After Zeng Yu talked with Liu Neng and Ding Xi for a while, he explained that they only need to selectively recruit homeless people at present, and there is no need to make a big fuss, after all, there are too many homeless people now, and wanton recruitment will cause the manor to make ends meet.

After talking about it, Zeng Yu saw that the time was estimated to be about the same, so he asked Liu Neng to lead the way, and the four of them walked to the square in the middle of the manor under the escort of their own soldiers.

When Zeng Yu walked to the square, he saw a few hundred people, old and young, standing in an open space in the center of the manor.

As soon as an old man at the head saw Zeng Yu, he hurriedly walked up.

"You're the new owner of the manor?" , The old man asked with a slight bow.

When Zeng Yu heard this, he knew that Liu Neng must have told his identity to the tenant farmers here just now, so Zeng Yu nodded immediately.

Seeing Zeng Yu nodded, the old man immediately knelt down and said, "I waited for 473 people from 93 tenant farmers to see the new master. His tone was extremely humble, and then the hundreds of people behind him knelt down, "I've seen the new master." But his voice was disorganized, and he looked weak.

Zeng Yu knew that the status of the tenant farmers was low, equivalent to slaves, and everything was counting on their masters. But he didn't expect these tenant farmers to be so humble, as if in their hearts, they were born slaves, and they must kneel down when they see their masters.

Zeng Yu hurriedly helped the old man up and said, "The old man is Village Chief Zhang, there is no need to be like this!" Hurry up! ”

Zeng Yu had great strength, but the old man couldn't break free, and quickly stood up under Zeng Yu's pull, and looked at Zeng Yu's eyes with emotion. He has lived for so long, and he has never seen a master who is willing to lift his slave up with his own hands like Zeng Yu.

Zeng Yu helped the old man up, looked at the kneeling people not far away and said, "Everyone get up." In the future, don't do this kind of prostration. I declare now that you are no longer tenant farmers. ”

Everyone looked at each other in surprise, and then knelt down together and said in a loud voice: "Please be merciful to the master, we will do our best to take care of the fields." This time, the voice was much more nervous than before, and they thought that Zeng Yu was going to drive them away. They can barely survive in this manor, but they have nothing left, and if they are kicked out of the manor, they will only be reduced to exiles, most of whom will starve to death.

A trace of sadness flashed in the eyes of the village chief surnamed Zhang, he thought Zeng Yu was a good master at first, but he didn't expect to drive them away in a blink of an eye, he stayed there, his eyes were full of gray, this is a kind of gray that has no love. Also, he is in his forties, and after decades of labor, his body has been destroyed prematurely by the years, and now that he is abandoned, it will not be long before he will become a dry skeleton on the side of the road.

"What's the matter, old man?" , Zeng Yu asked strangely while pulling the old man.

Zeng Yu didn't know what these tenant farmers thought, he was very curious why after saying that they were not tenant farmers today, everyone was mourning, and it seemed that because of such a sentence, the sky fell.

The old man panicked when he heard this, and hurriedly said, "Master, if you drive us out of the manor, I won't be able to live anymore." ”

When Zeng Yu heard this, he looked at Liu Neng and the others beside him, and said, "When did I say that I wanted to drive you away?" ”

Village Chief Zhang knelt down and said, "Master, didn't you just kick us out of the manor, you said that we will not be tenant farmers from today onwards, this is not what is driving us away." ”

Zeng Yu helped Village Chief Zhang up again, laughed and said, "Didn't I say don't bow down again!" And I didn't mean to drive you away just now, saying that you will not be tenant farmers in the future, because you will all be my subordinates in the future. You will continue to farm here, and you will keep everything you have to pay except for your taxes. ”

Zeng Yu also did this to buy people's hearts, he knew that slaves were the worst motivated to produce, and if these villagers could work better, it would be better to give them a free status. And even if they restore their status as civilians, they will definitely stay in the manor, firstly, the current people are very simple, such kindness is definitely worth their lives to repay themselves, and secondly, they will not be able to live if they leave the manor. So how could he not do such a beneficial and harmless thing.

When all the villagers heard Zeng Yu's explanation, they all knelt down in unison and shouted, "Thank you, master!" At this time, everyone's voices were loud, their faces were full of extremely excited expressions, and at the same time, their eyes were full of gratitude when they looked at Zeng Yu, after all, Zeng Yu gave them almost the grace of recreation.

You must know that it is almost impossible for ordinary people like them who live at the bottom of society to get rid of the lowest status of tenant farmers. Each of them longed for this day in their hearts, even more than they longed for food and clothing.

Village Chief Zhang knelt on the ground at this time, looked at Chen Chu gratefully, and muttered with a choked voice: "The lord is really a benevolent and righteous person!" ”

Of course, Zeng Yu knows that he is almost against the general trend of today's society, if it is spread, it will certainly be recognized and supported by the people at the bottom, but at the same time he has offended all the warriors. And the latter is the latter who holds power and resources in this society, and he will usher in countless verbal and written criticisms.

However, Zeng Yu knew why he did this, because he hoped that every Chinese citizen would be like a dragon, just as the I Ching Qiangua has a cloud, "With nine, see the dragons without a head, auspicious." He hoped that in the future, there would be no tenant farmers or slaves in Chinese society, and that everyone would live for themselves.

