Chapter 264 Yangzhou Salt Merchant
"Master, Madam said that the food has been prepared."
Fang Wanghai's personal old housekeeper reminded at the door of the study.
Only then did Fang Wanghai realize that he had been talking to his son-in-law for such a long time.
He quickly stood up and said, "Let's go now!"
Fang Wanghai and Su Ze went to the backyard and saw Mrs. Li talking to her daughter on the table.
Mrs. Li looked at her son-in-law. Fang Ruolan's ears turned red again. Su Ze knew that the mother and daughter probably said something personal.
Mrs. Li became more and more pleased with Su Ze as her son-in-law. She just heard from her daughter that she was doted on by Su Ze during this period after she got married.
"What? Ru Lin has just come to Nanjing, and you want him to go to Jiangbei?"
Mrs. Li screamed suddenly. She glared at Fang Wanghai and said,
"As an official, it's okay to send orders to my brother every day. My daughter and son-in-law have just When you come to Nanjing, you will send your son-in-law?"
Mrs. Li roared like a lion from Hedong, and Fang Wanghai's face turned pale with anger, but she couldn't get angry.
He also felt that he was wrong. Since the Japanese pirates invaded Jiangbei last year, there has been some turmoil in Jiangbei now. Su Ze helped him check the situation of the salt merchants, so naturally he could not bring his daughter there.
When the daughter and son-in-law are newly married, they ask the son-in-law to do things. This father-in-law is really unreasonable.
But Fang Wanghai had no choice. The imperial court was forcing him hard, and the salt lettuce issued by him had to be sold within the next six months. Now Fang Wanghai could only count on his son-in-law.
Su Ze quickly said: "Mother-in-law, my son-in-law is also doing it for state affairs. Besides, Jiangbei is not far from Nanjing, and we can return in about half a month." After hearing what Su Ze said, Mrs.
Li's face improved . .
She looked at Su Ze and said, "You men only have national affairs in your eyes. Forget it. Since you are going out, I will take Lan'er back to my house to stay for a few days. How about that?" Su Ze naturally smiled and said, "
Then Of course I listen to my mother-in-law."
Fang Ruolan looked a little lonely when she heard that Su Ze was going to Jiangbei as soon as she arrived in Nanjing, but she was very happy to be able to return to her parents' home for a few days.
This is what married daughters are like. When they are at home, they want to go out, but after they get married, they want to go back to their parents' home.
At this moment, Fang Ruolan suddenly felt nauseated. She covered her lips with her hands and made a gagging sound.
"Lan'er, what's wrong?"
Mrs. Li asked quickly when she saw her daughter's face was pale.
Su Ze walked over and grabbed Fang Ruolan's arm. He put his hand on Fang Ruolan's pulse. After a while, he said with a strange expression: "
Father-in-law, mother-in-law, why don't you invite the doctor to come to the house to take a look?"
Fang Wanghai also said He stood up a little excitedly: "Go and call the doctor quickly! What happened to Lan'er?"
Su Ze also said with a somewhat excited expression: "It seems to be a happy pulse, my son-in-law is a little unclear."
When he heard that it was a happy pulse, Everyone present showed excited expressions. After a while, a doctor walked into the backyard. After the old man took Fang Ruolan's pulse, he immediately bowed to everyone and said, "
Congratulations! This little lady is very happy!"
Mrs. Li's mouth was full of smiles. He quickly said to the maid: "Hurry up and reward me!"
Fang Ruolan's face was also full of a smile of disbelief, but thinking about it these days, Fang Ruolan felt that it was reasonable.
Her daughter's pregnancy was naturally a great joy. Mrs. Li simply asked Fang Ruolan to stay in the house, and sent people to buy supplements to support the fetus. The whole house was very busy.
Mrs. Li told Su Ze to go back quickly, and then let Su Ze go north.
Su Ze has also been surrounded by great joy these days. Fang Ruolan is pregnant, which makes him feel that he is finally tied to this world, and that he finally has a blood inheritance in this world.
This subtle feeling gave Su Ze a goal to strive for.
There is a happy event in the house, and the father-in-law and son-in-law in the house are even more energetic.
The Ministry of Household Affairs in Nanjing was responsible for the salt administration throughout the country. Fang Wanghai first sent people north to Shandong to mobilize the salt reserves in Shandong to Dengzhou.
At Su Ze's reminder, Fang Wanghai sent his close confidants to take care of the matter, and tried to control the rumors as much as possible.
Fang Wanghai also asked people to dig out the account books of the salt currency balances of previous generations from the warehouse of the Nanjing Ministry of Household Affairs. Fang Wanghai also organized people to check these account books and count the total number of salt currency that had not been exchanged after being distributed.
