Chapter 163 The Honest Man is Angry
“Fu’er, let your mother take a look.”
When Empress Cao saw Zhao Xing coming in, she stood up excitedly and pulled Zhao Xing to look at him.
"Mother, my children and ministers are all right." Zhao Xing said with a smile.
“I scared my mother to death.” Seeing that Zhao Xing was really fine, Empress Cao hugged Zhao Xing and cried.
"Mother, you are worried about your son's unfilial piety. Don't cry. It will be a big sin if you hurt your body." Zhao Xing consoled him.
"Mother is so happy." Empress Cao let go of Zhao Xing, wiped the corners of her eyes, pulled him to sit down, and said: "You too, is there anything that can't be done by others? Why? If you want to run out by yourself, what will happen to your mother and your father?"
Zhao Xing could only lower his head and admit his mistake honestly: "Mother, I have already realized my mistake."
"豱." Empress Cao saw that Zhao Xing admitted his mistake honestly and could no longer blame him. She said, "Your father was frightened by you. He hasn't had much rest since he got the news. You still follow me He said that when you come back, he will prepare a wedding for you."
Zhao Xing heard that Empress Cao said that his father had not had much rest in the past few days, and his heart grew stronger when he thought of his father's haggard look when he saw him before. Feel guilty.
But when I heard Queen Cao saying that she wanted to organize a wedding for him, I was stunned.
"Mother, my son is only fourteen years old." Zhao Xing said anxiously.
He won't turn fifteen in a few months.
"There are already many fathers among people as old as you. You are a prince and an only son. You are not only responsible for the rise and fall of the country, but also the important task of continuing the heirs. This matter has been decided. There is no room for change. You should be more honest and stay in Bianjing during this period, and you are not allowed to go anywhere." Queen Cao said.
Zhao Xing: "..."
Although I don’t want to get married so early, judging from the current situation, there is no possibility of changing it.
"Okay, your mother and concubine are also worried. Go and see her." Empress Cao patted Zhao Xing's hand and said.
"Yes!" Zhao Xing stood up, saluted, and retreated.
…………
When Zhao Xing returned to the palace, news of the assassination also spread in Bianjing.
Previously, the officials had kept the news secret, and the outside world did not know it.
For a while, everything in Bianjing seemed to be the same as before, but there was a feeling that a storm was about to come.
The prince was assassinated, and the official family only had such an only son. Who knows what the official family would do in their madness.
No one knows how many people will be involved in the end.
However, the imagined fury of thunder did not come. Instead, it was reported that the officials summoned Si Tianjian and asked him to choose an auspicious day for the prince's wedding.
Even so, there are far fewer impeachments regarding Kaifeng Prefecture's land inventory.
It seems that the officials are not pursuing the case, but it does not mean that they are not pursuing it.
It’s just that instead of leaving it to the Ministry of Punishment and Dali Temple to investigate, we arranged for people to investigate it ourselves.
At this time, the officials were filled with anger. Impeaching Zhao Xing would not cause trouble to the officials.
Zhao Xingai lets him do the hard work, it’s just a Kaifeng Mansion anyway.
If you want to count the acres of land across the country, you still have to take action from the government. When the time comes, there will be many ways to stop it.
The excuses discussed by Zhao Xing and Wang Anshi seem to be somewhat unnecessary.
Because the assassination made his father, the emperor and his mother worried, Zhao Xing also rarely became honest for a while.
Every morning he goes to the Kaifeng government office to deal with the affairs that need to be handled by him, and learns about the progress of land measurement in each county, and then returns to the East Palace to review the records.
On the other hand, Wang Anshi caused quite a stir in Yangwu County.
When Zhao Xing left Yangwu County, he asked Shi Jingbo to interview the landlords and squires in Yangwu County and ask them to voluntarily hand over their hidden acres.
However, how could these landowners and squires hand over the meat in the bowl?
Wang Anshi is not a soft-hearted person. Since the first courtesy is of no use, he can only go to the army.
Zhao Xing had long ago ordered Yin Hanzhang to investigate the illegal evidence of the landlords and gentry in the counties of Kaifeng Prefecture.
Few of these people were clean. Based on the evidence provided by Yin Hanzhang, Wang Anshi arrested several landlords and squires who had committed serious crimes. At the same time, he ordered people to count the acres under their names and found a large number of hidden fields.
In this case, the crime will be increased to one level, and he will be directly sentenced to exile, and all his family property will be confiscated.
Seeing that this was serious business, the other landowners and squires immediately handed over Yin Tian honestly.
For these people, Wang Anshi followed Zhao Xing's instructions and did not touch them. He just asked them to pay a fine according to the number of hidden acres.
The reason is very simple. I have paid less taxes for so many years on hidden fields. Isn’t it appropriate to pay a fine?
Although the amount of the fine made these landowners and squires feel a little pained, they could only pay by pinching their noses.
This is how people are, if you take one step back, there will be a second step.
If they had learned from the beginning that they would be fined for handing over Yin Tian, they might not be so happy.
But now that the fields have been handed over, wouldn’t it be a big loss if the old settlers were confiscated and their homes were confiscated and exiled because they didn’t pay the fine?
In just half a month, Wang Anshi thoroughly investigated the hidden fields in Yangwu County.
A total of more than 200,000 acres of hidden land were discovered, and a fine of nearly 100,000 taels was imposed.
