Chapter 167 Find a beautiful Qinhuai prostitute who is good at dancing

Chang Yanling and Li Zushu gave Wang Pu a good face. They left the bathhouse and returned to the Jinyiwei Yamen and began to distribute people to the surrounding prefectures and counties to redeem people. For a time, the cavalry in Nanjing City went out everywhere. The uninformed people thought that some unlucky official had violated the laws of the court again and were going to be sent to the Jinyiwei Prison.

However, Wang Pu did not rush to leave the bathhouse, but asked a master to rub his back.

Wang Pu lay naked on the soft couch, enjoying the master rubbing his back comfortably, while asking, "Master, are you Gui Geng this year?"

"Gui Geng?" the master said in confusion, "What Gui Geng?"

"Uh...that's how old you are this year."

"Oh, the official asked how old the little old man is, he is 61 this year."

"Old man, you've been rubbing your back in the bathhouse for many years, have you?"

"The little old man has been in the bathhouse since he was sixteen, and it has been forty-five years now."

"No wonder we have such good skills." Wang Pu asked again, "Is there anything else that the old man can do besides rubbing his back?"

The master said: "In addition to rubbing the back, the little old man can also massage, pedicure, haircut, and shave. Oh, by the way, the little old man can also cup people."

Wang Pu couldn't help but turn his head and asked, "How can you still cupping?"

"Yes." said the master, "the old man's cupping skills are inherited from the family."

"That's great." Wang Pu turned over and sat up, without the need for the master to rub his back, and asked, "Old man, you have a hard time making a living in this bathhouse. How much does it cost in a month?"

The master said: "When you are good, you can earn one or two taels of silver every month, but you usually only have three or five hundred sons every month."

Wang Pu said in surprise: "That's the only one?"

The master smiled bitterly and said, "Official, I'm good to have some food in our business."

In ancient China, scholars had a very high status, farmers had a high status, and merchants and handicrafts practitioners had the lowest status. Bathhouses themselves were low-ranking businesses, and rubbing people's backs in bathhouses was even more a low-ranking career. If they were all in the bathhouses, what else could they have to ask for?

Wang Pu said: "Master, from today on, you no longer have to rub your backs in this bathhouse. You are already a servant in the Admiral's yamen and can pay a salary of fifty taels of silver per month."

"The officer in the Admiral's yamen?" said the master, stretching out his five fingers and ate, "Five...50 taels of salary per month...50 taels of salary per month!?"

"That's right." Wang Pu nodded, "This governor is the new Nanjing Admiral Wang Pu. Tomorrow you can go to the Yanziji Admiral Headquarters to find this governor."

The master said tremblingly: "Official, is this...is this true?"

"Of course it's true." Wang Pu thought for a while and suddenly said to outside the box, "Liu'er."

Lu Liu came in and said respectfully: "General."

Wang Pu pointed to the master and said, "Give this master ten taels of silver."

Lu Liu looked at the master in surprise, then took out a ingot of ten taels of silver from his waist pocket and handed it to the master. The master took the ten taels of silver in disbelief. He looked at Wang Pu and said, "Official, this... this silver is really for the little one? Didn't you dream?"

"This is just part of the salary you are paid in advance." Wang Pu smiled, "But you must report to the Admiral Headquarters tomorrow."

"Oh." The teacher replied excitedly, "The little old man is ready to go."

After saying that, the master thanked him again and left happily.

Lu Liu said in confusion: "General, do you really have to spend fifty taels of monthly salary to hire this old man?"

"What do you know?" Wang Pu said, "Don't underestimate this old man. With his clear skills, he might bring me millions of taels or even tens of millions of silver to this general in the future, hehe."

"Millions?" Lu Liu shook his head with disbelief and muttered, "How is this possible?"

"You don't understand if you tell me." Wang Pu said, "Take me up and take my general's clothes. After taking a bath, you should go to Qinhuai for a trip. Now you have to find a good location and a good pavilion."

Half an hour later, Wang Pu brought Lu Liu and Xiao Qi to the bank of the Qinhuai River.

At this time, Wang Pu had already transformed into a handsome young man, while Lu Liu and Xiao Qi were wearing green clothes and slanted hats. They were like two unscrupulous servants who were accomplices of tigers.

The three of them walked along the way and saw shops standing by the streets. The shops were lined up one after another, so prosperous.

In fact, Jiangnan was indeed quite prosperous in the late Ming Dynasty. Because a large number of farmers could not bear the heavy tax burden, they sold their fields and fled. Some became privileged tenants, and some entered the city and became practitioners of handicrafts. At that time, Jiangnan and the Western regions were very prosperous. There were a large number of workshops for processing textiles, silks, porcelains, and tea. These workshops required a large number of handicrafts practitioners, which was actually the germination of modern industry.

With a large number of handicrafts and industries, there are a large number of merchants and a large amount of wealth. With wealth, a large number of service industries including brothels, restaurants and inns appeared, and thus the entire Jiangnan area was prosperous. A small group of so-called "historians" analyzed that this prosperity was a pathological prosperity, a deformed prosperity before the demise of the country, and in fact it was fart!

Anyone who knows a little bit of history knows that the Song and Ming dynasties were the heyday of Chinese civilization, and the Yuan and Qing dynasties entered the Central Plains was a completely regression of civilization. The so-called Kangxi and Qianlong prosperity of the Qing Dynasty was just a carefully woven lie.

In fact, by the end of the Ming Dynasty, handicrafts and industry in Jiangnan had been quite developed. In the field of thought, Cheng and Zhu Neo-Confucianism, which confined ideas, were also challenged by promoting the personalized Yangming Mind Science. The conservative idea of ​​emphasizing agriculture and suppressing commerce and the traditional ranking order of scholars, farmers, industry and commerce were on the verge of collapse.

If the Ming Dynasty could continue to develop without being disturbed by natural factors, it would partially realize the natural evolution from agricultural civilization to industrial civilization in the Jiangnan area.

At this time, the Ming Dynasty was at the critical moment when it turned into a butterfly. It was the time when various social contradictions were the most acute, and it was the time when it was the most vulnerable to attack. But at this time, the Ming Dynasty suffered a Little Ice Age and natural disasters followed. Then the thieves rose up.

The Ming Dynasty was exhausted and eventually the Qing Dynasty was taken advantage of by the Qing Dynasty outside the pass. The industrial civilization was about to be completed and the evolutionary industrial civilization was strangled. The Chinese civilization retreated for a total of three hundred years and returned to the barbaric Mongolian and Yuan era.

Wang Pu stood on the streets of Gongyuan, feeling deeply moved, as if the Qing Dynasty did not cause trouble to the Central Plains. If Jiangnan in the late Ming Dynasty could continue to develop, could the industrial revolution appear before the West? Will the Ming Dynasty realize the constitutional monarchy before England? Can the Han people continue to stand tall at the peak of world civilization?

"General, there is a loft over there."

Lu Liu suddenly shouted, and Wang Pu turned around when he heard the sound. He saw a towering three-story pavilion standing at the Wende Bridge not far away. Behind the three-story pavilion was a huge pavilion, which looked grand. There was a golden plaque hanging on the bottom of the three-story pavilion, with four big words "Xiaoyao Restaurant" written on it.

"It's really so grand!" Wang Pu couldn't help but praise him. "It's it, let's go, take a look."

Wang Pu took Lu Liu and Xiao Qi into Xiaoyao Restaurant. He saw that the ground floor of the Xiaoyao Restaurant was five rooms wide and three rooms deep. The business area of ​​the hall was nearly 400 square meters, almost as big as a basketball court. Forty or fifty eight-immortal tables were placed there and it looked extremely empty.

However, the business of this restaurant is obviously not very good. There are no less than forty eight immortal tables in the huge hall, but there are only four or five tables in the business.

A waiter came forward enthusiastically and sang loudly: "Young Master, please invite me to the private room upstairs."

Wang Pu nodded and followed the waiter to the second floor. The second floor was a separate private room seat, with a wide corridor connecting the east and west. Dongweng of this Xiaoyao Restaurant seemed to be a caring person who cared about flowers and trees, and gave each private room a nice flower name, such as orchids, osmanthus, chrysanthemums, etc.

The waiter looked for a "Juhua Hall" facing the street and said, "Please please, three of you."

When Wang Pu sat down at the table, the waiter poured a cup of tea for Wang Pu and asked, "This young master is so nervous. Is this the first time we have come to our Xiaoyao Restaurant?"

"That's right." Wang Pu smiled, "What's the delicious food and drink in your Xiaoyao Restaurant? Tell me about it."

The waiter smiled and said, "Our Xiaoyao Restaurant is the largest restaurant in Nanjing City. We have other restaurants. We may not have any other restaurants. We have ten years of Shaoxing daughter Hong, the strong fragrance of Kweichow Moutai. There are also red wine from the West, not to mention the dishes. There are all famous dishes in the world. As long as you can say it, our master of Xiaoyao Tower can make it."

