Guide to traveling through the Northern Song Dynasty

During the Anshi Rebellion, An Lushan occupied Luoyang and then divided his troops into three groups to advance.

All the way to Guanzhong, all the way east to Suiyang, all the way south to Nanyang.

The Battle of Nanyang was fought with "cannibalism" twice, and the Tang army relied on cannibalism to survive for thirteen months.

Whether before or after the war, Xinye next door was plundered, and was repeatedly plundered by Tang troops and rebels.

The Anshi Rebellion ended soon, and Xinye County, which was born in the early Western Han Dynasty, became a sparsely populated Xinye Town. It was not until the Yuan Dynasty that the county system was finally restored.

A large number of local refugees in Nanyang, as well as refugees from further north, are now resettled around Xinye Town.

Nine thousand soldiers and their families lived and cultivated together with these refugees.

"Brother Tong, are you going back to your hometown to visit relatives during the Chinese New Year?" Wu Commander Jin Rong came over and asked.

Tong Ershun said: "I won't go back, I will stay in Xinye to sort out the farm property."

Jin Rong was overjoyed: "Can you give up the family visiting spot in the team to me?"

"Draw lots," Tong Ershun said, "I am also participating. If I win, I will give you my place."

"That's good." Jin Rong was a little disappointed, but still very grateful.

There are twelve people in the team, and there are two places to visit relatives during the annual vacation. Tong Ershun will be given to him if he catches it. The chance is still very high.

It was time for a break from practice, and the two of them stood on the school field, looking at the White River in the distance.

Jin Rong said: "Do you want me to take something back?"

Tong Ershun shook his head and said, "There is no one at home."

"How come there is no one at home?" Jin Rong asked curiously.

Tong Ershun grinned and said: "My third brother is good at writing and arithmetic. He first worked with Mr. Zhu, and now he has been sent to Eastern Sichuan as the chief clerk. Hehe, the chief clerk is less than twenty years old. My old father and eldest nephew, I was also picked up by my third brother to enjoy the blessing."

"That's really promising. Brother Tong will be waiting to enjoy the blessings in the future!" Jin Rong was not flattering his boss, he was really shocked.

A county clerk who is less than twenty years old, as long as he is not a short-lived person, can become a high-ranking official despite his seniority.

There is another situation that Tong Ershun did not mention. His younger brother is Zhu Guoxiang's direct disciple - although he only studied with Zhu Guoxiang for one year.

"We have three brothers. The elder brother followed the Generalissimo to defeat Heifeng Village, and the third brother is now an official again," Tong Ershun mocked himself in a showy manner, "I am the least promising in the family. I have only become a captain now after fighting in the war."

Jin Rong couldn't help complaining: "Second brother, if you say this, I don't have the shame to be a soldier anymore."

Tong Ershun laughed.

He really has no future, his eldest brother has passed away, he married his sister-in-law, and the old people in Daming Village take good care of him.

But those who worked together as village heroes back then, as long as they were not killed in battle or disabled, would at best be promoted to the rank of commander or deputy commander of fifty soldiers. There were really not many squad leaders like Tong Ershun.

He started as a fire soldier, expanded his army after occupying Yangzhou, and was finally upgraded to a spearman. After several expansions of the army, he was still a spearman. Relying on his brother's support, he was promoted to the captain of the Yuanyang Squadron.

Tong Ershun has been working very hard to practice archery and spear training, but he still can't command the team to change formations for combat.

Maybe in a few years, this Jin Rong will surpass him.

Because Jin Rong is the corps leader, and the corps leader must be a sword and shield bearer, all of whom are the elite among the grassroots elites.

The drill lasted until evening, and Tong Ershun returned home with his weapons.

According to the army rules set by Ju Ming, if there is no war, two-thirds of the year needs to be drilled. But the Xinye side is busy clearing up wasteland, and the training time is reduced to half of the whole year.

Tong Ershun only brought his wife and children. Although his sister-in-law remarried him, the couple were extremely loving and had given birth to two sons and one daughter.

His wife also has to take care of the children, and there are more than 20 acres of land at home, which he simply cannot farm in his free time.

So five more refugees were recruited as tenants. This was the obligation of the refugees. Since they were allocated land for free and borrowed grain from the government to make ends meet, they had to share the land of the soldiers as tenants. You must first cultivate the land of soldiers before you can carefully serve your own.

"Captain Boy!"

