A Good Landlord in the Tang Dynasty: Emperor Yuan Cong

Chapter 1035 Baqiao
Baqiao.

Wu Huaiyu took Asang and his wife to rest for a while. He did not enter Baqiao Posthouse. There were many shops on both sides of the road outside the posthouse. He found a restaurant that looked good and went in.

Outside the house is covered in snow and freezing cold.

As soon as I entered the house, the heat hit my face.

"Inn, do you want to stay in a hotel or stay in an inn?" A teenage waiter greeted him with a smile, and his thick Guanzhong accent made Wu Huaiyu feel more friendly.

"What's there to eat?"

Although the waiter is young, he has been an apprentice in the store for several years, so he could tell at a glance that this business is not simple. This young man has a good temperament and is wearing a mink fur coat. The child brought by the young woman next to him is also wearing a mink fur cloak. He also brought with him a lot of entourage, the men were young and capable, and the women were also well-dressed.

This is a distinguished guest.

Baqiao is located on the outskirts of Chang'an. Nobles often pass by here from the beginning to the end of the year. The waiter also has a pair of sharp eyes.

That Alang is definitely a noble person with status, and he is at least Yin Fei or above.

"Well, I'm just used to it. The hotel waiter usually asks whether it's better to go to the hotel or to stay in the hotel."

"Dajian, originally meant to make fire. Everyone goes out and it is inconvenient to eat and drink on the road, so everyone will bring dry food. Some small shops only provide accommodation but not meals.
If guests need it, they can also borrow the kitchen and use the fire to boil some hot water or process dry food, so it is often called a fire shop. However, most of these roadside shops are wooden houses or thatched shops, so fire is taboo. Generally everyone calls it tipping. "

Most of these small shops do not provide food but only accommodate guests, or they only borrow firewood, oil and salt from the kitchen to boil water and heat dry food, and calculate the firewood price, or there is no extra charge.

Since he was an honored guest, of course he had to be treated with care, so he smiled and said that the kitchen had stewed mutton soup, hand-made mutton, and live chickens that could be slaughtered freshly. There were also other fresh vegetables such as white radish, carrots, potatoes, green onions, and leeks.

The service in this restaurant is pretty good, there are many staff, and the food is served quickly.

"Isn't there food in this store?"

It’s time for dinner, so let’s have something to eat here first.

"Why do you need to ask for tips when eating?"

"It just means eating."

When he was away from home, Huaiyu didn't pay too much attention to it. He had a table for his family of three, and a table for Shitou and his other entourage.

It also comes with a plate of pickled radish, spicy and sour shredded potatoes, scrambled eggs with green onions and several other vegetarian dishes.

Chenglu shouted that it was hot and wanted to take off his mink fur.
"Aye, what does tipping mean?"

"Can you please prepare some meat and vegetable dishes for us? You can also order some steamed cakes or soup cakes."

In addition, there were many guards and followers, but they stayed outside to guard the place very conscientiously.

"Ask the waiter to give each of the brothers outside a bowl of hot mutton soup, and four hot sesame pancakes for each person. If there is not enough, we will add more."

After Wu Huaiyu finished speaking, Shi Shouxin beside him took out a silver Kaiyuan and handed it to the waiter, asking him to prepare it quickly.

Wu Huaiyu held the boy in his arms, rubbed his little face, and patiently explained to him that it was not convenient to go out now. There were post houses along the post road, that is, the national highway, but people without status could not stay in them. Generally, people still stayed in small shops on the roadside.

Of course, this store is of good quality. After all, it is just outside Chang'an. Wu Huaiyu also specially chose this high-end store.
Although we will arrive in Chang'an soon, there is still about twenty miles to go.

There is also a very fragrant mutton soup, with a handful of green scallions sprinkled on top, and you can even smell the addition of pepper.
I also brought a basket of flax cakes.

Wu Huaiyu smiled and took off the leopard fur coat of this boy. This boy was born on Ludao and was not used to the cold in the north. He had been freezing all the way here. Fortunately, they were on the boat most of the time and could make a charcoal fire in the cabin. Asang I also specially prepared fur coats and other warm clothes early.