Of course, he knows that this is not possible now, but he will work in this direction step by step. Because what he needs is the blooming of the brilliant civilization of China, and the need to sprinkle the fire of civilization to the four directions, which requires the efforts of countless people, and even he is not confident that he can complete it in his own generation, but he wants to lay a solid foundation and then hand it over to his descendants.

Others, including Liu Neng, Ding Xi and Gude, didn't know what Zeng Yu was thinking at this time, but their views on Zeng Yu had changed even more at this time. If a person dares to defy the condemnation of the world, then there are only two possibilities, either he has a lofty ambition and the ability to support this ambition, or he is a fool who is in the limelight. Obviously, Zeng Yu can't be the latter.

Although a lot has been said, it is all done in everyone's minds, and the actual time has only passed for a moment. Zeng Yu helped Village Chief Zhang up, looked at everyone, and said: "Everyone get up, we will all work hard in the future, and our life will definitely get better and better!" ”

"The lord is benevolent and righteous, and the lord is wise~~" The villagers all shouted in unison.

Zeng Yu asked Village Chief Zhang to stay, and the others went back first. It was still early in the day, and he wanted to see the fields he had bought and the crops to grow.

The others naturally went back happily, and it is estimated that they will wake up laughing when they sleep tonight, and happiness comes too suddenly. Village Chief Zhang naturally took Zeng Yu very respectfully and walked towards the cultivated land outside. All the cultivated land is outside the manor, very close to here, and this manor was originally built here for the 5,000 acres of arable land. Village Chief Zhang walked ahead, although he looked very old, but maybe he was going to go to the field that he had cultivated all his life, or he suddenly got rid of the identity of a tenant farmer, his steps were not slow at all, Zeng Yu They needed to walk and couldn't catch up.

In a short time, they came to a field not far from the manor. At this time, it was the end of April and the beginning of May, and the wheat seedlings were almost ripe, green and yellow. Under the rays of the setting sun, I can see in the distance that the neat strip of wheat is like a golden ribbon. Walking into the wheat field, the wheat mangs are straight and vertical, really like a head-on big broom, as for the ear head, it also begins to become full, I believe that in more than a month, it will be like a boundless golden sea, and it is a sea of wheat fields that gives people infinite hope.

"It's all the Lord's 5,000 acres of land!" Village Chief Zhang bowed his body like Zeng Yu and reported.

When Zeng Yu saw this, his mood was very open, this was the first real piece of land he actually owned. The previous Jinniu Mountain, which he only occupied with an unclothed army, belonged to the thieves in the name of the imperial court, and the mountain belonged to the emperor's private property. But here, when Sun Hao and the others bought this manor and field, it was Zeng Yu's name that was registered. So this estate, this field, is registered as his personal private property.

Hearing Village Chief Zhang's words, he didn't pay attention for a while, just looked at this wheat field quietly: "Village Chief Zhang, I plan to rent this field to you now, and after you plant it for three years, it will belong to you forever." As for the taxes, there is only one, fifteen taxes and one, and all the other taxes collected by the government will be collected by me for you, and you only need to be responsible for cultivating the land. ”

As soon as Village Chief Zhang heard this, he immediately stayed there motionless, not frightened, twenty excited, just look at his constantly trembling lips and the tears that were about to emerge from his eyes.

At this time, although the land tax was 30 taxes and 1, it was half lower than the 15 taxes required by Zeng Yu. But in addition to this land tax, there is also endowment. The so-called taxation does not refer to taxes alone, but also to two kinds of taxes. At this time, the main sources of government finance were oral taxes and land taxes.

There are two kinds of endowment in the Han Dynasty, one of which is the oral endowment, that is, the poll tax, which is divided into two types: one is the calculation of the endowment, where the adults aged 15-56 with labor force pay 120 yuan per person to the state every year, which was reduced to 40 yuan during the reign of Emperor Wen; The other is called mouth money, where 7-14 years old, each person pays 20 yuan per year. The other is called "change of service", including "change of pawn", "main pawn", and "pawn" triple gravity service or military service. Peasants serve one month of local labor every year and become "pawns". Men between the ages of 23 and 56 are required to serve in the military for two years, one year of service in the county as a "regular pawn", and one year as a "soldier" or "guard" to guard the border or the imperial palace in the capital.

In addition, the government sometimes imposes additional taxes under false pretenses, and over the course of a year, even ordinary freemen may use half of the year's harvest to pay taxes. If the harvest is not good, they sell their fields and become tenant farmers or even slaves.

"The Lord is benevolent and righteous, and we will swear allegiance to the death!" Village Chief Zhang finally relieved himself now and knelt down to Zeng Yu.

"Village chief, hurry up, I have one more thing to explain to you. That is, you can reclaim the wasteland in the vicinity, and it will belong to you forever after three years of cultivation, just like the five thousand acres. Zeng Yu encouraged them to reclaim wasteland, because he knew that many of them could become fertile land, but everyone would not take the initiative to open up wasteland because they were tenant farmers before.

"Lao Yu must urge the villagers to work hard to open up the wasteland." Village Chief Zhang said excitedly.

"Okay, village chief, let's go back first, and you can announce what I just said to everyone." Zeng Yu also looked at the wheat field, and it was time to go back to see the sky. Among them, the village chief was pulled by Zeng Yu, and with him beside him, the village chief was naturally excited and restrained, and did not dare to be side by side with Zeng Yu.