On the fifteenth night of the first month of the third year of Chongzhen, there was no lively lantern gathering of the Lantern Festival in previous years, no noisy firecrackers and fireworks, only the cold wind was whistling and circling on the whole street, and there was only the last scream of the dying people in the street corner.
After touching the weather, the streets in Beijing have been quiet, which looks particularly gloomy and desolate.
At the intersections of important streets, soldiers stood to check the occasional passerby.
Red or white paper lanterns hang outside the gates of every house, dimly lit and swaying under the eaves.
In the dim light, you can see large martial law notices posted on the walls of each street entrance, or a corner of the corner can be lifted and rattled.
In the narrow and long streets and alleys, there are often groomers carrying small lanterns, beating broken gongs or bangs, and the shadow of the shrunken appears and disappears into the darkness; The slow, listless sound of gongs or bangs, listlessly shouting the customary trumpet: "The world is peaceful, the thieves are not prosperous, the sea is safe, and the Haiyan River is clear."
It also faded away in the wind.
The city is very quiet, there is a lantern every short distance, because the Jin soldiers occupy Tongzhou and both sides of the canal, as well as a large area of land outside Gyeonggi, so now Dongzhimen and Chaoyangmen are particularly tight, and the lanterns on the city are also relatively dense.
There were many fires outside the city, and the sky was reflected in a purple patch, and from far to the east, from time to time there came the rumbling of cannons, rolling in the sky like summer thunder.
But the residents of the city did not know the real situation of the battle, and did not know whether it was a cannon fired by the officers and soldiers or the Jiannu soldiers of Houjin.
Despite the rumbling of cannons outside the eastern city, the flames soaring into the sky, the patrolling of soldiers and horses in the city, the prohibition of night walks, and the wailing and dying of refugees in the streets, the deep house compound still lives a life of spending and drinking.
In those palaces that were closer to the imperial city, for fear of being heard by the palace, they did not use gongs and drums, or even silk and bamboo, during the singing, dancing and feasting, but only let the courtesans gently tap the eyes of the board with red sandalwood or ivory clappers, and sing in a low voice, sometimes as thin as a hair, as if there was nothing or nothing, curling continuously, hovering on the exquisitely painted roof beams, and then flying towards the mysterious space.
From time to time, the host and the guests paused their glasses in their hands, and tapped their toes lightly on the ground, watching and listening, almost stopping to breathe.
As soon as the singing stopped, they frequently nodded their heads in appreciation, happily persuaded the wine and food, guessed the fist, few of them paid attention to the sound of cannons and fires outside the city, and no one thought about what strategy should be offered to the imperial court, so as to quickly defeat the Qing soldiers and return the peace to Gyeonggi.
There were already many victims and beggars in Beijing, but recently more than 100,000 people fled from outside the city, and there was nowhere to shelter them, and many of them slept under the eaves on both sides of the street, huddled together for fear of freezing to death.
They shivered in the biting cold wind, groaning, whining, and sighing.
The women whispered to God, mourning and weeping.
The children shrunk together in their mother's arms, crying and crying out for hunger, tearing apart the hearts of adults.
But when the patrol soldiers sent by the Five Cities Soldiers and Horses approached, they were patient for the time being, and did not dare to say anything.
Since martial law was imposed a few years ago, hundreds of refugees have died every day, and everyone just watched numbly.
Although there are porridge factories in all five cities, and the Royal Commercial Bank and the Daming News Newspaper also give out porridge and rice, the mortality rate is getting higher and higher, especially among the elderly and children.
The northeast wind is blowing tonight, and the cold is terrible, and who knows how many corpses, large and small, will be carried to the mass graveyard tomorrow morning Tonight, Chongzhen dined with his favorite Concubine Tian in Chengqian Palace, but he was in a melancholy mood, so that his originally fair cheeks now looked pale and haggard under a few palace lights, and there were already a few deep crow's feet at the corners of his small eyes, and his eye sockets were also a little dark.
For several nights, he didn't sleep well, and today he went to court with five drums, and he was tired for a long time, and he had been reading documents in the Qianqing Palace in the afternoon.
I didn't leave the royal case for a whole afternoon.
Sometimes he felt really tired, so he asked the eunuch Bingbi to read the song and the Tang newspaper to him and draft the decree for him, but he could not be completely at ease with the eunuchs around him, and often suspected that they were secretly colluding with the courtiers and kept him in the dark, so he took a little rest, still struggling to read the documents and draft the decree himself.
Now after a few simple bites with Concubine Tian, she was worried about the war outside the city, so she put down her chopsticks, took a sip of hot tea, and sighed softly.
The entire Chengqian Palace, from Concubine Tian to the palace maids and eunuchs, was so worried that they didn't even dare to come out.
Concubine Tian wanted to know how much the battle outside the city was going on, but she never dared to ask the emperor for a word.
Don't say that she is a concubine, she is the queen, and it is strictly forbidden to say a word about state affairs.
This is the rule, also known as the "ancestral family law", and Chongzhen attaches more importance to this, in the harem, only his sister-in-law Empress Zhang can participate in some, but Empress Zhang holds her own identity, only when Chongzhen is really embarrassed, only a shallow reminder.
According to the current situation, he began to miss Lu Hanqiang very much, because only when Lu Hanqiang was there, he would not talk about the sky like other ministers, and he could always give himself a pertinent and practical advice when he was in trouble.
But it's a pity that Lu Hanqiang is not there, and now he feels the importance of Lu Hanqiang, he drove Lu Hanqiang out of the court, and he didn't want Lu Hanqiang to return to the dynasty in order to collect the lonely ministers, but now he needs it, but he is helpless, but now it's too late to say anything, Lu Hanqiang is far away in Shanxi, especially if he is willing to jump into this fire pit, I don't know.
After a few sips of tea, he put the cup back on the coffee table, and whispered irritably and majestically: "Take-off" When the emperor rode to the Wenhua Gate, Cao Huachun knelt beside the white jade road, and said in a sharp voice like a singer: "Slave Cao Huachun takes over" Chongzhen ignored him, got off, walked through the front hall, walked through the back hall of Wenhua, and sat down on a carved dragon chair covered with yellow mats in the east room.
Cao Huachun followed, knelt down again, and performed the regular court salute of bowing and kowtowing three times, if it was an ordinary eunuch, such as Wang Chengen, who waited around the emperor all day long, of course there was no need for so many etiquette.
But he's just come back now, and of course he has to be very respectful.
Picked up a fold and glanced at it, it turned out to be a bullshit please An Fold, when is this, not to mention getting something useful, please Ann Folds is just a means for the governors to brush up on their sense of existence, Chongzhen does not leave his seat for a day, most of what he looks at is these, but you don't look at it, in case there is something important in it Sigh, this thing was thrown aside "How is today's news" Chongzhen asked, "The sound of the cannon seems to be close again." ” Cao Huachun hurriedly stepped forward and said: "The capital is quite stable, and Jiannu has not been attacked, not only that, but also part of the Jiannu from the south gate has been transferred to the west, which is said to be to Liangxiang."
Cao Huachun carefully reported.
Chongzhen frowned, and then couldn't help sighing, it seems that Liangxiang is going to suffer again.
"Long live Qiyu, Chen Xinjia, the commander of the Beijing camp, has been waiting outside for a long time."
Cao Huachun glanced at Chongzhen cautiously and reminded him carefully. t1706231537: