Haisheng Mingdi

Chapter 883 Nine Year Spring

Shaotian nine years, spring.

The cold spring is expected to be cold. Although last year was a rare warm winter, this spring has been extraordinarily cold. February has come, but the spring has come.

The distance from Puji to Zhujiabao is only more than ten miles. When Zhu San came, he was wearing a padded jacket and a sheepskin jacket. As a result, halfway on the return journey, his head was already smoking and his body was covered in sweat. His precious horse was green. The mule's chest and legs were also drenched with sweat, which made the third child very distressed.

This mule is his treasure, he spent five silver dollars to find it personally at the cattle and horse market in Xi'an, and bought it after bargaining.His current business is inseparable from this treasure, and he counts on it to make great efforts.

The sun in the sky has no heat, the snow that just fell a few days ago is melting, and the ground is very difficult.The big mule pulled the carriage and walked on the snow-melting road with some difficulty. The wheels were often sunk in it, and the third child also pushed hard all the way, and finally walked through a muddy road to a hard place, and he was able to catch his breath.

"Father, we should buy a horse. The mule is still a bit weak." His son was on the other side of the cart, and the father and father walked beside the cart, covered in sweat.

"It's not cheap to buy a horse. A big horse costs more than ten silver dollars, and you have to pay a horse tax to get a horse license. You may also need a carriage business license. At that time, you have to pay a tax and a contract fee. Besides, raising a horse Much more expensive than raising mules."

The son mentioned buying a horse more than once, and even proposed to replace the old two-wheeled carriage with a four-wheeled one, but the third son never let go. He felt that buying a horse and replacing it with a carriage would cost a lot of money, and he had to pay taxes.

"Father, if we buy horses and replace them with cars, it will be much easier to go to the market to pull manure in the future, and we can also contract another manure market. Then our manure farm will be able to expand, we can sell more manure, and earn more money." There are more."

"It needs money."

"Loan, I've asked about our situation. You can apply for an interest-free three-year loan of 50 yuan in silver dollars. Let's advance some by ourselves. We have the money to buy horses and change cars. Then we will pack one or two more episodes to expand the loan. For the dung farm, if you hire a few more workers, you can sell more manure and make more money, and there will be no problem repaying the loan after three years."

"Come on slowly, don't worry, it's better not to borrow if you can. It's interest-free, but after all, we have to pay back the capital. Let's save up slowly by ourselves. When we save enough capital, we can buy horses and change cars to expand the manure farm. There are about ten people in the family, don’t just go away after two days of cooking.”

I don't know how many times the father and father argued about this matter, but every time the old man blocked his son back by saying that I have eaten more salt than you, and rejected his plan to expand production.

The old man's surname is Zhu. He is from Zhujiabao, Puji Town, Wugong County, Chang'an Prefecture, Guanzhong. There are many Zhujiabaozi with the surname Zhu, and many of them are red belts. The third Zhu is not a red belt. Poor, the third son followed his father to dig out dung when he was young.

According to what his father once told him, their ancestors also belonged to Prince Qin's Mansion, but they were illegitimate children born to a housewife. That ancestor was just a side branch of Prince Qin's Mansion who didn't even get a title and salary, so naturally there was no way. The illegitimate son was invited to a title, but for some reason, he was left alone and ignored, and finally became a manure digger during the war and famine.

The third child suffered for half his life, and later, with his faithful and diligent performance, he won the favor of the owner of the dung factory. He married the unmarried girl in her 30s to the third child, and accepted him as his son-in-law. After the farm owner died, the third child became the new dung farm owner.

From a poor excavator, he also became a small farmer.

But in those years of Chongzhen, Shaanxi was the hardest-hit area. Drought and locust plagues followed by thieves everywhere. The third child was also forced to take his wife and children to the Central Plains to escape famine and beg for food. They became refugees. Fortunately, they were lucky and survived until the end of the war. .

Not only was he able to return to the Guan, but he even allocated some land to their family. The land is not much. Although the Guanzhong Plain is fertile, it has a large population. The latrine at home will be cleaned regularly, and even every now and then, they will send some fresh fruits and vegetables grown in their own fields, which makes the third child stand out from the crowd of country people who collect Yexiang.

