War Palace and Knee Pillow, Austria’s Destiny

Vienna, Royal Garden.

Franz felt his forehead was wet, as if someone was licking him, there was warm breath all around, and the feeling of hair brushing across his cheeks.

Franz closed his eyes, thinking about what happened.

Just when Franz was thinking hard, he suddenly heard Mrs. Sophie's voice.

"Franz, stop licking, you will become stupid."

At this time, Franz opened his eyes and saw the Bernese Mountain Dog raised by Mrs. Sophie licking him.

Seeing that Franz was awake, "Franz" screamed excitedly twice and ran back to Mrs. Sophie.

"Mother, could you please give the dog and me a different name?"

"Okay, the next one is called Maximilian." Mrs. Sophie replied.

Franz was speechless for a while, seeing that it was already dark, and there was no trace of Thalia anywhere.

"Are you looking for Thalia?"

"Yes, I went for a walk with her today."

"That poor girl"

Franz frowned. Did something bad happen in the palace?

"What's wrong with her? Mother."

"She's hungry and has gone to eat."

"." Franz was even more speechless. "Can you finish speaking in one breath?"

Madame Sophie walked up to Franz, opened her fan and covered her mouth.

"Is this the way you talk to me?"

Then he pinched Franz's ears and walked towards his carriage.

In the carriage, Madame Sophie threw Franz a list.

"Franz, you are very filial. You know that the products of your mother's clothing factory are not selling well, and the flour you have hoarded is almost rotting in the warehouse. Tell me, what else do you know?"

"Mother, the military uniforms produced by clothing factories cannot be sold. No one would sell military uniforms in peacetime. You can't make money from things that can't be sold.

The entire European agriculture is having a bumper harvest, but you are hoarding flour. I think you must have heard the story that drought brings money to boats and water brings money to cars, and by analogy, you feel that it is right to hoard food during the harvest.

But you have to act according to your ability. You have mortgaged all your and my father's properties. If I don't help you sell them, I think you will go bankrupt.

Strictly speaking, I don't think you have any talent for business. "

Franz said seriously, cleverly avoiding the question of what else he knew.

Mrs. Sophie was a little angry, but what Franz said was true. If Franz hadn't helped her deal with this crisis, their family would have been discredited.

But Mrs. Sophie had already laid out a big game of chess. When she finished the game, she realized that she had no money, so she had to rack her brains to make money, but she did not have this talent.

But it was still humiliating to be ridiculed by his son. Anyway, there was no one else in the carriage, so he simply grabbed Franz's face and pulled him to both sides.

"Then, I should also thank you? Franz!"

"I don't think it's a ladylike thing to bully a kid with violence."

"So what should we do if our children don't obey the rules?"

"Then you should enlighten him with reason."

Mrs. Sophie and Franz had a good exchange of "physics".

"Franz, was it really your idea to sell those goods to the Mexicans?"

"Yes." Franz had no intention of lying, because Mrs. Sophie seemed to have known about it for a long time.

"You must feel that."

Before Franz finished speaking, he was interrupted by Mrs. Sophie.

"I'm very happy, Franz, you are my best son. Maybe your father's IQ has been transferred to you, but no matter what, you will definitely revitalize this family in the future."

Mrs. Sophie touched Franz's head and continued.

"Do you know what they call mother?"

"The only man in the Habsburg family," Franz replied.

"I don't like this title. This title should belong to you and your father. What I want to say is that if you have anything to discuss with me, I can help you."

Franz narrowed his eyes and noticed something unusual.

"Mom, what did you mess up again?"

"Well, I used all the grapes in your manor to make wine." Mrs. Sophie said.

"Just some grapes."

"Well, the grapes in your manor are not in good quality, and the wine you make is rancid." Mrs. Sophie added.

Franz frowned.

"Mother, did you steal the grapes from my manor to make wine and ask me to pay you for the unfinished wine?"

"No, I actually sent all that wine to your wine cellar."

"." Franz was speechless for a while.

"you"

"Then all the wine in your cellar went bad." Mrs. Sophie said apologetically.

"You are such a good mother. Do you know the value of those wines?"

Franz's wine cellar actually once belonged to Prince Elthazy. After his death, Franz II left a will and gave Franz the wines he had collected for many years, including many fine products. Together these are worth over 1.5 million florins.

"Franz, after reading so many books, do you think there is any way to save those spoiled wines?"

"No! It can't be saved, just wait and throw it away!"

February 1, 1837, Osaka.

Due to successive years of poor harvests in the Osaka area, food prices have skyrocketed, and starvation is everywhere.

Out of sympathy for the lower class people and for the future of the Edo shogunate, Oshio Heihachiro, a Confucian scholar of Yomei Shinsho School, petitioned the town for orders to open warehouses to release grain and provide relief to the victims.

However, the town ignored this and even took advantage of the famine to collude with businessmen to raise food prices to make huge profits and embezzle farmers' land.

As a Japanese fan of Yangming's philosophy, he has well practiced Yangming's "unity of knowledge and action".

After several requests for orders were rejected, Oshio Heihachiro gathered his comrade disciples and decided to defeat the superiors.

However, due to being reported by the traitors, the uprising was forced to advance the cause of justice.

Oshio Heihachiro's uprising was quickly suppressed, but then someone used his name to launch another uprising on an unprecedented scale. Countless hungry people and poor people poured into rural cities, robbed food, and killed officials.

The town official who had repeatedly refused Oshio Heihachiro's request was hanged in the square in the center of the city together with several hoarding businessmen.

The uprising quickly alerted the shogunate, who sent a large army to suppress it.

The rebel army, which had only simple farm tools, was vulnerable to the shogunate army supported by the iron artillery team.

Although the uprising was suppressed, it also sounded the alarm to the shogunate.

At that time, Osaka was the center of Japan's economy and was known as the "Kitchen of the World." A starving people riot actually occurred, which proved that the shogunate's exploitation of the people had reached an intolerable level.

Some people began to reform the tax system, hoping to eliminate unreasonable advance taxes and reduce the burden on farmers to alleviate domestic conflicts.

Some people saw the power of mind learning, and the whole of Japan started a craze for learning mind learning. After that, a large number of people who will leave a mark in Japanese history were born.

Among them was the later Japanese Navy Admiral Togo Heihachiro. There were only seven words on his waistband: "I will bow my head and worship Yomei for the rest of my life."

Some of the rebels used the money they robbed to bribe Dutch businessmen and send them to Europe.

At that time, Japan only allowed merchants from the Dutch, Qing Dynasty, and Portugal to trade in Japan.