"Is that true?" Wang Pu smiled, "You're serious?"

The waiter responded confidently: "Take it seriously."

Wang Pu said: "Dongfang chicken diced, boiled meat slices, pickled fish, will it be?"

The waiter said: "I mean, isn't it just Sichuan cuisine? No problem."

Wang Pu said again: "Dirty three fresh rice, fried vermicelli shredded pork, mixed cucumber with peeled skin, and beef sauce, will it be?"

"Huh?" the waiter said in surprise, "I haven't heard of these dishes."

These dishes are all Northeast dishes. The waiter knew that there was a ghost because the Northeast cuisine was formed very late. It was not until the late Qing Dynasty that a large number of Shandong people broke into Guandong and entered Liaodong that they began to form a unique flavored cuisine in the Northeast region. This was the late Ming Dynasty. How could the waiter predict the dishes two hundred years later?

Wang Pu said: "So, don't brag too much."

The waiter complimented: "That's because the young master is knowledgeable."

Wang Pu said again: "Your Xiaoyao Restaurant business doesn't seem to be very good."

"Don't mention it." The waiter said angrily, "It's all the poor and corrupt scholars in Fushe who made trouble."

"The poor and corrupt scholar in Fushe?" Wang Pu immediately felt energetic when he heard this and asked, "What's going on?"

The waiter said, "Young Master, you don't know. The business of our Xiaoyao Restaurant was very good before. It was really full. We were fighting every day. It's a pity that those poor and corrupt scholars who resuscitated the society four years ago made "Liu Du Guards the Unrest" and criticized us Dongweng, which made our Dongweng famous and the business of the restaurant was much worse than before. Dongweng wanted to sell the restaurant several times, but no one dared to ask for it. Alas..."

"Stay away from the public to prevent chaos and public disclosure?"

This is not a boring Confucian scholars such as Wu Yingji, Chen Zhenhui, Hou Fangyu, and Mao Pijiang, in order to find something for themselves. At the same time, in order to make a sound to attract the attention of the court, he wrote an article jointly attacking the remnants of the eunuch party, Ruan Dacheng. Isn’t this article just to keep the public from reveling?

Could it be that Dongweng in this Xiaoyao Restaurant is Ruan Dacheng and Ruan Dahuzi?

Wang Pu said: "Waiter, your Dongweng is Ruan Dacheng?"

The waiter coughed and replied, "That's right."

"Waiter, please go and invite your Dongweng." Wang Pu said, "I want to buy Xiaoyao Restaurant."

"Young Master, do you want to buy a Xiaoyao Restaurant?" The waiter said in surprise, "Are you afraid of getting into trouble?"

"Trouble?" Wang Pu said disapprovingly. "What trouble can you have?"

The waiter kindly advised: "Young Master, you have just arrived and didn't know that those poor and corrupt scholars in Fushe are so powerful. If they know that you bought Xiaoyao Restaurant from Dongweng, they will definitely cause trouble for you."

"It's okay." Wang Pu shouted, "You can just go and find your Dongweng."

"Oh." The waiter responded, "Prince, please wait, so I'll go and invite you here."

Ruan Dacheng happened to be in the Xiaoyao Restaurant account today, and he lost dozens of taels of silver that month. While shaking his head and sighing that his luck was not good, the waiter hurried into the account room and replied: "Dongweng, a young man said he wanted to buy Xiaoyao Restaurant, and was waiting for you in the chrysanthemum hall on the second floor.

"Oh?" Ruan Dacheng asked with a frown. "What kind of young master is it?"

The waiter said: "I'm quite handsome, I seem to have just moved to Nanjing."

"This is an opportunity." Ruan Dacheng said, "Let's go, take a look."

Soon, Ruan Dacheng followed the waiter to the chrysanthemum hall.

Ruan Dacheng suddenly saw Wang Pu and was stunned at first, then said in shock: "Ruan Dacheng pays homage to the prince-consort."

Although Ruan Dacheng was not tolerated by the Confucian scholars in Fushe, he was a Jinshi after all, and he was a rich man in Nanjing. Last year, Wang Pu took Huang Taiji to Nanjing and the military parade a few days ago. Ruan Dacheng also mingled among the gentry of the gentry and gentry, and was able to witness Wang Pu's style up close, so he recognized it at a glance.

"Ah? Prince Consort!"

The waiter didn't recognize Wang Pu. He was so scared that he fell on the floor.
To be continued...