These years of being the queen mother!

Zhu Cilin has always been impatient with such things, so he leisurely sipped tea and watched Queen Mother Yang carefully choose one by one.

Empress Dowager Yang was very serious about her selection. She carefully read over 100 styles of gold and silver coins, compared them again, and picked out the blueprints that she found more pleasing to the eye.

"Sanlang, which one do you think is suitable?"

"It's fine for the queen mother to decide, and I don't have any objections." Zhu Cilin said lazily after taking a sip of tea.

This bastard...

Empress Dowager Yang only felt a sudden pain in her temple, this bastard son is really different.It was rare to open her mouth to scold him, Empress Dowager Yang lowered her head again and scanned the selected blueprints, suddenly she had a flash of inspiration.

"It's not as good as gold and silver coins with five-clawed dragons encircling one yuan on the front, and how about the sun and moon in the middle and peony national flowers on the back!"

Zhu Cilin made up his mind to follow the style of gold and silver coins that Empress Dowager Yang said, and he thought it was very good, so he nodded. "Just cast it according to the style that the Queen Mother said." Zhu Cilin called a young eunuch to repeat the gold and silver coin styles that Queen Mother Yang said.After the little eunuch remembered it carefully, he went to the office of the Ministry of Rites and ordered the officials of the Ministry of Rites to draw a sample of the gold and silver coins according to the style of the Queen Mother Yang and send them to the Ministry of Households for casting.

Most of the officials in the Ministry of Rituals have a good level of literature. Not long after the little eunuch left, he drew a sample picture in a short while.When the ink was dry, the Minister of the Ministry of Rites took the gold and silver coin samples he had drawn and walked to the Ministry of Households in person.

The officials of the household department who got the samples of gold and silver coins led the craftsmen to work overtime. Finally, before July, the first batch of about [-] silver coins and [-] gold coins were minted, and a tall name was given. Daming dragon coins.

Compared with the Ming Dynasty Jinlong coin (gold coin) which only has the specification of "one yuan", silver coins, as the main currency in circulation in China, undoubtedly have more specifications.One cent, two cents, five cents, one dime, two dime, one yuan... The types of these silver dragon coins are the same as those issued by later countries.

When the new coin is minted, it must first be presented to the Holy One for review.After looking at it, Empress Dowager Yang and Zhu Cixi felt that the Daming Dragon coin was very delicate and beautiful like a work of art, so they ordered the Ministry of Households to issue the coin immediately, and asked the officials of the Ministry of Officials to assist the people in all states and counties to exchange copper coins and silver taels for the Daming Dragon coin .

Speaking of it, ignoring the fact that officials of the Ming Dynasty like to boast and label things indiscriminately, it is still pretty good to do things. Under the coordination of the officials of the six ministries, the exchange of the Dragon Coin of the Ming Dynasty went smoothly.At the same time, the craftsmen of the Royal Gold and Silver Factory are also working overtime to mint the next batch of Daming Dragon coins.But even so, the second batch of minted 50 Daming Dragon coins did not catch up with the private exchange of the first batch of Daming Dragon coins. After a half-month pause in the middle, after the second batch of Daming Dragon coins arrived , Only then began to exchange one after another.

During this period, Empress Dowager Yang also issued a decree stipulating that all military pay from now on will be issued with Daming Dragon Coins. On the basis of the original military pay, the monthly pay of each ordinary soldier is one Yuan Golden Dragon Coins. Ten (one yuan) gold dragon coins.As soon as such a super high salary was paid, the military officer was happy, and the civil servants were in an uproar.And just when the civil servants were sad and prepared to write a letter saying that the Empress Dowager Yang treated martial arts too favorably, the Empress Dowager Yang issued another order to change the salaries of the civil servants.

"The Ai family knows that the salaries of hundreds of officials are very small. If they don't collect filial piety, the salaries of low-level officials are not enough to support a family." Empress Dowager Yang said to the civil and military officials of the Manchu Dynasty with a smile. "The Ai family is preparing a high salary to support their honesty! The higher salary of the Ai family can at least put an end to some corruption problems."

"The empress dowager is wise." The empress dowager Yang had spoken so plainly, what else could the court civil and military have to say, they could only shout long live three times with a smile on their faces, and praise the wiseness.

Empress Dowager Yang saw that all civil and military officials had nothing to say, and she thought to herself, "If you are greedy in doing this, just greedy and not doing things", then the factory guards she controls are not vegetarians, and will definitely let the whole family, young and old, settle down in hell together. .So he stopped the topic and changed his mind.

"The Ministry of Households continues to step up the minting of dragon coins, and strives to recover most of the private copper coins this year. As for what to do with the recovered copper coins, what is your opinion, the emperor!"

Zhu Cilin: "I heard Xu Qing once said that my Ming copper products are very popular in Western countries. How about melting and recasting copper products?"

Empress Dowager Yang: "What does Xu Qing think?"

Xu Ye came out and replied: "I think the method His Majesty said is a good one, and it can solve the problem of a large amount of copper coins piling up on the national treasury."

Empress Dowager Yang: "Since Xu Qing also agrees, let the Ministry of Internal Affairs supervise this matter. At that time, the money sold for the copper products cast by melting copper coins will be divided into half by the state treasury and private treasury."

Why didn't they all go into the treasury!

