Dashun Yongchang

However, after experiencing the repeated battles of the Heshun Army in Jining, Dingtao, and Chengwu, the high spirits of the Qing army when they first went south have disappeared. The will to fight is completely different from the Ming army in the past. As a new force that has just defeated the imperial court, the discipline of the peasant army is much higher than that of the Ming army. In addition to the concept of nation and country that Li Zicheng began to instill in the army, It also caused Shunjun to shift from the idea of ​​resisting the imperial court to the idea of ​​defending the country.

Under organized conditions, the armed forces defending the homeland are always more capable of fighting. Even those local tyrants in Henan can often achieve surprising results in the face of the peasant army's attack.For the Qing army, it was quite a headache to face this kind of resistance war that was almost unanimous between the army and the people. It was not that they had not encountered such a situation. It was also the biggest loss of the Qing army's previous entry into the customs.

The reason why Abatai’s entry into the customs is not small is that he encountered resistance from the whole people in the process of attacking Shandong. The looting and killing actions of the Qing army in Shanxi and Hebei before this can be regarded as a wake-up call for the people in the north. Guan was not a revenge against the Ming Dynasty, but to plunder the population and property. Therefore, the soldiers and civilians in Shandong adopted a firm confrontation when facing the Abatai army. In such a fierce battle, Jining, Weifang and other cities were finally preserved. This is something that the Qing army has never encountered when it entered the customs several times in the past.

However, unlike the military and civilian resistance in Shandong that Abatai encountered, the military and civilian resistance organized by the Marshal's Mansion was more effective.After all, the soldiers and civilians in Shandong did not have a unified leader, but the gentry in each city led the people to stick to the city. They only wanted to protect themselves and rarely went out of the city to help their neighbors.

Therefore, although Abatai has a headache, he can still concentrate his forces to eradicate the resisting cities one by one.But now Shunjun is different here. Under the unified command of Marshal Du's Mansion, almost all cities and villages in Shunjun have been mobilized. The Qing army was not given the opportunity to capture manpower and replenish supplies.

That is to say, in the face of such a defense line with cities as fortresses and some rural fortresses as shackles, it is difficult for the Qing army to adopt any tactics of gathering troops to besiege a point. Jun flanked himself.In this way, an extremely long frontal front was formed.

And this kind of frontal offensive war needs to continuously fill up manpower and materials until one of the parties is drained of blood.However, it is clear that the Qing army was not prepared for such a situation.

Because the Manchus entering the customs was also a hasty decision. Just before, the Manchus wanted to join forces with Li Zicheng to attack Daming, but no one thought that Li Zicheng's Western Expedition would bring down Beijing.In order to prevent Dashun from really taking over the inheritance of Daming, Manchu relatives and nobles led by Dorgon and others impatiently ordered to enter the customs.

Although such a hasty entry allowed the Manchus to seize the opportunity to take down Shanhaiguan and Beijing, they failed to annihilate Li Zicheng's main force. This is the fundamental reason why the Qing army and the Shun army are now cemented on the front line of Shandong.As for the soldiers of the Ming army who surrendered to the Manchus, they did not surrender because they liked the Manchus, but because they saw Dashun lost Beijing and thought that Dashun might not be able to return, so they surrendered. .

With the idea of ​​serving the new dynasty, when these surrendered Ming troops followed the Manchus to win the battle, they naturally didn't think about it. Even if the Manchus surrounded the suburbs of Beijing, they just felt that the new dynasty was too domineering , does not seem to be the reason for Anmin.But when they encountered setbacks in the southward movement and news of the defeat of the Qing army in Qingzhou and Henan came one after another, the psychology of the soldiers of the Han army changed.

Chapter 486 Changes

One of the reasons why the surrendered soldiers of the Ming Dynasty contributed to the Manchus was that they believed that the Manchus were more powerful than the peasant army. Therefore, as long as the Manchus were behind him, even if the Shun army could defeat him, but when the Manchus played in person, the Shun army would be able to defeat him. It is bound to be invincible.They fight as hard as they can on the battlefield because they feel their side is winning.

