Ma Enhui Did Not Understand Commerce

As the year's end approached, Nanjing City grew livelier still. Opera troupes, entertainers, and merchants poured into the Capital from across the country, beating drums and gongs to draw customers.

Restaurants and teahouses teemed with people. Those strolling through streets and alleys, visiting friends and relatives, or traveling in groups brushed shoulders in the crowds. The areas around Wuding Bridge and Chaoku Street, the ten-mile stretch of the Qinhuai, and the Confucius Temple were especially bustling.

As dusk gave way to night, the many little courtyards along both banks of the Qinhuai River raised their flower signs, awaiting a romantic encounter.

On the river, painted pleasure boats rang with flutes and drums, while wine cups passed back and forth.

A small black-canopied boat drifted leisurely toward them. The copper bell atop its canopy swayed with the boat, chiming clear and crisp.

Ma Enhui clutched Zhu Yunwen's hand tightly, her face somewhat pale as she helplessly appealed to him.

Zhu Yunwen, however, was delighted. He said to Ma Enhui, "How long has it been since you visited somewhere this lively? You'll fall ill if you keep shutting yourself away."

Ma Enhui pinched Zhu Yunwen hard, feeling rather aggrieved.

What emperor and empress ever went to the Qinhuai River? If anyone found out, how could we show our faces again? Is this what you meant by inspecting the people's circumstances? Visiting the common folk?

I think you've simply grown tired of the beauties in your harem!

Ma Enhui lowered her head, not daring to look outside. If some official spotted her, she truly would have no face left to live.

It was all her fault for being so naive. She had accepted whatever Zhu Yunwen said without a trace of suspicion and innocently followed him out. Wandering the streets and alleys during the day, watching plays and acrobatics, had certainly been wonderful. But now night had fallen, and instead of returning to the palace, they had come to the Qinhuai River...

Ma Enhui tugged at Zhu Yunwen and said almost pleadingly, "Let's hurry back. This isn't somewhere we should be."

"Why not? There are plenty of delicacies along the Qinhuai River-the Fang Family's Lotus Root Silk Candy, the Liu Family's Risen-Flour Flatbread... Don't you want to try them?"

Zhu Yunwen asked with a smile.

Ma Enhui swallowed and asked, "Your... You brought me here just to eat?"

Zhu Yunwen laughed heartily. "What else? Your appetite has been poor lately, and you eat so little every day. In the end, it's because you've been cooped up. A stroll, a look around, a chance to clear your mind-that will do you good. What did you think I came here for?"

Ma Enhui blushed. "I... I thought you were bringing me here to eat."

"Really?"

"Really!"

"You weren't lying?"

Ah, a woman's words really mustn't be exposed. Zhu Yunwen rubbed his waist and glared fiercely at Ma Enhui. With a huff, she ordered Liu Changge, "Hurry through here."

Liu Changge dared not cross her. She even dared to pinch the emperor. If he disobeyed, she would probably kick him into the Qinhuai River.

Several narrow waterways branched off both sides of the Qinhuai River, with sluice gates at their entrances. Once the gates were opened, boats could follow the channels down to places of seductive beauty.

A larger pleasure boat approached head-on. Someone at its bow hollered, "Boat ahead, pull over to the bank and clear the channel!"

Liu Changge turned to look at Zhu Yunwen, who chuckled and said, "When have we ever made way for anyone else?"

Those words put Liu Changge entirely at ease. As expected of an emperor-such commanding spirit! He sank his breath into his lower belly and shouted, "Boat ahead, pull over to the bank and clear the channel!"

The man on the pleasure boat froze. He looked at the insignificant little black-canopied boat ahead, then at the large pleasure boat beneath his feet. Only after comparing them did he realize that his own boat was far bigger and more imposing.

"Move aside! If you don't, we'll ram your boat over!"

The man on the pleasure boat shouted.

Liu Changge sharply flicked his bamboo pole, sending a spray of water flying, and shouted sternly, "Come at us, and you're courting death!"

