A Good Landlord in the Tang Dynasty: Emperor Yuan Cong

Chapter 8 Longevity Bird
There are many plateaus in the north of Sanyuan, and there are many plateaus and ravines.

From the bottom of the plateau to the top of the plateau, it seems that there is a huge wall blocking the front, and the mottled vegetation is scattered, occasionally revealing the original color of the loess.

Climbing uphill on the plateau is very strenuous, and it is difficult for even a horse to go up in one breath.

"This Bailuyuan is also called Wanshouyuan, and the people are used to calling it Dongyuan." Li Zheng Li Si'an is the nephew of Li Jing's nephew in Lijiazhuang, and he came from a side branch.

He was very polite to Wu Huaiyi and his brothers, "In the fifth year of Wude, Your Majesty led the people to hunt on the Wanshou Plateau. Suddenly, a white deer came to the plateau with spirit grass in its mouth and played wantonly on the plateau. Snow white, the antlers are even more auspicious, His Majesty is even delighted, thinking that this is the blessing of the auspicious beasts descended from heaven, so he ordered the school hunting to be stopped and the white deer released."

It is said that where the white deer passed by, there are lush trees, abundant grains, prosperous animals, and happy families. Emperor Li Yuan issued an imperial decree, and Wanshouyuan was changed to Bailuyuan.

Huaiyu listened to this story and felt that it was full of routines.Maybe I actually met a white deer. After all, I heard that there are many deer in the northern part of Sanyuan. It is not unusual to have a white deer, but if the deer passes by like a miracle, it is obviously an intentional auspiciousness.

"Aye and I used to go hunting on this plateau, and we caught a few deer," Huai Yi said.

When they struggled to climb to the plateau, another scene appeared in front of them.

The flat land, the criss-crossing dirt roads, the villages that live together, and the crops that are thriving in the fields.

It is hard to imagine that there is such a flat land on the high loess platform.

In his impression, the loess high slope should have thousands of ravines, with ridges and ditches and earth beams, and the plateau here is so good that it is commendable.

Huaiyi told him that there are many Huangtu Maos and Liangs to the north, and the three plateaus in Sanyuan are very large and flat, only the edge of the plateau has many high gullies and deep ravines. It is bounded by Qingyu River, Zhuoyu River, Zhaoshi River and Shichuan River.

Bailuyuan is tens of miles long from north to south, and more than ten miles wide. If you count the Jingyuan connected to the southeast, it will be even bigger.

The condition of Bailuyuan is very good and the land is fertile. The original name of this place is Wanshouyuan. In fact, the name is not ancient, because Li Yuan’s grandfather Li Hu died and was buried in the north of Bailuyuan. This was renamed Wanshou Yuan.

The earlier name here was Chang'ao.

The land assigned to Huaiyu by the county magistrate Zhang is in Chang'ao Fort, which is named after the long depression from west to east. It is said that Fu Jian and Yao Chang fought in Zhaoshiwu, Fu Jian was defeated, and Yao Chang After being surrendered here, it was named Jiang'ao, and later gradually called Chang'ao, and because it reads like Changniao in the local dialect, it is also commonly called Changniao among the people.

"Your piece of land is very good. It was originally owned by a Zhuangzi of a high-ranking official in the former dynasty. It was confiscated two years ago because of a crime. It is a whole plot of [-] mu. Not far to the east is the Zhaoshi River, which can be used for irrigation. good field."

Jingfu on the south screen, towering mountains to the west, purple air from the east.

The three water veins from Xiwang'ao to Chang'ao are surging and mighty, and they come to the plateau, and they are all collected here.

Yong'an Town, the old county town of Wudezhong Sanyuan, is eight miles southeast of it.

The Chang'ao Fort was built on that Long'ao.

"arrive!"

Huaiyu was a little dazed, seeing nothing but fields and crops ahead.

"It's right there."

Au is a peculiar terrain on the loess plateau. It is a wide and shallow dry ditch formed by rain erosion. This kind of dry ditch on the plateau is very suitable for people to build houses in the au or dig caves on the au. live here.

It is said that Chang'ao Fort was originally built on the platform surrounded by the Aogou, and was later destroyed in the war. Although the name of Chang'ao Fort is there today, the fort does not actually exist. There are only many people living in the Augou.

This several-mile-long Chang'ao has many branch ditches and several villages scattered there, and these villages form Chang'ao Township.

The county also sent a scrivener from Cao household to lead the way. He took everyone to find the entrance of Aogou, walked down the long slope, and came to Aoli.

This scene surprised Huaiyu. This natural ditch is long and wide, about several feet high. It is a natural place to live together. There are trees and houses in it, but you can't see it at all on the plateau. Only when we got closer did we realize that there is such a world here.

The clerk first went to Lizheng and Cunzheng and explained his intentions. Both of them were very enthusiastic about Huaiyu.

"Congratulations to Wu Erlang, that piece of land is a good one. In good years, the yield per mu is two stones, and usually at least one stone and five."

They took Huaiyu directly to see the place.

The land is on the north side of the col, a very rare piece of land, not broken, and there are four boundary stones in the ground, which are very clear.

When the people working in the field saw them coming to see the field, they all surrounded them.

His land was originally Zhuangzi, an official in the former dynasty. A few years ago, his descendants committed crimes and failed to become officials.When the land was in the hands of the official, it was leased to the villagers of the village for cultivation. Every summer and autumn, a steward was sent to collect the rent, and the rest was left alone.After the land has no officials, it is still cultivated by them, but the government collects rent every year.

"These are villagers from Chang'ao Village. Because they have little land in their families, they also leased the land to cultivate. Erlang's land is planted by them."

