The ice on the North Canal has begun to melt, and many more slender men have appeared on both sides of the canal.

In the past, these slender men were always the poorest and helpless laborers, who could not find food elsewhere, so they counted on pulling fiber and selling coolies on the canal to earn some coarse grain to survive. But now it's not the same as before, the riverside slender man walked and came again, but these people are no longer alone, but after spring plowing at home, they come out to earn some extra money.

Fiber pulling is hard, but the income is still good, from Tianjin to Gyeonggi, there are many rivers that have to be pulled. This year, the imperial court has begun to repair the river from Tongzhou to Gyeonggi, although there is also a river, but in most cases, the boat can only go to Tongzhou, and it is difficult to transport ships directly to the capital.

Now the imperial court is preparing to build a Huailai Reservoir in the Huailai Basin of Xuanfu outside Juyong Pass in Changping, northwest of Beijing, to dam the Yongding River to intercept and store water, and even introduce several other tributaries into the reservoir.

When completed, the reservoir will facilitate drinking water and irrigation of farmland in Suncheon, and will even be able to divert water to the canal, allowing ships to travel directly from Tongzhou to the city of Jingshi.

However, it will take at least a year for this reservoir to be built.

Many Gyeonggi people go to Huailai Yanqing to repair the reservoir to make money, but some people still come to the canal to pull fiber. Although fiber pulling is coolie, it also has skills, and it is better to pull than to earn more than repairing reservoirs.

Li Zhuang is a native of Cangzhou, and Cangzhou has two things that are most famous, one is Changlu Salt Farm, and the other is Cangzhou martial arts. In addition to this, there are saline lands and canals. Although it is located on the Hebei Plain, the life of Cangzhou people in the past was not easy.

Most of the land in this place is saline-alkali land, and in addition, it is often plagued by floods, and the harvest is very poor. At the end of the Sui Dynasty, it was still a place where many Hebei heroes gathered to rebel. It is also a place where salt has been produced since the dynasties, so it is also an area where the sale of smuggled salt is very serious, which leads to the people here being martial.

In the past, Cangzhou people either dried salt for the imperial court, or secretly sold private salt, or went out to sell their arts. There are also many people who go out to sell their arts, of course, by the canal and the sea, and there are also many people who go out to sea to fish or run boats for people, and there are also people who pull fiber on the canal.

Li Zhuang's family was poor, and he had no land in the past, so he could only pull fiber on the canal, and after it froze, he also did some other work to work part-time and eat.

Although the shoulders and backs are full of calluses left by the fiber, the life is still bitter haha.

After the establishment of the Han Dynasty, the salt works of Changlu were also managed by the royal family. After adopting the new salt drying method and refining processing method, the Changlu Salt Farm only needs fewer people to dry more salt, refine better and whiter salt, and even process salt into many varieties of different styles.

Under the new salt production, distribution and marketing system, there is no selfish salt to sell, and there is no longer such a big profit. Ordinary people are not allowed to boil salt for sale, and the salt they cook is not as good as the official salt refined by the Salt Administration.

Salt is no longer a monopoly of salt merchants, and there is no need to smuggle it with such a big risk. Each province had a large salt warehouse, from which the merchants could easily wholesale salt.

Many stove households and salt sellers have changed their careers.

Most of the Cangzhou people went to Yanbei Province and immigrated to Yanbei, where they divided their fields and cultivated land.

Li Zhuang originally wanted to go. However, there was a seriously ill old mother at home, so she finally stayed. However, staying is much stronger than before, a large number of Cangzhou people immigrated to Yanbei, and many of the original former dynasty lords and nobles produced fields. Most of them were confiscated as official property of the imperial court. The court gave these rents to the people who remained, and the rents were much lower than those of the landlords.

Li Zhuang's family had seven people, and finally they were tenanted to 70 acres of land. Although the fields are not as good as other places, they are widely planted and harvested, and these fields can be planted, which can also ensure the food and clothing of the family. What's more, after the imperial court promoted crops such as potatoes and corn, the output of these lands increased a lot.

In the spring, the officials also rented oxen and horses for farming, provided potatoes and corn seeds, and even agricultural technicians went to the countryside to guide the fields. There are also canals that were repaired in winter, wells that were built, and waterwheels that were erected.

The spring ploughing went smoothly and was completed quickly.

The eldest son was apprenticed in an iron factory in Tongzhou, the second son was an apprentice in a shipyard in Tianjin, and the younger son was studying in a village primary school. The daughter helped his wife raise pigs, sheep, chickens and ducks at home, and the old mother's illness was much better after taking medicine.

There are no various arbitrary charges, and the wages of fiber pulling have risen a lot, and you can make a lot of money by coming here to get two months of fiber.