Before reaching the village entrance, some farmers nodded and bowed in greeting. This man was also a refugee resettled in wasteland. Although he was not Tong Ershun's tenant, he still regarded him as a great figure.

"It's Mo San. The bean harvest is great." Tong Ershun held his head high, as if he was inspecting his territory.

There is also a battalion commander, two captains, a deputy commander and several sentry commanders and deputy sentries in the village. Tong Ershun's military position is not high, but he has a good relationship with the battalion commander. They are veterans who came out of Daming Village together!

Looking at the golden soybean fields outside the village, Tong Ershun thought of the days when he was reclaiming wasteland in Daming Village.

There were many young soldiers in Daming Township, and some even worked as civil servants. After they moved out, the entire population of Daming Township dropped by more than half, and Zhu Guoxiang had to recruit unemployed vagrants or refugees to replenish the population.

All of Tong Ershun's land in Daming Village has been given to the government and replaced with wasteland in Xinye, and land reclamation subsidies are provided on an acre basis.

"The head of the family is back!" his wife Feng Shi said happily.

"I'm back." Tong Ershun said with a smile on his face. He could indeed take charge of his family now and was no longer the poor boy cultivating several acres of wasteland.

"Daddy, daddy!"

The children also ran over. Tong Ershun smiled and picked up his daughter, put it on his neck and played a horse riding game.

The next day, Tong Ershun took his wife and children without weapons to collect beans.

Several tenants respected him very much. When they met him on the way, they all bent down to greet him and made way for him to go ahead.

In addition to the unequal relationship between landlords and tenants, there was also the fact that Tong Ershun's family had few people, so he usually did not interfere with the tenant fields and was very generous when collecting rent. Unlike some soldiers who pretended to be too plain when collecting rent, they insisted on grabbing a handful more beans.

The tenants went to work in the tenant fields, while Tong Ershun harvested the crops he cultivated himself.

Not only was the wife harvesting, but the children, several years old, also helped pick up the scattered beans.

"Daddy, this is a piece of shit!" the eldest son shouted excitedly.

His wife Feng Shi immediately shouted: "Pick a leaf quickly, wrap up the dog poop and take it home!"

Tong Ershun laughed and went back with the newly harvested beans. They would need to dry them for another day or two before they could be threshed with a flail.

When he came to the fields again, he saw hundreds of people coming on horseback.

Ju Ming now has no shortage of southwestern horses. He has hundreds of musketeers, all of whom have mounts. They can march quickly and can be regarded as mounted infantry.

But these southwest horses were left over from the light cavalry, and they were better than donkeys. They were even about the same height as donkeys.

"Generalissimo?"

Tong Ershun thought he had seen it wrong and rubbed his eyes. It was indeed a marshal's flag. He immediately dropped his sickle and ran to the side of the road to stand.

In the nearby fields, all the soldiers had put down their farm work and stood by the road.

Wherever Ju Ming passed, the soldiers held their heads high, raised their left arms and clenched their fists on their chests.

The farmers didn't know what was going on. Some froze in the fields and watched, while others ran over and knelt down to greet them.

Zhu Ming helped a farmer up, then asked the others to stand up as well, and asked in a friendly manner: "What's your name? Where do you come from?"

The farmer shrank and replied, "My name is Zhou Xiu, and my hometown is in Yangdi County."

Zhu Ming knew this and asked, "Yangdi belongs to Yingchang Prefecture and is almost next to Xinzheng. How can you escape to Xinye to reclaim wasteland?"

Zhou Xiu looked miserable and began to tell her story: "Originally, my family had more than 20 acres of thin farmland, and I could still read a few Chinese characters. But when there was a severe drought, the harvest was not good, and I had to pay land tax and free husband money. All our food was robbed by officials, so the whole family had to flee the famine. We went first to Yingchang Mansion and then to Xinzheng. My parents both starved to death, and my brother was recruited by the government to serve as a Xiang army."

"My sister-in-law stayed in Xinzheng with my brother, and I continued to flee with my wife, children, and nephew. I was starving to death on the way, so I became a gang of thieves and followed a big king to rebel. When the officers and soldiers came to kill me, the team broke up. My nephew and my youngest daughter Also separated.”

"Anyway, we have traveled a lot, and now there are only three left in the family of nine. I don't know if my brother and sister-in-law are still alive."

Ju Ming sighed and said, "Oh, it's not easy to stay alive because of the ignorant ruler and the corrupt officials who abuse the people."