But the defeat of the Azig army, even the Manchu flag master like Luo Luohun was captured by the Shun army. It would be a big joke to say something like "Manchu is invincible" at this time.After realizing that the force of the Manchus might not be stronger than that of the Shun army, and that he might become the losing side, the New Han army in the Qing army suddenly began to look forward and backward again, thinking of being wise and safe.

After defeating Chengwu, the reason why the Qing army did not expand the results in time and completely defeated the retreating Shun army in the pursuit was also because the Xin Han army lost the idea of ​​​​desperate, and only wanted to accept it as soon as it was good. After all, seeing that the war could not last a day It will be over in two days, so the more brave you are at this time, the faster you will die.

If the Qing Dynasty has already ruled the world, then at this time, if you die on the battlefield, you can earn a family background for your family, but now the Qing Dynasty does not seem to have the momentum to unify the world. It may be dead in vain.These Ming officials who surrendered were not fools, so naturally they would not do such a loss-making business.

In fact, in addition to the fact that these newly surrendered Han troops began to shrink back, even the Manchus in the army also showed signs of war weariness. The defeat of the Azig Army made the Manchus in the Eastern Route Army think that the plan for the southern expedition It has almost failed, and the fight at this time will only kill a few more people, and there will be no fundamental changes.The difficulty of the Shun army and the fact that there were not many spoils in the battle also greatly disappointed the Manchus who regarded war as plunder. They felt that their blood was shed in vain.

With such complaints in the army, Doduo knew it was time to withdraw the army, otherwise his authority as the commander would also be lost to Iyhudi.However, Duoduo still hopes to teach the Shun army a hard lesson, so as to save Azig's lost face, so that the new Han army below will not have other thoughts. I really can't wait any longer.

Although Doduo thinks that if the war is disharmonious, the Manchus should retreat out of the pass, but he also knows that being driven out by the Han people and leaving the pass by himself are two different things. If they are driven out by the Han people, then the loss of the Manchus will be too great , and may not even be able to hold places like Shenyang.

Therefore, after realizing the change in the mood of the soldiers in the army, Duoduo had to give up his plan to drive the troops to continue to attack Guide and Xuzhou, and stood still in Dingtao, watching the movement of the Shun army.At this time, Dorgon sent someone to send a letter, and the judgment he made was in line with his thoughts, so after sighing in his heart, he asked someone to take Ni Yada down, let him have a good rest, and wait for himself. After writing the letter to the Nine Kings, let him return to Beijing to repeat his orders.

Just as Niyada left here, Duoduo sat there thinking for a while, and then he had someone call for Lord Zhen Guo

Du Erhu and Du Nuwen ordered them to go to the army in Cao County and Shan County to check the military situation, and then came back to reward themselves.

The two brothers Du Erhu and Du Nuwen accepted Duoduo's order and went out.In the city, Dunuwen tried his best to keep silent. When he and his elder brother left the west gate, he finally couldn't help but asked his elder brother, "What kind of military situation did the ten kings want us to see?" ? Why can’t I understand?”

Du Erhu glanced at his younger brother, waved his followers back a few steps, and then said to his younger brother, "The ten kings don't want to fight anymore, but they need a chance to withdraw, so they found our brother."

Du Nuwen didn't quite understand, looked at his elder brother and said, "Although the soldiers in the battalion have some weird words, they don't want to withdraw their troops, right? We have finally broken through the defense line of the Shun army, and we are going to have a truce? Then our previous Isn't the blood shed in vain?"

Du Erhu curled his lips and said: "What is our blood, isn't it all the blood of the Han people? When the Cao County was attacked, the blood of our people was shed. It is indeed a pity that Luo Bahana and Kerkun , they can be regarded as rare heroes among our Manchurians. But because of this, we have to be more cautious. If we win Li Zicheng but kill all the Manchurians, we have won this battle? Or have we lost? ?”

Du Nuwen couldn't make a turn for a while, and when he remained silent, Du Erhu looked at the dirt road ahead and said, "Don't think it's a good thing for the ten kings to come to us to inspect the military situation, he just wants us to come forward and propose to withdraw troops That's all. If there are any problems in the future, the responsibility will naturally become our brothers again."

Dunuwen was a little puzzled and said: "Since the ten kings don't want to fight, why should they push it on our brothers? With the brotherhood between the nine kings and the ten kings, would they still blame the ten kings for failing?" ? It doesn't make sense."