As soon as the news of Fang Wanghai's inspection of Yanyin's account books was released, it immediately aroused the attention of everyone in Southern Zhili.
Although the Nanjing Household Department is not as powerful as the Capital Household Department, matters related to the salt industry are also related to the wealth of many people.
So various forces were inquiring about Fang Wanghai's intentions. This was Su Ze's suggestion of "building the plank road openly and secretly visiting Chen Cang."
Here, Fang Wanghai is vigorously investigating Yan Yin, while Su Ze is preparing to go to Jiangbei secretly.
He did not go to Jiangbei alone, but first went to the Shanghai Anti-Smuggling Corps and found Xu Shixing, who was supervising the group training affairs.
"Brother Rulin!"
Ever since Su Ze returned to his hometown to get married, the anti-smuggling matter in Shanghai has fallen on Xu Shixing.
Lin Deyang has already reported to Su Ze what happened these days. Xu Shixing is indeed a capable person.
Unlike the elder who liked to quarrel with others in history, Xu Shixing was brave enough to do things when he was young and was not afraid of powerful people.
In these days, he led the anti-smuggling group to intercept several smuggling merchant ships belonging to the Xu family in Huating, and firmly controlled the Yangtze River waterway.
Nowadays, the big households in Jiangnan can only go to Huguan and pay taxes before they can send their goods out for sale.
Xu Shixing's father was the prefect of Suzhou and had served as an official in many places in southern Zhili. Su Ze did not greet him and directly told him about Yan Yin.
After listening, Xu Shixing lowered his head and said,
"The congestion of salt pipelines has always been a big problem for our government. In recent years, I heard that ordinary salt merchants have stopped buying salt pipelines." "
Today, there are still salt businesses in Jianghuai. There are only a few of them."
When Xu Shixing said this, Su Ze knew that he had found the right person. They hurriedly asked:
"How many of them can still do salt business now?"
Xu Shixing thought for a while and said: " Huaiyang salt merchants have not completely withdrawn like the northern border merchants. Today, there are still a few big families in Huai'an, Taizhou, and Yangzhou who are still doing salt business." "Among the Huai'an salt merchants, the main ones who are still selling salt
are He's from Huizhou." "Huizhou?"
Su Ze asked doubtfully.
Xu Shixing nodded and said: "Huizhou people are best at doing business. Brother Xu is from Huizhou. He should know better than me." Su Ze quickly wrote it
down, and Xu Shixing continued: "Huizhou merchants have gathered in Huai'an for business for a hundred years. However, they still take Huizhou merchants as their leaders and regularly return to Huizhou to worship their ancestors. Today, Huizhou merchants in Huai'an are basically concentrated in the Hexia area of Huai'an, also known as Hexia Hui merchants." Su Ze quickly wrote it down. It seems
that These businessmen are still very influential in Huai'an.
Since the Ming Dynasty, Huizhou merchants have been active in the commercial arena. Because Huizhou people are good at teamwork, Huizhou merchants were able to survive several turmoils in the Ming and Qing Dynasties.
It seems that domestic business is in decline, but Huizhou salt merchants still rely on group registration to keep warm and can still engage in salt business.
Xu Shixing added: "In addition, there are two other forces that are also engaged in the salt business in South Zhili."
"One is the Xu family of Huating. In addition to the cotton business in Songjiang Prefecture, the Xu family is also a salt merchant in Yangzhou. Business."
"The Xu family still does this?"
Xu Shixing nodded and said, "It only started in recent years, but the Xu family has been very big as soon as they came in. Now, almost half of the salt in Yangzhou is obtained by the Xu family. Salt merchants can only survive if they get salt from the Xu family at a high price."
Su Ze was a little surprised, but he thought it was reasonable.
Although the cotton business is profitable, Mr. Xu Ge was able to "Half Huating" in such a short period of time. It is definitely not possible to rely solely on the steady cotton business.
So what else can make money faster than the salt business?
Xu Shixing said: "In fact, the Xu family does not sell salt to the people at all. They only get salt from the salt field and sell it to small salt merchants for them to sell."
Su Ze asked: "Isn't this against the court's salt law? "
According to the requirements of the Kaizhong Law, merchants who obtain salt extracts can only sell within the prescribed range. This behavior of the Xu family clearly violates the provisions of the Kaizhong Law.
Xu Shixing said with a smile: "It would be great if all these small salt merchants work under the name of the Xu family. Besides, the Xu family can even get the salt, so what does this little thing mean?" Su Ze thought about it and felt that it was indeed the case. It seems
that Xu Ge's hometown is really good at making money.
