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Because of Shen Mingwen's sudden disappearance, some clues were traced to Shen Mingyou, and the three uncles and nephews who were originally scheduled to return to their hometowns after the exam decided to delay their departure for a few days. In order to reassure his family, Shen Xi wrote two letters respectively, explaining the situation to Tingzhou Fucheng and Ninghua's family.

On August 19, three days after the end of the township test, there was no news about the northern businessmen for the time being, but Su Tong came over to invite Shen Xi to go out to participate in the cultural meeting.

This time, Su Tong looked very solemn, especially indicating that the popular candidates for this township test will participate, and even the political envoy will also appear.

This political envoy is a senator, named Lin She, and his official residence is from the fourth grade, and he can be regarded as the top five noble officials in the political envoy department. Although Lin Shi is not the outer curtain official of this year's township examination, according to Su Tong, the two examiners of this year's township examination are from his guarantee.

Shen Xi thought about it for a while, so it was very likely that the questions of this township exam were leaked by this Lin She.

"Brother Su, it's not that I have to pour cold water on you, now that the township test has not yet been released, will it cause any bad impact on the scholars if I just meet with the important members of the Political Envoy Division?"

What Shen Xi is worried about is that this is not an ordinary literary meeting, but those candidates who get the exam questions deliberately bribe the external curtain officials.

You must know that the township examination is held every three years, and the political envoy department has to reap a lot of benefits from beginning to end, and the examination questions naturally have to be bought with silver, and now that the examination is over, there must be some "expression", and I hope that the examiner can take more care of it when admitting people.

Since the outer curtain official and the inner curtain official could not show up in person to receive bribes, Lin Shi was pushed to the front.

Su Tong probably understood what Shen Xi meant, and comforted him with a smile: "Brother Shen is too careful, in fact, in this literary meeting, those talented scholars will participate, and even Wu Gongzi will be invited." As far as I know. Many of the participants were from poor backgrounds and were specially invited. ”

Shen Xi nodded, he probably knew what was going on this meeting.

Distraction!

In order to prevent rumors of bribery and cheating in this township test, such a cultural meeting was held with great fanfare. On the one hand, he was able to accept bribes, but also made a false impression that a scholar only talked about learning and did not ask about his background. When others saw it, the people who attended the meeting were all famous students from all over the world, not the head of the school. It is a famous teacher, so that others will feel pity that they cannot be invited to participate in such a literary meeting, but they will not doubt the nature of the literary meeting itself.

Su Daodao: "Brother Shen is twelve years old this year, and he has achieved the second place in my Tingzhou Mansion Examination, and many people want to see your reputation when they hear about it...... The call is so high, it's not good not to go. ”

Shen Xi wanted to excuse himself, but Su Tong said that it was not good for him not to go. So he cleaned up and went to the tea garden where the cultural meeting was held with Su Tong.

Because it is a cultural meeting with a certain official nature held after the end of this township examination, the venue is very carefully chosen. A relatively elegant tea garden was packed, and singers and dancers were invited to help the fun, all of which were invited from the Fuzhou Teaching Division.

It seems that in order to seek power, Zi Qian couldn't open the door from Fang Guan, the commander of the Fujian capital, for a while, so she turned to the path of the political envoy.

The scholars who attended this meeting, Shen Xi, in addition to knowing Su Tong and Wu Xingyu, who were also candidates in Tingzhou Mansion, only knew Lu Cheng and Chen Chen, who had a banquet together in Huaiyang Building before.

Because Lin She, the senator of the Fujian Chengxuan Political Envoy Department, had not yet attended, the atmosphere among the scholars seemed extremely relaxed. But the more ordinary-dressed scholars were less popular, and many sat alone, as if they had been given a cold reception.

The richly dressed sons sat in a group and talked loudly. The laughter was loud, and some people even flirted with the girls who came from the teaching department.

Although in the Ming generation, the concept of the gate lord clan no longer exists, and the same scholars who have won the fame of Xiucai have the same social status, but because of the different family backgrounds. The division of social hierarchies is becoming more and more distinct.

The son of a real wealthy family disdains to be in the company of scholars from a poor family, they have family support behind them, and the relationship network covers all aspects of officialdom, even if it is just a middle move, you can also enter the court as an official and step by step into a high position. But if it is a poor scholar, even if he takes the jinshi, he will not be able to get a real shortage of officials for a long time, and he needs to wait for many years in the official department.

Su Tong is the absolute core in the usual literary meetings, but in this kind of official literary meetings, it belongs to "high and low", ordinary scholars have a generation gap with him, and the two sides have no common language.

As for those children of official eunuchs, they also look down on Su Tong, you are just a "rich man" in the countryside, even if you have a lot of fields at home, tea gardens and farms, and even know some people in the officialdom, but that will not be of much substantial help to your career.

Su Tong was given a cold reception after coming to the tea garden, so he could only find a secluded seat with Shen Xi to sit down, and as soon as he raised the teacup, someone came over to say hello, all of them were snobs from humble backgrounds but wanted to cling to the powerful.

These people can't get the affirmation of the children of the official eunuchs, so they can only come to Su Tong to try their luck, and they can make friends with scholars of Su Tong's level, and this trip is more or less in vain.

Although Su Tong himself is also a bit snobbish, but people take the initiative to come over to say hello, but he will not be the slightest slack, after saluting, Su Tong sat down with Shen Xi and sighed lightly: "It's a pity that I am not very familiar with this Senator Lin." ”

Shen Xi thought to himself: "You said that you are not familiar with Lin She, so where did you get the township exam questions?" ”

It's hard to ask these words, just when the second floor of the tea garden was bustling, there was a sudden compliment downstairs, it turned out that Lin Shi had arrived.

