novelAbuy Chapter 512
Chapter 512
Chapter 512
Ye Xianggao, Fang Congzhe and others listened patiently.
Feng Ziying's remarks are a bit off topic. How to build, what kind of ships to build, and how to use these ships are all things for later. What they want to hear is how to let the merchants in the south of the Yangtze River take the initiative without paying the court. Willing to set up shipyards in Denglai and southern Liaoning to build ships.
They are all representatives of Jiangnan gentry. If the imperial court does not pay, then if these merchants are to go north, then the only way is to force the wealthy Jiangnan merchants to enter Beijing like when Emperor Guangyuan moved the capital 80 years ago. I can only bow my head and obey orders.
At that time, the Jiangnan gentry and wealthy businessmen were hurt, and it also caused the Jiangnan gentry's dissatisfaction with the imperial court. The antagonism between the North and the South intensified. The shipyard is almost equivalent to donating.
The amount of donations is too large, and people have to be tied there, which is undoubtedly the spokesperson of these merchants, including the entire Jiangnan gentry and merchants, which is unacceptable to them.
Feng Ziying is also obviously aware of this point. This group of guys is obviously not interested in the specific conditions of the maritime trade ships and naval fleet ships that may be faced after opening the sea. What they are interested in is how to solve the problems mentioned before.
"Setting up a shipyard, the officials thought it would be possible to recruit merchants who are familiar with the shipbuilding industry in Jiangnan, and give these merchants free land in suitable areas in Denglai and Liaonan. In addition, these merchants can recruit some people who are familiar with construction. If they are registered personnel, they can be removed. , including registered craftsmen in Qingjiang and Longjiang shipyards, can also handle this,..."
This proposal immediately caused an uproar in the palace. Not only the Ministry of Industry, but also the cabinet and other important ministers of the six ministries obviously found it difficult to accept such a proposal.
Registered craftsmen and technicians are equivalent to the "private property" of the Ministry of Industry. Although they have no power to restrict their personal freedom, their household registration is permanently fixed and inherited from generation to generation. The iron rules of the year are undoubtedly difficult for them to accept.
Both Ye Xianggao and Fang Congzhe were a little moved.
There is no doubt that this suggestion is beneficial to the Jiangnan merchants who are willing to go north to set up shipyards, but they are also important officials of the court. To protect the interests of the court, this suggestion obviously hurts the interests of the court.
This suggestion was obviously too unexpected, and it was no surprise that it would be firmly opposed by other ministers, especially the Ministry of Industry and ministers from the Northern Region. Only Feng Ziying, a stunned young man, dared to speak out like this.
In their view, it may be difficult to get support for this proposal, and a hasty statement will only attract hostility and attacks.
And just because of this point, it is certainly impossible for these merchants to invest huge sums of money in the construction of shipyards in Denglai, southern Liaoning.
To build a shipyard capable of producing ships cannot be done by a group of technicians and craftsmen alone, and the technicians and craftsmen of Qingjiang Longjiang Shipyard, as Cui Jingrong said, these people have been separated from the real shipbuilding technology for long voyages, I am afraid Many of them are incompetent. If you really want to be a master shipbuilder, you have to recruit and train yourself.
Seeing that many ministers in the palace were either whispering, getting angry, or sneering and dismissing, Feng Ziying also knew that this would cause public outrage, but if this point was not brought up, the two shipyards would be so corrupt, and even these craftsmen It's a pity that the technicians are slowly degrading into unusable ones, so even if it offends some people, it must be brought up.
Seeing Feng Ziying's silence, Zhang Huaichang, the censor of Zuodu who had never spoken, said sharply: "If you lose your manners in front of the palace, you will be punished according to the law!"
As soon as this remark came out, everyone became quiet, and Zhang Huaichang said: "The emperor and the chief assistant have already said it before, let Feng Xiuzhuan finish the strategy first, and then discuss the specific situation. Why should you just listen to unsatisfactory words? With such clamor, a scholar who has been an official for many years is not as good as an academy student, how decent it is, it is an insult to gentleness!"
Feng Ziying's eyes fell on this Zuodu censor. This person's identity is also very special. Theoretically, he is from Songjiang, Nanzhi, but his ancestral home is not Songjiang, but Gai County, Liaodong. It's just that his father was with the army since childhood. He lived in Songjiang Weisuo, and later he passed the Jinshi examination as a military child and entered the imperial court, so theoretically his native place belongs to southerners, but in his heart he is a northerner, and he is a Liaodong native who is extremely rare among civil servants.
Zhang Huaichang is the No. [-] person in the Metropolitan Procuratorate, in charge of Fengxian. This person has a dignified personality and is aloof from others. All the officials in the court are in awe, even Ye Xianggao and Fang Congzhe respect him very much.
Fortunately, this person is not the kind of nitpicking type. The Metropolitan Procuratorate under his rule has basically followed this ethos, except that he is stricter with key groups such as the army, Wu Xun, and Long Banwei. He is also quite favorable to scholars and civil servants, so this person has a very good reputation among scholars in the north and south.
