Chongzhen Chat Group

When Emperor Chongzhen and his party went out, it was already a little late. At this time, Nanxun Town was bustling with people coming and going after leaving the residential houses and entering the streets.

Chen Youming was just two steps in front of Emperor Chongzhen and Concubine Tian. He introduced the situation of Nanxun Town sideways, acting very responsible.

"Sir, we have more than 11,300 households in Nanxun Town. The town is just like what you saw..." Chen Youming pointed to the shops on both sides as he said, "Most of them are making Husi silk or playing with it. Related businesses. The row of shops in front of here are mostly Husi tooth shop, which are full of samples, and Husi has another warehouse. "

When talking about this, he said quite proudly: "Our raw silk in Ming Dynasty is dominated by Hu silk, and at least 70% of the Hu silk business is transacted in our Nanxun town. Customers who come here to buy Hu silk every year , they are all big-money, a single transaction can easily cost tens of thousands of dollars..."

After hearing what he said, Emperor Chongzhen couldn't help but feel moved. Wang Chengen, the admiral of the East Factory who left Beijing first, reported to him that based on the clues currently available, those who intended to sabotage the opening of the sea in the Ming Dynasty were probably people who secretly sold goods overseas. Because the Ming Dynasty prohibited the sea, at least the goods were not allowed to go out. This allowed those people to maximize the profits of each ship that went out to sea. Once the sea opens and a large number of merchants go out, prices will inevitably fall, which will harm their interests.

With this in mind, he asked Chen Youming: "There are so many lake silks in Nanxun Town. Where do they come from to buy them?"

As a local, Chen Youming naturally understood these things, and immediately replied: "There are them all over the country, including those in the capital, and some in Nanjing, but more of them are from Zhejiang, Fujian and Guangdong, among which the Fujian and Guangdong are the best. Young master, you don’t know that those visitors from Fujian and Guangdong are really doing big business. As long as the quality of Hu silk is good, they will hardly negotiate the price. They are very generous!"

After he finished speaking, he suddenly pointed to a group of people in front of him, and there were seven or eight people escorting one person to a tooth shop. At the same time, he said: "Sir, this one must be from Fujian and Guangdong."

After finishing speaking, Chen Youming smiled and said: "If it weren't for the fact that the young master and his party all have northern accents, others would think you are also wealthy businessmen from Fujian and Guangdong!"

Liu Xingzuo, who was following Emperor Chongzhen, felt something in his heart when he heard this. Looking at the emperor's back, he suddenly became thoughtful.

Sure enough, Emperor Chongzhen was seen walking slowly, watching the group of people entering the door, and then asked with great interest: "Why did they buy so many?"

When Chen Youming heard this, he hesitated for a while and quickly replied: "What else can you do? Hu silk is the same as cotton, silk, and ceramics. You can only make a lot of money by selling it overseas. Look, sir..."

At this point, he pointed to the people coming and going on the street and said: "Last year, the court announced the opening of the sea. No, this year there are many more people coming to Nanxun Town than before, and many of them came early. , I’m afraid I’ll be late and not receive enough.”

"Oh, it seems that the imperial court did not allow sea trade before last year, right? The business in Nanxun Town should not be very good, right?" Emperor Chongzhen asked with a smile on his face, and it was hard to tell what he was thinking, as if he was chatting.

After Chen Youming heard this, it had already begun anyway, so he didn't care anymore, so he replied: "If the court doesn't let it, it means it won't, but it can't hold back the profits!"

At this point, he remembered that he still had unanswered questions, so he immediately added: "Although it was like this year in the past, the scale was not small. Otherwise, how could our Nanxun Town be so big!"

After hearing this, Emperor Chongzhen was about to say something else when he heard Concubine Tian's surprised voice: "There is a silk shop here. The facade looks good. Let's go in and have a look."

When she came here just now, there were one Hu silk and tooth shop one after another. Concubine Tian had no interest in it. Suddenly she saw a shop selling silk, and she felt itchy.

When Emperor Chongzhen was in later generations, he also went shopping with women. Knowing that this was a woman's nature, he nodded and said casually: "Okay, let's go in and have a look!"

Although the silk shop they wanted to enter was relatively large, it could not accommodate all of them, so there were only five or six Jinyiwei plainclothes following the shop.

The clerks in the store were all busy. When they saw someone else coming in with their entourage, someone immediately came over to serve them. They just apologized and informed: "There are people in the private rooms in our store now. If you don't mind, you can go here." You can also inspect the goods, and I guarantee there won’t be much impact.”

The positioning of this store is obviously relatively high-end. There are many products, and the quality is very good at first glance. The silks and satins of various colors and patterns are arranged regularly, which can be clearly seen by people entering the store. The counters are all divided into grids so that customers looking at the samples do not interfere with each other. Many of them even have curtains so that no one can be seen inside.

"Even the private rooms are full, it seems business is good!" Emperor Chongzhen stood in the lobby and couldn't help but sigh, and then said to Concubine Tian: "If you are interested, take a look here."

He was not in the habit of insisting on asking the store owner to free up a private room.

Concubine Tian naturally did not dare to violate Emperor Chongzhen's words. Moreover, her eyes were already full of those silks and satins, so she agreed and went to the cubicle to look at the samples.

The waiter offered tea, but Emperor Chongzhen didn't ask for it. It wasn't that he wanted to show off as an emperor, but it was a habit from later generations that didn't make him feel uncomfortable. Just stand in the corner of the lobby, look around the store, and pay attention to the movement on the other side of the counter.

He found that it seemed that the customers in this store were not stingy people. Almost everyone would buy some, no matter how much. Seeing the waiters coming and going as they were busy picking up silk and satin, Emperor Chongzhen couldn't help but say, "Every day makes a fortune!"

"Sir, these don't really matter. Those in the private rooms are the ones who come here." Chen Youming knew this, so he introduced.

Emperor Chongzhen nodded after hearing this, and asked smoothly: "These shops should pay a lot of taxes, right?"

"Our Ming Dynasty's rule is one tax per thirty!" Chen Youming immediately replied, "But we don't have a government office in the countryside. Most of them just ask the commander to give them a symbolic amount."

After hearing what he said, Emperor Chongzhen frowned and asked, "Do you know how much the annual commercial tax of Nanxun Town is?"

"I don't know!" Chen Youming shook his head simply, "Who cares about that. But I guess it's about a thousand taels!"

"..." Emperor Chongzhen couldn't help being speechless when he heard this. Nanxun Town is the largest lake silk trading center in the Ming Dynasty. The annual commercial tax is only about one thousand taels, which is really amazing!

He suddenly remembered that Wen Tiren had mentioned before that the tea tax was only 17 taels in Yunnan and about 6 taels in Zhejiang. Comparing this, the taxes paid in Nanxun Town are quite high!

I have to work overtime tomorrow night, and I will try to code another chapter tonight, or I will accumulate more debt.