The spray flew more than ten meters and struck the man on the pleasure boat squarely in the face.

"You've got some nerve!"

The boatman wiped the water from his face and shouted furiously.

"What's happened? Why have we stopped?"

Hearing the commotion outside, Zhu Zhi, the Prince of Liao, came out.

Zhu Geng, the Prince of Min, followed him. Admiring the bustling night scene before him, he sighed. "The Capital is so prosperous. If I could spend my whole life here, it would not have been lived in vain."

"My lord, there's a little boat blocking our way."

The boatman pointed at the small boat nearby.

Zhu Zhi and Zhu Geng looked down toward it.

Zhu Zhi rubbed his eyes. "I seem to have seen the man at the bow somewhere before."

Zhu Geng nodded in agreement. "He does look familiar, but the lights along the bank are too dim to see clearly."

Liu Changge's eyes widened. He turned to Zhu Yunwen and Ma Enhui and said, "It's the Prince of Liao and the Prince of Min."

Ma Enhui gave a deeply displeased snort.

Zhu Yunwen smiled knowingly. These princely vassals losing themselves in the embrace of beauties was not necessarily a bad thing. When the time was ripe, he could reclaim their fiefs, resolving the problem of the princes swallowing up land.

He stepped onto the bow and, under Ma Enhui's and Liu Changge's shocked gazes, shouted, "If you don't move aside, we'll ram your boat over into the river!"

The boatman and crew of the pleasure boat would not stand for that. They rolled up their sleeves, and some began hurling abuse. Yet one had uttered only two words before Zhu Zhi kicked him into the water.

"Your... Your..."

Zhu Zhi and Zhu Geng were dumbstruck, unsure how to address him here.

If they called him Your Majesty, the Qinhuai River would surely erupt. But if they did not, would that be disrespectful?

Heavens, Your Majesty, couldn't you just stay quietly in the Hall of Reverent Conduct?

Why come to the Qinhuai River? Are you trying to get us killed?

If word reached Kunji's ears, wouldn't flames engulf the three palaces and six courtyards?

"Clear the way!"

Zhu Yunwen shouted.

"Move, move! Hurry up and move aside!"

Zhu Zhi hastily shouted at the boatman.

Liu Changge smiled at the now-unobstructed channel and propelled the boat onward. As the little black-canopied boat passed the pleasure boat, Zhu Zhi and Zhu Geng waved repeatedly, watching it go.

"Did you see anything?"

Zhu Zhi asked Zhu Geng.

Zhu Geng shook his head resolutely. "I saw nothing. Nothing!"

Zhu Zhi nodded emphatically. He, too, had not seen a woman aboard the emperor's boat!

Not a word, even on pain of death!

"Are you still going to see that beauty of yours?"

Zhu Geng asked, trembling slightly.

Zhu Zhi looked down, then said with a mournful face, "We'd better return to our residences."

Once ashore, Zhu Yunwen took Ma Enhui into one shop to make inquiries, then into another to chat with its proprietor. They did not return to the palace until deep into the quiet night.

After so many imperial banquets, occasionally sampling the common people's pastries and delicacies was rather pleasant.

At least Ma Enhui's appetite had improved considerably.

On the couch, Zhu Yunwen leafed through the History of Song. Ma Enhui brought him a bowl of ginseng soup and sat beside him. "Your Majesty, was this outing for the sake of commercial taxes?"

Zhu Yunwen nodded and said to Ma Enhui, "Scholars, farmers, artisans, and merchants-people have spoken of that order for over a thousand years. Merchants have always occupied the lowest position. That isn't right."

"I cannot agree with Your Majesty on that. Merchants not only roam everywhere, but produce nothing themselves, yet amass wealth and fleece the people. Taizu's restrictions on commerce won the people's hearts."

Ma Enhui countered.

Zhu Yunwen closed the History of Song and set it down with a sigh. "If even my beloved consort thinks that way, it shows that reforming commerce will be a hundred times harder than reforming agriculture."