Du Erhu said disdainfully: "Because Prince Ying was defeated, if the ten kings take the initiative to withdraw their troops again, the kings of the White Banner will be besieged if meritorious crimes are discussed at the meeting of the king's ministers after the war. Are you going to be forced to hand over some military power? You must know that Hauge is still victorious in Datong, so if you compare them like this, won’t the level of the two sides come out?”

Although Dunuwen was inexperienced in politics, he also knew that Hauge and Dorgon became incompatible after the battle for the throne. The meeting of political ministers is also getting smaller and smaller. This situation is actually still dangerous.Because in the past, when Xian Khan dealt with the other three major Baylors or beat the small Baylors, he would first isolate them at the meeting of the king's ministers, and then suddenly attack and convict them. It is hard to say that the regent will not follow suit. According to Xian Khan The way to deal with Hauge.

Although he didn't want to intervene in the grievances between the two white flags and the two yellow flags, Du Nuwen was still angry at being blamed for no reason. He said to his brother: "What does this have to do with our brothers? As far as we propose to withdraw troops, Ten kings will be able to listen? Who will believe it if you tell it?"

Du Erhu said calmly: "As long as the Nine Kings believe in it, isn't that enough?"

Dunuwen was finally discouraged now. He walked forward with his brother in silence for a while, and finally couldn't help complaining and said: "I thought it was really bad luck that Luo Luohun Baylor was captured by the Shun army. But Now it seems that it is not him who is unlucky, but our brother."

Du Erhu didn't accept his brother's words, he just hoped to use this incident to make his brother mature, and stop thinking about fighting for an honor on the battlefield to wash away the shame of his grandfather and father.He didn't feel that his grandfather and father had any crimes. It was simply because his grandfather was the real heir of the Great Khan, but he was framed by Zhubeile and died. Therefore, everyone was sorry for their family, not their family for everyone.

As far as his father Du Du is concerned, he has made countless military exploits but has never been rewarded by Xian Khan. Instead, he was punished for complaining too much, and was finally abolished and died under house arrest.Luo Luohun's complaints and revelations about the first Khan were actually very sympathetic to Du Erhu, so he hid a copy of this article that was banned by Duoduo's order, and prepared to take it back to Beijing and place it in his father's spiritual seat Before, it can be regarded as comforting the father who died of depression.

For the next journey, the two brothers had their own thoughts, and they had nothing to say along the way, but they quickened their pace.So before dark, they arrived at the big camp established in the northeast suburb of Cao County. The generals of the Qing army who attacked Cao County were Malaxi and Ahanikan. When they heard that the Du Erhu brothers had arrived, they both greeted them outside the big tent.

Maraxi is still very enthusiastic when he sees the two brothers. Of course, this enthusiasm is mainly because he expects the two brothers to bring him some good news.After talking for a few words in the simple courtyard, Marahi invited the two brothers into the room to talk.Marahi's big tent was placed in a village, and it should be the ancestral hall for discussing affairs in the village. The place is quite empty, and it is a hall with a patio.

After Ma Laxi, Ahanikan and Du Erhu brothers sat opposite each other, Ma Laxi asked Du Erhu, "When will the big general's guns be brought over from the camp? Although the city wall of Cao County is not high, it is in line with the army. The defense is very resolute. I am afraid that there is no cannon to attack. In addition, can you bring more food? Now the food in the camp can only last for four or five days at most. Every time the food transport team is delayed, this If there is a food shortage, will the soldiers still have the mind to fight?"

After listening to Malaxi's question, Du Erhu sighed and said, "Daying is also trying its best to supply the front line, but the road from Jinan and Dongchang to Dingtao is not peaceful now, it's not that Daying deliberately delays the delivery Daying does have difficulties in distributing food. I can only report this issue to the Ten Kings for you, and there is nothing else I can do.

As for the cannon?What the Ten Kings mean is that the cannons are inconvenient to transport. If you can't figure out the main force of the Shun army, then the cannons can't be moved easily, otherwise it will be a waste of time to go back and forth.The important thing now is not to take down Cao County, but to find out whether the main force of the Shun Army will reinforce Cao County or Shan County. If the main force of the Shun Army cannot be eliminated, how long will it take for us to fight city by city? "

When Marahi was thinking about how to reply, the

However, Ahanikan has already responded: "What the ten kings said is reasonable. If we fight over the cities one by one, I am afraid that we will not be able to finish the fight for a few years. It is still necessary to destroy the vital forces of the Shun army and force them to give up the cities on their own initiative. Retreating is the right thing to do.

