Established a thousand-year family from the end of Qin Dynasty

Chapter 33

Seventh year of the Yuan Dynasty

New Year
Zhengdan day

Luoyueyuan

The ice and snow are gradually melting, and spring plowing will start in a few days. Wangjiazhuang needs to replenish new farming tools for various farming areas in advance, and the servants are busy.

Xu Yan curled up in the Wang's manor, and the maids lit a fire to cook early, prepared all kinds of delicacies, and waited for the owner and others to come back from offering sacrifices to their ancestors.

Every year on Zhengdan Day, the head of the Wang family will take his clansmen to the ancestral mausoleum to worship the ancestors. After returning, he will also participate in a family banquet. For a few days, I have to walk through the streets to visit relatives and friends. When all these are over, I will hold a social day sacrifice, entertain the gods with the best wine, food and meat, and pray that the gods will bring everyone good luck this year. Harvest, and during the She Day, everyone has to fast, not eat meat or drink alcohol, wear new clothes, and take a bath every day to keep clean.

And in Luoyueyuan Yuheng Land Reclamation Area, dozens of tenant farmers are brandishing hoes, digging out clay pots that were buried deep in the ground last year. Some spring wheat is stored in them. They put the spring wheat in clay pots every winter and bury them Underground, dig it out again in the spring of the next year, and judge this year's harvest by observing the amount of spring wheat in the clay pot.

At the same time, they will also prepare some food and wine that they are reluctant to eat, and wait until the festival day to sacrifice to the gods, praying for a smooth spring and autumn harvest.

Here in Liaodong, spring wheat is only planted once a year, planted in spring and harvested in autumn, so there is only a social day in the first month, unlike the Central Plains where spring planting and summer harvesting and autumn planting and winter harvesting lead to two community days in spring and autumn.

Just as these sharecroppers sighed and shook their heads looking at the condition of the spring wheat in the clay pots...

"Call-"

A carriage drove up, and a young man got out of the carriage. He was dressed in fine clothes, with a long sword hanging from his waist, and several strong men in full armor followed him.

Seeing this man, the tenant farmers all knelt down and said humbly, "I have seen the master."

"Everyone, get up."

The person who came was Wang Tairan, the head of the royal family, who had just returned from offering sacrifices to the ancestors. He originally wanted to go directly to the manor to prepare a family banquet, but he had a whim and wanted to go to Luoyueyuan first to see the situation of the tenant farmers and serfs.

"Thank you, my lord."

The tenant farmers got up one after another, but they didn't dare to run around, they stayed where they were and waited for Wang Tairan's order.

"Everyone, go about your own business." Wang Tairan's voice was very gentle, seeing the tenant farmers in sackcloth and tattered animal clothes, he couldn't bear it.

"Thank you, Master." All the tenant farmers thanked again, and then went about their own business.

And Wang Tairan was also walking in the fields, thinking in his heart.

"Brother is too harsh on the tenant farmers and serfs, and has trained too many soldiers and serf soldiers, and always likes to go out to fight. The small amount of grain is sold to Xu Township in exchange for iron ore to forge iron weapons. So that the life of these farmers is so miserable."

"This unhealthy way of development, relying on plunder to maintain the business model, is doomed to be short-lived. During the time of our ancestor Wang Kang, our Wang family had not many farmers, and we could manage them easily with a whip, but the chaos of the Seven Kingdoms suddenly increased the number of farmers in the Wang family How can six or seven thousand farmers continue to rely on whips to manage them? How can our royal family have so many servants to manage them? It’s time to change everything..."

The tenant farmers can still wear sackcloth, and then put on a layer of animal clothing for the winter, while the serfs are even worse, even the sackcloth is tattered, and everyone wears the thick animal clothing to keep warm. Whoever is about to freeze to death will be given Whoever wears it for a while is worse than the Jianren aborigines in the mountains and forests who have no salt to eat.

"Zhou Ming, in the Yuheng area you manage, what was the general situation of farmers fleeing last year?" Wang Tairan asked Zhou Ming, the son-in-law of the Wang family, while walking in the field.

"Hmm..." Zhou Ming is quite handsome, taller than Wang Tairan, and also dressed in Chinese clothes. After thinking for a while, Wang Tairan respectfully replied: "The tenant farmers are better. No one escaped famine, but five people froze to death. The situation of the serfs is not optimistic, 37 died of freezing, 95 fleeing famine, and three committed suicide, and..."

"And what?" Wang Tairan picked up a serf in the field and bowed to him, and continued to ask Zhou Ming.

"And we found that the serfs seem to have secretly organized a rebel organization called 'Hongyan Dao'. We have arrested two members of this organization, but these two members committed suicide after being arrested. We have not been able to obtain more information. "Zhou Ming frowned. He was very worried about the emergence of a rebel organization in his jurisdiction, and he was very afraid that what happened to Tianxuan would happen in Yuheng. Therefore, he has been ordering his servants to hunt down the relevant personnel of this organization, but there has been little progress.

"Pay attention to this matter and continue to investigate, but don't use harsh punishments, let alone torture into tricks, just observe secretly. We can't force the serfs to the opposite side like the previous king, treat the people with benevolence, and the people will be at ease." Wang Tairan said to the territory. The governance concept is obviously different from that of his brother. He already has the idea of ​​reforming the system in his heart to replace the harsh treatment of the people in the past.

After finishing speaking, Wang Tairan heard the sound of wailing again, looked along the sound of wailing, and saw not far away, a few servants were forcibly dragging a serf girl, and the serf girl was struggling violently, and several serfs knelt on the ground continuously Weeping and begging.

Seeing this scene, Wang Tairan already understood what was going on in his heart.

During the period of the former king Taihao, the treatment of the soldiers was greatly improved, and those who made meritorious deeds would reward wives and concubines and money, instead of only rewarding money like the ancestor Wang Kang.

This serf girl will probably be forcibly dragged away and given to a certain soldier who made great achievements in the battle of Nuolan River Valley.

For this matter, he has no way to stop it. It is impossible not to fulfill the promised reward, otherwise the loyalty of the soldiers to the Wang family will be greatly reduced, so he can only frown and sigh: "If you already need to be rewarded, continue Let’s continue the method of the previous king, but in the future, if there are new meritorious men, they can no longer forcibly select women from the serfs, but only reward them with money and silk, and let them find wives and concubines by themselves.”

"The head of the family said so." Zhou Ming flattered him. He had never been taken seriously by Wang Chong, and his wife Wang Roujing didn't like him very much. From Wang Roujing's understanding, it is estimated that she has been with Wang Taiyang overseas at the moment...

For certain things that might happen, Zhou Ming had long been mentally prepared. After all, since he joined the Wang family, he had already felt that there were many things wrong between his wife and Wang Taiyang. There are many people with mixed eyes, so I dare not go to that step clearly.

Both of them are overseas now, if they are not dead, they must...

For this reason, Zhou Ming has been thinking of ways to please the two brothers Wang Taihao and Wang Tairan, and earnestly implement everything they ordered. Whether it is to be strict with the serfs or treat the serfs well, as long as it is the order of the master brother, he will not do it. He didn't try his best, trying to keep his position in the royal family by pleasing the head of the family.

This also makes, although Zhou Ming is the person of Wang Chong, the second wife, in fact, he has always been the head of the family in his heart, and he will support whoever is the head of the Wang family.

(End of this chapter)