"The fire flows in July, and the clothes are given in September. The first day is hairy, and the second day is fierce; If you have no clothes and no brown, why do you die? This is a passage from the Book of Songs, National Style, and Feng Feng. The article is full of the desperate cries of the people at the bottom for life, which is said to have been done by the Duke of Zhou to persuade Cheng Wang to make it difficult.

The July of the thirteenth year of Chongzhen was indeed a desperate time period for the people in the disaster area of the Ming Dynasty. At a time when it was supposed to be the harvest season, there was not much harvest in the fields, which made many people in the disaster area also ask the question of how to survive in the second half of the year.

Compared with the situation of the people in these Daming disaster areas, the people of the small princely states in various parts of Nanyang have also fallen into a nightmare this year. After the Ming government raised the purchase price of grain, transporting grain from overseas to Daming finally became a profitable business.

Because of its tropical and subtropical location, there has been no shortage of food since ancient times, and in many places, rice can be harvested three times a year, even if the fields are not carefully cared for. In some of the more closed islands, because the farming technology is not developed enough, it is even in the primitive stage of slash-and-burn farming.

And even if the fields are not harvested due to disasters, the natives of these islands can survive the famine years thanks to the abundant plant resources in the tropical forests. For the small princely states of the region, there are only about two kinds of disasters they fear, floods and plagues.

However, in such an ordinary year as the thirteenth year of Chongzhen, the small princely states in various parts of the South Seas suddenly found that they had encountered an incredible food shortage. The closer to Daming, the worse the food shortage.

For example, in Vietnam, a country where the highest grain price did not exceed 0.25 yuan and one stone last year, the price of grain has risen to 0.35 yuan and one stone during the new rice harvest season such as July. Such a price was still a lucrative price for the merchants of the Ming Dynasty, but for the ordinary people of Vietnam, it was more than they could afford.

Because Vietnam is adjacent to China and has a history of thousands of years directly under China, the social structure here is almost no different from that of the Central Plains. However, Vietnam's royal power was not as perfect as China's, making Vietnam's upper class more akin to the role of gatekeepers and gentry, rather than lacking the means to confront the central power like the gentry class of the Ming Dynasty.

Therefore, with the exception of Ha Xi, Shanxi, Bac Ninh, Hai Duong, and Shannan near Thang Long, where there are many silk and porcelain producing areas, most of the areas belong to a self-sufficient agricultural economy similar to the manor system, and the commodity economy is not well developed. The most important of Vietnam's exports are natural resources such as ebony, rhinoceros horn, ivory, bird's nest and sea cucumber, followed by handicrafts such as raw silk and porcelain, but Vietnam's imports of Chinese goods can be described as all-encompassing, from needles and threads to large ships.

As a result of the free trade between Vietnam and Daming, the excess is getting higher and higher year by year, and the gap in the value of goods generated by the excess is filled by hard currency. However, it is a pity that Vietnam itself is not a country rich in precious metals, and this kind of super entry is expanding year by year, and it can only be filled with domestic gold and silver stocks, which naturally causes a shortage of money in the market.

Both the Trung clan in the north of Vietnam and the Nguyen clan in the south knew that the continuous outflow of gold and silver was harmful, but under the strong military deterrence of the Ming Dynasty and the hostile situation of the northern and southern regimes, neither side was able to issue a decree restricting foreign trade. Since the two regimes' previous loans to the Daming Bank were collateralized by customs revenues, they could not even adjust the import and export taxes.

Therefore, when the merchants of the Ming Dynasty took banknotes to buy grain in Vietnam, both the Zheng family and the Nguyen family not only did not stop it, but took measures to cooperate with these Ming businessmen, and took the initiative to collect grain from all over the country and sell it to these merchants, so as to obtain a large amount of Ming yuan to fill the deficit of the national treasury and maintain the normal operation of the regimes on both sides. In Vietnam at this time, the Ming Yuan was essentially no different from gold and silver, after all, only these three currencies could buy goods from the Ming Dynasty and pay interest on loans.

Vietnam's large-scale sale of grain in exchange for the Ming Yuan was, in a way, alleviating the shortage of money in the market and safeguarding the interests of the upper class. But for the middle and lower classes of Vietnamese, the rise in food prices has made their lives even more difficult.

Since the opening of the country by the Ming Dynasty, the ports of Yong Tien and Thang Long in the north of Vietnam, Hoi An, Ha Tien, Dong Ne, My Ha Ha and other ports in the south have become prosperous markets for foreign trade, and the border trade adjacent to China and Vietnam on land has gradually prospered. A large number of Chinese began to pour into Vietnam, engaged in mining, processing and manufacturing, food processing, rice milling, furniture and woodware making, etc., and the northern port of Yong Tien became a famous trading port on a par with Hoi An.

But behind this trade boom is a heavy blow to the subsistence small-scale peasant economy in the surrounding area. In order to obtain more and better goods in the market, landlords must further squeeze the tenants of their land. On the other hand, due to the influx of Chinese goods and Chinese merchants, Vietnamese handicraftsmen began to lose their jobs, and a large number of primary handicrafts were piled up at home and could not be sold, and many began to go bankrupt.