However, seeing that the temperature is getting warmer and the ground is about to freeze, if a batch of grain cannot be transported in advance, wouldn't it be more difficult to transport grain in the future?In addition, it is of course good to be able to eliminate the main force of the Shun army, but if the main force of the Shun army never moves, then what is the point of our staying here?We always have to at least have a backup plan, right? "

Du Erhu glanced at Ahanikan with some surprises. Although he was a general from the Two Yellow Banners, Ahanikan advocated the use of troops against the pass. Unexpectedly, this man now has the idea of ​​​​retiring troops. It seems that the situation on the front line is indeed true. Not so optimistic.The images of soldiers he saw when he entered the camp and Ahanikan's remarks made him no longer have to find any reason to withdraw his troops.

Chapter 487 Destiny

Rested overnight at the camp in Cao County, Du Erhu took his younger brother, accompanied by several Qing army generals, to inspect the camp and the situation of the Shun Army in Cao County in the early morning of the next day.

Niu Wancai's retreat to Cao County did not come from defeat, and Cao County's defenders had already rebuilt some of the surrounding defense systems. Therefore, after the arrival of the Qing army, they could not go directly to Bocheng, but confronted Tukuo and the Shun Army outside Cao County. .

Whoever occupies this soil profile actually means that he has the initiative in siege or defensive battle.Because the large open space between the soil profile and the city wall not only provided room for the defenders to gather and mobilize troops, but also provided indispensable vegetable and grain fields in the long-term siege.If the city defenders are oppressed and lose this area, then the four walls will become the last defense, and the city will not be far from falling.

Now this soil profile is still in the hands of the Shun army, which means that the Qing army has not yet gained the upper hand in the siege battle.But Du Erhu felt a little surprised after seeing the way the opposing Shun army defended Tukuo.

He turned his head and asked Ahani Kan, who was accompanying him, "The Shun army also set up a trench and barbed wire outside the soil profile? Didn't they retreat? How could there be such a complete defense?"

Ahanikan looked at the soldiers of the Shun Army who were patrolling inside the barbed wire fence, and said in a depressed mood: "Maybe Li Zicheng used all the wealth in the south of the Yangtze River for this war, and now the Shun Army is using barbed wire fences in more and more places." up.

This thing is really useful for defense. Digging trenches and repairing soil walls is very time-consuming and consumes the strength of soldiers. Building wooden walls takes up too much energy and is easy to be set on fire by the enemy. But barbed wire is different. This thing One roll does not take up much space, and a barbed wire fence can be pulled up by laying down a few stakes, and it is difficult to destroy. The only disadvantage is that it consumes too much money.

Soldiers are now most afraid of attacking this kind of position with barbed wire. This thing is hard to destroy and easy to build. Even if we open a gap, the Shun army will be able to pull up a barbed wire again the next day, especially with bird gunners behind the barbed wire , The soldiers took their lives to destroy a section of barbed wire, and then faced the next barbed wire, so that there was no end in sight. "

Du Erhu frowned slightly, because he felt that Ahanikan's answer was a bit irrelevant. He obviously asked how the Shun army's position was so complete, not how difficult it was to fight.It's not that he hasn't been to the front line of Wenshang County. Compared with the fort front of the Shun Army over there, the barbed wire fence in front of him is already considered thin.

However, Ahanikan didn't pay attention to Du Erhu's expression. He just looked at the Shun army's position in front of him and said to himself: "It is said that we broke the two cities of Dingtao and Chengwu, but in fact, only the city was defeated. It's just Wu, Dingtao's Shun army retreated on its own initiative. One only needs to look at the defense of Cao County to know that the Shun army probably didn't think they had failed, they just changed their defense.

Li Zicheng arrived in Guide City two days ago, and after receiving the news, the morale of the Shun Army in the city soared.Even with it, the morale of our army has dropped a lot.Why?Because everyone felt that Li Zicheng's presence on the battlefield seemed to represent victory. "

Du Erhu subconsciously glanced at Ahanikan. He felt that the general of the two yellow flags seemed to be a little bit wrong psychologically, as if he had completely lost the courage to fight against Li Zicheng.

