The rise of the poor

Chapter 2101: Enthusiasm is High

The people were enthusiastic about donating, and the endless stream of donations continued until sunset, when they gradually stopped.

Zhu Ping'an did not expect that the enthusiasm of the people for donations would be so high.

I remember that when the last emperor of Ming Dynasty, Chongzhen, was at the end of his rope and Li Zicheng was about to attack the capital, he asked the ministers of Ming Dynasty for donations. But when it was almost a month, what did these loyal ministers of Ming Dynasty do? The then chief minister Wei Zaode was the first to say that he had no extra money at home and took the lead in opposing Chongzhen's solicitation of donations from ministers. Other ministers were even worse, and they all pretended to be poor. Some even pretended to write "Urgent sale of this house" on the door, and some pretended to sell antiques on the street.

Even Chongzhen's father-in-law, the biological father of the empress, refused to cooperate. In order to get him to donate, Emperor Jiajing promoted him to the rank of marquis and then asked him to donate 100,000 taels. However, when the old father-in-law heard that he had to donate so much, he cried and said that he didn't have so much money. He also said that his family was so poor that they could only eat moldy rice, and he insisted that he could only donate 10,000 taels. After Chongzhen's repeated coercion, he reluctantly donated 10,000 taels.

Chongzhen thought the amount was too little, and asked him to donate another 10,000 taels, or at least 20,000 taels. As a result, his father-in-law went to the palace to ask the empress for help. The empress took out 5,000 taels of private money that she had saved for many years and gave it to his father, asking him to understand the righteousness of the matter and donate another 5,000 taels to make up 10,000 taels, so as to set an example for the ministers and save the Ming Dynasty.

As a result, Emperor Chongzhen's father-in-law withheld two thousand taels from the five thousand taels given to him by the empress, and only donated three thousand taels.

Seeing that only a few ministers responded to his request to donate silver, Emperor Chongzhen had to settle for the next best thing and asked everyone to donate physical objects, such as food, fodder, cloth, etc., thinking that it would be easier to implement. As a result, few people responded.

In the end, Emperor Chongzhen could only raise 200,000 taels of silver. He had no choice but to hang himself on the crooked tree on Coal Hill.

However, when Li Zicheng entered the capital, he demanded the stolen goods from Ming officials.

Do you know how much wealth did Emperor Chongzhen's father-in-law give to Li Zicheng? ! A total of 520,000 taels of silver, and other treasures worth 20,000 taels of silver.

The chief minister of the cabinet, who had no money at home, wanted to serve Li Zicheng, but Li Zicheng looked down on him and put him in jail. Under severe punishment, the chief minister of the cabinet, who had no money at home, also offered tens of thousands of taels of silver. After being tortured to death, Li Zicheng confiscated his property and exterminated his clan, and confiscated tens of thousands of taels of silver from both families.

There was also Wang Zhixin, the governor of the East Factory during the reign of Emperor Chongzhen, who also presented Li Zicheng with 150,000 taels of silver and treasures worth 150,000 taels.

As for the people, there are even more.

In the end, Li Zicheng obtained a total of 7000 million taels of silver from civil and military officials and the people of the Ming Dynasty by recovering the stolen goods.

7000 million taels, which formed a sharp contrast with the 20 taels of silver raised by Emperor Chongzhen.

With such a history, Zhu Ping'an thought that today's donations might be limited, but he did not expect that the people would have such a strong enthusiasm for donations.

Perhaps, at that time, the Ming Dynasty was still a middle-aged empire with strong control over society. The society was generally peaceful and stable. The people had confidence in the empire, and it was facing the real threat of Japanese pirates. That's why the people's enthusiasm for donations was so high.

Perhaps, there was also the positive influence of Zhu Ping'an and the Zhejiang Army. Zhu Ping'an's fame in Jiangnan was not at its peak, but he was also widely known, especially after the Battle of Suzhou, when his reputation exploded.

The story of Zhu Ping'an leading the Zhejiang army to defeat the Japanese pirates has been widely circulated, and has also given the people enthusiasm and confidence to donate.

If there were hot searches in this era, Zhu Pingan would definitely be in the top ten of the hot search list.

In short, when the sun sets, there are still people coming from far away to donate money and materials.

According to preliminary statistics, we have received donations of more than 30,000 taels of silver in most of the day today, and there are several donors who have donated more than 1,000 taels.

As for the actual items, it is difficult to count, but there are 278 mules and horses, and more than 300 sheep, pigs and other livestock.

As for food, cloth, etc., they were even more difficult to count. Zhu Ping'an took a preliminary look and found that these physical objects were just as much as silver.

This still took one day, and Zhu Ping'an also made subsequent arrangements. Ordinary people could go to the governor's office to donate, where they would be received by special officials and their names would also be listed on the "Honor Roll".

In comparison, Emperor Chongzhen only raised 200,000 taels of silver after a month of fundraising, and Zhu Ping'an raised one-third of what he raised in half a day.

This is just spontaneous donations from the public.

Seeing so many donations, Zhu Pingan was surprised but also felt a sense of responsibility. The enthusiasm and trust of the people made Zhu Pingan feel the weight of his responsibility.

Originally, this expedition to southern Zhejiang was just to complete the task assigned by Zhang Jing and confuse Xu Hai and the Japanese pirates. Now Zhu Ping'an really wants to gain the trust of the people and make some achievements in southern Zhejiang.

We must not let down the trust of the people.

The sun was setting at this time. We couldn't take the Zhejiang Army to southern Zhejiang overnight. We had to rest and gather our strength for a night, then leave the city tomorrow morning and march to southern Zhejiang.

Zhu Ping'an waved from afar in the direction of the teahouse where Li Shu was, then mounted his horse and returned to the Zhejiang Army camp with hundreds of Zhejiang soldiers.

Not long after Zhu Ping'an returned to the camp, Liu Mu and Ruo Feng rushed to the camp with Wang Zhi's mother, wife and children.

Liu Mu and Ruo Feng were both exhausted and their lips were chapped.

"Sir, we have fulfilled our mission and brought Wang Zhi's mother, wife and children from Jinhua Prison." Liu Mu and Ruo Feng entered Zhu Ping'an's tent and reported breathlessly while clasping their fists.

Both of them had hoarse voices.

"You've worked hard on the journey, please sit down and have some tea."

Seeing that the two men looked haggard, Zhu Ping'an hurriedly asked them to sit down and picked up the teapot to pour a cup of tea for each of them.

"Thank you, sir." Liu Mu and Ruo Feng quickly took the teacup with both hands and thanked Zhu Pingan repeatedly.

Both of them were very thirsty. Their throats were dry from traveling all the way. They didn't care about their image anymore and just picked up the teacup and drank it in one gulp.

"Did the journey go smoothly? Did Wang Zhi's mother, wife and children cooperate?" Zhu Ping'an asked after they had some tea.

"My lord, I had a smooth journey. Wang Zhi's mother, wife and children were quite cooperative except for being afraid."

Liu Mu replied.

"Don't worry, sir. They are all fine and sound. We will follow your instructions and treat them well like our own mother and sons." Ruofeng added.

"Very good, they are the key to this war in southern Zhejiang." Zhu Ping'an nodded with satisfaction.

With them, Zhu Ping'an had the confidence to face Wang Zhi's nearly 100,000 Japanese pirates, and the war was relatively controllable. (End of this chapter)