The matter of asking for food is related to the lives of thousands of people, and Li Chongwen will never be the shopkeeper because of Miss Liu's oath. He had to figure out every detail before he could make a final decision.

"Why is Miss so sure?" Li Chongwen asked.

Li Chongwen's distrust made Miss Liu a little angry. But she knew that the stakes were high, and Li Chongwen's caution was inevitable.

"Listen to Mr. Li, this Shu princess is in charge of so many things inside and outside the palace, there are thousands of granges and shops outside the palace, and there are thousands of princes, eunuchs, and palace maids in the palace, as well as the prince of Nong. In addition, she has to maintain other county palaces. She has to decide how many things up and down, she has to arrange, and she has to worry about them. Not a shrewd and capable woman, she will definitely not be able to manage well. ”

"The princess is shrewd and capable, and she knows it inside and outside this provincial city. Miss is about to say the point, why is she willing to give us so much food? Li Chongwen couldn't wait and hurriedly urged her.

"Mr. Li, don't worry! It is precisely because the princess is shrewd and capable that she will definitely give us food. Nong, look, we are nicknamed in Renshou County, eat white rice for half a year, how much grain do we need, and how much silver do we convert it into? ”

Li Chongwen was pinching his fingers to calculate, and Miss Liu had already pursed her lips and smiled: "I have already calculated!" According to 6,000 people, at least 12,000 stone in half a year. There may be more people coming out of the mountains, and we must ask for more, 20,000 stones. In recent years, the price of grain has been very expensive, and each stone is a whole number, and it is counted as three taels of silver, which is 60,000 taels of silver. Think about it again, how much land, how many shops, and how many houses can we get back if we occupy Renshou County......"

"You wait!" Li Chongwen suddenly realized. These stakes were not calculated, not because he was stupid, but because he was in the center of the whirlpool, and his thoughts were under too much pressure, so he didn't react for a while.

He said: "What Miss Liu means is that we will truthfully report the current situation in the county: all the people in the city are dead, and no one wants the fields, shops, and houses outside the city, and the big seal of the county has been found in the dung pit, so we just have to reach out and get it." The households and the farmers are the same, they have long been out of food, and they are hungry. As long as they eat the grain of the king's house, they are the king's people. Whoever doesn't want to be a farmer in the palace will find food by himself! There is no shortage of fields, there is no shortage of people, as long as you survive this year's autumn harvest, you will not want the food of the palace next year! ”

"yes, Nong has finally gotten his senses! I have looked through the field deed files in the yamen, not to mention that there are 200,000 mu to enter the palace, and one mu of land is cheaper for ten taels of silver to be sold, right? That's two million taels of silver! In the future, one acre of land will be rented for one stone, and won't it be 200,000 stone rent in a year?

There are also those houses, some of which are good ones that even Miss Ben has never lived in. Nong looks at those pavilions, those mountains, rocks, flowers and plants, and it makes people like it at a glance. And the satin fur and cotton cloth that was thrown on the ground at random was so stained, it was really a terrible thing...... This one in and one out, the palace can make a lot of money! I think that the princess is such a shrewd person, this abacus will always be able to beat! ”

Li Chongwen did not interrupt Miss Liu's chatter. He actually thinks more, the transshipment and distribution of grain; this year's spring sowing and autumn harvest; wheat seedlings in a barren field; the contribution of households and land; The land distribution of the grass labels, the security of the county seat, and other important matters were all swept through his head.

When Miss Liu finally finished speaking, Li Chongwen said: "When I came, the students saw that there were wheat seedlings planted in some places on the side of the road, and they had not yet raised flowers and tasseled. There are also millet on some slopes (Note 1), which are all grains. The students thought that we should first take care of the wheat fields that had been planted, one of which would save labor, and the other would not have to wait until autumn, and we would have wheat rice in the summer. ”

Who knew that Miss Liu was scornful of Li Chongwen's golden idea. She replied coldly: "The wheat rice is rough and hard to swallow, and those are all eaten by the slaves of the subordinates!" If you want to eat nong, Miss Ben won't eat it! ”

Miss Liu suddenly lost her temper, which made Li Chongwen and the second monk confused. But he didn't have time to grind his teeth with women, so he instructed Lu San to grind ink and prepare paper, and he had to write letters to the princess, the prince and Tang Fatzi respectively, reporting the situation and applying for food.