Hot hand-caught mutton, the meat is very plump,

"The mutton in Guanzhong is just better than the one in the south," Asang lamented. Although her ancestral home is Puzhou, she grew up in the Liaodong Peninsula, so her living and eating habits can be considered northern.

For example, this time when she returned to Beijing, Chenglu kept calling him cold, but she actually felt quite friendly.

Now when I drink this mutton soup, I feel that way even more.

"It would be better if there was a bowl of mackerel dumplings." Asang missed the mackerel dumplings eaten during the New Year in Qingnipu, his hometown.

In fact, when I was in Ludao, I ate it often, but I didn’t feel that way, maybe because I didn’t eat it with my family.

Wu Huaiyu also took off his coat.

He immediately tasted that the mutton was not local to Guanzhong, but probably Turkic mutton from the Hetao area. Wu Huaiyu can still eat mutton from Guanzhong, Shuofang, Hetao, and even Yinshan North.

The best mutton in Guanzhong is Tongzhou sheep, especially the ones raised in Shayuan have the best taste, but they are still not as good as the Yanzhou Tan sheep from Shuofang.

The mutton in Hetao is also of very good quality.

I asked the waiter and he replied that the mutton in their store comes from Yinzhou.

Wu Huaiyu smiled and didn't listen to the waiter's praise of the quality of the mutton in the store and the live sheep shipped all the way from Yinzhou.

Wu Huaiyu didn't expose the waiter. The mutton was authentically from Yinzhou, but it was still edible. This was not a live sheep. It was clearly a sheep slaughtered in Yinzhou after winter, and then frozen and transported to Chang'an. Luoyang and other places. People of the Tang Dynasty regarded mutton as a delicacy.

Especially in the two capitals, the consumption of mutton is very large. In winter, ordinary people have to eat mutton several times.

Naturally, the supply of sheep raised in Guanzhong is insufficient, and in winter, it is no longer possible to drive sheep from Hexi Longyou, Shuofang Hetao, or even Turks beyond the Great Wall to Guanzhongzhongyuan. The weather is cold and there is no grass on the road.
Therefore, during this season, a large number of sheep were slaughtered and the meat was frozen and transported south.

Due to the cold weather, these frozen muttons can remain fresh to a certain extent, but they are definitely not as good as freshly slaughtered sheep.

The Wu family has always been engaged in the business of selling live sheep and selling frozen mutton, and the scale of the business is quite large. I think back when Master Liang was still king of Shuofang, the relationship between the Turks and the Tang Dynasty was very bad. At that time, the north Although there are border markets, their opening and closing are uncertain.
The export of sheep from the north to the south is also not large-scale.

It was Wu Huaiyu who destroyed Liang Shidu. After the imperial court regained Shuofang, under his auspices, the border market became stable, and cattle and sheep poured in in large numbers through the border market.

There was even an avenue of sheep.

In the past few years, many dignitaries from Chang'an have also been involved in this business, such as Xu Luoren, General Zuo Yulin, whose family used to be a horse dealer in Hedong. This business is huge. Now in Shuofangbian City, horse dealers are The Xu family still accounts for a large share of the business.

For example, Shi Tangjian, the governor of Yizhou, his family also directly enclosed a lot of land in Shuofang to raise sheep, and also sent people to the Turkic tribes in the north to do business.

It is said that the Tang family business was relatively ugly. They sold all kinds of goods from the Central Plains to the Turkic tribes, but they did not sell them for money, and they did not even exchange them for cattle, alpaca and fur. Their trading methods were very special.

The goods are sold to herdsmen, but only small animals are exchanged for them, such as lambs, calves and ponies. After the exchange, they are not taken away, but the herdsmen agree that these calves and horses will still be kept by the herdsmen until they grow up a year later. .

When the small animals grow up, he will not pay more if they are taken away, but if they die, the herdsmen will have to pay compensation.

They also like to lend money to herdsmen. You can borrow money from their businesses, but the interest rates are very high, and they have to pay with livestock. In short, the Tang family business has gained a lot of notoriety from the Turkic herdsmen in just a few years.

But with these methods, the Tang family firm did make a lot of money.

