Xinshun 1730

Chapter 918 The Old Ones Don't Go, The New Ones Don't Come (Part [-])
The young man who begged the traffickers was surnamed Zhang and his humble name was Pilu. He was a typical impoverished person in Huanghuai.

The so-called typical is very different from other places.Poor is not typical, there are poor people elsewhere.

There is a saying elsewhere that a broken house is worth ten thousand.But for the typical poor people in the flooded areas of the Yellow River and Huai River, dilapidated houses are not worth much at all.

All of them, the whole family, the most valuable thing is a "foundation", which can be understood as a homestead.

Often water, the concept of the house is not long-lasting.

However, the ancestral houses left by the ancestors of the past dynasties must have been built on the high platform of Bagengzi.

This year it will be filled with soil, and next year it will be washed away.Refill the next year.He was washed again in the next year.

That is, the ground buildings are built in vain, and are often washed away by water.Besides, I can't cover the good ones.

However, it is difficult for ordinary floods to completely wash away the foundation filled in the ground.

This is considered a family heirloom.Ask the people in Huanghuai District, what is a family heirloom?It must be the old house of my own family, and it is not the ground building of the old house, but the foundation stone below.

Said it was worth money?It's actually worthless at all.

Say it's worthless?Without this thing, it would be difficult to even build a house, and today there will be tomorrow.

Besides, what else does Zhang Pilu have?
Probably, there is nothing but the IOU of the debt owed to the master's house.

His daughter-in-law was exchanged for his sister when his parents were still there.The younger sister changes wives, and by the way, the younger sister is also the sister-in-law of my uncle's brother's family.A child can call his sister aunt or aunt, whatever he wants.

Oh, by the way, Zhang Pilu also has a broken boat at home.This is also a must-have for every family in Huanghuai District.Once the water hits, you can still survive in a boat.

There is a popular saying in later generations that calling you poor is because you are lazy.This sentence is really inappropriate for Zhang Pilu.

He is not lazy at all.

But still poor.

Not only poor, but also in debt.

It seems that it is not up yet.

The little land passed down from my family's ancestors can't harvest much food.Then you have to rent someone else's land.

If you rent land, you have to pay the rent.

The rent is not over yet, the leased land has to be "rolled" in this year and month.

Others rent the land, and some people invite the master's family to have a meal every month, serving delicious food and drink, several times a year.Or if there is a more beautiful daughter-in-law in the family, please ask the master to sleep and try something new.

Firstly, Zhang Pilu didn't want to let the master's family try out his daughter-in-law, and secondly, his daughter-in-law was not very good-looking, and the master's family had no intention.So he belongs to that very typical "serf".

If there is any work in the master's house, he needs to work.For example, digging canals, repairing walls, repairing dams and the like.

If you have ambition, just say that we are in a rental relationship, you and I are equal, why should I work for you for free?Of course it is good to have ambition, but you can choose to starve to death.

The little things produced in the field are not enough to eat, and it is impossible to live without renting the land.

People like Zhang Pilu are not afraid of big disasters, but small ones.

Fortunately, the catastrophe, the imperial court will provide relief.Since Dashun won the world, the amount of money for disaster relief has indeed been much higher than that of the previous dynasty. After all, Dashun knows the consequences of not providing relief when there is a disaster.

If there is a catastrophe, with relief, at least they will not starve to death.Even if the interest is not included, the debt owed can be a little less than usual.

I'm afraid of that kind of small disaster.

The imperial court did not provide relief, and the magistrates had to conscript labor to work after the relief.The conscripting of labor is to peel off the skin, which is different from the Yellow River Canal area.

In the Huangyun area, theoretically, the imperial court should implement a whipping method, that is, "recruitment of labor", and spend money to hire people to do some water conservancy projects.

In fact, what the imperial court gave was two taels of silver a month.But after arriving at the place, there is only one, two, two, and three dollars left for one person.

However, the annexation of land there has not yet reached a very serious level, so for example, an ordinary small peasant family was assigned this job, and it was just in time for the busy farming season.

So the local government also tacitly agreed: after ordering your corvee, you can spend money to hire people to do it.One or two a month, if you don't want to do it, and people who are less free than you are willing to do it, you just ask someone else.

But the place where Zhang Pilong is located is not a big river area like the Yellow River and Huaihe River.It's a small river.

It is impossible for the imperial court to allocate funds from the central government to carry out the water conservancy project of this river. To put it bluntly, the household government collects the money, which is not enough to maintain the Yellow River and the canal. How can it be possible to allocate money to repair something that is not famous Sheyang River.

The central government does not allocate funds, and local officials have to repair it.Flood every year, who can bear it?
The magistrates can't pull out the gold, so they have to apportion it.

Apportionment is not a national tax, but a local tax.Local taxes, handymen, and gentry are given preferential treatment and exemption. This is called "the difference between high and low."In the founding classics of the former dynasty, this is an important manifestation of the distinction between high and low, and it is the political correctness of Confucian ideology.Like a handyman, let the scholar-officials do the work of mud legs?To repair the embankment?Isn't this degrading?Doing the same job as the mud legs, it's hard to face.

And even if there is no express reduction or exemption, and the magistrate increases the apportionment, the gentry have every reason to think that this is an arbitrary fee, and the magistrate will have to go around after suing.