This is obviously an extremely abnormal state. He was about to say something when he suddenly felt that this scene was very familiar. He tried to think back and found that when Lao Khan passed away, this state of ignorance also appeared in the Eight Banners. .At that time, everyone felt that the old Khan who could lead everyone to fight against the Ming army was gone. What should the Manchus do next?

This mental state directly led to the failure of Huang Taiji's first attack on Jinzhou after he ascended the throne. Even when the frontline army retreated, they bypassed the Chinese army and fled back to Shenyang. They were almost caught by the counterattacking Ming army. Huang Taiji said furiously: "It's fine to run away, but no one thought of to inform me when I ran away. Is this an act of loyalty to the lord?"

Unexpectedly, many years later, he actually saw this scene on the Manchus again. This time, it was not that they had lost their trusted commander, but that they had grown fearful of the enemy's commander.Du Erhu couldn't help thinking about this, Huang Taiji often said that the Manchus are a brave nation, not comparable to the weak Han people, but in fact the Manchus are timid, they only dare to show their bravery in front of the weak, once they meet When they get to the strong, they want to escape.

Thinking of this, Du Erhu couldn't help blurting out: "Li Zicheng is the one who can fight against a country with one person."

Ahanikan didn't realize the inappropriateness of Du Erhu's words, but nodded in agreement: "The generals below Li Zicheng, we have all fought against each other, and it's no big deal. Our army's early southward march is like a broken bamboo. Henan, Shandong Most of the areas fell into our hands, and officers, soldiers and civilians from all over the country came to vote one after another, and the generals of the Shun Army were almost powerless to fight back.

But when Li Zicheng returned from the south, the Shun army became more and more courageous. Not only Luo Luohun and Shang Kexi were captured and killed, but even Prince Ying's army was defeated, and the soldiers of Henan fell to the Shun army again.

Now that I think about it, Li Zicheng is quite similar to Xianhan. When Laohan passed away, everyone was in panic, but Xianhan reunited the hearts of my Houjin, not only surrendered to North Korea, but also cleaned up Mao Wenlong's thorn, And wiped out Lin Danhan, and since then I have become a big country outside the customs.

Li Zicheng is doing the same now, suppressing Remnant Ming in the south, and immediately confronting us in Shandong and Henan, and causing me to lose my troops and generals, isn't this destiny? "

Du Erhu didn't want to talk anymore, he just expressed his admiration for Li Zicheng's courage to turn the tide, but he didn't mean to add any halo of destiny to him.However, under the indoctrination of Nurhaci and Huang Taiji, the Manchus became extremely awed by the destiny. This certainly made the Manchus have the will to fight against the two powerful enemies of Mongolia and Ming Dynasty, but it also made the Manchus often think Some inexplicable things are attributed to God's will, which is also the root cause of the popularity of Tibetan secrets among the Manchus.

Li Zicheng has created unbelievable miracles from being a postman to leading an army of hundreds of thousands to overthrow the Ming Dynasty. Even the Manchus do not think that Li Zicheng came to this position for nothing.It's just that in the eyes of Dorgon and others, the destiny of the Manchus is higher than that of Li Zicheng, and the easy capture of Shanhaiguan and Beijing seems to prove this point.

But with the defeat of the Azig Army, Manchu's destiny seems to be fading, while Li Zicheng's destiny seems to be rising.Faced with this situation, generals like Ahanikan felt fearful. This is probably the sequelae left by the two generations of Manchu Khans who overemphasized the destiny.

Although Du Erhu didn't answer Ahanikan's words, he was still thinking about what Li Zicheng was thinking in the face of such a favorable situation.Is it trying to wipe out the main force of the Qing army on the East Road in World War I, so as to drive the Manchus out of the pass?Or just accept it as soon as it is good, keep the existing results and seek a compromise with them?

When Du Erhu was thinking, Li Zicheng was actually not doing anything related to the war. He was busy with two things, one was rebuilding the local grassroots regime, and the other was starting to cultivate supporters of Dashun.

