CHAPTER XXIII
The location of Nanshan Village is not good, although it is under the management of Lantian County, Chang'an, but it is not the slightest bit of "eight rivers around Chang'an". From beginning www.biquge.info to end, irrigation is a difficult thing for Nanshan Village. There is a stream in the Zhongnan Mountain in the south of the village, but it is a little far away. In addition, it is the Bahe River, which is very close, but it is a pity that the terrain of Nanshan Village is high, and the river water cannot be brought up at all.
It doesn't work to rely on God to water the ground, so after the rain, the young people in the village carried buckets of water from the Bahe River under the leadership of Qin Zhen. That's not the way to go. It takes seven days to water all the sown fields in the village, and after seven days, the first field is dry and needs to be watered again. It's like entering a dead loop, tossing people without a day of peace.
Wei Xuan couldn't stand it. Relying on manpower to carry buckets of water is not a way, Qin Zhen is such a strong man who was bent over in just three days. Although it is said that the face of the loess is facing the sky, that is just a statement.
Taking advantage of the spring rain, Wei Xuan called all the old and young masters in the village to his house and held a simple meeting. The meeting was a new thing this year, and the small courtyard of Wei Xuan, who was in charge of men, women and children, was crowded. In fact, seeing this situation, Wei Xuan still felt a little sad. In the past, this courtyard was crowded with village children, but now it can hold the whole village.
Five flavors are mixed, five flavors are mixed.
Uncle Wu's prestige is still there, and his throat was calmed on the occasion of chaos, and Wei Xuan could only secretly wipe away a cold sweat. Turning around, he picked up a piece of charcoal and drew on the two hanging door panels. The black lines formed strange shapes in Wei Xuan's hands, which looked like a huge wheel, but they were much more complicated.
The layout of the fields in Nanshan Village is very strange, perhaps because of the mountain, there is no endless flat spread of the Guanzhong Plain at all, but it is like the terraced fields of Lingnan, but it does not form an obvious step, but the terrain near the south of Zhongnan Mountain is high, and the terrain near the Beiba River is low. For this kind of terrain, it is said that the right way to divert water from the mountain is to divert water from the stream, but unfortunately the stream water is blocked by many boulders. Calculate the cost of water diversion from gravel and bring the water from the Bahe River up is the right way.
Wei Xuan did not choose to overturn, although this kind of water diversion tool produced in the Han Dynasty was useful, it was not suitable for the situation in Nanshan Village, even if it was a more labor-saving keel overturn. The gap between the south and north of the village is still very large, and the overturning truck, which can only be used by manpower, is not much less labor-saving than manual water lifting. In this regard, Wei Xuan chose a purely automatic cylinder car. It's a bit troublesome to make, but fortunately, you don't have to take care of it after it's installed, and if you want to irrigate, you just need to open an opening in the canal.
It is not difficult to train the car, even if there is no full-time carpenter in the village now, it is not difficult to assemble one according to the design drawings drawn by Wei Xuan. It's just that the most critical axle is a little troublesome, and the others are just made of local materials, and there are many thick trees in Zhongnan Mountain.
The Bahe River is still very wide and the water is very gentle, so it is not a good place to place a waterwheel. Fortunately, the small tributary of the Bahe River in the north of Nanshan Village is not enough, but it is enough.
According to Wei Xuan's design, a large pool should be dug in the south of the village, and then a canal should be built to lead directly to the Bahe River. The water scooped up by the cart is poured into the pool through the erected pipes, and when the pool is full, the excess water is returned to the Bahe River through the canal. As for the irrigation of the fields, it is only necessary to make an opening in the side of the canal, and after watering, the hole is filled, and it is impossible to break the ridges with the water in the canal.
The size of the cylinder car has been calculated by Wei Xuan, and the size of six meters in diameter is not too big, and there is no trouble in transportation. Transporting the processed timber to the river and assembling it on the spot is very simple, except for the extra effort required for the key axles. In just a few days, there is a slowly rotating cylinder car in the river north of the village, which is very rhythmic.