Most of these hidden acres are ownerless, and a few have been occupied. They will be returned to the people after verification.
Even so, according to Wang Anshi's rough estimate, there are still 200,000 acres of farmland left.
Zhao Xing saw the zhazi sent by Wang Anshi and silently calculated it in his heart.
Although Yangwu is affiliated to Kaifeng Prefecture, it is a bit far away from Bianjing, and the price of land per mu is not as high as in Bianjing.
One acre of land ranges from 3,50 taels to more than 10 hectares. The price depends on the fertility of the land and the convenience of watering.
The fields in the hands of the landlords and squires were all of medium and high quality, and one acre was worth seven or eight taels. In other words, the hidden fields discovered in Yangwu County alone are worth more than one million taels.
This is just one county, it can be described as shocking.
Preliminary estimates indicate that the Song Dynasty actually had hundreds of millions of acres of hidden land.
Let’s not talk about the value of these fields. The annual taxes alone are an astronomical figure.
According to Zhao Xing’s understanding, the current number of registered cultivated lands in the Song Dynasty is only over 400 million acres.
In other words, hidden fields accounted for about one-fifth of the total cultivated land in the Song Dynasty.
Zhao Xing took this Feng Zhazi to the palace.
When the officials saw the content on the Zhazi, they were in disbelief and said: "Is this true?"
"Father, my son and I checked the records. When the emperor's grandfather was in power, There are more than 520 million acres of registered land in the world. Today, there are only 440 million acres of registered land in the world. This means that in the past few decades, there have been 80 million acres less land. Land, but the northwest is already barren, and there are not 80 million acres of land, right?”
Zhao Xing did not explain the issue of authenticity, but compared the data on acres of land during the late emperor's time with the data on acres today.
"How dare they!" The official said through gritted teeth.
He had never paid attention to this. Although what Zhao Xing said was a bit shocking, the officials did not think that Zhao Xing would use this to deceive him.
After the officials ascended the throne, they treated civil servants, nobles, and military commanders with great tolerance and preferential treatment.
However, during the decades of his reign, eight thousand acres of farmland disappeared.
As Zhao Xing said, although some territory was lost in the Song-Xia war.
But the land in those places is barren, and because they are located on the border and have been in war for a long time, there is not much arable land.
"Come here!" The official said coldly: "Summon Mr. Han, Mr. Yu... and others to come over."
"Yes!" Mr. Liu responded and withdrew. .
The official took a deep breath and said: "Fu'er, you did a good job this time. Otherwise, I would have been kept in the dark. Why didn't you tell me in the first place?"
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"Father, my son had doubts in his heart and there was no evidence, so he thought that he would tell his father after finding the evidence." Zhao Xing said.
He had considered telling his father this before, after all, the data could be found with a little research.
However, he hesitated and chose not to say anything for now.
Tell your father that he will definitely arrange for someone to investigate, and there is a high probability that nothing will be found.
He checked it himself, and the data he found was the most convincing.
At that time, my father would send people to investigate again. If no problem could be found, it would not mean that there was no problem, but that there was a problem with the people.
Hearing the words, the official pondered for a while and said, "Are other counties also so serious?"
Hearing the words, Zhao Xing knew that his father was still lucky and felt that this was just an example. .
However, Zhao Xing still shattered his father's illusions and said: "The situation near Bianjing is better, but in places farther away like Yangwu County, the situation is basically the same."
“Damn it!” The officials lined up their desks, their eyes full of sharpness.
This was the first time that Zhao Xing saw his father look like this, and there was even a hint of murderous intent in his eyes.
Actually, this is normal.
My father has been an honest man among emperors since ancient times.
He is not like some mediocre and foolish kings who ignore government affairs and are content to enjoy themselves.
On the contrary, he was diligent, loved the people, and was very frugal.
He was also able to detect the long-standing shortcomings of the imperial court and implemented new policies to change these.
However, many of the shortcomings of the Northern Song Dynasty were indeed exacerbated during his reign.
It is just hidden by prosperity and not highlighted.
Zhao Xing feels that his father's behavior cannot be considered mediocre. He can only be said to be too idealistic, too deeply poisoned by Confucianism, and believes in ruling the country by virtue.
It’s not that Confucianism is bad, it’s just that it puts the cart before the horse.
Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty deposed hundreds of schools of thought and only respected Confucianism in order to consolidate and strengthen imperial power.
The core of Confucianism is moral education.
Rulers need this kind of thinking to make the ruled obey their rule in order to achieve the goal of eternity.
But the emperor does not need this.
When my father ascended the throne at a young age, he did not learn the imperial power from the late emperor. Instead, he was instilled with a lot of Confucianism by those ministers and cultivated him into an 'honest man'.
An honest person has a good temper and does not get angry easily.
But once an honest person gets angry, he is very scary.
"Father, what do you think should be done with the hidden fields that have been measured?" Zhao Xing asked.
The official pondered for a while and said: "Of course it will be distributed to the people who have no land."
"My son thinks this is inappropriate." Zhao Xing said.
When the officials heard this, they knew what Zhao Xing must be thinking, and asked: "In your opinion, what should it be?"
"Take it back to the imperial court and rent it to the people by the government." Zhao Xing said.
Nationalizing land is the best way to prevent land annexation.
(End of this chapter)