How did the beggar gang decline? ——The dispute between the Pure Clothes Sect and the Dirty Clothes Sect

The leader of the Beggar Clan is really getting poorer and poorer...

I remember when Xiao Feng was still the leader of the Qiao Clan, at the "Songhe Tower" outside Wuxi City, in front of Qiao Feng "There was a large plate of cooked beef, a large bowl of soup, two jugs of wine, and nothing else on the table. It can be seen that he was eating and drinking very freely and freely." When Qiao Feng and Duan Yu finished their drinks and paid the bill, Qiao Feng "took out a piece of silver from his side, threw it on the table, took Duan Yu's hand and said, 'Let's go!'".

When Gang Leader Hong appeared for the first time, the situation turned out to be like this: "Huang Rong was about to tear the chicken open when someone behind her suddenly said, 'Tear into three parts and give me the chicken butt.'… ...The beggar took out a few golden darts from his arms and said, "I saw a few people fighting yesterday, and one of them was a rich man. The dart he placed was actually shining with gold. The old beggar took the dart and held it for him." Come here. The inside of this dart is made of scrap metal, and the outside of the dart is plated with real gold. If you don't have enough money to use it, you can get seven or eight pieces of silver." Obviously, Gang Leader Hong is different from Gang Leader Qiao when he goes out. Gang Leader Hong usually does not pretend to have money (no money to pretend).

The difference between the two generations of gang leaders is far more than that. In "Dragon", Quan Guanqing's purpose of deliberately framing Xiao Feng was to support a puppet regime and become the actual leader of the Beggar Gang; In "The Legend of the Condor Heroes", although the purpose of Elder Peng and others to usurp the throne is to defect to the Liao Kingdom, behind the scenes, it is a debate about the future of the Beggar Gang's revolution. In other words, except for the rebellious Elder Peng, Elder Jian, Elder Liang and others do not care who becomes the leader of the Beggar Gang. They care more about how the Beggar Gang should develop. This point is reflected in the hero meeting in the later period of "The Legend of the Condor Heroes". Elder Liang said, "Although our Beggar Gang is currently experiencing a decline in talents, if we are to have figures like Gang Leader Hong and Gang Leader Huang who are rare to see in a century, that is It will never be seen again, even someone as virtuous and able to convince the crowd as leader Lu Gu will never be found again... I remember when our gang recommended the leader at the Junshan Conference, Huang Qian was finally elected... She is the leader of the old man. After becoming the leader of the gang, the Beggar Gang prospered and prospered. "Of course, the prosperity of the Beggar Gang at this time was mainly due to fighting against the invaders, and it was indeed not as wealthy as it was in the Northern Song Dynasty.

What’s more interesting is later. In "Dragon", when Qiao Feng was still in power, he usually called himself "Qiao Feng, the leader of the Beggar Clan", but when it came to Hong Qigong, Hong Qigong Qi Gong's favorite words to call himself are "ancestor of beggars" and "old beggar". We know that begging is an industry. Although the status is humble (nine scholars and ten beggars), there are all kinds of talents in the industry. Judging from the nickname, Quan Guanqing is known as the "Scholar of the Ten Directions" in Jianghu. Not to mention the strategy, other elders also have their own He has special skills, such as Elder Chen, who is a master at playing with scorpions; but when he comes to the beggar ancestor Hong Gang leader, the main business of the beggar gang is to beg for food. Even when Li Sheng and others greet the direct disciples of Hong gang leader, they only provide beggars. Chicken is a food that should not be put on the table. Not to mention the talents with various skills in Qiao Feng's era, all of them are gone. Except for Elder Peng's Soul Conjuring Technique, which seems to be somewhat interesting, but decades of hard training can't compete with Huang Rong's " "Nine Yin Manual". If we admit that financial resources are the key to the prosperity of a gang, we must admit that from the period from Gang Leader Qiao to Gang Leader Hong, the Beggar Gang must have lost some profitable businesses, and these businesses should determine the development of the Beggar Gang from the Qiao Feng era of the Northern Song Dynasty. From its prosperity to the Southern Song Dynasty, the beggar gang gradually declined. So, what exactly does a beggar do?

In the novel "Water Margin", Wu Song returned to Yuncheng County from a business trip. When he saw his brother who died tragically, Wu Song's first reaction was to find Uncle He Jiu, the "tuan head" in the city. We know that Uncle He Jiu’s income at that time mainly came from helping government departments conduct autopsies, move corpses, and cremate corpses. So what is "Tuantou"? In "Wonderful Views of Modern and Ancient Times: The Golden Jade Slave Beats the Lover with a Stick", it is written that "there was a leader among the beggars, named 'Tuantou', who was in charge of the beggars." In other words, beggar leaders do not rely entirely on the income from begging by downline beggars. They also have more decent ways to generate income, and the income is not bad.

Although the two law enforcement elders of the Beggar Gang were not inferior to Bai Shijing and others at this time, their iron bones could not be transformed into organizational discipline ability. After that, the Beggar Gang was never able to revive and regain its former status in the world. And Chen Youliang, a traitor whose conditions were much worse than Quan Guanqing's, was able to manipulate the heroes of the Beggar Clan just because of the financial support of the Ruyang Palace. Not to mention that Shi Huolong, the leader of the Beggar Clan, became paralyzed when he was practicing the Eighteen Dragon Subduing Palms to the twelfth one. How could he lead the heroes with such qualifications?

So where did the talents of the Jingyi Sect end up? I guess those more promising organizations will be the ultimate destination of the elites of the Pure Clothes Sect. For example, Mingjiao, Honghua Society, Tiandi Society... Anyway, if you live in the world for a day, you will be there for the rest of your life. Who do you work for?

But no matter what, the Beggar Gang established its momentum in the Qiao Feng era, but eventually declined due to money problems. In the novel, it is a pity that there are no more beggars after the Ming Dynasty.