The four princes only felt full of energy, and they had never been so refreshed in their lives.

Xiao Cheng, who was forcibly pulled out of the classroom by him, was unhappy, but Xiao Peanut was relieved that he was no longer forced to study. However, when the two of them listened to Zhang Shou briefly explain the reason for the matter, they first went back to Jiuzhangtang to teach, and then the four princes crackled and burst their mouths, and as soon as they talked about all kinds of details, their faces changed together, and the initial dissatisfaction was swept away.

Xiao Cheng once had a good life for a while, but he was also embarrassed, especially after having no father and no mother, Liu Zhiyuan and Zhu Tingfang left Beijing one after another, even if someone like Hua Qi quietly fed him food, but he still lived like a ghost - a ghost in the real sense!

And the little peanut is not to mention, whether it is Lao Salted Fish or Xian Yunhe, all of them are people who starve if they don't do it for a day, so he has also helped with all kinds of work since he was a child. Therefore, after hearing this, Little Peanut first asked, "Then what are we going to investigate?" Did you go to the Gusu restaurant to inquire and ask them if they really accepted apprentices? ”

"No, go directly to the Gusu Restaurant, it's easy to startle the snake. I thought we could go to these three people's homes quietly, well, don't use the teacher's name, just visit the door in the name of a classmate, and then we'd better send something. ”

The four princes are small and big, and as soon as their eyes rolled at this time, the idea was simply to open their mouths: "Let's dress normally, so that we won't be too conspicuous when we go there." At that time, we will say that the teacher has set a fasting leader for the intermediate class, and we are going to comfort the students. Buy a little egg tofu or something, so it's decent to come to the door. ”

Xiao Peanut has watched the whole process of the four princes racking their brains and those children in the same class in the past few days - in view of the iron-clad battalion and flowing soldiers, the intermediate class has a total of seven classes, and they are changed every day, even if he stayed for so long and couldn't remember all the one hundred and twenty classmates, the four princes can call out the names of most of the people in the three classes in three days, he really has to admire.

For example, at this time, the fourth prince could still think that when he went to visit his classmates' homes, he should buy eggs and tofu, which ordinary people would improve their diet, instead of meat such as roast chicken and mutton...... Of course, the most amazing thing is that the four princes even proclaimed themselves fasting!

He glanced at Xiao Cheng, and when he saw that the person was nodding vigorously there, he realized that this kid had been fooled by the four princes. But he racked his brains and thought about it, and realized that he was the assistant specially sent by Zhang Shou to the four princes, and he knew that it would not work to sing the right play, so he could only ask helplessly: "Then you really want to go now?" It's still class time, right? ”

"Of course, we have to go while they are still in the public school and can't go back, otherwise if they see us, won't they be in a gang? Besides, those things in the intermediate class, for you Little Peanut, should be very simple, if you really miss the class, go back to the ones you don't understand, I'll just make up for you! You have to believe me, I'm good at it! ”

The fourth prince slapped his face without saying anything, and said loudly, "Okay, okay, it's settled, let's go find the sixth brother and let him escort us over!" By the way, where their family lives, this also depends on the sixth brother to guide the way, they all say that as soon as he stomps his feet, the outer city will tremble, and it is good to have him as a local snake! ”

It is not difficult for the three little guys to convince Ah Liu, after all, the fourth prince is justified that it was Zhang Shou's order, plus with Xiao Peanut and Xiao Cheng as witnesses, Ah Liu would not think that they were holding chicken feathers as arrows.

So, Ah Liu personally went to the public office to check the school registration information card of the three students - this is modeled on the system of the Guozi Prison Supervisor Roster, in addition to the names of the students, the names of the parents, the occupation and the address of their hometowns, there is also the conclusion that the household is true in the field investigation, and the last item is that Lu Juan directly uses his entourage to complete it efficiently, which can be said to have plugged the last gap.

And the four princes who were peeking on the side couldn't help but be greatly admired, and when he got in the car, when he talked about it with Xiao Peanut and Xiao Cheng, he had to pat Zhang Shou and Lu Juan's sycophants. What a foresight, seeing the subtle knowledge, all kinds of idioms popped out of his mouth one by one, and finally even Ah Liu, who was driving outside, couldn't listen to it anymore.

"I'll save it for a while!" Although he was very happy to listen to, he didn't know that the fourth prince was deliberately currying favor with him!

The four princes who were talking endlessly suddenly stopped eating. And Little Peanut breathed a sigh of relief - he is a person who likes to talk very much, so he always dislikes Xiao Cheng for being too boring, but now he realizes Xiao Cheng's helplessness when facing him in the past, because the fourth prince is really curious and talkative, there are so many questions that there are too many words!