Over the past few years, Lao San has even contracted most of the night incense and toilet collection and cleaning work in Puji Town, defeating many opponents by virtue of services.

Relying on the manure source in Puji Town, he built a manure field in Zhujiabao, processed the collected manure and sold it to landlords and farmers as dry manure.

This business can't actually make a lot of money, but for many ordinary people, it is also a good job.

The family has ten acres of land, and rented another twenty acres of official land, and then opened a manure field. The family collected and processed manure during the slack, which made the family more and more prosperous.

There are more than a dozen members in the family, and the standard of living even exceeds the situation of the old man's family when the third child married.

The third child now takes his family to farm and collect manure. He is very frugal and refuses to waste any money. He saves money to buy two acres of land every year and sends his grandson to school.

He firmly believes that hard work and thrift can make you rich, at least not worrying about food and clothing.

After experiencing the difficulties in the first half of his life, he paid much attention to saving and was more cautious. His son wanted to borrow money to expand the manure farm, and even wanted to learn from others to invest money in the mine to become a shareholder. The third child always refused. He knew that his sons disliked the manure farm. This job, but he will not dislike it, his father and son have done this job for two generations, and they have also supported them.

Although the family now has more than ten acres of land of their own, he will never dislike the work that can feed them.

"Father, I just heard in the town that the saint is coming. It seems that he will pass through Wugong County in the past few days, and also pass through our Puji Town." The eldest son is actually the same age as the emperor, and he wears a dog fur hat. , with a patched cotton padded jacket and a sheepskin horse hexagram on the outside. The eldest son is a little short and thin, which is caused by lack of nutrition when he was young.

At the same age, the Ninth Five-Year Supreme, but he can only follow his father to dig out toilets to collect night incense. He is not satisfied with this kind of life. It is a good business, as long as you work hard and do it with your heart, you can pass it on to your family. It is a very good family business. After a year of hard work, you can not only provide food and clothing for the family, but also save money to buy two acres of land, and save some food and money. Save money for emergencies.

If the family is more frugal, it can still provide for the boys to go to elementary school. If there is a talented person, the family will bite their teeth and confess. Maybe they can produce a scholar, even if they confess a middle school student. Yamen has become an official.

The third child never thought of going to recognize his ancestors and return to his ancestors. He felt that he couldn't explain clearly at all, so it was unnecessary. It was better to manage his own life well.

"Did you find out when the saint passed by?"

"It's either the day after tomorrow or the day after tomorrow. It should be those two days."

The third child nodded, took out his own cigarette pouch, put a pot of cigarettes in the pot, put it in his mouth, and lit it. He was smoking the dry shredded tobacco grown by himself, and said to his son, "Go back and find out if it is When."

"Do what?"

"The saint passed by, and our family will kneel to meet him on the side of the road. We can survive in troubled times. Whose blessing is it that we rely on? It is the saint. Now our family can have our own land, our own livelihood, and food and clothing. Who do you depend on? It’s a saint, and we can’t forget the man who dug the well when we drink water. Our whole family has been blessed with the saint’s life, and our new life now depends entirely on the saint, how can we not be ungrateful?”

"You go home and catch another sheep, catch two chickens, prepare a basket of eggs, and put two stones of grain in it, and then offer them to the saint together."

The eldest son felt distressed, "Father, these things are almost worth a donkey."

"People must be grateful, otherwise they are no different from livestock."

There was another muddy road ahead. The father and father stopped talking and bent over the cart together to help push the cart. The big mule also began to tow the cart.

On the country road, two people, one mule and one cart, headed for the countryside with several buckets of dung.

The ground on the side of the road has been turned over once, and the snow cover has melted half and half in the ground.

Last year was a warm winter, and everyone was worried that there would be insect pests this year. Fortunately, there was heavy snow this late spring, which may kill many insect eggs in the ground.

Last year, the counties and townships organized locust prevention campaigns, mobilized the people to open up the places where locusts lay eggs on the river and lake beaches, and even mobilized the people to dig locust eggs to exchange for food. The elderly and children can exchange several catties of food in a day.