Zhu Ciling pursed her lips, regretting that she had lost half of the money she earned, and said out loud that she would do as Empress Dowager Yang said.So the court meeting ended, and the Ministry of Internal Affairs, which has been serving the royal family and managing the clothing, food, housing and transportation of the royal family members, also began to join in the busy work, directing craftsmen to put boxes of old and new copper coins into the melting furnace, and recast them into a very Chinese-style animal tripod and incense burner. and copper products in the shape of the twelve zodiac signs.

In this way, it came to August [-]th, the day of the Mid-Autumn Festival.There are lights and festoons everywhere in the palace.According to the custom, on the day of the Mid-Autumn Festival, one should drink sweet-scented osmanthus wine, eat taro, snails, and duck, and there are collective activities among the folks who steal green onions and vegetables.Of course, there are no such activities in the palace, so early in the morning, the empress dowagers of the two palaces personally led Zhu Shuxie, Zhu Shuxie and the four daughters-in-law to work together in the imperial dining room.

In addition to preparing the above meals, they also have to eat moon cakes and light lanterns, and according to the custom in the palace, after the meal on this day, the queen will lead everyone to sacrifice to the "Taiyin Lord".Now that Zhu Cilin is not yet married, he naturally does not have a queen. Traditionally, the Empress Dowager Ci'an or Empress Yang took the lead in offering sacrifices to the "Taiyin Lord" during the Mid-Autumn Festival.

The empress dowagers of the two palaces take turns for one year, and this year it is Empress Dowager Yang's turn to preside over the work of offering sacrifices to the "Taiyin Lord", but Empress Dowager Yang wanted to avoid laziness, so she let the matter be pushed to Empress Ci'an.Fortunately, the procedure of offering sacrifices to the "Taiyin Lord" is not responsible. Only an altar is set up in the southeast corner of the courtyard, and please come up with a magic code (a big rabbit is printed on a piece of paper to smash medicine in the moon palace) and insert it in the incense altar. .The incense altar is a square bucket filled with fresh sorghum, and the mouth of the bucket is pasted with yellow paper. On the table are four plates of fruit and four plates of moon cakes. The moon cakes are stacked half a foot high.

In addition, there is a large wooden plate in the middle, and there are round moon cakes with a diameter of one foot, which are specially made for rabbit sacrifices.Four bowls of clear tea are to put the tea leaves in the bowls and rinse them with cold water.In this way, the concubine and the princess, led by the empress of the main palace, salute to the altar together, and the ceremony is considered complete.The procedure is not too complicated, so Empress Dowager Ci'an made fun of Empress Dowager Yang's laziness, and then took over the job of continuing to host the "Sacrifice to Taiyin Lord" this year!

"I don't know if I didn't see the moon at night this year. Bao'er remembers last year, during the Mid-Autumn Festival last year, the moon hid in the clouds and didn't even show its face. You know that eating moon cakes and drinking osmanthus wine during the Mid-Autumn Festival is the most beautiful thing." It's just a matter of course, one is indispensable, this lack of a moon to reward has really reduced the nature a bit!"

"What my sister said is true, but it's useless for you to tell Belle. Belle is not a Lunar Star Lord, and I can't control when the moon will appear."

Zhu Shunan squatted aside, putting sugar into the chopped mooncake stuffing, while grinning and voicing the noise of her first sister.In this regard, Zhu Shuxi naturally refused to do it, and hurriedly tried to twist Zhu Shuyi.

Zhu Shumei begged for mercy while avoiding with a smile. "Good sister, Belle is wrong, so don't scratch Belle's tickle, I don't know that Belle is most afraid of being tickled."

Zhu Shuying naturally ignored Zhu Shuying's begging for mercy, the two joked for a while, and then reconciled under the smiling eyes of others.

Empress Dowager Yang glanced at the chattering and laughing crowd, and said with a smile, "I remember that Makata and Rita both like to eat salty food."

Makata, who was helping Empress Dowager Yang, hurriedly replied: "The Empress Dowager remembers correctly, both concubines and younger sisters like to eat salty food."

Empress Dowager Yang still likes Makata and Rita, two sisters from the grassland. These two girls have always lived their lives according to their duties, and they are much better than the two sisters named Li who like to be demons. So Empress Dowager Yang was also happy to give them face, and said kindly. "At that moment, don't forget to make mooncake fillings with some salty meat fillings."

"The concubine will thank the Queen Mother for her kindness first, and eat the mooncakes when they come out of the basket."

Empress Dowager Yang chuckled, and when she was about to continue joking, Wang Tiqian, who had been serving Zhu Cilin all along, ran over in a hurry and said in a high-pitched voice.

"The two empress dowagers, Your Majesty has an invitation to discuss important matters."

They actually asked the queen mothers of the two palaces to go to Kunning Palace together. Presumably the matter must be very important and related to the queen mother Ci'an.

There was a glint in Empress Dowager Yang's eyes, but she stepped forward calmly, and said to the stunned Empress Dowager Ci'an. "Sister, let's go, don't make the emperor wait."

Empress Dowager Ci'an came back to her senses, but she still seemed a little distracted, and she and Empress Dowager Yang sat on the Phoenix Throne together and headed for Qianqing Palace.In this way, the little eunuchs who carried the phoenix trotted all the way, and soon arrived at the Qianqing Palace.After getting off the Phoenix and entering the Qianqing Palace, the moment Empress Dowager Yang saw Zhu Cilin who was sitting, she felt that his face was a bit ugly, so she couldn't help asking solemnly:

"Emperor, you called me Aijia and your mother Zhang back in such a hurry, but something serious happened."

The author has something to say: Update o(*￣︶￣*)o