At this time, Miss Liu spoke again: "Mr. Li, let me write it." The four or six prose of benevolence, righteousness and morality, although the little woman is not as brilliant as the one written by Xiucaigong, but this Xiucaigong may not be clearer than me. Don't forget, my father is from a good background. The little woman of Bagu Shiwen also started from a young age, and there are always dozens of articles. ”

The urgent mail to the princess and Tang Fatzi was quickly handed over to Lu San and sent by Pegasus overnight. One cart was left behind, and the rest went back to continue transporting grain. But Li Chongwen's letter to Zhu Pingjin was never sent. Because Li Chongwen is still a little selfish, he doesn't want Zhu Pingjin to mistakenly think that he is a person who shouts loudly when he encounters some difficulties after reading the letter. He hoped to sort out the affairs of Renshou County into a relatively calm situation, and then report to the prince in a comprehensive manner.

The next morning, Li Chongwen led the grass label to the county seat of Renshou.

The bodyguards were divided into two teams, those who did not want to stay in Renshou County, or the one team who wanted to go home first to say hello escorted the cart back, and the other team who was willing to stay in the land to send food to the refugees in the mountains first, and then took them to the county seat to rendezvous.

Because of his positive and hard-working performance, he has some prestige in the grass standard, and his two sons are protecting the caravan, and Wei Gan has been reused by Li Chongwen. His task was to lead a team of about 100 men to search around the county.

One encloses all the ownerless land, especially the ownerless land where grain is grown. Any land for which no title deed can be obtained is regarded as ownerless land and is declared to be owned by the royal government.

The second is to give policy lectures to all the households they meet. Those who are willing to eat grain go to the county seat to register with Mr. Li. After registration, they will be the bankers of the royal palace.

In the past, all the household registration documents issued by the government were handed over and confiscated, and they were reissued every few days. All those that are not far away are invalid. As for the households whose own families can take out the title deeds, persuade them to surrender to the palace, otherwise they will not be given rations; Tenants who rented land from other families were allowed to stay at their own discretion. Anyone who is willing to come to Wangzhuang, regardless of men, women, old and young, can get five acres of land for rent. If the tenant leaves voluntarily, the owner is not allowed to stop him, otherwise he will be arrested and punished.

There are only two taboos in Wei Laoer's actions. According to Li Chongwen's instructions, one is that the scholars in the county should not provoke for the time being, and the other is that they are not allowed to kill people at will.

Two days later, Li Chongwen lived in the county government and began to sit in the court to ask questions. On the one hand, he received the villagers and households who had returned one after another, and on the other hand, he arranged for the two owners of the village, Li and You, to lead the people to clean up the dead bodies and ruins in the county.

In order to save food, Li Chongwen took the lead in reducing his food ration to six taels a day, and there was nothing left of the polished rice, snacks, vegetables, and bacon that Tang Fatzi gave him for private enjoyment.

Miss Liu led a large group of girls to the street to seal the house and things. Each of the girls had a stack of seals covered with the big seal of the county, as long as there was no one in any house, Miss Liu waved her hand, and someone immediately pasted the seal on the door.

Xiaolan, the maid, mingled with a group of aunts, who had to sew a thick winter coat for each farmer at Mr. Li's request, using cotton cloth discarded in the city.

In order to rectify the order in the city and prevent people from taking advantage of the opportunity to steal and rob, Li Chongwen also set up a city guard team composed of bodyguards and Zhuang Ding to patrol the streets and alleys day and night. Several thieves who climbed over the wall to steal were all beaten to death mercilessly and tied up in the declaration pavilion of the yamen to show the public.

There are many measures for recovery and reconstruction. However, the difficulties have not been reduced by these measures. Because more and more people are returning to the city to eat, which greatly exceeds the previous estimate.

A few days later, more than 10,000 people were eligible to eat in the county, that is, those who had registered as village households or donors. According to the current situation, Li Chongwen predicts that the number of refugees accepted by Renshou Wangzhuang may be as high as 30,000 to 50,000!

The tragic situation of the thief Tu Renshou, as well as the stories that happened after Renshou ran out of food, later became examples repeatedly cited by Zhu Pingjin's imperial literati, just like the pagoda in Bifeng Gorge and the oil painting under the city of Qiongzhou, which has a certain symbolic significance.

In the pen of the royal literati, the thief is a human being, and he also has to eat. Thieves rebel in order to survive, so anything that threatens their survival is their enemy, including the common people, who are also poor.

The thieves went to fight all over the place, and the marching speed was extremely fast, which is the origin of the name "thief" in the official history. It is impossible for a thief to carry a large amount of baggage, and the only way to solve the problem of eating and dressing is to grab it wherever he goes! Fighting local tyrants and landlords is the main way for thieves to plunder.

