Guide to Traveling through the Northern Song Dynasty.

Chapter 965 0960 [Sweet potato leaves are delicious]

There is a ferry crossing on the Yellow River to the east of Huaizhou City.

There are boats at the ferry, and you can escape to the east bank of the Yellow River.

If you take a boat south, Jingzhou City is just a few dozen miles away.

Continue sailing south from Jingzhou City and you will reach Lingzhou, which is heavily guarded by Ren Dejing. It will soon be surrounded by Deng Chun's 130,000 troops!

To the south?
Or east?
Wang Cunli, who escaped from the city, didn't think much about it and took a boat to cross the Yellow River to find his brother Richard.

Although Richard was his political enemy, Wang Cunli still chose to believe in Richard's ability at this time, because he felt that Ren Dejing in the south was a fool!

Wang Cunli is the biological father of the current Queen of Western Xia.

Ren Dejing is the biological father of the previous Queen of Western Xia.

Although their daughters are about the same age, they are still one generation apart, and as they are both royal relatives, the fight between them is even more intense.

Historically, Xiao Heda launched a rebellion.

Wang Cunli jumped out first to lead the troops to quell the rebellion, hoping to gain more power through military merit, but was defeated again and again by Xiao Heda.

This gave Ren Dejing an opportunity. Ren Dejing took over the military power and quickly dealt with Xiao Heda. From then on, he gradually became a powerful official in Western Xia.

Soldiers and civilians swarmed out of the East Gate and rushed to the ferry to grab boats. Wang Cunli led a group of personal soldiers on horseback, wielding swords and hacking at anyone who stood in his way, and finally managed to grab two boats and escape quickly.

The nearby soldiers followed suit, killing civilians indiscriminately and stealing all the remaining ships.

The soldiers and civilians, who had no boats to take, could only flee along the river bank. They were afraid that Yue Fei would massacre them, so they ran all the way to save their lives, without even taking food with them. It is estimated that many people starved to death on the way.

After crossing the river, Wang Cunli headed straight to the northeast, where Richard's troops were hidden.

After crossing the narrow farming area, there is a large grassland with lush grass ahead.

By dusk, Wang Cunli was tired and hungry.

Fortunately, when we crossed the Yellow River, there were some food on the boat and our water bags were filled with Yellow River water.

After eating something, it was already dark, and Wang Cunli lay down on the grass and fell asleep. He had not slept the whole night, and now he could fall asleep even on horseback.

The next day, he continued riding wildly.

The vegetation gradually became shorter and less, and by the afternoon, it was half grassland and half desert. After passing this semi-desert zone, the grassland ahead was slightly better, but only the local tribes knew that desertification was becoming more serious year by year, and the sand was eating up the grassland bit by bit.

This has a lot to do with overgrazing, but the real reason is the cooling of the climate and the continuous southward movement of the 400 mm isohyet.

Desertification began to intensify in the middle and late Tang Dynasty. There is a clear record in the "New Book of Tang" that a terrible sandstorm in the second year of Changqing buried the famous city walls of Tongwan.

“Woooooooo~~~”

"Stop!"

The horn sounded, and hundreds of cavalrymen who were grazing gathered around.

This is where Brother Richard hides his troops. There is a semi-desert zone on the outside, but you can still graze inside. Further north is the Mu Us Desert.

Thousands of livestock were temporarily raised here as food for the cavalry under Brother Richard.

Wang Cunli revealed his identity and asked, "Where is the King of Jin?"

The general who was left to guard the livestock said, "His Royal Highness the Prince of Jin has led his troops to attack Yanzhou."

"Quickly send a few people to report that Huaizhou City is gone." Wang Cunli said anxiously.

