Chapter 91 Private money of Fuzhou Ship Administration Yamen

In the following days, Hu Chuyuan continued to visit the factory under the ship administration office. He also took time to go to the ship administration school and found that the school has been in operation for 13 years, and only two manufacturing class students were enrolled, with a total of 41 students.

This amount is a little too little.

He kept this matter in his heart, but did not make any changes immediately.

If the Fuzhou ship administration is easy to handle, it will not be his turn. In fact, after Shen Baozhen, successive Fuzhou ship administration ministers do not have the actual ability to manage the ship administration yamen. Although the level of the yamen is equivalent to the governor, it is far from being managed by ordinary governors.

It can be said that the subsequent minister of the ship was worse than the first term. Ding Yichang was still alive. Wu Zancheng and He Ruzhang were all Li Hongzhang's cronies and incompetent rats.

Li Hongzhang is a person who likes to appoint incompetent people. His philosophy of employing people is to "emporize virtue and quantity of talent". To put it bluntly, whoever is more obedient, who respects him more, and who is more oriented, he will arranges whoever to take up important positions.

Whether the Fuzhou shipping government office is good or not has nothing to do with him. He just wants to transfer the talents and resources in the government office, so the more obedient the better, the more incompetent the better.

Hu Chuyuan is different. He likes to use those who are really capable. Only in this way can he "enjoy success and taste life".

Before coming to Fuzhou, he transferred Zheng Xitai, the general account of Jiangnan Commercial Bank, and more than ten people, including Feinz, Rawls and Wester, from the Technical Bureau of Qichangyang Bank, through Wu Shuzhen, and Hua Weifang from Gezhi Academy.

Zheng Xitai is a Cantonese. At the age of 17, he entered Shanghai Liru Bank as an apprentice. At the age of 22, he was promoted to the main account. Hu Xueyan fell in favor of him at a glance and recruited him to Fukang Qianzhuang as the shopkeeper of the Shanghai Concession.

Among the first American technician consultants recruited by Wu Shuzhen and Rong Hong for Hu Chuyuan, only three have college education backgrounds, two of whom are Feinz and Rawls. The former was the manager of the Pittsburgh Steel Company, and the latter was the former chief engineer of the Virginia Shipyard.

In order to dig up these two people, the Wu family paid a lot of money.

These people are not simple.

Zheng Xitai, who is only 42 years old, is the one of all the shopkeepers of the Hu family. He is qualified enough to be called the fifth big shopkeeper. He is not tall, slightly fat, and a little grateful.

However, he is indeed a very smart person. In the six years of grinding of Liru Bank, he has exercised fluent English and has a unique understanding of the Western banking industry and the traditional bank business.

In order to check the accounts, Zheng Xitai transferred four main accounts and more than ten help accounts from the Fuzhou Branch of Jiangnan Commercial Bank. In addition to several of his cronies, nearly 20 people who were proficient in accounting checked all night for three days before checking all the accounts of Fuzhou Ship Administration.

Early early in the morning, he submitted the urgent accounting report to Hu Chuyuan, which was more than 20 pages thick.

Hu Chuyuan has always been a very relaxed person. Anyway, there are not many things in the world that can defeat him.

He looked through the accounting report while eating breakfast.

He is also a guy who knows how to "enjoy success and taste life". After four days of coming to the ship's office, he asked Hu Rong to change all the furniture of the office. The antique calligraphy and painting, bronzes, porcelain and jade used for decoration are all treasures.

After reading the whole communique, Hu Chuyuan couldn't help frowning slightly and asked Zheng Xitai, "Are you sure about this private payment?"

Zheng Xitai said with a wry smile, "My employer, the accounts of the government are full of holes. There are too many problems. People with a little ability can see the problem. As for this private money, I dare to take the head guarantee. Since Lord Shen took over the government office, he began to misappropriate it. When he became the governor of Liangjiang, he has always been misappropriated by the director Ye Wenlan. After 13 years, a total of 2.14 million taels of silver were drawn.

Tut.

Hu Chuyuan sneered in his heart and said to himself: Shen Baozhen... That's all!

He thought for a moment and asked Zheng Xitai, "Guess where this money is now and how much is left?"

Zheng Xitai thought for a while and said, "I guess that from the beginning, Lord Shen transferred public funds from the government to let Ye Wenlan do business outside. Ye Wenlan is mainly engaged in Nanyang trade, selling porcelain, silk, tea and lacquerware from Fujian to Nanyang, and then tinware, sugar, spices, and even private salt from Nanyang to Fujian. In recent years, Ye Wenlan has a lot of money and has opened more than a dozen banks in Fujian. It is estimated that the money is also lent outside. In this way, I'm afraid there will be more and more, at least six million taels!"