In fact, it is not difficult to rebuild local grassroots political power. If the management of the Yellow River and the restoration of construction can be carried out, then the grassroots organizations will naturally be restored.And it was no different from Li Zicheng's speculation. Even the gentry who harbored deep hatred for the peasant army would not object to the two things of governing the Yellow River and restoring people's livelihood.

In particular, the people of Guide Mansion, who were deeply troubled by the Yellow River, were very excited about Li Zicheng's talk of harnessing the Yellow River instead of talking about war after arriving in Guide.For the people of Ming Dynasty who have experienced years of war, they don't want the war to continue at all, because the war has brought them no benefits except for the lives and wealth of their families.

For these people, they don't care who will be the emperor, they only care about whether there is someone who can end this troubled world and let them return to the peaceful life before the war.Even a life under heavy taxation is much better than a life with no hope in sight.

Li Zicheng's two propositions of harnessing the Yellow River and restoring local people's livelihood naturally won the support and approval of most people, which also made Ding Kuichu's resignation not arouse too much attention from the people of Guide.

Li Zicheng did not follow Daming's practice of handing over the responsibility of water control and local restoration to the officials, and asked the local gentry to assist him. Instead, he asked the council to discuss a feasible plan first, and then the Marshal's Mansion was in charge of supervision. Check local governments for implementation.

Although this council should theoretically be a council elected by the whole province of Henan, due to the uneven selection of personnel from various places, an enlarged meeting with the Council of Guide Mansion as the main body was formed in the end.However, when this meeting began to discuss the governance of the Yellow River and the restoration of local people's livelihood in Henan, Li Zicheng gave the representatives of the gentry a blow at the meeting.

When participating in the discussions at the meeting, Li Zicheng, some representatives of the gentry, put forward to himself that the clearing of Zhang Tianmu was harmful to the interests of the gentry, and he was furious for a while and said: "Why does the Marshal Du want to clear the Zhang Tianmu? Don't you understand? ?

In the past ten years or so, some people took advantage of the chaos of the war to take advantage of their own family status to occupy the land of ordinary people. Are there still such incidents?Don't talk about Xiaomin's land, that is, those Wangzhuang villages in Henan, how many of them are now occupied by you, and you still have the face to talk to me about Qingzhang as a disturbing act?

To restore the people's livelihood in Henan, we must first clarify the land registration in Henan. If the people don't have land to cultivate, how can they live and work in peace and contentment?Small people can't live and work in peace and contentment, so can you continue to enjoy the glory and wealth?I rebelled not to defend your interests. If you are allowed to continue to oppress the common people, why would I rebel? "

Chapter 488 Proceeding One

Faced with Li Zicheng's sudden fury, the representatives of the council immediately focused their attention on the people in the front row.According to the rules of this era, any matter that is discussed by the public is almost always discussed in front of the City God Temple, and the Lord City God is invited to be a witness.

Although Li Zicheng didn't believe this, Guide Mansion didn't have a dedicated meeting hall, and it wasn't appropriate to put it in an official office or a private mansion, so he obeyed everyone's wishes and held a meeting in front of the Town God's Temple as usual.

Li Zicheng sat on the steps of the Town God's Temple, and the others sat on the left and right under the steps. It looked like a small court meeting.However, it is different from the Chaohui in that everyone has a seat to sit.

The representatives in front of everyone were representatives from several prominent families in Guide Mansion.Although Li Zicheng has tried his best to ask all localities to select some real people's representatives when electing representatives, but the representatives who can be elected by various places to participate in the Henan Provincial Council still do not see any ordinary people, and the worst status is also a scholar. People are at least powerful with official status.

Of course, after these people arrive in Guide, they still have to pay respect to the local noble families in Guide, because at least in Daming, the local noble families in Guide have all been high-ranking officials at the provincial and ministerial level, and the official status of these people, but It was just a small official awarded when he followed the Ming Dynasty's army to suppress bandits, and he was basically unworthy of publicity.

What's more, the origin of their official positions is also difficult for the Shun Army, so the representatives of these places are quite honest after they come to Guide, and everything is headed by the local prominent families in Guide.Because the Henan Provincial Council was established in a hurry, some places did not even send representatives, but only entrusted representatives from neighboring areas to attend the meeting. Therefore, this time, more than half of the provincial council members are members of the Guide Mansion Council.