Chang'aobao is a large village. Although the fort is no longer there, the village is still there. After the chaos, the government recruited refugees, and there are still more than 100 households here.It is said that when the fort was still there, there were not only garrisons here, but also a place where merchants from south to north must pass.

Chang'ao has more than 6000 mu of land, half of which is in the hands of landlords and government officials, and half of which is distributed to the common people. Most of the common people's families have only [-] to [-] mu of land, so most villagers still rent land from landlords and official land. .

The piece of land in Huaiyu has always been tenanted by ten households, each with ten acres. When they heard that this young man was a new landlord, they all came forward to say hello with some anxiety. They were worried that the land would be taken back or the rent would be raised. For them, it is also unwilling to hear unacceptable bad news.

All of them came forward to say hello respectfully.

This obvious intention of flattery made Huaiyu feel a little burdened.

"Hi Erlang."

"Erlang, do you drink water? It's fresh from the water cellar. It's sweet and cool."

They need to continue to lease the land.

Zhao Shuli pointed to Huaiyu to the villagers, "Listen up, everyone, this Wu Erlang, a native of Longqiaobao, Qinghe Township, this county, is a son of the Yuan Congjun Army, and his father is the commander of the Zhishi Tunying Brigade with Wupinxun. His elder brother is a hundred cavalry from the imperial army. From now on, your land will be owned by Wu Erlang, and how to deal with the land will be up to Wu Erlang."

Zhao Shuli is very sophisticated, deliberately used this name to shock the group of peasants, and then gave Huaiyu a chance to sell favors.

Huaiyu didn't intend to play tricks on purpose, she just came to see her land today, to confirm first before signing the contract.He will not manage this land by himself for the time being. With Father Wu around, he cannot separate the family from the law. The land is still planned to be rented by those tenants.

"If everyone in this land is willing to continue to rent, then I am willing to do so, but the imperial court has ordered that within three years, I will plant mulberry elm and jujube trees on [-] acres of Yongye Field."

After a brief talk, Huaiyu finally signed a new lease with the ten tenants who came over.Each household still rents the original ten mu of land, but needs to plant two mu of land with trees.

The land rent remains the same, divided in half, and half of the output in the field goes to the landlord Huaiyu, but this half is agreed to only receive half of the summer grain harvest, and the wheat grass is also divided in half.But the common people don't need to share the rent when harvesting autumn grain.

Correspondingly, Huaiyu only provided land, and did not provide everything such as cattle, seeds, farm tools, etc., and the tenants had to pay for watering the land.

In Huaiyu's [-] acres of Yongye farmland, when trees are planted and food is grown in between, the harvest is only half of the normal harvest, so only half of it is required to be handed over.

Later, when the mulberry jujubes were ripe, Huaiyu sold the mulberry leaves to the tenants.

Clerk Zhao helped to draft a new lease, and under the witness of Lizheng Village Zheng, the landlord and tenants pressed their fingerprints together.

"Congratulations Erlang, this land can bring you at least sixty shi grains plus dozens of bundles of grass a year." He also reminded Huaiyu that according to the usual practice, when the tenant pays the rent, he is also responsible for transporting the grain and grass to the Go to the Wu family in Longqiaobao. If the Wu family comes to collect it, they will have to add a truck fee per mu.

"If the prefectural and county government allocates money to the fields, the tenants will also be required to pay the money."

Anyway, Wu Huaiyu's land doesn't need to worry about anything, the summer grain is divided in half, as long as there is no famine, at least dozens of grains will be harvested.

"Before this land was not an official, the county levied six buckets of grain per mu, plus fodder and foot money, but in fact it has collected eight buckets of grain plus grass and foot money every year in the past few years, which has greatly exceeded The summer grain is half gone. Now that Erlang has set the rent, they can get a lot of money."

In a good year, the maximum yield per mu is no more than two stones, eight buckets plus foot money, etc. In addition, there are still two liters of grain per mu to be handed over to the free warehouse. In fact, it is already halfway through. How much is the reduction.

"There used to be a few cave dwellings in Aoli, which were originally owned by Wangjiazhuangzi, and now they are all given to Erlang." Zhao Shu brought him back to an old cave dwelling in Aoli, which was an extra favor from the magistrate Zhang.

The cave dwelling is a bit damaged, but it is good to repair it once or twice.

Thank you Huaiyu, I won't need them for the time being, but they are just a few cave dwellings after all.

When everything was done, the ten tenants also breathed a sigh of relief. They were afraid that Huaiyu would have some extra demands. Now everything is going well, and it has even returned to the original rent for the Wang family when they farmed the land. The burden is lighter when planting.

They discussed how to chip in to buy a chicken for Huaiyu to eat.

"How can we let everyone spend money? Food is expensive now, and chickens are also expensive. When the harvest comes, I invite everyone!"

This land was handed over to Huaiyu after the summer harvest, so this year's rent is only half of the autumn grain, and from next year, the rent will be half of the summer grain.

At present, food prices are very expensive. A bucket of rice costs more than 300 yuan, a catty of salt costs fifty or sixty yuan, and a catty of oil costs eighty, ninety or even a hundred yuan. As for meat, it is even more expensive. A sheep costs several thousand dollars, which could buy a cow during the first emperor's reign. Even the cheap pork that scholars and nobles look down on now costs tens of dollars a catty.

An egg costs several pennies, and a chicken is not cheap either.

He also doesn't have the heart to add a burden for nothing to the people who are also struggling these days.

After chatting with everyone, we bid farewell and returned.

He couldn't help but think of the historical records. In the third or fourth year of Zhenguan, the world was full of abundance, and a bucket of rice was only two or three dollars. In comparison, the lives of the people are indeed very miserable right now.

(End of this chapter)