Zhou Xiu said: "Thanks to Mr. Jing Lue and the Grand Marshal, when we arrived in Xinye, the government distributed grain and harvested beans in the summer. The government really did not send anyone to collect taxes, nor did they urge me to return the grain. This second season of beans is needed again. After harvesting, I finally got through this year. The government is very benevolent and righteous. When the land is plowed, I will pay back the grain I owe. I also promise not to default on the land tax."

A soldier smiled and said: "Zhou Zhoulang, this is the generalissimo!"

Zhou Xiu was startled, extremely excited, and immediately knelt down and shouted: "Your Highness, Generalissimo, I thank you for your life!"

The nearby farmers also knelt down again. They knelt down before simply to see that Ju Ming was very majestic and must be a high official. Now I kneel down, but I do it from the bottom of my heart. Without the Zhu family and his son, many of them would starve to death.

"Get up quickly," Zhu Ming personally helped several of them up and said to Zhou Xiu, "It's a good time to farm. When I go to the Central Plains, maybe you can find your brother and sister-in-law."

Zhou Xiu said quickly: "I will definitely be good at farming, and I will also be able to farm the land of the military tenants!"

Ju Ming patted him on the shoulder and said a few words of encouragement.

Zhou Xiu felt that his body had become lighter by a few kilograms, and the Generalissimo was so kind and kind to him. What a good official, he will definitely be a good emperor in the future.

Ju Ming continued to move forward, chatting with farmers along the way and chatting with soldiers when he met them.

"Generalissimo, I am Ershun," the man said happily when it was Tong Ershun's turn. "The old lady is holding a birthday banquet, and I am helping to carry the table!"

Ju Ming suddenly felt cordial and asked, "Are you from Daming Village?"

Tong Ershun said: "It's Daming Village. My family went there very early. My brother's name is Tong Shun. He and the Generalissimo defeated Heifeng Village."

"You said Tong Shun, but I have an impression. He is a soldier under Zhang Guangdao, and he also took a detour to make a surprise attack on the back mountain of Heifeng Village." Zhu Ming immediately remembered.

Tong Ershun was happy and frustrated at the same time: "The Generalissimo still remembers my brother, but it's a pity that he was killed by the government. All the officials in the county government should be killed."

The clerks and archers in Xixiang County did kill a dozen of them, leaving more than thirty people sent to hard labor. Who made them offend the veterans of Daming Village, or even offend Ju Ming himself, but Bai Chongwu interceded, and those who were not deeply involved were not pursued.

Ju Ming sighed and asked: "Don't talk about these old things, what is your current military position?"

Tong Ershun immediately lowered his head and said with difficulty, "I am still the captain."

"Practice well and don't embarrass your brother!" Zhu Ming was speechless.

"I must practice hard!" Tong Ershun's face turned red with embarrassment.

Ju Ming turned around and saw that the farmers were following him. He immediately ordered: "Let them go back to collect beans, so as not to delay the farming season."

Ju Ming stopped looking for people to question and moved forward with his musketeers.

The soldiers and peasants knelt down spontaneously and watched the generalissimo leave. When he was far away, he stood up and talked to each other. They all felt that they were proud of having had close contact with the generalissimo.

You can brag about it for a lifetime. When you go shopping in town, you can brag about it to the merchants there.

Especially someone like Zhou Xiu, who had spoken to the generalissimo and could continue to brag about it until the day he died and closed his eyes.

"Captain Tong, the generalissimo doesn't put on official airs, and he talks very kindly to us common people. Is Mr. Manager like this too?" Everyone gathered around Tong Ershun.

Tong Ershun's nostrils turned upward: "Of course, Mr. Zhu went to the fields himself to teach the people how to grow crops."

"Do you need to be taught how to farm?" The villagers thought he was lying.

Tong Ershun said: "Really, the crops harvested by the farmers who were taught by Mr. Zhu personally will definitely be better. It is said in our Yangzhou that Xianggong Jinlue met an immortal overseas, and his method is actually an immortal method. . You may have never seen corn and sweet potatoes. When the wasteland is fully cultivated, the land that is not suitable for growing wheat and rice will be mixed with corn and sweet potatoes. Then you will know what fairy food is!"

Everyone didn't care about collecting the beans and continued to inquire about the gossip about Zhu and his son. Tong Ershun finished telling what he knew, and the rest was made up and boasted.

In his description, the Zhu family and his son were no different from gods descending to earth.

Moreover, many villagers really believed it.