Tut.

Hu Chuyuan gave a bad smile and said, "The amount is really a lot."

Zheng Xitai added: "In addition to this private money, the phenomenon of corruption and deduction within the government office is also very serious. At least 300,000 taels of official silver are lost every year. In addition, the salaries of foreign consultants are generally too high, and the military salaries of Fujian sailors are also paid by the government. The four problems add up, it is no wonder that the shipping government has no money available, and only more than 100,000 taels of silver can be taken out for shipbuilding every year.

Tut.

Hu Chuyuan was very happy and said with a smile, "So, Lord Zhongtang and He Jing are so eager for me to take care of the shipping administration."

Zheng Xitai couldn't help asking, "My employer, what are you going to do?"

Hu Chuyuan was calm and flatly ordered, "You take people to sort out these communiqués again, divide them according to each official, and see how much each of them is greedy. The evidence should be sufficient. Each person should have one copy. I want them to see it clearly by themselves."

Zheng Xitai nodded and said yes, and then he went on to work.

Hu Chuyuan called Hu Rong over again and told Hu Rong to prepare fifty-seven envelopes and silver tickets. The denominations of silver tickets vary, with a maximum of 3,000 taels and a minimum of only one hundred taels.

In Hu Chuyuan's view, the problem of corruption and deduction by these officials is not big. What they are afraid of is that they deliberately purchase inferior coal and iron at high prices and lose public funds.

How to benefit yourself without harming the public?

Of course, it is also very convenient for him to use his financial resources to control the entire Fuzhou shipping administration, including the Fujian sailors.

He has a lot of money. Why doesn't he take it as his most powerful weapon?

After ordering these things, he continued to invite Wu Shuzhen and those American consultants to visit the shipyard and factory of the ship administration. While looking at them, he also thought about how to improve the production capacity of the ship administration in Fuzhou.

At noon, as soon as Hu Chuyuan saw the three docks of the ship administration, Hu Rong hurried to him and said that there were relatives coming to him.

Relatives?

Hu Chuyuan felt strange and returned to the ship's government. As soon as he entered the study, he saw a very familiar young man sitting in it. He was twenty-seven or twenty-eight years old. He was white and fat, but his figure was not tall, and his expression was vaguely similar to He Jing.

Hu Chuyuan thought, it turned out to be this person...!

This is He Jing's own nephew He Qigong, who was born in Guangdong and has been following He Jing as a staff member. He is also He Jing's most trusted confidant.

Seeing Hu Chuyuan, He Qigong got up with a smile and arched his hand and said, "Brother, I haven't seen you for a long time!"

"Cunion!" Hu Chuyuan nodded politely, asked He Qigong to sit down again, and asked, "Didn't my cousin follow Uncle He in the capital? Why did he come back now?"

He Qigong smiled and took out a fold and two secret letters from his cuffs. He first took out the fold and gave them to Hu Chuyuan, saying, "Uncle has many positions, and he really can't manage the ship's affairs, and he can't live up to the imperial entrustment. He specially handed over the folds to Prince Gong, the military minister, and Lord Shen, the minister of the Ministry of War, but all the ship's affairs were handed over. I'll deal with it for you, but the big thing needs to be reported. Prince Gong and Lord Shen, the minister of the Ministry of War, have agreed and made an approval on the fold. My uncle asked me to bring this fold back to you immediately, so that you can work in the ship's government office!"

"Oh?" Hu Chuyuan was secretly happy that he was about to want this thing.

Open the fold and take a look. Sure enough, as He Qigong said, the Military Affairs Office and the Ministry of War have confirmed this matter and agreed that "Fuzhou Ship Administration and Administered Hu Chuyuan" has jurisdiction over the affairs of the Ship Administration and Government Office, but... All major events must be adjudied by He Jing, the governor of Fujian and Zhejiang.

After watching the fold, Hu Chuyuan couldn't help laughing and said to He Qigong, "I'm still short of this fold!"

"It's not, isn't it? Without real power, it's really difficult to do things in this place!"

