410, the money is still there but the people are gone
"Why didn't I see anyone along the way? When I entered the territory of the Qing Dynasty, the farmland was deserted and the houses in the villages collapsed. I didn't see a single person for hundreds of miles."
When Qu Xiao'e heard this, her face turned pale with fright. She looked back in panic, then ran to the door and listened carefully for a while to make sure no one was eavesdropping.
Then he turned back in fear.
"Young master, you can't talk about these things. Please spare my family. I don't dare to take this pearl flower anymore. Please take it back, master." Qu Xiao'e was half body limp, and the pearl flower seemed to be hot to the touch. She threw it to Fan Yongdou in fear.
Fan Yongdou's face turned gloomy. It seemed that there was something wrong with the Qing Dynasty. He would not dare to do business with them until this issue was clearly understood.
This time, my father sent me here after receiving a letter from Fan Wencheng. Does your family know the situation here?
"Xiao'e, don't be afraid. I won't go out and talk nonsense. You know what is said here, I know it, and no third party knows it. Please tell me what is going on here. The money is indispensable for you."
Qu Xiao'e's face turned pale and she begged: "Master, you came as a guest, turned around and left. Xiao'e is still here begging for a living, please let me, this poor person, go."
Fan Yongdou knows that if you want people to do dangerous things, you have to solve their worries. Otherwise, what will they do if you finish the work and walk away?
"Xiao'e, my name is Fan Yongdou. I am one of the eight major Shanxi merchant families in Zhangjiakou. I am a member of the Jiexiu Fan family. You can see from Fan Chengyin's reception of me how powerful our Jiexiu Fan family is. Tell me what you know
Everyone told me that I will ask Fan Chengyin to get you over, and you will stay with me as a maid and serve me. I will take you back to Zhangjiakou when I leave, so that you can get out of this tiger's mouth, are you willing?"
Qu Xiao'e burst out crying, fell to her knees on the ground, and cried loudly: "Master, please don't lie to me, you are really willing to take me away."
"Although I, Fan Yongdou, am not a good person, our Fan family has relied on our reputation to reach the scale we are today. What I say will never be false in the slightest."
Qu Xiao'e cried like pear blossoms and rain, as if she wanted to vent all the pain of these years.
Fan Yongdou waited patiently for her to finish crying and then asked in detail.
Soon, Fan Yongdou understood what was going on.
It turns out that this matter is not complicated. After the Battle of Sarhu and when he had just captured the Liaodong region, Nurhaci declared that he would "nurturing Nikan (a contemptuous name for the Han people in the Later Jin Dynasty)", but he soon embarked on a mass killing
The Han people's path was to first massacre the poor people in Liaodong, then kill the poor people and then the rich households.
The Han people in Liaodong could not bear the oppression and being turned into slaves, so they rebelled one after another. They poisoned water wells and food, and attacked lone bannermen, resulting in the death of a large number of bannermen.
Nurhachi was so distressed that he stipulated that only ten or more people could go out in a group, and a fine of one silver coin for each missing person was required to prevent the Han people from attacking lone bannermen. When buying things in a store, the name of the shop owner must be registered to avoid being poisoned.
In order to suppress the resistance of the Han people in Liaodong, Nurhaci came up with an idea.
The Han people were forced to move and live in a large castle. With the Han people living together, the limited army of the Later Jin Dynasty could easily suppress the earthquake.
While this method consolidated rule, it also had an extremely serious consequence. Because the journey was too long, a large amount of cultivated land was abandoned, and the Han people living in concentrated areas in Liaodong were seriously short of cultivated land.
At this time, the whole world was in the Little Ice Age again. Due to natural and man-made disasters, grain production in Liaodong was severely damaged, leading to years of famine. In the years before his death, grain prices had reached dozens of times the normal price, and he was ridiculed as "
Grain sells for gold price”.
Everywhere the Eight Banners went, they plundered local residents and killed those who resisted. Those who surrendered were allowed to keep only one person and two pieces of clothing, and all other property was handed over to the Eight Banners.
Because the Eight Banners did not know how to produce at all, they could neither farm nor weave, and they were clumsy at making clothes.
They lacked everything, all daily necessities. Apart from fighting, there was nothing they were good at.
The most terrible thing is that they do not know how to manage the country or organize production. They only know how to fish and hunt.
After they robbed all the Han people, there would be no supplies left to rob.
But after they ate all the food they had stolen, they began to starve.
They don't know how to organize production at all.
Nurhachi believes that food shortages are due to too many poor people. The top priority is to get rid of the garbage population as soon as possible.
