Zhang Yue and Huang Lu studied in Wu's house behind closed doors for several days in order to attend the palace examination.
The housekeeper sent by Wu Mansion and the servants all know that Zhang Yue is now the second in the provincial examination, that is, he is the future uncle of the house. It is rare that he lives here now, so he should not be held in high esteem.
In order to serve his uncle-in-law and his good friends, Butler Wu and others tried every means.
Anyway, Zhang Yue and Huang Lu's various needs were met, except that they couldn't entertain themselves with wine and sex.
For example, Zhang Yue is from the south and is not used to northern food, so Butler Wu asked the elders in the house for advice on how to make some dishes from Fujian and Zhejiang in different ways.
Every day when Zhang Yue was together, servants would boil hot soup for him to wash, and servants would dress him and tie his hair in a bun. After Zhang Yue dressed up, he drank tea and rinsed his mouth, then read with a book for half an hour before having breakfast.
Zhang Yue and Huang Lu came to the dining table and sat down, and placed the fried broad-leaf catechu, jujube cake, walnut meat, steamed rolls, bad ginger, etc. on the table.
After breakfast, Zhang Yue wandered around the house, exchanging reading experiences and chatting with Huang Lu, and then went back to his room to do his homework, including a poem, a poem, a policy or an essay every day. Untouchable.
After finishing writing, Zhang Yue and Huang Lu commented on their respective articles, and then had lunch.
People in the city of Bianjing have the habit of having lunch, but in Taixue they only have two meals a day.
However, lunch is just some staple food, which is a transition between breakfast and dinner, so it is not very rich. After Zhang Yue slightly ate some, he went to take a nap in the house, while Huang Lu went back to his room to rest.
Zhang Yue slept for an hour or two before getting up, then went out for a walk with Huang Lu, and then returned to his room to take a shower.
The most anticipated thing of the day was dinner. There were tender chicken, fat goose, fat bream and fresh fish. The best was the yellow mutton from Liao Dynasty. Zhang Yue liked to dip it in garlic paste and devour it.
After eating, Zhang Yue usually rests at the second watch before reading.
In February, the spring rain has just stopped, and everyone in the capital goes out of the city to continue their spring outing.
The spring scenery is ten miles outside Bianjing City.
Many scholars gathered friends and company and traveled with carriages and horses.
After reading for a few days, it was a nice day and the two of them went to the Erxianggong Temple in the west and inner city of the city together.
The Erxiang Gong Temple in the capital is a must-visit place for everyone who comes to Bianjing to raise a child. Praying for dreams and divination here are extremely effective and are even more famous than the Daxiangguo Temple.
As for who is the father of these two husbands?
There are different opinions, but generally speaking, they are regarded as Ziyou and Zixia, two students of Confucius.
Ziyou was the Prime Minister of Wucheng, and Zixia hired people from other countries. I don't know when they became known as husbands. The Erxianggong Temple has a high status in the minds of scholars who come to Beijing to take the exam. This temple has many miraculous phenomena, which have been recorded for generations. When students ask questions about gains and losses, the temple responds like a bell.
Therefore, before the Provincial Examination and the Palace Examination, the Erxianggong Temple was particularly popular.
Zhang Yue and Huang Lu went there early in the morning. When they passed by the famous Wanjia Steamed Bun Shop in the capital, they bought two steamed buns and ate them while walking.
The two of them arrived at the Erxianggong Temple at the foot of the inner city and saw that there were quite a few scholars who came to pray.
People in the Song Dynasty generally believed that the imperial examination matter depended on fate. Sometimes your article can be world-famous, but if you are not lucky, you will not succeed. But sometimes you fail after repeated attempts. In despair, you have a strange dream, and then try hard, and you succeed.
Many scholars in the Song Dynasty circulated such stories about the imperial examination.
For example, a young man named Yang went to Erxianggong Temple to pray for dreams. I looked at the Jinshi list in my dream. My name was not on it, but there was a person with the same name named Yang Zheng.
So the man immediately changed his name to Yang Zheng, and he really passed the exam.
There are also dreams about exam questions.
A student dreamed of Wu Zixu, his father-in-law, who asked him to read a poem "Guangwu Tongfu Gaozu" for several days in a row. The candidate did so, and the final question happened to be the first two sentences of this poem, and finally this People can go to high school.
Now they arrived at the Erxianggong Temple, worshiped Ziyou and Zixia, and then placed the money in the hands of the boys on their left and right. The monk in the temple asked the two to stay in the temple for one night and pray for dreams.
Zhang Yue and Huang Lu both smiled, and the monk added: "But the theory of praying for dreams is still empty. The most important thing for you in daily life is to do good deeds and accumulate virtue. If you do good deeds in this world, even if you fail in the current exam, you can leave it to your descendants." If you do something unjust, even the fame you have gained will be lost."
Zhang Yue and Huang Lu both listened to the monk's advice with great respect and piety.
Huang Lu asked Zhang Yue if he believed it, and Zhang Yue said: "Why don't you believe it? One fate, two luck, three feng shui, four accumulation of yin virtue and five reading. Look at people's destiny and feng shui. Where are you from, whether you are born smart or not, and where you are born. These are the The most important thing is that we can’t decide.”
"Therefore, the only way to do things is to accumulate yin virtue and study. This accumulation of yin virtue is above and beyond studying. Being a man who can be filial to his parents, take care of his wife and children, and sometimes even give a kind word to others and not do unjust things in his life, these are better than How many books you have read is more important than how big an official you are."
Huang Lu nodded, and then the two of them strolled around the temple.
There happened to be more than a dozen plum trees in the temple courtyard. Nowadays, the plum trees have almost withered after winter and spring, and only some plum blossoms are left hanging on the trees.