But local tyrants and landlords are not fools, they will sit at home and wait for the thieves to cut off their brains. They would flee into the city with their families before the peasant army arrived. If the city cannot be broken as soon as possible, the thieves can only meet their basic needs for survival by plundering the common people in the villages and towns around the city. But when the thieves have eaten enough, the people who have no food will starve to death!

Limited survival resources can force good people into devils.

Besides, that Zhang Xianzhong has never been a kind person!

Zhu Pingjin's royal literati also searched a large number of historical materials to explain the reasons for Renshou's lack of food.

After the thief broke through Luzhou on the fifth day of the first lunar month, he traced the river along the left bank of the Yangtze River. One share broke Nanxi County two days later; One group turned northwest ahead of schedule, conquered Rong County on the 11th, and entered Jingyan County and Renshou County. Jingyan County was not defeated, and Renshou County was broken on the 14th. Counting from the time the thieves' vanguard entered the border of Renshou County, the siege of Renshou lasted about five or six days before and after.

The fierce resistance of the Renshou defenders caused heavy casualties to the sacrifice thieves. After the city was destroyed, the city's grain was burned by the defenders, and the rejoicing thieves found nothing. During the siege, the rations carried by the thieves were basically depleted, and they had no other way but to go to the countryside to plunder food on a larger scale.

What made the people of Renshou even worse was that the thieves had to rob them, and the officials and soldiers had to rob them.

Zhang Xianzhong evacuated from Renshou County, and the officers and troops of the various departments pursuing Mengzhen and Chu Town passed through this area one after another. The mobility of the officers and soldiers was not as good as that of the thieves, and it was even more exhausting to chase here. The pursuing army is a guest town, lacking local support, so naturally they are also robbing everywhere.

Snatching and snatching like this, the Renshou fugitive refugees could not return for a long time, and they ended up in the dilemma of having no food to eat. Li Chongwen led the villagers into the city, and the villagers who learned that they were safe returned home one after another. But they were greeted only by burnt cottages and empty granaries. They had no choice but to go into the city to eat.

However, another important reason why Renshou cannot be ignored is Li Chongwen's strategy of dividing the land and dividing the land. Wei Gan went out of the city to preach, which added fuel to the fire. Almost all the tenants came into the city and waited for the palace to divide the land. The landlord who escaped the catastrophe lost his tenants and was also at risk of starvation, so he had to go into the city with the land deed to make contributions. As a result, the snowball is getting bigger and bigger, and the population of a county is moving to the county seat.

Renshou has always been a big county in Sichuan.

According to the county government records, the population of Renshou County before the war was about 100,000, and the total population is estimated to be no less than 150,000 with the widespread hidden households in various places. In the war, 30,000 or 40,000 people were directly killed, and most of the villagers outside the city fled to the surrounding prefectures and counties or mountains. Some people died of starvation, some people went to Meizhou, Peng County, Jianzhou, Ziyang County and other surrounding places, and of course, some people started a business with no capital. At least 50,000 or 60,000 people were lost to these families due to the war, far more than the number of people who died directly. The rest of the survivors are estimated at least 70,000. According to Li Chongwen's current situation, it is likely that most of the refugees will pour into the county seat to eat!

However, the county town also ran out of food. On the day of the Lantern Festival on the fifteenth day of the first lunar month, a slave-turned-refugee led the city guard to dig a grain cellar buried in the ground in the original master's house. A grain cellar can save the life of a family in a famine. But for the tens of thousands of mouths in Renshou County, this bit of food is just a drop in the bucket.

The dinner on the day of the Lantern Festival was the last meal that Li Chongwen could offer.

Each person can get a bowl of food, on average, only two taels, like a small rice ball the size of half a fist.

It's time for darkness to cover a city of hunger.

The hungry Li Chongwen couldn't sleep. He stood in the courtyard of the county hall, staring at the black sky where there was nothing. Tomorrow there will be no food to be distributed, will the hungry people riot? If the hungry people rioted, would he, Li Chongwen, end up like Liu Zhixian and leave his head on the flagpole for the birds to peck?

At this moment, he heard a commotion outside the yamen, and an excited voice came to his ears with great clarity:

"Lu Tou is back!"

Note 1: Shu millet (SU) is sorghum. Sichuan has a record of planting sorghum as early as the Han Dynasty, so it is also called Shu millet locally.