Ji Xiaolan is an upright, witty and eloquent man, and a red man around the emperor. During the Qing Dynasty, salt and iron trading was the main financial revenue of the country, and the country attached great importance to it. This involves the lifeline of the national economy, and the emperor attaches great importance to these things. In this way, there has been no problem with this kind of business, but during the Qianlong period, there were problems in the sales and management of salt, which caused losses to the state treasury. At this time, the minister in charge of regional salt and iron management, especially the emperor, explained the situation. Hundreds of thousands of taels of silver were also seized. Hearing the news, the emperor was very angry and thought that there must be corrupt officials bending the law. So the emperor began to investigate the matter thoroughly.
Although this matter has nothing to do with Ji Xiaolan at this time, because of his complicated family relationship, he was afraid of bringing trouble to his relatives at home, so he had to tip him off quietly. As people around the emperor, it is natural to be cautious in doing things. You can't blatantly tip off the news, you can only rely on your own intelligence. He wrote a letter to the corrupt official (the great-grandfather of his son-in-law). Although there is no hint in this letter, the salt residue at the seal and a handful of tea leaves made him immediately understand what Ji Xiaolan wanted to convey to him-salt inspection (tea) printing. With the news, he immediately asked his servant to transfer all the money to other places, which saved his life.
I didn't expect Ji Xiaolan to send messages in this way, which is really admirable. Finally, what Ji Xiaolan did was exposed, but Emperor Qianlong was curious about how he did it, so he exempted Ji Xiaolan from punishment.