The patriarch and the two elders of the housing family together formed the village elders group of Lujia Village. The handling of all major matters in the village needs to be approved by the three people, and at the same time, it also deals with civil disputes. If the village finds out that a daughter-in-law has cuckolded a man, the patriarch and the other two elders will organize the villagers and put them in a pig cage and sink them to the bottom of the pond.

"Ahem!" Patriarch Lu Sansheng knocked the dry tobacco bag on the ground, stood up and said to the crowd, "Fellow villagers, I gathered everyone today to discuss a major matter with you. ”

"This matter is related to the future of Lujia Village."

"Early this morning, someone came from the Yamen, and it was Master Zhang, the celebrity of the county lord. Master Zhang said that the county lord's arrangement was to let a person with a foreign surname surnamed Huang come to our village as the village head. What do you think about this? ”

"Uncle Nine, what kind of official position is the village chief?" One villager said, "I've only heard of the county chief and the chief of security, and I've never heard of any village chief." ”

"Master Zhang said that the village chief is the head of a village, and he has more power than the chief of A, and everyone in the village must listen to the village chief. The village chief is probably the newly arranged official position of the yamen, and we, the ordinary people, have no right to intervene in the affairs of the government. They said that if there is an official position of village chief, then there will be one, and I just want to ask everyone if they agree. The patriarch said.

"Of course I don't agree." As soon as the words fell, a villager in his mid-forties and as strong as an ox stood up and said, "Our surname is Lu, why should we listen to a person with a foreign surname?" ”

"That's a good point." The villager next to him followed, "From ancient times to the present, the village has not listened to the rules of people with foreign surnames, and even the chief of the first chief cannot interfere in the internal affairs of Lujia Village, why did the county magistrate send an outsider to take care of us?" ”

"The county magistrate sent such a village chief for no reason, could it be that there is some conspiracy to target our Lujia Village, our Lujia Village has always been law-abiding and has never opposed the government?" A thin villager said.

……

Opposition has abounded, and none of them agree.

"Stop, stop, I'm not done yet." The patriarch said, "The county lord seems to know that our clansmen will oppose it, so Master Zhang said that if we agree, the government will exempt the village from all taxes for five years, including poll tax, field tax, logging tax, and pheasant tax...... and conscription for military service. Emperor Zhu had just ascended the throne, and the tax burden in the county was terrifying. ”

Many people will think that in the early days of the dynasty, because of the policy of rest and recuperation, the people would live well. However, the fact is just the opposite, the establishment of the imperial court, the people's lives will not only not be improved, but will be more miserable.

The devastated land needed to be built, the newly established imperial institutions required huge expenditures, and the remnants of the warlords of the previous dynasty also needed military salaries...... All of this requires a lot of money to support.

However, it is impossible for the money to fall from the sky, and it can only be found to bleed from the common people.

For the sake of their own political achievements and in order to restore production as soon as possible, some local officials can only continue to exploit the people. The imperial court had just been established, and it was impossible to come up with money to build it for them. Even if some local imperial courts will allocate funds for construction, it is only an exception. One place has an exclusive appropriation, and the remaining 99 places are all found by the officials themselves.

This is the prosperity of the people and the suffering of the people, and the real good life of the people can only be in the middle of the dynasty, or when everything is built, there will be a prosperous era.

As long as the local officials spend their money on construction and do not enrich their own pockets, the imperial court will acquiesce or even encourage them. That's why there is such a sentence, since there was an Emperor Zhu, there have been nine years of famine in ten years.

"That is to say, in the next five years, the grain grown in the field will be eaten by ourselves, and not a single grain will have to be handed over to the yamen." The patriarch said in an accentuated tone.

Five years of tax exemption?

The crowd calmed down and began to whisper. Five years of tax exemption is a big temptation for them.

"Our Lujia Village is already very poor, and the little grain we get in the field has to be handed over to the government, so we can't eat enough. I remember the drought the year before last, and Tiezhu's daughter-in-law and two children all starved to death. The patriarch said, "This is a big matter, so I told the people in the yamen that we will wait until we discuss it tonight before making a decision." ”

"As for whether we agree or disagree in the end, although we elders can make a decision, we still have to listen to everyone's opinions."

"I was exempted from taxes for five years, but in exchange for five years of being enslaved by a person with a foreign surname, I will never do this!" A sturdy villager's road.

"That's right, we'd rather starve to death than lose our temper!" The thin villager said, "Our surname Lu must have the integrity of the surname Lu, think about what kind of integrity our ancestor Huai Rengong was back then?" When he was dying, he was unwilling to accept the invitation of the Song Dynasty court, and finally starved to death on the back mountain. We are all descendants of Huai Rengong, and we can't bend our waists because of five buckets of rice. ”

Most of the villagers still oppose this matter, and the glorious deeds and integrity of their ancestors are the last dignity in their bones. Even if the court promised to exempt them from paying taxes for five years, they would not do it.

Death of starvation is not a holiday.

Although the current patriarch does not manage the village well, and the village starves to death, but after all, it is their own people and everyone obeys. And even if people with foreign surnames manage well, they will not obey.

"Don't talk about it two of you, we are all descendants of the second room, the words of the younger generation are not important, let's listen to the opinions of the second uncle. The meaning of the second master is what we mean. A dark-skinned villager.

"Ahem!" Hearing this, the elders in the second room stood up, "I disagree with this matter in principle, after all, starvation is a small thing, and a loss of discipline is a big thing." Who knows which pit the village chief surnamed Huang will take our Lujia Village? ”

"What the second master said is right, outsiders can't be trusted!" Dry and thin villagers.

"Since the people in the second room don't agree, what about the people in the third room?" The patriarch directly turned his gaze to the villager in the third room. The elders of the third room are relatively young, only about fifty years old, and said lightly: "I agree with the second room." ”

The patriarch looked at the crowd and said, "It seems that everyone has the same opinion. That is, people with foreign surnames are not allowed to come in. ”

After a pause, "But there is another thing that Master Zhang said, but it really makes the old man want to agree." "The patriarch said," Master Zhang said, if we agree with the person surnamed Huang to be the village head, then the government will send a private school teacher to our village to teach the children to read. And he also said that the teacher would not leave. ”

"In addition, in the future children's test, the county will also take care of the scholars in Lujia Village."