Under the plum tree, there was a fortune-teller who was reading calligraphy. When he saw the two scholars, he smiled slightly and waved to them in front of the stall.
Zhang Yue and Huang Lu looked at each other's immortal expressions and couldn't help but step forward.
The fortune teller smiled at the two of them and said, "I have a fate with you, and you two are here to inquire about the future."
Zhang Yue and Huang Lu all nodded, and the fortune teller said: "Thousands of miles of study is just to become an official. If you have an official, you will have a wife. If you have a wife, you will have money. If you have money, you will have land. Books contain gold and silver."
Zhang Yue and Huang Lu shook their heads and said, "This is too vulgar, too vulgar."
The fortune teller smiled and said: "Vulgarity and excellence depend on whether you get it or not. Getting it is vulgar, and not getting it is extraordinary. In fact, fame and wealth are like a dish. It tastes the same when you want to eat it, but it tastes the same when you eat it. One taste, but if you eat it every day, it will be another taste."
Zhang Yue and Huang Lu all laughed and said, "It's interesting."
The fortune teller saw the two of them and listened to his words and continued: "How about you two doing fortune-telling?"
Zhang Yue and Huang Lu nodded. Huang Lu took the money and immediately took out a note.
But I saw the word 'not allowed' written on the note. However, this word is a little different, with the upper and lower parts slightly separated.
The fortune teller smiled and said: "It seems that this person has failed in his studies."
Huang Lu smiled casually and said: "It doesn't matter, I'm here anyway, just take the test casually."
The fortune teller said: "Officials are open-minded. It's the same principle. You don't have to despair. There is a way to resolve everything. I have a way here..."
Huang Lu smiled and said, "I don't know how to solve this problem and allow me to pass the imperial examination?"
The physiognomist was stunned for a moment, then his expression changed, and he said forcefully: "It's hard to say. There was also a scholar before who thought he would pass the palace examination, but he got an eye disease... and couldn't write a word."
Huang Lu nodded, then put the note into his sleeve and said, "That's fine, I'll just use this note to take the palace exam. If I pass the exam, I'll come back and smash your stall!"
Zhang Yue quickly advised: "Anzhong, please be merciful when the time comes. Just destroy the stall. Don't break the person."
The fortune teller was shocked when he heard this and said: "The official stays!"
Huang Lu turned around and said, "What to do?"
The fortune teller said: "Please give me this note to read again."
Huang Lu sneered and handed the note over.
The fortune teller looked at it and said with a smile: "Guanren, I am not wrong. You see, the word 'must' is not continuous up and down. Isn't this just 'one de'? Congratulations, official, congratulations to the official." "
Zhang Yue and Huang Lu looked at each other and laughed in unison.
The fortune teller also wiped his sweat after seeing this and laughed twice.
"It's good for one person. If you can make someone laugh, that's all." Zhang Yue took out a handful of money and put it on the stall.
The fortune teller was overjoyed to get the money, and then said to Zhang Yue and Huang Lu: "I hit it off with you two. In fact, as soon as I saw you two, I saw that they are both dragons and phoenixes. They will definitely be on the yellow list after the palace examination."
Zhang Yue and Huang Lu both said nothing and continued to visit the temple.
The two wandered to the back hall of the temple, where they saw a long white wall covered with poems.
It seems to be the graffiti left by those who came to Beijing after their arrival.
In later generations, it was of course considered an uncivilized behavior to "come here for a visit", but in the Song Dynasty, it was a trend among scholars.
There is also a special name called "Lieti", which means writing names and poems on the pillars.
Many places even cater to readers who like to list topics on the walls by providing pen, ink and paper.
In many restaurants, hotels, temples and other places in Bianjing, a board dedicated to inscribing poems called a "poem plaque" will be hung.
The "Poetry Card" is pre-painted with a layer of white powder. After it is filled with poems, it can be washed off, painted with another layer of white powder, and reused. During the Lantern Festival on New Year's Eve, Zhang Yue saw many such poetry plaques at Daxiangguo Temple.
The treatment of scholars writing poems like this was different when they were revealed and before they were revealed.
There was a prime minister in the Tang Dynasty. He was a poor young man who lived in a temple and was looked down upon. Others did not call him when they were eating. Later, this man became a high official and returned to the temple where he lived. Not only was he received a grand reception, but even the poems he wrote on the wall were covered with blue gauze.
This person felt inspired after reading it and wrote a poem. The poem contains the following words: "After thirty years of dust, now I have a green sarong." '
Zhang Yue looked at the words on the wall.
Zhang Yue couldn't help but laugh and said: "I wonder who can get a blue sarong?"
Huang Lu smiled and said, "I don't know, but you and I might as well give it a try."
Zhang Yue shook his head and said: "I'm not good at poetry, so I won't mention it anymore. I'd rather read the good works of my predecessors."
So the two of them walked while reading the poems left by their predecessors on the wall.
Zhang Yue and Huang Lu originally came here to see a few 'blue sarongs' to see if any famous celebrities they knew had left poems here, which would also be an eye-opener for them.
However, what Zhang Yue and Huang Lu didn't expect was that 99% of the people who wrote the inscriptions here were unknown to them, and they had never even heard of them.
Zhang Yue and Huang Lu became more and more uneasy when they saw what was happening behind them, and their backs were covered in cold sweat.
Looking at their poems, there are smug, uneasy, dismissive, and various life styles.
Now their poems and articles remain here, but where have the people gone?
There are hundreds of thousands of people on this wall, are there only a few who can leave their names in the history of history?
PS: After the author coded, for some reason I got a severe headache when I looked at the chapter I just coded, so I apologize to everyone if there are any mistakes. If book friends see it, you can post it in a chapter review or book review. I will change it when I see it.