After being reprimanded by Zhang Huaichang, the hall was immediately quiet and silent, Feng Ziying raised her eyes to look at Ye Xianggao, Ye Xianggao nodded, then Feng Ziying continued: "Your official also knows that this discussion must be unprecedented, but our party I went to the Longjiang Shipyard in Qingjiang for on-the-spot inspection. If this situation continues, these craftsmen and technicians will basically be useless in less than ten years, because the technology of shipbuilding is also changing with each passing day. Why can't they go to Denglai and Liaonan with their boat skills instead of letting them disappear from everyone?"
"Besides, the officials of the Ministry of Industry are also here. We all know that these craftsmen are struggling to make ends meet, and have no interest in the matters arranged by the superiors. Craftsmen and craftsmen must be as different as heaven and earth, there is no other, there is no incentive and reward mechanism, they do not do one thing, do more or less, and do well or poorly, how can we make them work hard like private shipyards? ? No benefit, no benefit, no benefit, who would like to endure hardships and losses?"
Feng Ziying specifically pointed out that this is a small person, different from the "gentlemen" in the palace, so as not to argue about the way of enlightenment.
Although it can still be seen that many people disapprove and disapprove of this, some people are thinking about this issue. At least with Zuodu Yushi's reprimand, no one will jump out to be a monster at this time.
"The establishment of shipyards in Denglai and southern Liaoning must encourage and support merchants. Otherwise, how can they attract each other? The support of craftsmen and technicians is on the one hand, and the allocation of land for free support is also on the other hand, but these are not enough. The shipyard will cost a lot. The investment of money and silver will not be able to see the effect immediately, if you want to find these Jiangnan merchants to go north, you have to take some measures,..."
When the drama came, everyone pricked up their ears.
"To build a shipyard, the merchants themselves must invest a lot, but they may not have enough money, so what should we do? Some people have thought about letting the imperial court contribute, but after the imperial court has invested, how can we prevent these merchants from using the imperial money indiscriminately? Lost? If you intervene in management, will there be no distinction between the host and the guest, resulting in constant internal strife, and finally mutual shirk responsibility, and the result will be nothing?"
Feng Ziying asked herself, apparently denying the possibility of the imperial court's funding. This also made some people feel relieved, and some people were slightly disappointed, but more people became more interested and wanted to see how to solve this deadlock.
This is an obvious matter. If merchants are to pay for their own work to work for the imperial court, they will definitely find various reasons to justify the difficulty.
"The lower official's opinion is that he can be encouraged to borrow money from the Yinzhuang money shop to build, not only to build shipyards, but also to use this method to build ships in the future..."
When this idea came out, many people in the hall shook their heads again and again.
There are indeed Yinzhuang money shops in Jiangnan and Jingshi, many of which are integrated with pawnshops and gold and silver shops. It does not mean that loans cannot be made, but loans are basically done in the form of mortgages, such as gold and silver jewelry and Antiques, such as fur clothes, such as silk and satin, can even be exchanged for money with land deeds and house deeds as pledges, but that is basically not a loan, but a pledge, and of course there must be interest and handling fees.
But this kind of mortgage and pledge for money is generally not large, usually between a few taels and a few hundred taels, and it is basically rare for a thousand taels. After all, what can be mortgaged with thousands of taels of silver? , If you really need a land deed and a house deed, you don’t need to go to a pawn shop. You can borrow money immediately from friends or lenders.
As for the real money shops and banks in this era, they are basically set up for merchants to collect service fees for universal deposit and withdrawal services, and there is basically no business of lending.
But building a shipyard and borrowing money for shipbuilding are different. It may cost tens of thousands of silver at every turn. Which pawn shop or Yinzhuang money shop dares to undertake such a job that can make the shop go bankrupt?There is no such precedent.
But Emperor Yonglong, Ye Xianggao, Fang Congzhe, Zheng Jizhi, and Li Sancai's eyes lit up, and they understood the meaning hidden in Feng Ziying's words.
In the matter of Linqing tribute bricks before, Cui Jingrong mentioned in his memorial that the ban on tribute bricks was lifted, but many merchants with skills and manpower suffered from not having enough money to start their businesses, and borrowing usury would have too high an interest rate and too much risk. Large, restricting the development of tribute brick production industry.
In his memorial, he mentioned that Feng Keng suggested that the imperial court could open a bank, or form a joint venture with private merchants, mainly to support this kind of business that is beneficial to the people's livelihood and the imperial court.
However, Emperor Yonglong later handed over this memorial to the cabinet for discussion. Although he agreed to lift the ban on tribute bricks, this proposal was only circulated among the cabinet and the Ministry of Household Industry, and it did not attract attention, let alone be handled.
But now that Feng Ziying's old story is brought up again, it is obvious that this matter is really taken as a key part of it.
This guy is really powerful, he actually made a move in advance, and responded step by step, making you follow him unknowingly. Both Ye Xianggao and Fang Congzhe saw the fear hidden behind some appreciation from the other party's eyes.
(End of this chapter)