And in such a situation, if the price of food rises again, it is naturally forcing the people at the bottom to take risks. On July 19, the 13th year of Chongzhen, villagers in a village in Shanxi, Vietnam, intercepted a convoy of local landlords transporting grain abroad.

The Ruan brothers, who led the villagers, said angrily to the local supervisor of the convoy: "In the past 20 days, you have already transported grain four times to the outside, with a total of more than 1,000 stones. ”

The butler sitting in the car didn't feel any nervousness at all when he looked at the group of farmers with hoes and farm tools, after all, he knew all these people, and every time he went down to the village, he didn't even dare to raise his head when he saw him. When a flock of sheep gathers together, it is just a flock of sheep, can it still become a pack of wolves?

The butler with such a mentality didn't even get out of the car, so he sat cross-legged on the frame, pointed at the Ruan brothers who stopped in front of his car with a whip in his hand and said, "Who gave you the guts?" Even Master Ruan's grain truck dares to stop it, don't you want to grab grain? ”

The young man in the crowd who was angry but didn't have the attitude of the housekeeper suddenly replied: "Steward Mo, you don't add charges indiscriminately, we just came to ask for an explanation." At the time of the summer harvest, you said that you wanted each family to pay off the past debts first, and then borrow new debts from Master Ruan. However, after we paid off the old debts, but Master Ruan did not release the new debts for a long time, and transported this lot of grain to the city, do you want to starve us to death? ”

"Who, who is slandering Master Ruan, stand up for me. I really don't believe that I can't cure you mud legs, even Master Ruan dares to choreograph..."Steward Mo jumped out of the car violently, and rushed towards the crowd in front of the car with a curse in his mouth.

Taking in the past, everyone subconsciously took a few steps back, only Ruan Fujin, the second eldest of the Ruan brothers, directly greeted him and blocked in front of Steward Mo. Ruan Fujin is tall, a head taller than Steward Mo, and has studied martial arts since he was a child, and has a fiery personality, even Steward Mo was reluctant to provoke these two brothers in the past.

Therefore, seeing Ruan Fujin coming up with an unkind face, he suddenly stopped his pace, and the momentum he had just raised couldn't help but weaken a little, but he refused to forgive each other and said: "Ruan Fujin, don't you mess around, if you annoy Master Ruan, do you want to stay in Anxi Village?" ”

Ruan Fujin's brother Ruan Fuping grabbed the brother who wanted to do it, and said to him in a calm tone: "Steward Mo, we are all tenants of Master Ruan, so naturally we don't dare to arrange Master Ruan behind our backs. However, most of the grain harvested this summer was handed over to Master Ruan, and there is not much grain in our family, so we can't go hungry and farm for Master Ruan, right? Please also ask Steward Mo to make it convenient to borrow the grain that each family wants to borrow first, and then transport the rest to the city, we will not interfere..."

Steward Mo lowered his face and interrupted Ruan Fuping and said, "Fart, Master Ruan's grain is also something I can borrow privately?" If you want to borrow grain, go to the Ruan family's compound to borrow it, and if you want to fight these grain carts, it is absolutely impossible, this is all for the owner..."

Realizing that he had missed his mouth, Steward Mo suddenly stopped, but Ruan Fuping had already asked relentlessly: "Is there a master?" Didn't you just say that the grain was to be transported to the city and stored? Why is it that now that there is an owner again, has all this grain been sold? ”

Steward Mo made a move at this time, and while beckoning to several family members behind him, he threatened the Ruan brothers: "Don't inquire about what you shouldn't inquire, get out of the way quickly, don't toast or eat or drink." If something goes wrong, be careful that I tell the lord to take your land and tell you to get out of the locality..."

Steward Mo's threat did not scare the Ruan brothers, but Ruan Fujin stepped forward and grabbed Steward Mo's collar and said, "Don't go, let's make it clear first..."

Between the two of them, Steward Mo was accidentally thrown out by Ruan Fujin, and his waist hit the car gear behind him. This ruthlessness made Steward Mo unable to help but shed tears.

Angered, he finally had no scruples, beckoned the family members around him to come forward and arrest the Ruan brothers, and scolded viciously: "Bastard, you dare to rob Master Ruan's food, I have to send you to the yamen in the city to beat you board, see if you are still hard in the yamen..."

Ruan Phu Kim led several young villagers to confront the family members of Old Man Ruan's family, while Ruan Phu Ping shouted loudly to the villagers behind him: "The government has no way, the landlord is arrogant, since they don't give us a way to live, can we still stay at home and starve to death?" Let's fight for this life and eat a few full meals..."

At the instigation of Nguyen Phu Binh, the already disgruntled villagers finally got involved. So this small conflict soon turned into a riot in the whole village, and almost half of the Ruan family, including Steward Mo, was killed by the villagers, and only Steward Mo, several housekeepers, and coachmen fled in advance when they saw that the situation was not good, and they saved their lives.

After robbing the grain convoy, the Nguyen brothers also knew that they would not be able to turn back, so they called on the villagers to attack the Nguyen landlord's house in the countryside again, thus opening the prelude to the great Vietnamese peasant revolt in 1640.

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