After these words were spoken, the hundreds of cavalrymen who stayed behind became even more anxious, as their families were all in Huaizhou!
The general was so angry that he pulled Wang Cunli off his horse, grabbed Wang Cunli's collar and shouted angrily: "How dare you come looking for us? Since you took command of the army, you have never won a single battle. You only know how to run away with us. I fled from Longzhou to Youzhou, and then from Youzhou to Yanzhou, and then followed you to Huaizhou. It was not easy for the King of Jin to lead us to counterattack, but you lost such a big city of Huaizhou!"

Hundreds of cavalrymen dismounted and surrounded Wang Cunli and his personal guards.

"Kill him!" someone yelled.

"Kill! Kill! Kill!"

More and more Xixia cavalry shouted.

Wang Cunli begged for mercy in fear: "Don't kill me, I am the father-in-law of the emperor, and my daughter is the queen... We haven't lost yet, Daxia hasn't lost yet. As long as the Prince of Jin rushes to capture Yanzhou, the enemy's army will be cut off from food! Don't kill me, you won't get any good results if you kill me..."

Just as everyone was arguing about whether or not to kill, a strong wind suddenly blew up.

The wind was getting stronger and stronger, blowing up countless sand and dust.

"A sandstorm is coming. Hurry up and get the livestock in!"

The crowd abandoned Wang Cunli and drove the livestock into the tent.

Dozens of miles to the south, in a semi-desert zone, Li Yanxian's army also stopped marching. The wind and sand there were smaller, but still uncomfortable, so they stopped and set up tents to avoid it.

……

Further away in Yanzhou, Yao Pingzhong was hiding in the city with his troops.

When Wang Cunli was fortifying the city and clearing the fields, he tore down several sections of the Yanzhou city wall.

The broken city wall had not been repaired for decades, and the outer wall had been exposed to wind, rain and sun, and the wall skin had already begun to fall off automatically. The craftsmen hammered iron drills into the rammed earth layer like mining stones, and then smashed the iron drills vertically to destroy the city wall.

The gaps in the city walls that were torn off were two to three hundred meters wide in total. This was also the reason why Brother Richard rushed to attack Yanzhou City!
If the walls of Yanzhou were intact, he would not dare to lead his troops to attack.

Brother Richard has already found out that Li Yanxian has led his generals and elite troops to march towards Huaizhou, three hundred miles away, and there are only a few Ming troops left in Yanzhou City.

The wind and sand were getting stronger and stronger, and the Western Xia soldiers felt a little uncomfortable.

Brother Richard ordered a temporary halt to the march and called all the chieftains to say, "This is the blessing of God and Buddha. The strong sandstorms are blowing to cover us. The enemy in Yanzhou must be unprepared. We can easily recapture the city. Tell these words to the soldiers, tear off your sleeves, wet them, cover the mouths and noses of the soldiers and horses, rest for a while and then head straight to Yanzhou!"

What Brother Richard said made a lot of sense. This sandstorm was indeed beneficial to them, so the morale of the 20,000 Western Xia cavalry was greatly boosted.

When they were about ten miles away from Yanzhou City, Brother Richard stopped and waited, and only charged towards the city when it was completely dark.

In the city, large areas of houses were burned to ruins, which was what Wang Cunli did before he left.

The remaining wood on the ruins had been carried to the gap in the city wall by the civilians and piled up in a mess. The rammed earth blocks that had been stripped off the city wall were also carried away and piled up with the wood to form a very simple fortification to prevent a large number of Xixia cavalry from charging in.

Wang De's troops under Yao Pingzhong were definitely withdrawn by Li Yanxian, and some other troops were also withdrawn.

At this moment, there were two thousand cavalry, six thousand infantry, and more than a thousand civilians in Yanzhou City.

Both the military and civilians took turns sleeping.

Moreover, they did not wear armor during the day, because they could spot the enemy from a distance and had plenty of time to put on armor to fight the enemy. At night, they had to wear armor to rest and be ready to fight at any time.

In a room, twenty or thirty laborers were lying down to rest.

Just rest, no sleeping allowed, they have already slept during the day.