What the gentry said is correct, I paid the national tax on time, let alone tax evasion, the country stipulated thirty one tax, and I paid the money that should be paid, why should I say I was tax evasion?Why should I pay the local apportionment?Do you have any paperwork from the household government for apportionment?Do you have any official documents from the Temple of Heavenly Blessing?Is there an imperial decree from the emperor?Pay one tael today, how about another ten tael tomorrow?

There are one billion mu of land in the country, 2000 million mu of national tax, and 0.02 taels of silver for one mu of land, which is equivalent to 3 catties of rice.

Although the local government has certain restrictions, it is definitely not enough to spend, but there are some things that local officials have to do.The distribution of corvees is mainly distributed on the heads of ordinary people like Zhang Pilu.

There are too many things to apportion.

Officials come to inspect, consumption has to be apportioned; transporting grain pays national taxes, and the grain cannot be sent to Taicang by itself, which requires apportionment of manpower, and has to be transported there; repairing river embankments, which requires apportionment; There are officials passing by the post station. In theory, the officials’ followers and family members have to spend their own money. The post station is only responsible for the individual officials. But in theory, Wu Sangui should fight for the interests of the nation, so the local officials really let others spend their own money. ?
Therefore, Zhang Pilu's wife is not good-looking, and he can still rent land, and he can live so long that he is not dead. It can be seen that he is not only hardworking, but also has a good physique.

But the problem is that he is so diligent and still owes a lot of debt.

Human traffickers say that Nanyang is good in every way, and it is good in every way. In Zhang Pilu's view, one sentence is the most attractive:
Nanyang can get rich and change its destiny through labor.

It seems that as long as you have the strength and are willing to work, you can change from hired labor to half-hired and half-self-cultivated; then the class jumps to the owner-peasant; then to the landlord; Lord, and then rose to the big capitalists in Songjiang Prefecture.

Of course, Zhang Pilu's greatest imagination at this time was to become a "self-cultivator".

However, this was enough to attract him.

After all, it sounds like a place where labor can change destiny.

According to what Zhang Pilu thought, he was only eighteen this year.I went to Nanyang and worked for three years or paid for the ship.Then work for another three years until you are 24, when you are strong and strong, save up your capital, and open your own land for five or six years. When you are 30, you have [-] to [-] acres of land and a cow. This is not the life of a fairy. ?

Zhang Pilu felt that with his own strength, he would be praised by the master "Pilu can really do it" when working at the master's house on weekdays. If he had some capital, even if he couldn't afford a cow for the time being, a hoe , As long as you can eat enough food every day, you can dig out half an acre of land every day, and you can catch up with half a head of cows.

In the future, if there were forty or fifty mu of land planted with two mu of cotton, the wife would spin and weave at home, and the children would be able to change into new coats every New Year, wouldn’t it mean that they would be immortals on this day?
A tenant farmer who does not want to be an owner farmer is not a good tenant farmer.Even if you go out to work, it is just "curve self-cultivation".

In a place like Nanyang, people are not afraid of people having dreams, but they are afraid of people not having dreams. They feel that they are living a miserable life everywhere, so why run so far?
This is piercing Zhang Pilu's heart.

After kneeling for a long time and begging for a long time, the trafficker on the opposite side just didn't let go.After the trafficker finished talking that he himself had seen the mountain of swords and the sea of ​​blood, Zhang Pilu realized that it was useless to kneel here, so he had to bring his wife and retreat temporarily.

Only 1500 people are accepted here, and no more will be accepted.There are [-] to [-] people who are waiting for the water to recede and drink relief porridge every day.

Fortunately, those who have children under the age of eight, those who have to support the elderly, those who are sick, those who are not in good health, those who are forty years old, and those who have signed a long-term contract with the host family are not required.

Although many people wanted to go, few actually chose it.

The traffickers may have picked soldiers before and are very professional.When seeing someone, first pinch your mouth open to look at your teeth; then punch your chest twice to try to cough or not; tap your knees and feel your bones.

It is similar to picking animals in the livestock market.

The only advantage here over the rural areas in southern Jiangsu is that due to climatic factors, the infection rate of schistosomiasis is lower than that of the areas along the Yangtze River.

Therefore, despite such or such requirements and such and such inaccuracies, the quota of 1500 people is almost full.

Zhang Pilu was anxious. He heard that he might come again this year to ask for a group of people, but he might have to wait for next year.It's hard to say whether I will live or die next year. How can I wait for next year?

Besides, the child will not be eight years old next year.

Glancing at the child in his wife's arms, he gritted his teeth and said, "Either way, I'll drown. If the old one doesn't go, the new one won't come, just go there and regenerate."

The wife looked down at the baby in her arms. The baby who had just finished drinking rice soup was extremely happy. She didn't know how cruel life was at this time, so she fell asleep.The little hand was still scratching and scratching in his sleep, and he didn't know what he was dreaming about.

Although the tender feet were dirty, there was a touch of white tenderness that only a baby could have in the gray bumps.As long as you don't cry, it's really gratifying.

Zhang Pilu's wife looked at the sleeping baby for a while, but didn't hesitate too long.He hummed and nodded, thinking that he should still drown.

(End of this chapter)