IV. Orphans (I)
In March, the peach blossoms were red, and "Yuzhang Villa" ushered in a new owner.
Yuzhang Villa is the name given by Zhao and Ju to the newly bought Zhuangyuan, which has nearly 30 rooms in front and back. It was originally an industry placed after the official Zhishi of Beijing, because his son was implicated by Han Yanxuan, not to leave Shanyin, this village was idle, until Zhao and Ju took a fancy to this place, and the chief of the whole security came forward to buy it.
The original owner of the Zhuangyuan was in a hurry to leave the capital, and this Zhuangyuan was used for vassalization, and the inheritance as an heirloom seemed to have less paddy fields, so the selling price was not expensive, even so, it was counted as six thousand guan - Zhao Youju's mother, Mrs. Quan's face changed when she heard this price, but the eldest son's insistence still made her take out the six thousand guan.
This is the majority of the profits they have made from selling snow candy for months, and although snow sugar is still bringing them a steady stream of wealth, it is no longer as profitable as it was at the beginning. First, it is because the snow sugar on the market in Zhejiang is gradually saturated, after all, sugar is not salt, and it is something that must be eaten every day; Second, because they bought a large amount of brown sugar, the price of brown sugar gradually increased.
Fortunately, the Jinguo sales channel opened by Shima Guangyan still allows Zhao and Ju to receive a profit of about 300 yuan per day. This money is already quite a lot, Renzong's prime minister, the privy month's salary is only three hundred yuan, although after more than a hundred years, there are Wang Anshi, Lu Huiqing, Cai Jing and others tossing, there are Jin country captive, prices are expensive, copper money has gradually become less valuable, but three hundred yuan is still a huge wealth that many poor people can hardly imagine.
With this money as the foundation, Zhao Youju felt that his planning could finally begin.
"Sure enough, it's a good place, and Ju, such a big place, even if the purchased population arrives, it's too empty, why not hire a few more families?" Quan's satisfied look at the village, after moving in, she was busy visiting room by room, she had never lived in such a large village in her life, and now the family business passed on to future generations has been there, as long as she saw Ju and Rui brothers marry a wife and have children, she felt that she had no regrets in this life.
"It's up to the mother to decide." In this little matter, Zhao and Ju still respect their mother's opinion.
"This courtyard is not very dilapidated, those orphans are here, how are you going to settle them?" This precocious son buying orphans must have a deep meaning, before the whole family always thought that it was the order of the immortal Lu Zu, so he didn't ask in detail, and now he finally can't bear it.
"The child deliberately separated the last one into the yard, half of which lived in the boy, and the other half in Lori...... Girl. Zhao Heju knew that this matter had to be handled by his mother, so he didn't hide it, and said straightly: "Mother and Brother Rui live in the second entrance, and the third entrance should be useful for the children, and after a while, there will be a courtyard outside the fourth entrance." As for the family members hired by the mother, they were placed in the first wing. Mother thinks so, okay? ”
The whole family has no idea, how can it not be allowed.
On the second day, Zhao Xi led Xiaocui to Shaoxing Mansion to buy people, at this time the Great Song Chengping had been in peace for a long time, and there was no hunger, and a small number of good slaves were abducted by people, or they were adopted since childhood and were ready to be sold, and the main source was the children and children of the prisoners. Zhao Xi took a fancy to a few strong men, who were originally the sons of criminal officials, while Xiaocui picked four rough maid rings. As for those mothers-in-law and daughters-in-law, Zhao and Ju have already confessed, those people often develop many bad habits in the original master's family, so they don't want any of them.
When these slaves first arrived at Yuzhang Villa, they inevitably looked down on this family, but in less than two days, they were taken out by Zhao and Ju and they were obedient.
The four rough maids are all average, and when she bought them, Xiaocui paid attention to them, and did not buy a beautiful fox. Therefore, Zhao and Ju didn't have much interest in their training, so they sent it to Xiaocui to specialize in sewing and washing at home. Those sturdy men were taken by Zhao Yong to reclaim the land, these jobs they were used to doing, and the Zhao family had a lot of food and clothing, so they did it very hard.
With the strong labor, the left and west of Yuzhang Villa changed greatly, first leveling out a relatively stable place under the hillside, and Zhao Heju ordered Zhao Xi to hire people to build houses (Note 1) and build a row of earthen houses there. Originally, spring was not a good time to build a house, but building an earthen house was only an expedient measure to settle the villagers, and Yahuan could live in a big house with the main family, but these sturdy men could not.
At the same time as building the house, Zhao Yong and led these sturdy men to dig a weir and build a dam on the stream, Zhao Xi was also puzzled by Zhao and Ju's order, but now he is used to not asking the reason.
On the seventh day of the fifth month of the fourth year of Jiading, just after the Duanyang Festival, the dam had not yet been built, and Shima Guangyan had already sent the children of Zhao and Ju over, and it was still Zhao Xi who came forward to receive them. Although it was not easy to trade between Dajin and the Great Song Dynasty, the Shi Mo family had been in business for many years and naturally had their own channels, so transporting some of the children to Shaoxing Mansion did not arouse any suspicion.
Unfortunately, these children were young and malnourished, and because the northerners were not accustomed to the water and soil from the south, five of them died of illness along the way. Shi Mo Guangyan had been prepared for this for a long time, and deliberately bought ten more people, so the number of people who were taken to Yuzhang Villa by Zhao Xi was five more than the thirty that Zhao Heju wanted.
There were twenty-one boys and fourteen girls, the eldest of whom was about twelve years old and the youngest of whom was only nine years old. Standing on the top of the steps and looking at these frightened children, a trace of sympathy rose in Zhao Youju's heart. But he quickly erased this sympathy, which had no meaning to these children, and if history had been allowed to go according to his knowledge, the thirty-five children, if not poor and sick, would have died in the great Mongol invasion more than twenty years later.
It was a catastrophe in which civilization succumbed to barbarism and humanity was defeated by animal nature, and no war could have brought about such a great change in the development of human society as the Mongol invasion. There seems to be a hand in the darkness, jealous of the ingenuity of the descendants of the Yan and Huang of the East, hating the civilization of the Chinese people, and repeatedly unleashing the beast-like barbarians, creating disasters for China, interrupting the process of self-development of these black-eyed and yellow-skinned people, and taking away the opportunity to dominate the fate of the earth to those greedy whites.
Zhao and Ju are convinced that since they have been reborn into this era, they must shoulder the mission of bringing history back to the normal track it should have.