Begging in late Ming Dynasty

Chapter 118 Eunuchs Are Very Useful
What does it mean that a hairless phoenix is ​​not as good as a chicken?

He was ordered to hunt down and kill him two days ago, this eunuch is so energetic!Wearing a black gauze hat on the head and purple gold beams on the body, it is as majestic as it is.But now, the clothes are torn, the hat is lost, and the wounds are not healed after being beaten severely, and the corners of his mouth are still gasping as soon as he walks in. Song Qingshu's people around him hate this guy who almost killed him It was itchy, and when he returned to the cottage, he was locked in the stable with a chain like a dog. Now this guy still smells like horse dung, how miserable it is.

The smell made Song Qingshu cover his nose in depression, and Xiao Luobo also pinched his nose. He threw the dead eunuch to the ground, and then quickly hid aside, staggering, and the bastard simply fell to the ground.

In the film and television works of later generations, eunuchs are not good things. In this life, when people mention eunuchs, they either scold or spit on the ground. Erlang legs, sitting on the Taishi chair and humming.

"Why do you want to see me?"

In the past few days, he either ate leftovers thrown out of the canteen, or ate grass with the horses. The eunuch was really on the verge of dying, and his sharp voice was a little bit lower. Without a trace, he kowtowed pitifully to the ground, but what he said made Song Qingshu's eyes widen.

"I heard that you are short of iron recently, sir, I know where you can find iron!"

…………

There was a loud bang, and more than half of the little gunpowder left in Funiu Mountain disappeared, but the effect was also outstanding. On the ridge not far from the back of Funiu Mountain, a cave popped out abruptly, with a scarred face, Liu Zongmin and the others all came, looking at the hole with black ash coming out in amazement.

An old production team leader who came over gave him a slap on the head: "Oh, I heard that there is a big iron mine here in Shangnan, and it's actually next to our village!"

"Here it is!" Stumbling while standing, the dead eunuch weakly stroked his hand inside, and Liu Zongmin wanted to go in. Song Qingshu hurriedly grabbed him, and immediately ordered to the side: "Drive a mouse in." !"

The most indispensable thing in the countryside and mountains is the mouse. In less than a moment, someone caught it, tied its tail with a strong hemp rope and threw it in. After a few minutes, Song Qingshu asked someone to pull the mouse out, but this time it was alive and kicking. The mouse had already hung up foaming at the mouth.

This hole has been sealed for more than ten years, and I don't know if there is a vent hole. After holding back the poisonous gas for so long, it's no wonder that I didn't die if I went in recklessly. Seeing the mouse die miserably, Liu Zongmin clucked his tongue, Song Qingshu didn't He waved his hand unhurriedly: "Go and get the blower for iron making, let me blow it in!"

More than a dozen blacksmith apprentices brought five large blowers made of cowhide, and poured them against the opening of the hole for a while. After blowing for almost an hour, they threw a big mouse in. When he came back, he bit off the hemp rope on his tail, and ran away into the cave. Seeing it with confidence, Song Qingshu waved his hand inside.

"Light the torches, let's go!"

This is an old mine, and you can still see the iron-making furnace and the rotten coal and wood thrown into the ground. It's scary that there are still a few skeletons in the corner, and I don't know how deep the hole is. But not far from the door, there are piles of boxes piled up. Scarface took his big gun and stuck it into the outermost box, and then pried it open. A smell of rust came over his face. Several people searched the past with torches, and the trained steel ingots were piled up in the box.

There are no less than a few hundred boxes here, and each box is about fifty catties, and there are at least tens of thousands of catties of steel ingots and iron materials. Let alone a thousand hoes and shovels, tens of thousands can be punched out. I am so happy that Liu Zongmin The boss grinned wide, and Scarface looked around excitedly, while Song Qingshu himself breathed a sigh of relief.

What a fluke.

This iron mine was opened during the Wanli period. It is said that the Lord Wanli was a faint king who had not been in the court for more than 30 years, and wantonly collected property from the localities.But in fact, Song Qingshu thinks that this Lord Wanli is very shrewd, and his method of restraint is to distribute mine supervisors to various places, collect business taxes while digging minerals to create commercial value.