Since the defeat of Jieli, the DTZ has been in decline over the years and has been scattered. The Tang Dynasty can be said to have been very successful in controlling the DTZ tribes.
On the one hand, it was the deterrence of force, but on the other hand, it was the long-term stability of border market trade. The imperial court also gave preferential treatment to the leaders of the Turkic tribes. The leaders were canonized, and their children were also summoned to Chang'an to serve as officials. Through border markets and rewards, the lives of these tribal leaders were improved. They are living a very prosperous life, and now they don’t even need to risk going south to rob.

However, the life of ordinary herdsmen in the tribe may not be better than before. Now they can only be herders with peace of mind, and they no longer need to carry swords on horses to fight and rob. However, the leaders also imitated the Tang Dynasty in the Central Plains and taxed them and sent servitude to them. Their burdens are also heavy, and those profiteers in China always use lending and other means to harm them.

Nowadays, some herdsmen are fed up with the tyrannical tribal leaders, and they simply go to join the Tang people and directly become the Tang Dynasty's unified households, and the treatment is better.

"Have you heard that the King's Royal Highness returned in triumph and His Royal Highness the Crown Prince came to Weiqiao to greet him in person? General Fan and His Royal Highness the Crown Prince both wore golden armor and rode back to Chang'an in a military chariot.

Civil and military officers from Chang'an greeted each other along the way.

All the prime ministers came to greet him at the gate of Chang'an City. "

At this time, voices came from the table next to him. A man looked excited, his face was red, and his words were flying.

"General Fan is really great. He is worthy of being the father-in-law of Lord Wu, the God of War. The stalemate lasted for half a year and made the young Tubo King proud for a long time.

If you don't take action, you'll beat the shit out of them if you do. Another man answered, "Let's have a big drink!" "

"Drink victory!"

Several men at the same table raised their glasses together.

"Let me tell you, General Fan is a peerless general. When Duke Wu was still practicing Taoism with Yinxian in Zhongnan Mountain, General Fan had already joined Emperor Gaozu in raising an army to conquer the world. At that time, General Fan was only two years old. More than ten, right? When Duke Wu came down from the mountain, Fan Xing was already Duke of Shangzhu and Rong."

"Yes, General Fan is a fierce general in the Qin Palace. He was granted the title of Zhuguo and Duke together with Qin Shubao, five years earlier than Yuchi Jingde."

"But how did I hear that General Fan was able to accomplish this great feat this time because it was Duke Wu who had previously protected General Fan from being the general manager? Moreover, the strategy for defeating Tubo was also a trick that Duke Wu had already prepared and given to Fan in advance. The general's."

"How do you know?" Someone was dissatisfied.

"I'll tell you the truth. When General Fan left the capital to serve as the governor of Lizhou, Duke Wu said goodbye to him at Weiqiao. I happened to be there at the time. I remember that day was at this time last year, and it was snowing and windy. The ground was freezing. General Fan was ordered to leave Beijing in the face of danger. Years ago, he rushed to the border.
Duke Wu saw each other off at Wei Bridge, wrote a farewell poem, and then took out a brocade bag and gave it to General Fan. I saw it with my own eyes. "

The man said he had a nose and eyes.

Everyone was dubious.

Asang couldn't help but chuckle when he heard this next to Wu Huaiyu, and asked him quietly, "Do you really have a clever plan?"

Wu Huaiyu smiled slightly,
There is no trick, but there is indeed a clever plan. In this battle of Songzhou, Fan Xingping followed the tactics he suggested to the court.

He blocked the Tibetan army at the foot of Gansong Ridge and dragged them for more than half a year. Then he launched a fatal counterattack against the Tibetan people in the winter, and the battle was successful.

Fan Xingniu Jinda and their team executed very well and won without any sloppiness.

I didn’t expect that they would have such a grand and solemn welcoming ceremony when they entered the city in triumph today.

Wearing golden armor and riding in a military chariot, he and the prince presented the prisoners to the Imperial Ancestral Temple. The civil and military officers went out of the city twenty miles to greet him, and the three princes and prime ministers came to the city gate to greet him.

Today is really a happy day for Fan Xing.

This battle taught the Tubo people a hard lesson and blocked their ambition to enter Tuyuhun. Will there be a historic defeat in Dafeichuan where a hundred thousand Tang troops were wiped out?
(End of this chapter)