The work of digging a pool and digging a canal is very simple, but it is a hassle to run a pipe from the barrel frame to the pool. There are not many bamboos that are thick enough, and Uncle Wu led people to go around the mountains for three days before cutting enough bamboo. These bamboos are suitable, as thick as a child's thigh, and they are placed on the shelves that have been erected just enough to reach the pool. Watching the pool fill up little by little, Wei Xuan couldn't help but breathe a sigh of relief.
The bare pool was not pretty, Wei Xuantuo Qin Zhen caught a little fish and threw it in, and some trees were planted by the pool. They were all transplanted from the mountains, but they were easy to feed, Wei Xuan stared at the trees for a few days and saw that there were a lot more leaves on the trees, and then he was relieved. The pool was large and deep enough to fill up in two days. Uncle Wu built a small thatched hut by the pool, and he kept staring at it for the past two days, and only when the water was full did he open the opening that had been left a long time ago, and saw that the extra pool water went down the narrow canal to the river. Uncle Wu, who has never shed tears a few times in his life, is in tears at this time, although he has not made a sound, it is like thunder.
Wei Xuan watched this scene quietly, did not say anything to consol, just patted the rhubarb at his feet and left. Wei Xuan, the feelings of the Tang people for the land, did not understand, but this did not prevent him from respecting Uncle Wu's behavior. Although this incident made Wei Xuan's status in Nanshan Village much higher, only Wei Xuan himself knew that he was just grateful to the villagers.
The grace of dripping water and the spring reciprocate each other are not Wei Xuan's style.
Ploughing, weeding, and fertilizing are only a small part of the field, and irrigation is the most important thing in the long growing period of crops, especially in this era. The problem of irrigation is solved, and there is much less work in the field. However, it is also important to watch out for wild animals in the mountains that spoil crops. Uncle Wu specially divided the shifts for the young men in the village, and one of them stayed in the hut next to the pool for three days. Wei Xuan also wanted to go, but was persuaded on the grounds that he had more important things to do.
Tilting his head and thinking about it, this is true.
There are more people and there are more people, and there are fewer people and fewer people. With fewer children, Wei Xuan has more time to do his own thing, and now he is looking for a new path to the prosperity of the village.
The dining table in the Zhenguan period was very monotonous, and ordinary people rarely ate vegetables, even if there were many steamed, and they were very light. Wei Xuan's stomach has enjoyed the farmhouse cuisine for most of the year, and it has long reached its limit. Now that it is stable, it is natural to find a way to improve it.
There are a lot of treasures in the mountain, and Wei Xuan found a lot of beans last year, and now he just planted them. Although Kunlun purple melon is rare, it is not difficult to find and is planted together. Cucumbers are also common, and with the addition of not uncommon leeks, a large area is also planted. Wei Xuan didn't fake other people's hands, they all planted it with his own hands, and the villagers couldn't understand what was the use of planting these things, but it was Wei Xuan's will, so he followed him. It's just that in this way, the family's sheep have less place to graze, and the children have to go far to herd the sheep now.
Wei Xuan didn't have the heart to popularize what nutrition was, and many things would only be believed if people tried them themselves. Just like salt, who would have thought that toxic brine would turn into snow-white green salt after some boiling? After coming to Datang for so long, Wei Xuan only had two things that reached the limit of his endurance: one was the crotch cloth of all evils, and the other was the vinegar cloth that exuded a strange smell and the salt cube that was hard like a stone. Many times, Wei Xuan thought that his current body, which was sick at two ends in three days, was because of eating those salts. Now that there is Qingyan, I can finally throw away those strange things, although the whole village looked distressed when I lost them.
Of course, the green salt thing can be eaten by himself, but it can't be passed on, and it is indispensable to be known by others, Wei Xuan doesn't want to be arrested as a smuggler of salt, and he doesn't want to explain the principle of this thing to others. It's okay to steal good things for fun, and yelling around will only cause trouble. At this point, today's Nanshan Village people and Wei Xuan have the same opinion.