novelonline Chapter 873 The whole family moves
Chapter 873 The whole family moves
Chapter 873 The whole family moves
The drought in the north and the coldness of this winter have made life extremely difficult. Although a sleet has soothed the earth's throat, the crops in the field have died of drought and the harvest has been lost. Most of them depend on ordinary farmers. The common people have become disaster victims this winter.
And since the past few months, they have sold almost everything they can sell in exchange for some food. When the heavy snow fell, they were dumbfounded. Many people were huddled together in single clothes.
In the corners of the county walls, in the ruined temples outside the city, in the dilapidated villages that are almost unpopular...
Wang Tingxiang, as the elder of the pavilion and the commander-in-chief of this disaster relief, felt heavy in his heart after he visited various places to inspect the famine.
As a result, he also changed his original views on the court's funding and human trafficking.
In Luoyang, Henan, Governor Wang Xian accompanied Wang Tingxiang to secretly visit the actual situation of setting up porridge sheds there.
"Although the imperial court has allocated funds for disaster relief food, it cannot handle the large number of people. After the ice and snow thaw, the roads will be muddy. Once the disaster relief food is not delivered in time, the situation will become even worse."
Speaking of which, Wang Xian was really sad.
Generally speaking, disasters are concentrated in one prefecture or several counties within a prefecture, but the drought in the 20th year of Zhengde was indeed relatively serious.
The snow was flying, and everything as far as the eye could see was white.
The disheveled victims lined up in the wind and snow to receive porridge, and the skinny people gathered in patches like ants.
These are all mouths that need to be fed.
"Fortunately, we have Weigang (Wang Xianzi) to implement good governance, otherwise there would have been countless human tragedies." Wang Tingxiang stepped forward, and there were grains and sweet potatoes piled outside the porridge shed.
There will be more sweet potatoes.
In this way, the rice porridge is accompanied by sweet potato porridge, at least the porridge and rice will not be too thin, and the stomach will feel like water after drinking it.
Wang Tingxiang turned around and said: "The cabinet will officially issue an order to transport people to Taiwan and Lu after the Lantern Festival at the latest. If it goes well, it may be earlier. The Central Plains is densely populated. If God doesn't show mercy, there will be millions of victims." .At the same time, there is still a lot of wasteland in those two places."
Wang Xian became interested and asked, "Has the imperial court really made up its mind?"
"Yes. You need to greet the prefect and county magistrate first so as not to be caught off guard when things happen."
In December of the 20th year of Zhengde, the first sign of the Great Immigration was first raised in the Tongzhou area of the capital.
Is there an opportunity to make money? It was the bureaucracy that first smelled it. A few officials' sons went to the Shaofu Enterprise Department to set up a transportation company first, and then obtained the qualification certification through connections.
And they also have capital. Through connections, even if they borrow money, they will first get 5 boats.
Because the court is pushing this matter, it has the green light all the way.
They then found a few losers to spread the word among the victims, providing rice and meat, and they were even able to create pictures of the places where the immigrants went.
This thing is much harder to get than money and ships. At least you have to know the people there.
Otherwise it would not be possible in such a short time.
After all, it has only been 2 months since it was proposed.
In fact, from the perspective of modern people, this matter is not very good, because people are clearly marked with a price. The imperial edicts received by the governor-general offices of Taiwan and Lu must be based on head count, age, and health.
In any case, healthy young labor is definitely the most expensive.
If you are slightly sick, it will be difficult.
When it comes to the transportation process, it is easy to be overwhelmed. Even if it is overcome, the price will be low.
From the perspective of profit, transporters will screen when they 'recruit' people.
In this process, a person and how much money they have will definitely be quantified. Otherwise, the business will not survive.
But nowadays, the buying and selling of people is common, and the selling of children and daughters is not something that only happens in legends.
In fact, a more thorough profit calculation should be to capture and transport people by force, treating people as animals and slaves. Because normal transportation of people is too expensive. The cost of transportation, ships and personnel is not even 20 taels, and the businessmen probably won’t make any money.
But 20 taels is the price of a high-grade war horse, which is enough for an ordinary family to feed themselves for a year.
It was necessary to transport 30 people, which was five to six million taels of silver. This was done twenty years ago. After completing this task, the court had to stop and cannot move on several other things.
But this time Zhu Houzhao did not choose a more economical method, which would have too many sequelae. Not only that, he also gave a 'package price' for the entire family to move.
Because these people used to be required to cultivate wasteland and this was a technical job. It's not possible to just find any young person.
There is an old saying that a family with an elder is like a treasure.
When farming, you need to know how to look at the weather and what you do in any season. These things are determined by older people based on their experience. How about saying it's a treasure?
In addition, it is more stable for a family to be in one place, instead of the court spending a lot of money to get someone to go there, only to come back after making some money.
These are all details.
On the whole, if a hungry person is given food, he is almost unlikely to refuse it.
Zhu Houzhao didn't know the feeling of hunger, but the victims would chew tree bark, eat Guanyin soil, sell their daughters, or even exchange their children for food.
It has already reached this level. How unacceptable would it be for him to leave his hometown and go to another place?
In fact, disaster victims themselves will flee, isn't it because they can't survive?
Therefore, as soon as the Tongzhou sign was launched, its popularity even exceeded the expectations of the parties involved.
The young people who initiated the initiative were naturally happy when they heard about it. Their fathers all held official positions in the court, and the news came from the court, so there was no doubt that it was false.
They even knew that the imperial court had shipped part of the official silver to Taiwan and Luzon.
"Let's take a look!" The leader was Zhang Yu, the son of Zhang Chi, the Minister of Household Affairs.
The three friends behind him also have roughly the same identity.
