856, this product was still divided into four grades and became increasingly worthless!
Of course, in fact, the Russian medals have an even more deceptive design, that is, all recipients of medals must pay a "pension" to the national treasury. What "pension" is it? It is not a pension for medal recipients.
, but a pension for poor recipients of the medal. Of course, Li Xiao did not need to pay this amount for the St. George Medal!
It’s not because he is a Grand Duke, but because the Medal of St. George is free and you don’t have to pay for it. Of course, you get what you pay for, and a medal that doesn’t require payment is only so rare!
However, this Order of St. George or other medals of the Russian Empire also has an implicit benefit, that is, as long as you obtain the medal, you will enjoy the rank. The so-called rank is actually the status of nobility.
According to the laws of the Russian Empire, before 1826, as long as you received a medal, you automatically became a noble of the Russian Empire and enjoyed the rights of a hereditary noble. However, when Nicholas I came to power, in order to highlight the respect of the nobles, special regulations were made
, even businessmen who have received medals do not enjoy noble privileges.
After 1845, the aristocratic rights obtained through the award of honors were further blocked. Only those who obtained the first rank among various levels of medals or received the Order of St. George and the Order of St. Vladimir the Grand Duke at all levels could enjoy hereditary nobility rights.
Medals of other levels do not enjoy the rights of hereditary nobility, but only the rights of general nobility.
Anyway, there are quite a lot of circles here. Of course, a mere Medal of St. George is nothing to Li Xiao. He doesn't care about the weighting effect brought by hereditary noble status. After all, he already has the title of Grand Duke.
He has a knighthood, and based on his achievements in Wallachia, a mere Medal of St. George is really not worthy of him.
There is no way to do this, because according to the wishes of Duke Mikhail Gorchakov and Lazarev, Li Xiao must be awarded at least a first-class Order of Saint Catherine for his merits, or even directly
There is no problem in awarding the Russian Empire’s highest honor, the Order of St. Andrei Pervozvane.
Because there is indeed nothing to say about someone’s merits, but the awarding of a medal has to be approved and stamped by Nicholas I. With such a small mind, how can this guy give the most annoying nephew the highest honor, or even give him a medal according to his own wishes?
The lowest rank, the Order of the Duchess of St. Olga, was given away.
However, his idea was strongly resisted and protested by the military, because most of the soldiers are not blind yet. If such a big credit is fooled, no one will be willing to work for the empire in the future. Even your nephew who hates you can't
The bad rules are so bad, let alone a small medal, so what? Can't you be so stingy!
So after a quarrel, Li Xiao received such a mediocre medal and a nominal rank of major. Why is his rank of major nominal? Because the military rank was given to him, but his position remained the same.
Just a junior company commander.
From this aspect, Nicholas I was really stingy and cruel to him, trying every possible means to suppress his promotion.
Of course, when this inside story was known to Li Xiao through letters from Duke Mikhail and Leonid, he was not very angry. Because Li Xiao had long known that Nicholas I regarded him as a thorn in his side and would not suppress him.
How could he?
Anyway, Li Xiao had long been mentally prepared not to use the hidden dragon during the reign of Nicholas I, and his mentality was relatively stable.
Also receiving awards together with Li Xiao were Leonid, Boris and Vishniak. These three also each received a medal of St. George, but Leonid, who was very saintly, felt that he had done nothing.
It was a complete shame to receive the medal. He felt that Nicholas I was too unfair and should not award medals indiscriminately.
Boris is the happiest, because the source of his family's hereditary noble status is that his grandfather received the Order of St. George for participating in the first battle to partition Poland. It can be said that his family's noble status is derived from this medal.
Now that he has received this medal after his grandfather, this family can finally consolidate their embarrassing aristocratic status.
And Boris feels that since he can obtain the Order of St. George so quickly, it is possible to get a higher-level medal or even the Order of St. Andrew in the future, and he may even be directly awarded a real noble title by the emperor. Anyway, he is
I was so excited that I couldn't sleep.
Vishniak is not much different from Li Xiao, because he has received the Order of St. George before, so there is nothing to be excited about. More importantly, his position and military rank have not changed much, so naturally he will not be too excited.
Happy.
For this reason, he even wrote a letter to Li Xiao complaining: "...our Majesty is really stingy. He just gave away such a great achievement with just a medal. I thought I could at least be promoted to lieutenant colonel and get some money!"