"Hey, brother, where is your hometown?" Yang Danian asked.

Niu Fu replied: "Weinan."

Yang Danian said: "Weinan is far away, how can we recruit them to Yansui to be civilians?"

Niu Fu said: "How should I know? Most of the villagers in my village went to Hehuang and Huaide."

"I guess life is very easy over there." Yang Danian said enviously.

Niu Fu smiled and said, "Not bad. If the Zhu family took over the throne, it would be more promising than the Zhao family. Can you grow wheat here?"

Yang Danian said, "Why plant wheat? If there's drought, there'll be no harvest. We plant millet, which is drought-resistant and can harvest a few grains even if it doesn't rain. Do you plant wheat?"

Niu Fu said: "Dry fields are mostly used to grow wheat, and paddy fields can also grow rice."

Yang Danian said, "I'm not afraid of you laughing at me. I only ate rice for the first time a few years ago when there was a severe drought. I heard that it was Hanzhong rice that the government brought in for disaster relief. It tasted delicious, even better than white flour buns."

A civilian nearby laughed and said, "Yang Er, don't brag. Can someone like you ever eat white flour buns?"

"Why can't your grandfather eat white flour buns?" Yang Danian said angrily, "I've eaten them many times and I'm tired of them. Brother Niu, don't listen to him. I've eaten a lot of good things. I've also eaten the cornmeal you have."

Niu Fu said: "Corn cobs are only delicious when they are tender. They can be roasted or boiled, and the kids will be very happy. If they are old, they are not delicious. Corn paste is too oily and it won't satisfy the hunger of people with tuberculosis."

Yang Danian asked, "What do you think the tender corn cob tastes like?"

Niu Fu smiled and said, "It's sweet, just like eating honey."

Yang Danian couldn't help swallowing his saliva: "If I have time, I will also get two tender corn cobs to eat."

"Thanks to the Emperor, sweet potato leaves are also very delicious," Niu Fu said, "If you plant a few acres of sweet potatoes, you won't have to worry about having no food for most of the year. The young leaves can be eaten by humans, and the old leaves can be given to livestock. They are much more refreshing than bean leaves."

Soybean leaves have always been regarded as vegetables by the Chinese.

Especially the lower-class people, they picked bean leaves and cooked them into porridge, but unfortunately the texture was too rough and not tasty.

Now that we have sweet potatoes, the leaves are plentiful and cheap, making them the favorite vegetable of poor families. Old sweet potato vines and leaves can also be used to feed livestock.

Yang Danian began to imagine the taste of sweet potatoes and sweet potato leaves, thinking that they must be delicious, and he couldn't help swallowing his saliva as he thought about it.

"Woooooooo~"

"Dangdangdangdang~"

A warning horn was sounded outside the city, and a gong was struck on the top of the city wall.

The sound of gongs rang out in the city, and a garrison officer rushed out of the house and shouted to the civilians, "Enemy attack! Pick up your weapons and come out quickly!"

Yang Danian and his fellow villagers quickly stood up and walked out of the house with guns in hand with great agility.

They were people from other towns, and all men under the age of 50 had to train during the slack farming season to be on guard against Western Xia crossing the border to plunder at any time.

If Yang Danian were ten years younger, he would definitely be serving in the army now.

Even though he was just a militia, Yang Danian had his own weapons, which were the standard leather armor, standard spear and standard sword issued by the Command Headquarters.

Niu Fu seemed a little flustered. His hometown was in Weinan, far away from the Ming-Xia border, and he had never practiced there.

However, when Brother Richard, who was outside the city, was discovered by the Ming army scouts, he immediately led his troops to charge at full speed.

Twenty thousand Western Xia cavalry rushed to the gaps in the city walls.

Because there were too many obstacles in the gap, the Western Xia cavalry dismounted and turned into infantry to cross the obstacles and enter the city.

(End of this chapter)