However, Ah Liu did not directly drive the carriage to bring the three little guys to the door of the house, but took them to buy condolences such as eggs and tofu mentioned by the fourth prince, and Little Peanut also specially bought a bag of caramel candy. In the end, Ah Liu's familiar car stopped in front of a tavern, and after depositing the carriage, he led the three of them into a narrow alley.

The fourth prince who followed behind was still in high spirits at first, but as he walked, he found that the ground was uneven, and he almost fell several times, so he did not dare to look around, but lowered his head and carefully examined the miserable ground. In the end, he finally couldn't help but ask, "Sixth brother, how long will this go?" ”

Ah Liu's feet didn't stop, and he didn't look back and said, "At least a quarter of an hour." ”

Hearing an exaggerated inhalation sound behind him, Ah Liu turned his head to look at the four princes, and saw that people looked bitter, Xiao Cheng and Xiao Peanut looked as usual, so he explained lightly: "Many officials can't afford to raise carriages, so they go to the carriage and horse shop to borrow them when they need them." If you go by car, no matter how ordinary you are, it will be in vain, and people will know that you are not ordinary at a glance. ”

"Also, I don't go in with you, there are too many people out of the city who know me."

The fourth prince suddenly realized, but when he heard that Ah Liu actually didn't send them in, he couldn't help but be surprised, and subconsciously asked, "Then how can we find that place?" ”

In and out of the capital, he has found a very headache problem, that is, there are rows of houses everywhere, and unlike every palace in the palace has a courtyard gate, after entering, whether it is a side hall or a main hall, there are often plaques to indicate what kind of place this is; In the inner city and the outer city, except for those who are in charge of the mansion will have a plaque, there is no other at all!

Especially in the alleys where the houses of the small people are gathered, many houses do not even have walls, and there are many rotten fences! Unless it's an acquaintance, you don't know whose door you're out of the door even if you walk to the door!

Seeing that the four princes obviously showed a bitter color, Xiao Peanut finally understood why Zhang Shou wanted him and Xiao Cheng to follow. Because the dragon son and phoenix grandson in front of him, who was born in the palace, lacks common sense at all! Of course, people are much better than most of the golden branches and jade leaves that grow in the deep palace, after all, they often go out of the palace, but when it comes to doing things, people are blind.

Therefore, seeing that the four princes, who were originally full of fighting spirit, wilted in an instant, he could only interject and say: "Okay, you don't have to worry, Xiao Cheng and I will help to ask for directions!" Don't you think it's more normal to ask all the way to the door? ”

The fourth prince wanted to refute it, so that they would have to find out when the three families would have to find out all the way, but under Ah Liuna's gaze, he didn't dare to say anything in the end. As he walked through the dirty, dimly lit alley and deserted alley, he saw a mess of low-slung houses, very different from the neat alleys of the inner city.

His scalp suddenly went numb, how to find someone?

But Ah Liu didn't go out of the alley, but stopped there. He nodded at the house and said lightly: "Look at the school registration information, the three of them live in this area, you can find someone yourself." ”

Unlike the four princes who were completely dumbfounded, Xiao Cheng was so curious that he looked around, but Little Peanut seemed to be at ease. Seeing that a few four or five-year-old children were chasing and fighting, he stepped forward with a smile on his face, and the bag of caramel he bought when he bought egg and tofu before immediately came in handy.

In a place like the outer city, parents and elders don't have the time to teach their children not to eat foreign things, plus caramel is really a luxury for ordinary children, and sweetness easily overshadows suspicion. And when Xiao Peanut pointed to the Four Princes and Xiao Cheng and told a few children that they were Chen San's classmates and that this trip was a visit, several children were even more excited and took the initiative to agree to lead the way.

Of course, they also have the audacity to ask for payment for leading the way!

So, the four princes were dumbfounded to see that the little peanut easily paid two pieces of sugar per person, and asked them to lead the way to the three households, and they paid one piece first, and then paid the second one after leading the way to the place, and when he saw a few children running fast with their little short legs in their mouths, and turning back to wave to them, he couldn't help but stare at the bag of caramel and look at it.

How good is this sugar? Curious, he immediately asked the little peanut for a piece, but as soon as he tasted it in his mouth, his cheeks immediately puffed up. Where is this delicious, sweet, there is no other taste!

Although the imperial dining room in the palace was unsatisfactory in the past, there are at least a few people in the small kitchen of the Qianqing Palace who are good at making dim sum, let alone now. Moreover, from time to time, Song Juren would send dessert recipes to the palace, and then be made by a certain imperial chef designated by the emperor, so his mouth had long been raised, and there was nothing attractive to him about this kind of thing.