He Qigong smiled, and then said in a low voice, "In addition to my uncle's position in the capital, he not only wants to fight for some convenience for you, but also wants to compete for the imperial court's coastal defense military expenses for Fujian and Zhejiang. Now the court has made a plan to allocate 4 million taels of silver for coastal defense every year to set up the Beiyang Marine Division and the Nanyang Marine Division. My uncle wanted to take a bite from the annual sea defense allocation of 4 million taels. He wrote a fold, but he felt that the weight was insufficient, so he asked me to come back immediately to discuss with you to see if I could add two or three more reasons. "."

After saying this, he handed the secret letter with He Jing's name above to Hu Chuyuan.

Hu Chuyuan carefully opened the letter and saw that He Jing also analyzed the big situation in detail.

In 1874, when Japan attacked Taiwan, public opinion in the Qing Dynasty was in an uproar. At that time, there was already a saying that the whole country would build coastal defense. Coincidentally, Zuo Zongtang also wanted to recover Xinjiang with the strength of the whole country, and the matter of coastal defense could only be put on hold for the time being.

After several years of debate, and with the gradual end of the war in Xinjiang, the Qing court began to pay attention to coastal defense, and decided to host the Beiyang Marine Division and the Nanyang Marine Division. They no longer expected Fuzhou Ship Administration and Fujian Marine Division, and the Yangtze River Marine Division controlled by the Hunan Army was not included in the imperial court's plan.

The key reason why the Qing court made such a decision was to bring the Beiyang and Nanyang sailors under the control of the court, rather than being subject to the Xiang army like the Yangtze River sailors.

He Jing has his own analysis. He believes that Cixi, Prince Gong and others have no intention to focus on handling the Nanyang Water Division at all. They just want to set up the Beiyang Water Division. The Nanyang Water Division, the Yangtze River Water Division and the Fujian Water Division are not in the plan of the imperial court.

In addition, the Nanyang Marine Division itself is positioned to defend Jiangsu and Zhejiang, which conflicts with the Yangtze River Marine Division and the Fujian Marine Division, making the value of the Fujian Marine Division even lower.

But he still wanted to fight, so he wrote a fold and listed three reasons.

First of all, on the grounds of the annexation of the Ryukyu Kingdom, we want to buy two or three more ironclads. The specifications are roughly the same as those of the ironclads, so as to repeat the old story of the 13 years of Tongzhi's attack on Taiwan.

Second, he said that the Fujian Marine Division is under the jurisdiction of the Taihai Sea, which can block the foreign fleet from going north. It is the first pass of the coastal defense of the Beijing Normal University. It is close to the defense of Jiangsu and Zhejiang, the southern aid to Guangxi, and the Beijing Normal University. Third, it is said that the whole country's strength to set up the Beiyang Marine Division, which is the best policy, but how can the imperial court's coastal defense "lonely admire" Li Zhongtang?

Finally, he said that Jiangnan Commercial Bank was very profitable, and the official shares drew more than 3 million taels of silver in the red year. If the imperial court did not support the holding of Fujian sailors, it would be controlled by the Liangjiang Xiang army, which was not appropriate.

After reading it, Hu Chuyuan had to say that politicians are politicians... He Jing is very clear about his "heavy burden". With his qualifications and achievements, of course, he can sit on the throne of governor of Fujian and Zhejiang, but it is very abnormal to serve as the governor of Fujian, the minister of ship in Fuzhou and the general of Fuzhou at the same time.

Not only this, the imperial court has not yet filled the vacancy of the admiral in Fujian and Zhejiang provinces, and He Jing continues to actually control the real power of the admirals of the two provinces... Because at this stage, as long as the vacancy of the admirals of the two provinces is filled, according to the meritorious service, the person in office must be the military officers of the Huai Army and the Xiang Army. Instead of this, Cixi, Prince Gong and others would rather keep their positions vacant and be controlled by He Jing, the governor of Fujian and Zhejiang, so that the military affairs of Fujian and Zhejiang provinces would not be controlled by the Hunan and Huai provinces.

In fact, the court deliberately increased He Jing's authority and used him to contain Zuo Zongtang and Li Hongzhang. In terms of qualifications, He Jing is one of the few local members who can rise up with these two people.

He Jing's last two reasons are all aimed at his "heavy burden", and the arrows are not empty, and every sentence directly points to what the magnates are most worried about.

(Supplement: After writing for so long, the protagonist began to take the first step in the military and political fields. This is this book. It's a little delayed.)

(The protagonist's development route should still be very clear. He became an official and controlled the military force in the most common way in this era. The whole first volume is paving the way for this transformation.)

(There will be arrangements for questions about how the protagonist's self-protection will be gradually. It seems too early to ask in a hurry now)

(Finally, I hope you can support me)