Puzzled, Ma Enhui asked, "Why does Your Majesty wish to lift the restrictions on commerce? If you do, and everyone goes into trade, won't Great Ming's lands lie barren? With weeds overrunning the fields, how could Great Ming prosper?"

Zhu Yunwen frowned.

In later ages, the market economy had made commercial competition so fierce, yet not everyone had gone into business. Why were there so many worries here in ancient times?

Doing business also required brains. It was not as though someone could carry a few coins, buy goods in Guangzhou, and then sell them in Nanjing at a profit.

It required capital, expenditure, sales, and channels for buying and selling.

Of course, it also required paying taxes.

The marketplace was a battlefield. The proportion who fell gloriously in the marketplace was not necessarily lower than on an actual battlefield.

"Lifting the restrictions on merchants can increase tax revenue and improve our finances. The Great Ming of the future will need a great deal of money to sustain it."

Zhu Yunwen wanted to build a truly prosperous and wealthy Ming Empire, but his ambitious plans were always constrained by limited finances.

Take the New Army Strategy alone. These soldiers guarded the frontiers for their country, and all the people of Great Ming owed them a debt of gratitude! Yet Great Ming's current finances were nowhere near sufficient to extend the New Army Strategy to the entire army!

Nor could the Revenue Ministry pour all its funds into the army. After all, everyone needed to eat, wives needed jewelry, and children needed to attend private schools. If the court had no money to pay salaries, how could anyone keep working?

What could be done without money?

The greatest means of raising money for dynasties throughout history had been increasing taxes and holding out a hand to demand money from the common people.

Open your mouth and add another tax category-what could be easier?

Had history ever lacked bizarre taxes?

The drinking-water tax of King Li of Zhou, Ji Hu, the bachelor tax of Emperor Hui of Han, Liu Ying, the late Qing levies on wearing shoes and going barefoot, the Republican-era warlords' tax on basking in the sun...

Apart from boasting, what couldn't be taxed?

But the common people had no money. There were simply a great many of them. Squeeze half a tael of silver from each person, and the entire empire would yield thirty million taels-enough to live on for a year.

As for whether the common people lived or died, how many truly cared?

Ma Enhui could not be blamed for failing to understand the power of merchants. Zhu Yuanzhang had been far too ruthless, suppressing them to the utmost. The share of commercial taxes in Great Ming's central revenue was so pitiful it could make one weep.

Apart from the monopoly-based salt tax, all commercial taxes-the tea tax, shipping tax, transit tax, and business tax-came to less than a million taels even when counted to the last coin.

Against the central government's thirty million taels in revenue, that amounted to only a single-digit percentage-a mere scrap.

Ma Enhui put the book away and asked gently, "If Your Majesty lifts the restrictions on merchants, how much more tax revenue could it bring?"

Zhu Yunwen rose from the couch, fetched the inkstone from the desk, and handed it to Ma Enhui. Smiling, he asked, "How much does my beloved consort think this inkstone is worth?"

Ma Enhui turned the inkstone in her hands, examining its relief carving of a dragon with motifs of fortune and longevity. Uncertainly, she said, "This jade inkstone should be worth a thousand taels, shouldn't it?"

Zhu Yunwen sat beside her and smiled. "Good. Let us price this jade inkstone at a thousand taels. How much tax should we collect?"

Ma Enhui knitted her brows slightly and calculated. "According to Taizu's commercial tax rate, one part in thirty, a thousand taels would yield a little over thirty-three taels."

Looking at the inkstone, Zhu Yunwen said with a bitter smile, "A little over thirty-three taels enters the National Treasury, while they take away the vast majority. Ha, lifting the restrictions on commerce would be of little use like that. But what if we changed one in thirty to one in twenty, or one in ten?"

"One in ten?"

Ma Enhui rose in alarm. "Your Majesty, absolutely not! Quite apart from the fact that Taizu set the commercial tax rate, wouldn't changing one in thirty to one in ten suppress the merchants? Surely that would run counter to Your Majesty's original intention?"