Chapter 594: The Emperor with a Filter

The servant calmed down after a while, and then said, "The eldest son's name is on the list of candidates."

"By the way, Mr. Su won the first place."

Gu Qing clapped his hands, "Brother Chen already won the first place, and now he won the first place. If he can also be the first place in the palace examination, it will be a great three places!"

Gu Zhang's mind was not on Su Chen, but he was happy that his son had realized the dream that he could not realize when he was young.

However, winning the title of a candidate was not the final result, it could only be regarded as obtaining the qualification for the palace examination.

He suppressed his joy and told Gu Qing in a deep voice, "Sit down at home and read the essays carefully for the next one or two days to prepare for the palace examination."

The next day, early in the morning, before dawn, Gu Qing washed up and had breakfast, and went to the palace to participate in the palace examination.

The palace examination was held in the Hall of Supreme Harmony.

The 120 candidates and one first place were named, and the ceremony was performed, and then the test papers were distributed.

The palace examination was nominally presided over by the emperor, but no emperor would stay in the Hall of Supreme Harmony for a whole day.

Basically, it was just a formality. The emperor presided over the ceremony and left.

The palace examination only tested policy questions.

Policy questions were to raise one or two problems that the court needed to solve, and the candidates had to give countermeasures.

The general meaning of the topic of this palace examination was that after three years of drought in the north, the remaining population was less than one-third of the previous population, and the fields were barren and no one was cultivating them. How could the north quickly recover its vitality?

Su Chen and Gu Qing were both people who had fled famine. Compared with other candidates, they were more familiar with the situation in the north. The two thought for a while and began to answer the questions.

It was almost noon when the emperor came over for a round.

He first walked to his nephew and looked at his article.

Needless to say, Su Chen's handwriting, even the draft, looked like it was printed, a very standard official style, regardless of the article, just looking at the handwriting was pleasing to the eye.

The emperor looked at it, smiled, and was about to leave when he caught a glimpse of Gu Qing.

When the Gu family was in Ping'an City, they did not have much contact with the Wangfu, but the emperor had met Gu Qing two or three times.

He didn't know that the elder brother of the Crown Princess had also participated in the imperial examination, and even passed the palace examination.

The emperor walked over and stood beside Gu Qing to read his article, and nodded slightly for a while.

First of all, Gu Qing's handwriting is also very good. As long as they are scholars, they have learned the official style since childhood, because the palace examination requires writing in the official style.

Secondly, several countermeasures proposed by Gu Qing, such as reducing taxes, checking unowned land and giving it to the people at a low price or for free, and the government issuing grain seeds, etc., are more pragmatic and feasible. The writing style is slightly simple, but it is still a good article.

After reading the two acquaintances, the emperor was not interested and left.

At noon, the palace gave food and continued to take the exam after eating.

It was not until sunset that someone came to collect the papers.

The papers were collected, the names were covered first, and then sealed. It would not be until the next day that several examiners would take turns to review the papers.

The examiners gave five-level evaluations to the papers, selected the ten papers with the best comprehensive scores, and presented them to the emperor, who then personally selected the first, second and third.

In just a few days, ten test papers were placed on the emperor's desk.

The emperor flipped through the ten test papers and found Su Chen's paper first. His nephew had often corresponded with him in the past, so his handwriting was very familiar. After taking a closer look at the article, the emperor couldn't help but slap the table heavily, "What a good article!"

The article quoted classics and was written in a brilliant way. Not only did it have its own unique insights on government affairs, but the writing was also extremely beautiful.

The emperor wrote a one on Su Chen's paper without hesitation and put it aside.