031 Funeral
Since the day of the family sacrifice, the second lady has been ill, which has made the Zhao family gradually calm, and the days seem to be on the right track.
During the period, many distant relatives of the Zhao family rushed to the funeral, and there were also old friends and colleagues of Mrs. Zhao who came from afar to pay respects.
In the affairs of the front yard, women can't interfere, naturally there are arrangements made by Master Zhao and Zhao Da Steward, Fang Fei looks at the purchase materials handed over by the house stewards every day, checks the delivery lists of various merchants, and deals with some trivial chores, and the days pass quickly.
In the past few days, Fang Gengshun bought the ancestral house of the Xu family on South Street, but it did not open so quickly, because the Xu family's house used to only live in people, and it took a lot of effort to change it into a shop.
During this period, Fang Geng checked all the guys in the shop, although he didn't find out who did it, he eliminated two suspicious guys, and found two crop men from the countryside to take over the position, as for the South Street side, Fang Luo was arranged to come over to supervise.
Fang Luo forgot who he was, but there were some instinctive things that he didn't forget, such as dressing and eating, and later found out that he knew poetry and arithmetic, and in addition to that, he also knew some kung fu, and he could see that it was difficult to decline, and he was a person with a background.
However, the doctor also said that he escaped death this time, and his brain was too badly injured, and it may not be easy to recover his memory, and it is even impossible for his whole life. However, Fang Fei didn't think that this was a bad thing, at least, the Fang family had a good buddy.
The stars are moving, time flies like a white horse, and in a blink of an eye, it is the day of the funeral.
According to common sense, Mrs. Zhao has to stop at least 7749 days, and he dies on the seventh day of the seventh month, and the 49th day of the spirit will be the end of August.
But Mr. Feng Shui carefully calculated, in the second half of August and the whole of September, there is no suitable day for the funeral, if the spirit is suspended for 49 days, then it will have to stay up for another September, and there will be an auspicious day until mid-October.
It's the height of summer, the hottest time of the year, and countless ice cubes have to be consumed every day to ensure that the corpses don't decompose.
After some discussion, the ancestor made a decision on July 16, one day after the Midyear Festival.
Sixteen is the day of the burial, the hour is set at three o'clock, Shoucai is carried from the Zhao family's mansion to the Zhao family's ancestral cemetery, and it takes at least one and a half hours on the road, therefore, the time of mourning is on the fifteenth, and the night is up.
Because it was a funeral at night, he had to pick up the torches to prepare, and the people who carried the torches with the baskets alone arranged more than 30 of them, illuminating, carrying longevity materials, scattering paper money, doing chores, etc., as soon as the chief steward of Zhao arranged it, even the rough mother-in-law and girl in the back kitchen were counted and there were not enough manpower, so he had to spend money to hire dozens of temporary workers to come back to help.
Although the preparations were sufficient, there were unforeseen circumstances, and the sky was still clear on the 14th, and by the 15th the sky was overcast, and it was drizzling at night.
According to folk sayings, rain at the time of the funeral is a good omen, which means that the descendants will be blessed for a long time, and the heavier the rain, the stronger the blessing.
Since the date of Mrs. Zhao's death, it is a sunny day, and it rains on the day of the funeral, and the town says that this is the manifestation of the ancestors of the Zhao family, and the future of the descendants of the Zhao family is unlimited.
The Zhao family is happy, but although the omen is good, it has added a lot of trouble to the funeral, the funeral team is not less than 500 people, and many people have to be sent to hold umbrellas, and the rain only began to fall at night, where can so many people be found to hold umbrellas at one time?
Several backbones of the Zhao family discussed again and again before making a decision, and each of them assigned an umbrella to follow those who carried longevity materials, lighting, and scattered paper money to set off firecrackers.
The second is the filial son, the eldest lord who carries the spirit card, and the second master who carries the soul banner is the top priority, each sent two umbrellas, and the rest are self-sufficient.
Then the monks who followed the funeral couldn't spare manpower for a while, so they only arranged for a few elderly monks to hold umbrellas.
After this toss, even the golden spirit in the ancestor's room was taken away, leaving only Mother Wu, and Fang Fei's side did not leave one, except for two Xiao Si guarding the door on each door, the Zhao family was almost empty.
As soon as the time came, the confession in the front hall was immediately withdrawn, leaving only the paper-paste white wall, and the mourning hall was full of foreign family members who came to worship.
The younger generations of the Zhao family, led by the eldest master, all knelt outside the mourning hall, and many girls were lying on the ground, crying.
Mr. Yin Yang carried a seven-pound rooster into the mourning hall, held the rooster's head, stood in front of Shoucai, bowed three times through the paper wall, and suddenly shouted 'withdraw'!
As soon as the words ended, the crowd of onlookers in the mourning hall rushed forward and began to tear down the paper-paste white wall, coaxing the purple bamboo poles used as wall bones.
This is a contemporary custom, the rich and noble people but where someone in the family has passed away, to build such a bamboo bone white paper wall, the higher the life of the deceased, the more auspicious the bamboo pole used to build the wall, especially if there are children at home, in order to get a good fortune, it is desperate to rob.
The Zhao family grandfather passed away at seventy, which can be regarded as a long life, the purple bamboo pole and the fast were snatched up, the paper shreds on the ground were also cleaned, and the inner hall where the longevity materials were parked was presented in front of everyone.
On the left side of the coffin, the ancestor dragged the sick body out and sent his son on the last journey, Fang Fei, who was plain and white, held the ancestor with one hand, covered half of his face with a handkerchief in the other, lowered his head, and seemed to be hiding his face and crying in the eyes of outsiders.
At this time, Mr. Yin Yang came to the coffin with the rooster with his legs tied, pinched the rooster's wings, pulled the cockscomb and pulled the rooster's neck back, and then pulled off the fine hairs above the raised neck, and pinched Bai Shengsheng's throat.
Chief Steward Zhao ordered someone to bring a bench, put a white porcelain bowl, and personally served the tray of kitchen knives wrapped with white cloth strips, raised his hands above his head, and bowed forward.
The gentleman took the kitchen knife, wiped it on the chicken's neck, and then aimed the bleeding mouth at the white porcelain bowl on the bench, and the rooster struggled in vain a few times, and the blood soon filled most of the bowl.
As soon as Steward Zhao waved his hand, someone stepped forward to take the dead rooster and trotted to the back kitchen.
According to custom, the rooster should be made into a dish for the filial sons who came back from the funeral, but the Zhao family has a large population, so it can only be boiled into soup, and each person can get a small bowl.
Putting back the kitchen knife, Mr. took out the cow brush, and began to draw strange patterns on the head of the coffin with fresh chicken blood.
The juniors of the Zhao family outside the mourning hall got up one after another, knelt in the open-air courtyard outside the mourning hall, and two teams of young and strong young men rushed in from both sides of the mourning hall, lifted the longevity and rushed out of the mourning hall.
The people in the mourning hall also followed suit, and without leaving a single one, Grand Steward Zhao took out a large lock dipped in chicken blood and locked the door of the main hall directly.
This is also a local custom, to avoid the soul of the dead from lingering here and refusing to leave.
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