Li Zhuang has already made up his mind, first scrape together a sum of money to buy a calf to raise, raise a little mother, the family has a lot of land, the total rent of the official's cattle is not cost-effective, although the rent of the official family is not expensive, but if the cow is his own, when the cow grows up, a year can almost give birth to a calf, raise it, a calf cub is also a lot of money.

The two sons are apprentices outside, and there is also a silver dollar every month, and the two children are also sensible, and the factory is wrapped in food and shelter and even clothes and shoes, these two children are sensible, never spend money indiscriminately, and the wages and overtime pay will always be saved and sent home.

Li Zhuang planned to save the money first, and maybe he could repair the house by the end of the year.

After many immigrants left, their fields and houses were bought by the government, and these fields were rented to those who remained, and the houses were distributed to those who stayed but did not have houses, and the house prices were very cheap, and a symbolic amount of money was collected, and installments were allowed.

The house that Li Zhuang was assigned was not bad, much better than the shack he used to have, and he didn't plan to build another one, just repair it, and he could live there for many years.

Li Zhuang planted a lot of potatoes this year, and he had signed a contract with the grain station in advance, and even the purchase price was set, and the purchase price was very satisfactory to him.

As long as there are no serious floods and droughts, potatoes can be sold for a lot of money when they are harvested. It is said that these potatoes were purchased in the past, and they were all processed into starch, and then processed into vermicelli or something. Li Zhuang also ate the vermicelli made of potatoes, they pulled the fiber on the canal, the boat family ate it, sometimes met some more generous boatmen, and when the boat was opened, they had to eat a meal of pork stewed vermicelli, and the vermicelli was said to be made of potatoes.

The noodles soaked in lard are stewed soft and delicious, and this is the most delicious food Li Zhuang has ever tasted. He didn't expect that such an ordinary artichoke could be made into such good-looking and delicious vermicelli.

Vermicelli is more delicious and better preserved, which is for a farmer like Li Zhuang. It's good news, it means that there is a market for the potatoes they grow.

Artichoke is indeed a good thing, and the harvest can be much higher than that of wheat and rice. Although the price is not as good as the money for wheat and rice, it is still more cost-effective than growing wheat and rice, and it is easier to serve.

If only the grain station had been collecting potatoes at this price, planting them for a few years, and then they would be able to save money to buy some land back. According to the official proclamation, the government allowed and encouraged them to redeem the land of the imperial court that they were now tenants. These tenants have a right of first refusal and the price is fair.

You can have a field of your own. This is the dream in the hearts of every farmer.

The spring breeze was still a little chilly, and Li Zhuang and the slender men of the same village squatted on the edge of the Tongzhou Canal Wharf. After coming out, he ran away with a cargo ship, which was considered to be open.

While sitting on the dockside and waiting for the boat, Li Zhuang and the others took some potatoes and roasted them beside them. These potatoes were also brought from home, and they were slightly smaller, and they refused to go back to their accommodation at noon, for fear of missing their work, so they simply roasted the potatoes and ate them.

Smaller potatoes are easy to roast and quickly develop a fragrant flavor when roasted over the fire.

"I heard that the imperial court is going to build a track from Tianjin to the capital. It is said that when the track is completed, it will be able to run a large carriage. Two horses can pull several carriages, can pull tens of thousands of pounds of things, and run fast. Li Song, from the same village, said.

Li Zhuang was surprised. "Isn't that more loaded than a grain ship?"

The average grain ship is loaded with four or five hundred materials, which adds up to about 30,000 catties. And such a grain ship from Tianjin to Beijing, generally has to be equipped with ten slender men, and when encountering headwinds, they have to pull fiber. Therefore, Li Zhuang and the others came out of the village to form a team of ten people. Accept the employment of the shipowner together.

"How can there be such a thing, how much can a horse pull? Also tens of thousands of catties. ”

"What did I lie to you, I also heard from a ship boss. People say that they have noses and eyes. Just like in the past, Cao Yun didn't always take the canal from Shandong to Beijing through Hebei, but now you see, Cao Liang and so on still take the canal, not all of them go to Tianjin by sea, and then ship into Beijing. In the past, there were 100,000 slender men on the canal, countless Caoding, which of you dared to believe that one day you would go to the sea and go all on the sea, but now there are many fewer ships on the canal. ”

After the establishment of the new dynasty, Cao Yun changed to sea transportation, and many civilian merchant ships also mainly took sea transportation, which carried more capacity, and secondly, it was faster and safer. In the past, the Ming Dynasty refused to take the sea by sea, but all the grain and commercial goods went through the canal, because there were too many interests involved, and no one was willing to let go, but in the new dynasty, the sea transportation was decided by the emperor himself.