After more than 200 years of development, the industry and commerce of the Ming Dynasty have been quite complete. In the south of the Yangtze River, the so-called capitalism sprouted. But it was precisely because of this that the burdened ordinary people at the bottom aroused a strong reaction from the scholar-bureaucrats, who scolded Wanli as a fatuous king.

On the contrary, the current Emperor Chongzhen, who is now praised by the scholar-bureaucrats as the Ming emperor, paid the Liao's salary and the suppression of the salary to the bottom of the small peasants who were already on the verge of collapse. To the yeoman tenants who accounted for one-tenth of the wealth of the empire.Emperor Chongzhen paid too much attention to the courtiers' comments, and did not dare to suppress the entire scholar-bureaucrat class at all. He only used party disputes to provoke internal strife among the scholar-bureaucrats, and pushed the political situation into more chaos.

If he had half the vision of his grandfather, Emperor Wanli, he wouldn't be able to get more and more bandits to suppress more and more people, keep pushing the people to the side of rebels, and the whole country will follow the bandits, and finally end up with the end of the country being destroyed.

It is precisely because of the cheese of the scholar-official class that more than half of the mine supervisor and mine tax sent by Emperor Wanli immediately closed down after the death of Emperor Wanli. This iron mine was also closed under the counterattack of the scholar-officials.However, the succeeding Emperor Taichang really didn't have the emperor's life. After decades of hard work, he finally became the emperor and died within a month of ascending the throne. However, Emperor Tianqi was young, and all the court's attention was focused on the three major cases in the late Ming Dynasty. In the Hongwan case and Yigong case, the eunuch Sun Da'an who managed the mine was forgotten in Shaanxi, and this unlucky old eunuch had to join the Qin Palace to die alone.

The eunuch captured by Song Qingshu was called Jiao Yulin. Coincidentally, he was the adopted son of Sun Daan. Naturally, an eunuch Sun Daan could not have any heirs. Before he died, he kept the map of the mine in his private possession. The tens of thousands of catties of iron passed to this father-in-law Jiao. You must know that the market price of steel is [-]% per catty. If these tens of thousands of catties of steel ingots and refined iron are poured out, there will be a huge wealth of almost ten thousand taels.

But now that Eunuch Jiao couldn't keep his life, what's the use of asking for money, if he could survive a little, he quickly spit out the iron ore matter, which made Song Qingshu cheaper.

Seeing that those with Scarface who had never seen the world were still looking at boxes one by one, Song Qingshu simply slapped his thigh helplessly: "What are you still looking at, it's all ours, take it back!"

Suddenly realized, Liu Zongmin and the others immediately dragged the boxes out, Song Qingshu gritted his teeth and hugged one, a group of people moved twenty boxes out of the mine, Song Qingshu asked people to use mountain vines, branches and the like to cover the mine Well, this news must not go away. If it spreads outside, the government will probably be the first to grab it.

Satisfied, he led a few confidants to move the iron to the tricycle. Song Qingshu was about to yell at the animals to pull it, but suddenly his sleeves were pulled by someone. Turning around in shock, he saw that Mr. Jiao was pulling his clothes very sadly. Sleeve, muttered weakly.

"Master, can I have some food?"

…………

The iron ingots and steel ingots were transported back, and they were immediately pulled to the coal mine at the back of the fool ditch, and the blacksmiths who were apprentices with Liu Zongmin threw them into the furnace enthusiastically, and began to make farm tools nervously, and gave Liu Zongmin a few boxes of cast iron. It was time to go back and continue to fire the guns, but this time Song Qingshu felt that the number of revolvers was enough for the time being. He asked him to shoot the single-shot long-range flintlock. With his technology, it is estimated that he will have two new ones this month.