"The last ones who can get salt are the nobles in Nanjing." "
Among them, the Li family of Linhuai Marquis does the biggest business, especially since the Li family has soldiers, and they once surrounded the salt field. The situation of forcing the salt farm to hand over the salt."
"Is this okay?"
Xu Shixing shook his head and said, "The Li family has salt in their hands. Who in Nanzhili would dare to take care of such a thing as forcing the salt to be delivered?"
Okay, as Su Ze guessed. It’s almost the same. Those who can play the power game in the salt industry are the children of powerful officials, nobles and wealthy businessmen.
Ordinary small businessmen can only rely on them and eat leftovers from their mouths.
After having a general understanding in his mind, Su Ze went to Suzhou City and invited Xu Guo to accompany him. Under the escort of elite soldiers from the Anti-Smuggling Corps, the three of them took a boat from Shanghai to the Yangtze River and arrived in Yangzhou, the important town of water transportation and salt industry, in three days.
In February in Yangzhou, the chill has not gone away, but the willow trees by the canal have also sprouted new buds.
The last time Su Ze came to Yangzhou, Yangzhou was almost poisoned by Japanese pirates. The granary outside the city was burned, and the city was in a state of desolation.
At that time, Su Ze only took a detour in Yangzhou and did not enter Yangzhou city. But this time when he came to Yangzhou, the whole city had regained its vitality.
Walking in the Dongguan Street Market, looking at the boats on the canal, and looking at the shops on both sides of Qingshi Ancient Street, Su Ze seemed to have returned to the commercial street he visited before crossing over.
Xu Shixing also praised and said: "I heard that Dongguan Street has been so prosperous since the Tang Dynasty. At that time, Yangzhou was still the hub of maritime shipping in the south of the Yangtze River, and goods from all over the world could be purchased on Dongguan Street." Xu Guo also said: "Du Mu has a
poem Said: "It's better to roll up a bead curtain than to roll up a bead curtain when the spring breeze blows ten miles along Yangzhou Road."
Everyone nodded, and Su Ze looked at this long street and once again felt the strong vitality of this city.
The entire Dongguan Street relies on the east city wall of Yangzhou. The Grand Canal passes through the street, and across the street is the dock for loading and unloading goods.
Today's Dongguan Street is not only a market for ordinary people to visit, but also the commercial hub of the entire Grand Canal. A large number of goods are transferred here, and merchants buying and purchasing goods can be seen everywhere.
This time Su Ze was pretending to be a businessman preparing to sell salt. As expected, Xu Guo's family had some connections among salt merchants. With Xu Guo's help, he got a letter of thanks from Yangzhou's Lu family salt merchant. This was a businessman in Yangzhou. Huizhou businessman doing business.
Xu Guo said to Su Ze, "The Lu family is on the side of Dongguan Street. Let's find someone to ask for directions."
After a while, Fang Aizhu found a smart boy and took them into Dongguan Street. in the ancient alley.
After going around and around for a long time, the group of people came to a low-key house.
"This is Lu Daguan's Shouzhi Garden."
The boy took the reward and said goodbye to everyone happily.
Xu Guo took the greeting card, and a disciple of the Lu family took the greeting card. After a while, he saw a young master coming out of the house.
"Mr. Xu, my father is out on business. Please tell me to entertain you all well. I am Lu Dou, welcome you all!"
This Lu Dou should have received the instructions from his father. He knew that Xu Guo was the governor of Huizhou Prefecture, so he was very polite in his attitude.
Xu Guo introduced Su Ze and Xu Shixing, both of whom were his classmates in the Nanjing Imperial College, and Lu Dou became even more enthusiastic.
Those who can enter the Imperial Academy must be Juren. Lu Dou also has studied, but he is really not good at studying. To this day, he has not even been admitted as a scholar.
However, after salt merchants make money, they often also have some spiritual needs. Huizhou merchants are also known as Confucian merchants, so they have always loved literary activities.
For example, the Yangzhou Lu family often organizes cultural activities in their house, and they also sponsor some literati, so they have a high reputation in the entire Yangzhou city.
While Lu Dou invited the three people into the room, he said: "It's a coincidence that the three of you are here today. A cultural gathering is being organized in the mansion. I wonder if the three of you are interested?" Unlike
Zhejiang scholars who like to organize various lectures, the literati in Jiangnan Be more tactful.
From Jiangnan to Jiangbei, there were also large-scale academy lectures, but more of them were smaller-scale literary gatherings.
The so-called literary meeting is actually similar to a "salon", which is to invite some scholars to gather under a certain theme. It is probably similar to the poetry club run by Fang Ruolan back then.
Hearing that the Lu family was having a cultural gathering, Xu Shixing and Xu Guo both looked at Su Ze with expressions of interest on their faces.
(End of chapter)