The imperial court actually restricted the children of officials from doing business, but this matter was left open. There were not many opportunities to make money, so naturally they had to seize it.
By the time they dodged the heavy snow and arrived at the simple shed set up at the gate of Tongzhou City, the registration and screening work had already begun, and people from the county government were maintaining order.
There are no slogans, and the common people who are illiterate cannot understand them. But there was a boy who kept holding pictures to promote the story, shouting loudly, "Dear fellow villagers, our Ming Dynasty won the battle in Luzon and occupied a piece of land! If you can't live with it, follow the imperial court. The emperor has already ordered The purpose is to prepare seeds and agricultural tools there to support our people in reclaiming wasteland."
In the past twenty years, the emperor has done a lot of justice.
Therefore, the emperor's reputation among the people is very good. Even a child has been taught that the righteous emperor loves and protects his people.
After all, various things such as sweet potatoes, land acquisition, exemption from corvee, etc. are happening one after another. Even if there is no deliberate publicity, ordinary people can experience it themselves.
Not to mention, in the Tongzhou area, Zhu Houzhao also strongly promoted the abolition of civilian herding, freeing the people from the hard work of raising horses.
"Come here, everyone! Give us food, keep it and deliver it to the right place!"
The victims in each household were so hungry that they didn't know whether they understood or not. Anyway, they answered whatever was asked when they came to him.
Zhang Yu was listening on the side.
"What's your name? Where do you live? How many people do you have?"
The middle-aged man replied, "This little man, Lu Quandi, has four members in his family. They are from Luzhuang, Miao County, Tongzhou."
"Would you rather go to Taiwan or Luzon?"
"When I go to Luzon, there should be more of my family there, so I can have someone to take care of me when the time comes."
"Uh, you..." The man holding the pen wanted to say something, but he held it back and nodded in a roundabout way, "You're right, there are probably a lot of people named Lu in that place."
"Hey. Then... then this..." The man's eyes kept scanning towards a tent behind him.
"Go, go. Seeing how hungry and skinny your baby is, you should come earlier."
"I came early. It took a long time for the doctor to check my body. Anyway, thank you, thank you very much."
As he said this, Lu Quandi took a child on his left and right hands, and shouted happily but timidly, "Let's go, we can get some food."
The tent where the food was distributed was connected to a small courtyard at the back.
After checking your health, signing up, and pressing your fingerprints, you can eat by yourself in the small courtyard after receiving the food.
You can't leave at this time.
It is impossible for you to eat for free, and there is a special person to monitor it.
For people like Zhang Yu, this is a huge sum of money.
As for what kind of food the merchants provide, the imperial rule is that dead people are not allowed to be eaten.
After all, under these conditions, the goal of providing big fish and meat is too ambitious. Steamed buns, rice, and sweet potatoes are all good.
But if the food is bad and people are fed up, then it will definitely affect the 'price'.
The good and bad businessmen here will be able to tell the difference.
What Lu Quandi received was four steamed buns, plus a bowl of sweet potato porridge for him and his wife.
When entering the hospital, they are also divided into different categories. A family like this is in the same category, and they have the highest 'price'.
After walking inside, I found that there were actually more than a dozen families.
"Brother Lu!"
"Old Song Dynasty?" Lu Quandi was also pleasantly surprised. This was his fellow countryman, "And sister-in-law, are you here too...?"
Two mud-legged country people don't care about finding a place to sit down.
The Song family felt better after eating a bowl of hot porridge, but at this time they could only smile miserably and said: "I can't live any longer, so this is the only way."
The Lu family's daughter-in-law followed silently behind him, while his two children were munching on the steamed buns. Especially her daughter, who had a pair of big, watery eyes. While she was nibbling, she saw a little girl looking at him across the way. Holding her.
Probably because she couldn't bear it, she even grabbed a piece and gave it to her.
"Old Song, do you know what this is all about? Give us food and then transport us to such a far place. Could it be..."
"No, Brother Lu, I don't know if you haven't been out of the country in the past few years. I heard people say that the imperial court really beat Luzon."
Lu Quandi's face was still full of worry. He was forced to do nothing. If he didn't eat, he would not be able to hold on any longer. Otherwise, he would not jump into this 'fire pit'. "Anyway, just take it one step at a time."
"Where did Brother Lu go?"
"Luzon."
Old Song stood up and said, "I chose Taiwan because I wanted it to be closer. I'm going to ask if I can change it so that it would be better for our two families to be together. You eat first."
"it is good."
Not long after, Lao Song came back and met the eyes of several people and said excitedly: "It's changed. The court doesn't seem to mind whether he goes to Taiwan or Luzon."
"Really? That's great!"
While they were chatting, a young man came in outside and said, "Listen carefully, everyone. Look clearly at the thing in my hand. This is called a map. Taiwan is close to the mainland, just opposite Fujian. It will take more than 20 days to arrive. Luzon is in Taiwan. To the south, it takes thirty days to walk. Taiwan is big and Luzon is small. Taiwan belongs to the Ming Dynasty, there are no barbarians, but the land must be cultivated by oneself. As for Luzon, the court has just conquered it, and there are barbarians, but there are also advantages. First Even if there are fewer people and more land, each family is based on a hundred acres, and some barbarians can farm it, so they are very cheap..."
Everyone, including Lu Quandi, listened attentively.
In fact, it was explained in great detail, but it sounded so wonderful that these suffering people were a little hesitant to believe it.
"If there are barbarians, will there be a war?!" Someone asked this question.
The introducer said: "Don't worry. When you get to Nanyang, you will walk sideways. The emperor has decreed that if you touch one of the people of Ming Dynasty, Ming Dynasty will destroy his entire country!"
(End of this chapter)