On the fifth day of the first lunar month in the ninth year of Tianming (1624), an order was issued to classify those who had grain or those who had no grain. The decree stipulated that those who had six to seven gold dou (one gold dou equals one dou and eight liters) of grain were classified as "haves".
"People of the Valley".
Those who have less than six to seven gold dou, but still have livestock, "enough to survive" are also included in the number of "people with grain"; if they are not enough to survive, they are included in the number of "people without grain".
Nurhachi ordered that "people without grains be brought in from house to house and made into Aha (i.e. slaves)", and later ordered that all the "people without grains" who were brought here be massacred.
After killing these poor people, the population decreased significantly. After all, there are many poor people everywhere. The food problem was alleviated. However, they did not know how to organize production and wreaked havoc on the local economy. Soon there was not enough food to eat.
On the other hand, since the early years of Tianqi, the climate has become colder, Liaodong has been drought, and grain production has become more and more serious. At first, Nurhaci believed that the problem of contradiction between man and land could be solved by annihilating the poor through violent means. But later, when it could not be maintained again, he had to
Start killing wealthy people.
Before his death, Nurhaci even massacred some wealthy households, first as "killing the poor" and later as "killing the rich", in order to free up more land for the Eight Banners to cultivate. He believed that the lack of food was due to the lack of land in the Eight Banners.
, in fact, there is so much land in Liaodong that it is impossible to plant all of it.
However, the output of the Eight Banners' land was many times lower than that of the Han people. After millions of Han people were removed, there was not enough food to eat again.
The Han people in Liaodong, who lacked food, fled and resisted more fiercely. In the end, almost all the Han people in Liaodong fled. During this period, due to the huge failure of political governance and the complete collapse of economic governance, the Hou Jin Dynasty was in a state of half-death for a long time, and the country could hardly maintain its operations.
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Huang Taiji took over a messy business. He was anxious every day. How to survive became his biggest headache.
We can't all disperse and go back to the old woods.
Now the Eight Banners enjoy the young women they snatched, and the captured slaves to serve them. They enjoy doing nothing all day long, and they can no longer live the hard life in the mountains and forests before.
If he dares to do this, you can imagine his fate.
During the massacre of the Eight Banners, only a very small number of people were left, such as young women, opera singers, craftsmen, doctors, veterinarians, blacksmiths, tailors, etc. There were three to four million people in Liaodong, but only a few dozen were left when Huang Taiji ascended the throne.
Thousands of bannermen and hundreds of thousands of Han slaves.
The Liaodong region, especially the Liaoyang area, was once extremely wealthy. Because Liaodong was rich in products, a large amount of gold and silver from the mainland flowed into Liaodong. Over the past two hundred years, Liaodong accumulated huge wealth.
After the population dropped sharply, a large amount of gold and silver fell into the hands of the Eight Banners. Because there was too much gold and silver and too little material, it caused serious inflation. And society had very little output, and prices reached jaw-dropping levels.
One gold dou of grain is worth eight taels of silver.
A good horse is worth three hundred taels of silver.
A strong ox is worth one hundred taels of silver.
A piece of python satin is worth one hundred and fifty taels of silver.
A piece of woolen green cloth is worth nine taels of silver.
At this time, the prices of all the goods available in the market in Liaodong were ten times or even a hundred times the normal price.
"One gold dou of grain is worth eight taels of silver." This price is more than 80 times the normal price.
"A good horse is worth three hundred taels of silver." Yuan Chonghuan bought horses in Liaodong for around 20 taels per horse, while the Mongolian cost price should be around 8 taels per horse. In other words, the price of horses is normal.
More than 15 times the price.
Fan Yongdou took a breath, these barbarians actually made a wealthy Liaodong become like this.
The population has dropped by 90%, and supplies have dropped by 950%. Liaodong has a serious surplus of tens of millions of taels of gold and silver.
Then he burst into ecstasy, what a huge amount of wealth this is, how has the Fan family done such a business in the past two hundred years? Seventy or eighty million taels of silver in their hands is really a sin, it is better to earn it by yourself.
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The Fan family in Zhangjiakou was able to start up and reach today's scale because they understood one truth. How to maximize profits, that is, monopoly.
However, when going to the east entrance to trade with the Qing Dynasty, the Mongols are the stumbling blocks. If you want to make this windfall, you must deal with them.
At this time, he no longer cares about their bad skin.
By the way, there is also sea. Shandong can smuggle through sea. This is also a competitor, and there is another obstacle there.