Regardless of seniority, power, and intelligence, everyone felt that they were not as good as the Guide family, so they naturally acquiesced in the situation that the Guide family was the leader.It is precisely because the strength of the local gentry in Guide gained the upper hand in the newly formed Henan Provincial Council, so the gentry in Guide felt that they seemed to be able to negotiate terms with Li Zicheng, so they met when Li Zicheng came to the council. , made a request to stop Qingzhang.

The ideas of these Guide gentry are obviously simple. Although they gained the upper hand in the council, Li Zicheng now has a lot of support from the people and the army with the prestige he just returned from the victory. Ignoring the pressure these gentry put on him, he immediately accused the Henan gentry of stealing property from local civilians in the past ten years or so.

Li Zicheng's fierce attitude was beyond the expectation of the gentry. They had seen Li Zicheng's tolerant attitude towards the tyrants from all over Henan, and thought that the Dashun Emperor had finally realized that the foundation of establishing a dynasty was, after all, We have to rely on the support of these gentry and landlords.

But now Li Zicheng's fury made them start to become timid again, and they couldn't help turning their attention to those who were qualified to speak on behalf of the gentry and landlords.The objects of attention of these representatives are the representatives of the Shen, Hou, Song, and Ye families in Guide.

However, at this time, the representatives of these families turned their attention to Hou Xun, the former Minister of the Household Department. After Li Zicheng drove Ding Kuichu home to recuperate, Hou Xun knew that his secluded life might not be guaranteed.Although he still didn't have the idea of ​​becoming an official in Dashun, he also knew that it might not be possible to cooperate with the Marshal's Mansion.

There is no way, who made the current Hou family have a great career, has surpassed the Shen family and the Song family, and has become the head of the Guide family.Both the Shen family and the Song family made their fortunes early. The Song family achieved success in the Jiajing period, while the Shen family was the teacher of Emperor Wanli. Therefore, these two families were among the top families in Guide before the apocalypse, while the Hou family did not rise until the end of Wanli. , but became the late comer, because Hou Xun, the former minister of the Ming Dynasty, is still there.

At Hou Xun's age, if Daming is not finished, he still has a chance to recover.Therefore, the power of the Hou family in Guide is naturally a latecomer. Why did the gentry of the Ming Dynasty regard the imperial examination as the right path? The incorruptible Hou family's real estate in Guide is also comparable to that of a prince.

In this way, a problem arises, if you don't have an official body to protect your huge family business, how can you keep this tens of thousands of furniture?When the Hou family was powerful, they often invaded other people's fields. If you no longer have the status of an official, it will naturally be the turn of a new official to eat your flesh.

Before Hou Xun could live in seclusion in the countryside and refused to be an official in Dashun, it was because of Ding Kuichu's presence. With his fellow countryman and Ming's official relationship, Ding Kuichu naturally had to speak for them, the hometown gentry, after all, the Ding family was also a member of Guide If the interests of the gentry in Guide are damaged, the interests of the Ding family will also be damaged.

But now that Ding Kuichu has been relieved of his official position, the Guide gentry have lost an official representative who can represent their interests. How dare Hou Xun continue to be a noble hermit in the countryside at this time? If you want to be kind and friendly, if you make them feel that you are fighting against yourself, they will really kill you.

However, the reason why some township officials were unwilling to cooperate with the Shun Army was not sincere, but just to protect the family's reputation.Because these scholars also know that slaves with three surnames will be spurned by others and will not be trusted by the new dynasty, so they refuse to be ministers with two surnames in order to protect the minister's day, and then let their children serve in the new dynasty to maintain the continuation of the family , which is the best of both worlds.

But farmers like Li Zicheng didn't understand this truth. From their point of view, these officials refused to accept Dashun's appointment because they wanted to fight against Dashun. If Ben is an official with a bad reputation and refuses to cooperate with Dashun, then he can go to hell with Daming.

The Hou family also suffered from this loss when they were sticking to the Guide Mansion before, which greatly hurt the vitality of the originally huge Hou family, and made Hou Xun have to declare that he retired and did not care about world affairs, so as to protect himself and his family in the troubled times , In fact, it is tantamount to giving up the responsibility of defending Daming.