Eight hundred miles away, Qinchuan is the most fertile land. However, the Guanzhong Plain has always been densely populated. Defense battalions, provincial patrol battalions, towns, post stations, government offices at all levels, schools, and river workers all occupy a lot of land.

It would have been nice if the third child's family could get ten mu of land at the beginning, but they have saved money to buy another ten mu of land in the past few years, so they can be regarded as small landlords.

When this cold spring is over, the field will be busy, the wheat will grow, and their manure will be sold well.

"Father, recently I heard that a fertilizer factory has opened in Xi'an City, and it is said that it is under the name of the Royal Shaofu Supervisor."

The third child didn't believe it, how could the royal family compete with the common people for the job of collecting dung.

"Their manure is different from our manure. It is said that their manure is all bird manure brought back from the South Sea islands, and then processed. It is said that the manure is extremely fertile, and many royal manors have begun to use it. This kind of dung is in short supply."

The third child taught his son, "Even if bird droppings can fertilize the land, how can you get so much bird droppings?"

"I've also heard that on some islands in the South China Sea, the bird droppings have accumulated for countless years, and the bird droppings are several feet thick. It's like digging coal, and it can be dug non-stop by a boat. These bird droppings After being processed into fertilizer together with animal bones, it can greatly replenish soil fertility, which is much better than our dung."

"I don't believe it." The third child didn't believe such absurd rumors at all.

Land planting does need to replenish soil fertility, usually by burning straw, or applying the ash from the stove to the field, and then collecting the manure of cattle and sheep and applying it to the field, or collecting human excrement and urine.The manure field of the third child is a deep processing of manure. After accumulation, fermentation, and even adding some soil and ash to make high-quality fertilizers, it can effectively supplement soil fertility.

Otherwise, ordinary fields will not be supplemented and can only be rotated or fallow, and the yield per mu will be greatly reduced.

Every old farmer knows very well how useful manure is to farmers' farming. There will not be a piece of cow dung and sheep dung wasted on the roads in the countryside.

In order to fertilize the land, the common people will even dig out the pond mud and silt in the river pond in winter and dry them before adding them to the field.

But Lao San, a professional manure farmer, has never heard of bird droppings. How much bird droppings can there be?

The boss himself was dubious, he had only heard about it, but he had never seen it, so he could not refute his father, so he had to change the subject, "Father, I heard that many people go to Xikou to Hetao to reclaim wasteland and grow naked oats. One year's harvest can be eaten for ten years."

Naked oats, also known as oily wheat, are drought-resistant and easy to store, and can be stored for ten years without spoiling.The Hetao area was originally a nomadic place for Mongolians, and now they continue to immigrate to the border, but it is still sparsely populated.

Many people in the inland who lack land but are unwilling to leave their hometowns will go there to lease land, also known as commercial villages. Generally, merchants go there to contract a large piece of land, and then recruit people to plant it themselves. The land rent is cheap .

There are also some people who spontaneously contact a group of relatives and friends to rent a piece of land over there to plant together. As long as there is no disaster, the harvest in one year can be enough to feed for ten years.

The main reason for such a harvest is that there are not many people there, so it can be cultivated extensively, and one person can plant two to three hundred acres. Even if the yield per mu is low, it cannot support a large amount. Usually, there is not much need there. When the harvest season comes, all the wives, children, and children of the family are called to harvest. The grain can be sold directly to the government or military warehouses at the Hetao, and the price is very fair.

Waiting for next year, you can change the rent for another piece of land, so you don't have to worry about the lack of land.

In addition to naked oats, buckwheat and red barley are mainly grown there, as well as rapeseed and potatoes.

There are also many farmers who went to Hetao to lease land. After running for a few years like migratory birds, they simply applied for immigration and settled there, and then they could get their own fields or continue to lease land. In the past, people mainly I was worried about the Mongols in the Hetao area, but after a few years, I found that the Han and Mongols get along very well there now, especially because the imperial court has a large army there. More and more people were tempted, so they simply moved over.

The eldest son of the third son also thought about going there to acquire land, and even wanted to settle there, but the third son disagreed. He opposed the separation of the family, and he didn't want his children and grandchildren to go to the frontier. He still liked Guanzhong and Babai Li Qinchuan, how wonderful this land is.

