Guo Zhiyuan stepped forward to help the old woman up, and said with a pleasant face: "The old man, please get up quickly, respecting the old is my internal business, and this official will definitely make the decision for you and let you enjoy your old age in peace!" ......" said and turned to the loyal man and said sharply: "As a son of man, you can't be filial to your mother, how can you bear to send your mother to the tomb of the living dead to die?!" ……”

The loyal man was so frightened that he couldn't speak, he only knew that he was kneeling there and trembling, Guo Zhiyuan also knew that no matter how much he talked to this kind of person, he couldn't hold back a fart, so he had to turn his head and say sharply to the daughter-in-law there: "You woman is even more vicious, if it is your own parents, can you bear to treat them like this?!" ……”

The daughter-in-law was bolder, and plucked up the courage to cry: "Back to the county official's words, the mother of the woman has already died, and she was not yet fifty years old when she died, but the father of the woman lived to sixty, and he also entered the grave of the living dead the year before last, and now he is gone, if the woman is not vicious, the family is too poor, and there is no rice to cook, if the mother-in-law does not enter the grave of the living dead, the family of the woman will starve to death!" ……”

The old woman also hurriedly helped: "County official, don't blame my son and daughter-in-law for this fact, entering the grave of the living dead is voluntary, and the old man is old and weak, and it will be in vain to live again, dragging down ......future generations."

Guo Zhiyuan touched his nose a little embarrassed, he wanted to educate the harsh daughter-in-law but didn't expect to ask such a result, he also knew that the daughter-in-law there should not be lying, seeing that the family couldn't even light the lamp oil, he knew that it was indeed destitute, so he had to cough dryly and said: "As long as the official is there, the bad habit of sending the old man who is still alive to the tomb of the living dead will never be allowed!" I'll ask someone to send some money and food to your family tomorrow, and after the New Year, the official will repair the official road, and you can let your husband go to the people's husband, and you can get six dollars of silver every month, and take care of the food, which should be enough to support the family! ……”

The three of them were overjoyed, and kowtowed to thank him without saying anything, but Guo Zhiyuan had no intention of staying any longer, and waved his hand to walk out of the courtyard gate of this house after a few words of appeasement, and when he walked to the door, he still felt depressed in his heart, and turned his head to Xu Guangqi behind him and said firmly: "Sir, such bad customs as the tomb of the living dead are too cruel, and the Japanese officials will issue a decree to prohibit such bad customs and customs!" Never let such a human tragedy happen in Gutian! ……”

Xu Guangqi shook his head and sighed and said: "Gongzi loves the people like a son, and he is a great good, but such bad habits and customs are probably not forbidden by Gongzi's decree, Gutian is mountainous and less fertile land, and an acre of fertile land only produces two or three stones of grain, excluding taxes and tenant rents, there is little left of the peasant households, and they can barely support their families. Gongzi can help a family, but it is impossible to have so much money and food to relieve the people of the county, although the construction of roads can temporarily alleviate this problem, but it is difficult to fundamentally solve the problem......"

Guo Zhiyuan was also silent, and later generations summarized the reasons for the fall of the Ming Dynasty, mainly three major factors, one is natural disasters, the second is party strife, and the third is system corruption, the Manchu Qing Dynasty just seized the opportunity to act as the gravedigger of the Ming Dynasty. One of the most force majeure is natural disasters, especially in the Chongzhen years, affected by the climate of the Xiaoice River, the climate turned cold, flooded in the south and drought in the north, crop production was reduced, and the people who starved to death did not know how many, and the desperate people had to join the team of the Liukou, the Ming Dynasty army was exhausted, but the Liukou were more and more, and finally Li Zicheng broke through the city of Beijing, forcing Chongzhen to hang himself, and the Daming Dynasty also collapsed!

The problem of food and clothing is always the basic problem that a country has to solve first, if even the problem of food and clothing can not be solved, the country will not be stable, let alone development, but it is not easy to solve this problem, even in later generations, China did not basically solve the problem of food and clothing in the country until the 21st century, with the production conditions of this era, Guo Zhiyuan to solve this problem is simply an impossible task, no wonder Xu Guangqi is also very pessimistic about this!

Guo Zhiyuan scratched his hair with a headache, if he hadn't encountered this matter today, he might have chosen to be an ostrich and ignore this problem for the time being, but now that he has met it, it is impossible for him to sit idly by, and if he is not in charge of the people, it is better to go home and sell sweet potatoes, hey, sweet potatoes! Guo Zhiyuan suddenly had a flash of inspiration in his mind, yes, Gutian is mostly mountainous, not suitable for growing rice, but suitable for growing sweet potatoes! Sweet potatoes are much better than rice, as long as they are planted, they don't need to take care of it, and the yield per mu is much higher than that of rice, and sweet potatoes can not only satisfy hunger, sweet potato leaves can also be cooked, and they can also be fed to pigs if they can't finish eating, which is definitely a treasure in this era of food shortage!

Sweet potatoes were first discovered by Columbus in South America, brought back to Europe and dedicated to the Queen of Spain, at the beginning of the 16th century, Spain began to plant sweet potatoes on a large scale, and later Spain occupied the Philippines as its colony, and brought sweet potatoes to the Philippines, so that they were gradually planted in Asia, sweet potatoes first entered China in 1593, Fujian Changle merchant Chen Zhenlong went to Luzon Island now in the Philippines to do business, found sweet potatoes, realized the great value of sweet potatoes, when the Spanish colonists were very strict about sweet potatoes, Forbidding outsiders to take them away, Chen Zhenlong risked his life and hid the sweet potatoes in the horse's belly before bringing them back to China.

So at this time, China actually already had sweet potatoes, so why couldn't sweet potatoes be quickly promoted and planted across the country? There are several main reasons, first of all, people in this era are more repulsive to alien species, so sweet potatoes are also called "sweet potatoes", which means from the land of barbarians, and the taste of sweet potatoes is far inferior to rice and flour.

In addition, at this time, the impact of the Xiaoice climate is not so obvious, the pressure of food shortage is not so great, only a few people of insight are aware of the role of sweet potatoes, vigorously promote, but still have little effect, has not been able to promote planting in a large area of the country, and until the Chongzhen years, the impact of the Xiaoice climate is increasing, there is a large area of drought across the country, this time it is too late to promote sweet potato planting.

Thinking of this, Guo Zhiyuan couldn't help but glance at Xu Guangqi on the side, in history, Xu Guangqi was one of the few people of insight in China who realized the huge role of sweet potatoes at that time, and among his many historical achievements, there was a promotion of sweet potato planting, in his "Complete Book of Agricultural Administration" specifically recorded the relevant knowledge of planting sweet potatoes, corn and other foreign crops, in order to promote sweet potato planting, he also wrote "Sweet Potato Shu", but unfortunately he was excluded by the authorities at that time, and his opinions were not taken seriously, and he could not save the fate of the Ming Dynasty!