Now that Li Zicheng has defeated the Qing army all the way to the south, the confrontation between Dashun and the Qing Dynasty has begun to form, so the Hou family will naturally live under the rule of Dashun in the future, so the Hou family has to maintain a little influence in front of Li Zicheng to avoid being the target of Li Zicheng's purge.

At this time, Dashun had not yet formally opened an imperial examination. Although Tian Jianxiu conducted an imperial examination in Xi'an, the object of the examination was for people from Shaanxi and Shanxi, and it could not be regarded as a formal imperial examination.This also meant that scholars from all over the world could not enter the ruling center of Dashun through an effective channel, so Hou Xun had to attend this meeting.

But right after the meeting was held, there was a bad situation where Li Zicheng was in conflict with the majority of the representatives in the meeting, which also made Hou Xun very annoyed. He had been living in seclusion before, just worried that he would encounter this situation.

As a fairly capable bureaucrat, Hou Xun is very clear about one thing, that is, in the process of replacing the old dynasty with the new dynasty, it is not just a matter of changing the emperor. Powerful people, not to mention the current change of dynasty, where a group of founding heroes of the new dynasty replaced a group of old ministers of the previous dynasty. This is a fact that is not uncommon in history.

Therefore, after he visited Ding Kuichu, he understood the other party's hint, and knew that Li Zicheng's forcing Ding Kuichu to go home to recuperate was actually a signal, a signal to clean up the old gentry.At this time, fighting Li Zicheng against Li Zicheng is almost a dead end.

But Hou Xun couldn't just ignore the eyes of the representatives of the gentry around him. If he didn't stand up for the gentry now, then the Hou family would offend the gentry, big and small, in the Guide Mansion. What about a foothold?

Even though he felt embarrassed again, Hou Xun had no choice but to speak to Li Zicheng with difficulty under the gaze of countless gazes: "In front of His Majesty, how dare we speak nonsense to offend Tianwei? It is also true that there are intentional blackmailing of Xiaomin and other acts of disturbing the people, Xiaomin told Wumen that we must always tell His Majesty about these things, otherwise who are our representatives representing?"

The representatives present watched Li Zicheng with bated breath, wanting to know Li Zicheng's reaction to Hou Xun's statement. If the other party still blindly suppressed it with power, everyone had no choice but to keep quiet. Li Zicheng said what he said, and the hero doesn't eat it. Is it a loss in front of you?

Li Zicheng got up and walked back and forth on the steps twice, then stopped to look at the representatives under the steps and said: "I understand what Representative Hou said. If you are only worried about the subordinates disturbing the people, we can Strengthen supervision, but I absolutely do not agree that the clearing of Zhang’s land is an act of disturbing the people, and if the ownership of the land in Henan Province is not cleared, will the common people be willing to cultivate other people’s land?”

Hou Xun turned his gaze slightly, and found that no one stood up to share Li Zicheng's pressure for him. These people were obviously very smart, and they all wanted to hide under his big tree to enjoy the shade. Even if Li Zicheng got angry, he would cut it down first. Only his tree.

This made Hou Xun sneer a few times in his heart, he would not do what these people wanted, it is impossible for the Hou family to fall down like this, even if they lose some property, as long as the family is still there, the Hou family can still recover, more What's more, Li Zicheng seemed to have a good impression of his son Hou Chaozong, so he naturally wouldn't let Li Zicheng leave a bad impression of the Hou family at this time.

So Hou Xun took a deep breath, then took Li Zicheng's words and said: "Your Majesty's words are very true. The common people really need to confirm the ownership of their land before they can farm with peace of mind and the people's livelihood in Henan can be restored. So I don't object to Qingzhang Tianmu, I am willing to set an example, starting with the land of my family.

However, Your Majesty, I would like to ask you to consider how to supervise the subordinate staff to bully the common people. If we have a grievance, we can tell your majesty, what else can the common people do other than endure it? "

Hou Xun's words naturally caused an uproar in the venue. Everyone did not expect that Hou Shangshu would surrender the thief, but Li Zicheng's expression eased after he took a look at Hou Xun. He nodded and said: "Representative Hou said Yes, Xiaomin needs a channel to speak out, so as not to be bullied by subordinates..."

Chapter 489 Proceeding Two