At this time, he heard Xiao Cheng's voice behind him: "Children from ordinary families have never eaten much sweet things since they were children. Because not to mention sugar, even salt, you can only put a little bit when cooking, because the price of salt is not cheap. This is still the virtue of Grandpa Taizu, who made the price of salt public to the world and wrote it into the canon, claiming that the Ming Dynasty will remain unchanged for eternity, otherwise it will ......"

"Otherwise, the price of salt could easily skyrocket." Little Peanut heard Xiao Cheng's words, and casually answered, and when he led the four princes to follow those children, he whispered to the four princes to popularize these common sense.

"Private salt is not rampant in this dynasty, because the price of official salt is not expensive, only six wen a catty. Therefore, salt can be afforded, and salt must be eaten, if you don't eat it, you won't have the strength, but sugar is different, and it doesn't matter if you don't eat it. On the market today, caramel costs 20 wen a pack, brown sugar is 15 wen a catty, and white sugar is more expensive. ”

"The slightly yellow kind of white sugar costs forty wen a catty, and the whiter the color, the more expensive the price. The finest snowflake white sugar, crystal clear, is packed in a delicate porcelain jar, which is not sold by the catty, but by the jar. I heard that the rich and noble people recognize this kind of tone the most, the more expensive they are, the more they buy, a can of 500 wen can be sold, and the thinnest kind even costs 1,000 wen. ”

If Zhang Shouren was here, he would tell these three children that it was not expensive, the price of six wen a pound of salt, in any era of salt and iron monopoly throughout the ages, it was all quite a considerable low price, that is, in some periods of the Ming Dynasty in history, there were similar salt prices to this price.

In the Tang Dynasty, salt was sold in buckets, and a bucket of salt was sold at a low price of 110 Wen, but this was just a flash in the pan, most of the time, a bucket of salt was 250 to 300 Wen, that was the norm, and when converted, 20 Wen a pound was at least.

As for the Song Dynasty, most cases were 40 wen a catty, but occasionally there would be a high price of 100 wen a catty, and the well salt in Sichuan was sold for 150 wen...... As for the Ming Dynasty in history, it was only during the Chongzhen period that the price of salt was completely out of control, but it was about fifty wen a catty.

Therefore, in the Ming Dynasty in history, it was okay to cross the smuggler and get well-off, but if you want to be rich, unless you rebelled at the end of the Ming Dynasty, don't think about it. Because the smuggler can only sell the salt to the official salt dealer at a low price, otherwise can you still openly open a shop to sell? As for sugar, this luxury product originally had a narrow audience, that is, it was not until the development of the sugar industry in the Qing Dynasty that the price of rice was reduced.

All in all, the four princes who originally proposed the implementation plan can now only follow behind the little peanut butt and watch each other play. He watched Little Peanut take the caramel as bait and easily found Chen San's home.

When Chen's mother heard the news and came out to ask, Xiao Peanut, who had read the school registration information card, knew that she was working as a tailor at home to make clothes, and when she saw Chen's father, he was another uncle, which was called a courteous and cordial.

After a few homely sentences, Little Peanut enthusiastically introduced the four princes as the head of the class, and came to visit the classmates' homes at the teacher's orders, and then offered eggs and tofu as condolences. The Chen family's parents and husband and wife are obviously honest people, and when the mother saw this, she immediately said with sincere fear that her son was going to drop out of school to become an apprentice, and he would never dare to be an apprentice, and the father was helpless and sighed.

At this time, the fourth prince finally found a chance to speak, and he hurriedly threw out the question he had asked Chen San and others in the public school again: "But, isn't there no salary to be an apprentice?" ”

But just as he was about to say that stealing from school would not work, he was bumped by Xiao Peanut's elbow, and the words that came to his mouth were completely choked. At this moment, he suddenly remembered that he had come to visit him by pretending not to know anything, not that he knew that people were going to drop out of school as an apprentice to listen to the news. So, while he immediately shut up, he tried his best to show the most concerned expression.

The eldest little peanut among the three is not much old, Xiao Cheng and the fourth prince are not yet ten years old, and people of the Chen family's parents of this age are naturally very easy to relax their vigilance in front of such a little big child. In addition, Xiao Peanut just said that the four princes were famous prodigies in public schools, who could write and calculate, and they were neatly dressed to see people, so they all relaxed their precautions.

"This apprentice is different from other apprentices, and his salary is 1,000 yuan a month!" When Chen's mother said this, her face showed a trace of confusion, "His eldest brother is about to become a carpenter, and if the third son goes to Gusu Restaurant again, his father will finally be able to breathe a sigh of relief." ”