As for that eunuch Jiao, it can be regarded as a meritorious service. Song Qingshu didn't want to kill him for the time being, and even rewarded him with a delicious meal. The white flour steamed buns that he usually dismisses are now like delicacies in the eyes of this dead eunuch. Before he could swallow the steamed buns, he rushed to take another mouthful of porridge, stuffing his mouth full with steamed sweet potato stalks and pickled vegetables. It was rare to see this gang of eunuchs having a scene of cannibalism. Song Qingshu also watched Just for fun.

But suddenly, thinking of something, Song Qingshu grabbed the eunuch's sleeve and asked in surprise, "Have you met Song Xiance? Is that the fortune teller, the short one?"

"I've seen it." Hastily swallowed the steamed bun in his mouth, rolled his eyes so choked, stuffed it with another mouthful of porridge, and then regained his breath, the eunuch Jiao hurriedly replied: "The other day he came to lead the donkey and saw The clothes and hats of the miscellaneous family, throw a steamed bun to the miscellaneous family, and then tell the miscellaneous family that you are short of iron."

Hearing Eunuch Jiao's explanation, Song Qingshu couldn't help but burst out laughing. It seems that this Song Xiance is not only relying on pretending to be a ghost, he has some amazing foresight, he should have found a way to keep him.

…………

After rushing to work for more than ten days in a row, the vacant farm tools can be regarded as ready. Coincidentally, the first light snow of this winter, almost two months late, also fell in the ocean, covering the entire Shangluo mountain area with a light layer of white. The sweet potato seedlings and potato seedlings that were still struggling to survive immediately froze to death.

Not daring to procrastinate any longer, Song Qingshu directly ordered all the men, women and children in the village to go out and start digging potatoes!
Early in the morning, I saw more than 3000 men, women, and children marching together in the continuous light snow. The shouts of the production team leader and the women's director could be heard everywhere on the top of the mountain. After a few months of weeds and lichens, the middle-aged man with a brand-new hoe tried his best to dig up some hard ground. As the picks went down, red sweet potatoes and yellow potatoes were immediately turned up everywhere. Knowing that this is life-saving food, the women, young and old who followed behind didn't care about the mud, they just grabbed it with their hands, knocked off the dust, and put it in the cart.

It was really a scene of prosperity everywhere, and the men were sweating profusely during the dog days, pushing the wheelbarrow with shirtless shirts and quickly transporting the crushed sweet potatoes and potatoes back to the cellar of the cottage for storage.

Randomly picked one out from the passing car. After all, it grows in winter, and the temperature is not enough to nourish it. The small potato is bigger than a ping pong ball, and the sweet potato can be skinny. Proficient in Nanjing Mandarin, he spoke to Song Qingshu.

"My lord brother, if you still want to grow food in this cold time next year, you should pick out the big fruits this year and use them to grow seedlings. Oh God, it's a headache to think about eating such small potatoes!"

Monk Yang's words reminded Song Qingshu, the best way to raise seedlings!Thanks to the foreign monk gratefully, Song Qingshu called Xiaoluobo, and told him and Caiwei to do it. The last time the two production teams fought each other, it reminded Song Qingshu, like running a restaurant, Song Qingshu still let Caiwei Helping myself organize things, and then arrange my own disposal, has formed the effect of a small government, so this matter has to be handled by them.

Tang Ruowang was still not at ease, so he followed Little Carrot to pick it up. Without him, Song Qingshu didn't have the mood to continue patrolling, so he simply sat down on the highest mountain field and looked down.

It has been more than a month, but there is still no news about Zhang Xianzhong. Could it be that something really happened as Scarface said?
Scarface reminded him for a while, and Song Xiance reminded himself again that in the past few days, Song Qingshu always had an ominous premonition, which made him feel heavy in his heart, and after sitting for a long time, the restless Song Qingshu simply Zhi Leng jumped up and walked quickly to the cottage. He wanted to find Scarface, and ordered the other colonial villages to harvest the potatoes immediately, regardless of whether they were ripe or not, and then returned to the cottage with food.

But as soon as he arrived near the crowded village gate, he saw that he had already got out excitedly with his scarred face. Before Song Qingshu could speak, he had already spoken hastily.

"The Taoist priest you want has been found!"

(End of this chapter)