Su Tong put down the teacup, got up and said, "Let's go, let's go down together to greet us." ”

I didn't know each other before, but it doesn't mean that I can be sluggish in greeting, Su Tong is rich and powerful, and it is still easy to use money to tie up with the powerful.

But when the two went downstairs, Lin Shi had already been surrounded by a group of scholars, because Lin She's ancestral home was a Houguan in Fujian, and some people had gone up to climb relatives, and they called him "Shibo".

Lin is a big surname in Fujian, there are a lot of people with the surname Lin, over the years of the Fujian Township Test, there will be people from the Lin family to get the solution to the Yuan, and the lifters are everywhere, and today invite people to the tea garden to participate in the literary meeting. One or two percent of the people are surnamed Lin, and when they go up to relatives with Lin Shepan, these people seem to be very reasonable. Look, this is a high-ranking official of our clan. You people with foreign surnames should stand aside!

In this era, the township party is all over the government and the opposition, if you are an official, you don't know a few fellow villagers and clans in the court, you are embarrassed to greet people. Even if not. You also have to hurry up to find a teacher, and then climb to the same subject, in the same year, two people who can't beat the side of the eight poles can be connected together through some kind of bond, as for the people with the same township and surname, it can be said that they are the township party in the township party.

Su Tong and Shen Xi stood behind for a long time, and they couldn't squeeze forward to say hello.

Lin Shi saw that he was surrounded by a posture, and it was too difficult to go up to the second floor, so he simply chose to stay on the first floor, so that all the scholars who participated in the Wenhui could only go downstairs, and there were only a few scholars from poor backgrounds who deliberately put on music. After going downstairs, he went out directly through the hall and walked away, and Lin Shi didn't have time to take care of them.

"Master Lin holds an important position in the Political Envoy Department, which is really an example for our scholars, and the students have admired it for a long time, and a small greeting ceremony is not a tribute."

Just after Lin Shi sat down, there were "unacquainted" candidates who began to give gifts.

The gift is not precious, just a fan, not like it is from a famous artist, but there is a jade pendant. Looks like it's worth a few bucks.

With a smile on his face, Lin Shi waved his hand and said, "This official came here today, just to discuss tea with all the scholars, purely for learning. This official never accepts invitations. ”

Shen Xi suddenly understood. The one who went up to give gifts was the "trust" deliberately invited by the Wenhui, in order to show that Lin Shi was an official and Qingming.

Sure enough, after Lin Shi said this, a bunch of people praised Lin Shi for being an honest official and having a noble character. said it in a similar way, so that Shen Xi almost believed it when he heard it.

There are also people who specially took a pen to record Lin She's words, and then shook their heads and chattered, praising them...... There are always sycophants who will do whatever it takes, even if they shoot the horse's hooves.

"Ladies and gentlemen, please be seated, please be seated."

Lin Shi looked very enthusiastic and beckoned the scholars to sit down, Su Tong and Shen Xi couldn't squeeze in front, and they didn't want to go up to the second floor alone, so they quickly found a seat on the side and sat down.

And those who desperately wanted to squeeze into the front seats, but in the end they didn't even have a seat, and in the end they couldn't block the sight of others, so they could only stand against the corner of the wall and listen to the "teachings" of Shangguan.

Lin Shi said: "When I was the same age as you, I studied hard in the cold window, and I began to get up and read every day when the rooster crowed five drums. ”

"Justified, justified. It's no wonder that Lord Lin can be a jinshi, and he is really a model for us. "Somebody started slapping again.

Some scholars are the same age as Lin She, and they may be a few years older than Lin She, and these people are not far behind flattery, and they simply treat Lin Shi as a grandfather.

Lin Shi continued: "The way of heaven is fair, the title of the gold list of the world's scholars, which one does not need to study hard for more than ten years or even decades? If you want to ascend to the sky in one step, or even study for three or five or seven years, you want to seek wealth and nobility in the field, which is really arrogant. ”

This sentence sounds like it is asking all the candidates to work hard to learn, but those who don't know it think that he is mocking "certain people".

Among all the scholars present, there were two people who belonged to what Lin Shi called "alternative", one was Wu Xingyu, who was sixteen years old, and the other was Shen Xi, who was only twelve years old.

Wu Xingyu was enlightened at the age of five or six, barely enough to meet the standard of more than ten years of cold windows that Lin Shi said, and Shen Xi was only twelve, and if he wanted to meet this standard, Shen Xi had to be enlightened at the age of two...... A two-year-old doll has difficulty speaking, how can she read and write?

After Lin She's words were finished, those old people naturally straightened their waists, as if to say: "Look at me, how consistent with the standards raised by Lord Lin, how can you fight with me?" ”

Most of the people nodded in agreement, and some people couldn't get used to coming to participate in the township test at a young age, so they fell on Shen Xi.

Su Tong said in a low voice: "Brother Shen, don't be surprised, Lord Lin admires young talents very much. ”

Shen Xi knew what his identity was now, and he wouldn't be stupid enough to argue with a senior member of the imperial court from the fourth grade.

However, Shen Xi can calm down, but some people can't hold back, Wu Xingyu has already stood up, took two steps forward, and saluted slightly: "Senator Lin said this, I dare not agree." ”

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PS: Fifth Update!

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