At that time, there was also Cao Ding trouble, and the trouble was very big at the beginning, and some people thought that there were hundreds of thousands of people eating on the canal, and the emperor would be afraid of making a fuss. As a result, most of these people were forcibly relocated to Taiwan, Hainan and other places outside the border. The troublemakers who made a lot of trouble can still divide the fields and land after immigrating, and those who make a lot of trouble are still mining in the mines of those mountains.

"Doesn't Jingshi also have a railroad, it is said that many mines and docks now also have railroad carriages. Now it is not unusual to lay a track between Beijing and Tianjin. ”

Li Zhuang also nodded at this time, they have entered the capital, there is this kind of rail carriage in the capital, the wheels are on the track, and two horses can pull several carriages to run, and it is very brisk.

"It seems that we will have less work to pull fiber in the future."

"You still want to pull fiber for the rest of your life, and now that you have land at home, you don't have to worry about eating. I don't have a fiber pull, so I can do something else. ”

It's actually very hard to pull fiber, just like it is now on a March day, sometimes you have to jump into the biting river water to push the boat. And in the summer, they can only wear a pair of Burmese crotch pants, which can only be tucked in front a little bit, and then the upper body and buttocks are all exposed.

Because they sweat a lot in summer, and they often have to go down to the river, they get wet and dry and wet all day long, and no matter how good the clothes are, they can't stand it.

Therefore, on the canal, you can often see rows of bare-ass balls with fibers.

And after pulling the fiber for a long time, when you get older, your legs will be uncomfortable, and even many people will not be able to walk because of too much immersion in water.

It's not for a bite to eat, which one is really willing to pull the fiber. Now everyone's life is also rushing, and now they have just been assigned to the field, and in two years, everyone will be more relaxed, and there are still a few who are really willing to come and endure this hardship. When the time comes, when they are not so nervous, they can also go to build roads and reservoirs to make money, and make less, but at least they don't have to suffer so many crimes.

"I heard that it is very good that they moved to Yanbei Province, each of them has divided a large piece of land, and now they have built a tunbao to cultivate together, and I heard that they can divide the field to the household registration in two years, and they have cultivated it themselves, as if one person has a hundred acres of land."

A while ago, the immigrants in the village went to Yanbei to return to their hometown to sweep the Qingming Festival, and said a lot of things about the immigrants, and said that the new home of the immigrants was out of the blue, they had a hundred households in Tunpu, but they had a large area, and there were no other forts in the front and back ten miles, and all the fields nearby were their forts.

Many villagers regret not going there in the first place.

"It's good now, what's the good thing about leaving home." Li Zhuang couldn't go at the beginning, but now he is very satisfied with his current life, no matter how good the immigration is, he is not moved.

If you can live in the place where your ancestors have lived for generations, why do you have to leave your hometown.

"They still took advantage, a hundred acres of land per person, and the land we left to divide still had to be rented and paid." One of my companions sighed.

"If you work hard, you can slowly redeem all the tenant land." Li Zhuang said.

At this moment, a fast horse galloped by, the bell on the horse's neck rang crisply, and the knight even had a flag on his back.

"The messenger, it seems to be from Tianjin."

"Isn't there good news, is it because Japan has won so quickly?"

Li Zhuang and his fellow villagers looked at the messenger who was billowing smoke and dust away, and each guessed.

The messenger galloped into Beijing.

In the Forbidden City, when Liu Jun received the urgent report presented by the chamberlain and quickly swept it, he couldn't help laughing.

"Your Majesty, isn't it good news from the front?"

Liu Jun smiled and handed the letter to Wang Kun, the celebrant and the superintendent, which was indeed great news. Just before the Japanese army was preparing to launch a formal attack, the 300,000 stone daimyo Nabeshima Tsuneshige of the Saga Domain of Hizen Province in Kyushu surrendered without a fight and took the initiative to ask the Han to surrender and surrender.

There are now more than 200 daimyo lords in Japan, and there are dozens on the island of Kyushu.

Among them, the Saga domain is not the largest, the Shimazu family in Kagoshima has more than 700,000 stones, the Kuroda family's Fukuoka domain has more than 500,000, and the Katen's Kumamoto has more than 500,000, but the Saga domain is also in the top ten among the Kyushu domains, which is still much stronger than the other 120,000 and 350,000.

In particular, he occupied Nagasaki, next to Hirado Island, and when the Han Dynasty had not officially launched a full-scale attack, he had actually taken the initiative to surrender, which really made Liu Jun feel very good.

It seems that wherever they go, there are no such people, who only care about selfish interests and ignore the general interests of the country and the nation.

But such a Japanese, Liu Jun likes it.

Nabeshima Changmao knows current affairs so well, Liu Jun is already thinking about it, maybe he can make good use of it. (To be continued.) )