The frontier is good now, but what if the imperial court loses control of the Mongols one day, what should we do then? If we want to go back to the Guanzhong Plain, there will be no place left.

In front is Zhujiabao.

The fort is on a platform, and there is an earthen wall outside the village. This is the village wall, which can prevent thieves and thieves. However, the security in Guanzhong is very good now, and the village wall has lost its original function.

Outside the village wall, there are vegetable fields of various families, patches of green and full of vitality.

Seeing Baozi, the third child felt relieved for a while, it felt like home, very warm.

Everything is good, nothing is as good as home.

A golden nest and a silver nest are not good for your own kennel.

"I heard that the sages conquered the countries in the Western Regions, and now they emigrate to the Western Regions. They are all the best oasis plains, especially the newly conquered Yili River Valley and Suiye River Valley. It is said that each person who immigrates there can get at least fifty acres of land, A household can get up to [-] mu of land, after which they will be landlords and even have pastures.” The eldest son’s tone was full of envy.

Although the family does not have to worry about food and clothing, there are more than 20 mu of their own home, and some official land is planted as tenants, and there is a manure field, but there are more than a dozen members in the family, and his three brothers are all married, but they are still the same. Everyone lives.

He really wants to separate his family and live in another family. He even wants to immigrate to Hetao or even the Western Regions. He wants to have his own land. Now that the world is so peaceful, the bold and the timid will die of starvation. Poor, but my father is only willing to stick to his hometown, guarding the dung yard, not allowing them to do this, not allowing them to do that.

"You young people, you are just too frizzy to be down-to-earth, too frivolous and prone to somersaults."

The old man is very grateful to the current emperor. Without Emperor Shaotian, there would be no new Ming Dynasty, nor would there be today's peaceful and prosperous age. He can return to his hometown, and he can be allocated fields, and live a stable life with low taxes. Life is stable, this is a life that I never dreamed of before.

He doesn't have much ambition and desire, he just wants to live a solid life, save money to buy a few acres of new land every year, save enough money to buy a few more cars or buy a few horses and mules, so that the manure farm can contract more market towns, Collect more dung, hire more people, and accumulate more throughout the year to buy more fields.

He just wanted to take his time, and he didn't want to take out loans or borrow money, and he didn't want to immigrate for the frontier land. He was very satisfied with his life now, so why would he take risks and leave his hometown?

He is used to everything here, and he doesn't want to leave here.

The life of fleeing famine and wandering in the past still occasionally makes him have nightmares.

Xiaofu is at ease, and he is satisfied.

He understands his son's thoughts, but stubbornly believes that he has experienced a lot, so he is more reasonable than his son, and his son is too adventurous, which is wrong.

He didn't want his son to leave even more. How nice it is for the family to be together.

When I got home, my son seemed to be deeply shocked, and he went back to his room in a depressed mood.

The third child called his wife and daughter-in-law and asked them to prepare new clothes for the whole family. The cleanest and most decent clothes should be prepared and washed in advance.

In addition, sheep, chicken, duck, eggs, rice noodles, etc. must be prepared.

"The government didn't say that they would donate these." The old woman was a little bit reluctant. When she was young, she looked like a man, big and thick, so even the daughter of the manure farmer was not easy to marry. In the end, the old manure owner also I had no choice but to recruit the third son-in-law of the dung worker in my field.

The third child is very good to this wife. He is outside the home, and the family is all taken care of by his wife, including money and food. Over the years, the husband and wife have cooperated with each other tacitly.

"It's not a request from the government, it's our own gratitude to the saint, let's prepare."

Although the old wife was muttering, she still went to prepare.

The third child sat in the house, smoking a dry cigarette, and remembered what his son said before, the bird droppings from the Royal Shaofu Prison, the commercial land in Hetao harvested enough for ten years, and the emigration to Ili in the Western Region. A minimum of [-] mu per family, and a maximum of [-] mu per household, thinking about this, he fell into deep thought, and even had some doubts about his persistence.

Is it really necessary to let the eldest son's family immigrate to the Western Regions or Hetao?
(End of this chapter)