Hearing this, Li Zhijie hurriedly stepped forward and cupped his hands and said, "The student is none other than Xu He, the head of the trial case in Hailing County!"
After saying that, he took a deep look at Xu He.
Xu He understood, stepped forward and saluted, "The schoolboy has met Mr. Futai."
Peng Ruyu nodded noncommittally, then stared at Xu He's floating ticket and looked at it twice: "Guarantee, are you here?"
As soon as he finished speaking, four people from Wu Decao and Chu Yuan came out. Because there were five people on bail, only Wu Decao stood behind Peng Ruyu.
As per the old rules, after some inquiries and drawings, it was time for Xu He to inspect.
Xu He was terrified. Even in later bathing centers and old bathhouses, he would not strip naked in front of so many people.
Fortunately, Peng Ruyu said at this time: "I heard that you once said, "Don't be afraid of being shattered into pieces, you want to leave your innocence in this world." I believe you are not a person who cheated on the scientific examination. Go ahead and search yourself!"
As soon as these words came out, the people around him all looked at Xu He with envy and jealousy.
But when they heard the two lines of the poem read by Peng Ruyu, they all looked shocked. They didn't expect that the young man in front of them could actually produce such a profound and enlightening work. No wonder Master Futai didn't let anyone search him.
In the eyes of scholars in this era, poetry is the voice of the heart. If he can write a poem like "Song of Lime", then Xu He will definitely not cheat.
Although he is a bit idealistic, the cute thing is that if Xu He was born and raised in this era, he would not be able to cheat at all.
Why?
Because I can't afford to lose this person, not everyone will do "compassion to the peasants" and yet do something hugely corrupt.
Therefore, this era is running incredibly in this simplicity and loveliness, according to its own behavioral logic.
Xu He breathed a long sigh of relief, and finally no longer needed to be so ashamed.
When he entered the second door, he found that a huge examination room appeared in front of him. There were large temporary bamboo sheds in the east and west of the entire courtyard. Each shed was about thirty rooms in size.
There is a large hall between the two sheds, where the examiners and officials sit.
There is a pavilion in front of the main hall, and a banquet room next to it. Next to the two examination booths, there are three doors and three soap rooms. This is a resting place for the soldiers, government officials, and officials on inspection.
There are long tables and benches in the open shed, which are as long as the open shed, with one person sitting every two feet apart.
This kind of position is usually placed by the officials in the workshop. Because the officials infringe on the fishing expenses, the quality is very poor. The board is thin and brittle, with cracks in it. If you sit on the stool and apply a little force, it may break.
There were more than a dozen people sitting in the front row. In order to prevent whispering, the more than ten seats were nailed together with bamboo strips. As long as the candidates moved their hands and feet slightly, the entire table and stool would shake, making the exam day not quiet for a moment. .
Moreover, candidates cannot fully put their body weight on this kind of table and stool. After a test, it is like walking on a horse, which is very painful.
This is the examination room for Yangzhou Prefecture, the richest city in the country. The examination conditions in those outlying prefectures are even worse.
Some state capitals can't even afford desks. Candidates come to the exam with desks and chairs on their backs, right?
So before the exam, all the door panels and bed boards were borrowed by these candidates. There were so many candidates that there were not enough door panels and bed boards, so they had to use butcher chopping boards to make up the number.
Someone wrote "Zhuzhi Ci" to describe this scene:
The national examination is too grand,
How many scholars are sitting in the lobby.
The oil board was carried as a test case.
After the exam, my clothes were shiny.
But fortunately, Xu He was still very lucky this time. When he entered the examination booth with his number plate, he found that he was sitting on the edge of the examination booth.
Why is he said to be [lucky] in this position?
If it was windy or rainy, this location would be miserable, but today the sun was rising, the wind was clear, and the light was very good.
The most important thing is that he sits on the far edge of the long bench with two legs to support it, which is safer than sitting in the middle without the support of the stool legs.
Xu He sat on it and moved his buttocks. It was indeed much more stable. He secretly breathed a sigh of relief. Finally, he didn't have to squat and write all the exams in one day.
After a while, finally, the lengthy qualification review was over, and the government examination booth was closed and locked.
The officials all received the examination papers and distributed them to the candidates.
After everyone had received them, an official came out from the lobby carrying a large board. The board was covered with red paper and had large characters written on it. Xu He couldn't see it because it was far away, but it must be examination questions.
Sure enough, after getting Peng Ruyu's approval, the official read out the test questions loudly.
[The Master said that "Shao" is extremely beautiful and good.] After reciting it, the official called someone to walk through the examination room one by one carrying a board, and asked those who could not hear clearly to copy the examination questions.
Xu He wrote the topic on the manuscript paper while thinking about the test questions.
This question comes from "The Analects of Confucius·Bayi [sound: meaning]"
Zhu Zi's commentary explains: "佾, the dance line, there are eight emperors, six princes, four officials, and two scholars."
To put it bluntly, it is a kind of dance. There are eight people dancing in this dance, a total of sixty-four people.
The full text of this chapter in "The Analects of Confucius·Bayi" is: "The Master said that Shao is both extremely beautiful and good. He said that Wu is extremely beautiful, but not very good."
Xu He recalled Zhu Xi's annotation of this passage, but he had forgotten the specific details.
But he still remembered the general meaning.
To put it simply, "Shao" and "Wu" are the music of Shun and King Wu respectively.
Beauty is a combination of sound, light and electricity, which is very beautiful and interesting. And kindness is another kind of beauty.
Shun, Shao and Yao brought rule, and King Wu conquered Zhou and saved the people. It was a meritorious deed, so their music is beautiful.
However, Shun's status came from Yao's abdication, but King Wu came from rebellion. There is a difference between the two, so Shun's performance is perfect, but King Wu is a little regretful, because he got the throne by robbing him.
Xu He thought about Zhu Xi's comments many times in his mind.
But I still can't figure out how to write this article.
He put himself into Confucius and thought about how he would describe this matter to his disciples if he were Confucius.
After thinking for a long time, he still couldn't get what he wanted. He gradually became bored and frowned slightly.
What Xu He didn't know was that when he frowned, Li Zhijie also became nervous.
At this time, Li Zhijie was even more anxious than Xu He.
Although he had not personally taught Xu He how to write articles, he personally appointed Xu He to be the county chief of crime, and he also admitted that he was his student in front of everyone.
I have already reached this point. If Xu He's article is not well done, it will really make Shilin laugh.
Li Zhijie has a problem. When he encounters a tangled problem, as long as there is no one around, he will hold his hands and chew his nails with his teeth.
But with the prefect Peng Ruyu nearby and a crowd of candidates below, it was really indecent to bite his fingernails. He could only suppress his thoughts and use his index finger to pick the barb on his thumb to relieve it. It really made him anxious to death.
Peng Ruyu was actually paying attention to the candidate Xu He at this time.
On the one hand, because of the name of Xu He's poem, even he had heard of it in Gaoyou Prefecture.
There is also the fact that he knew the details of his predecessor's defeat before taking office. This Xu He also appeared in this incident many times.
It can be said that the tax money collected by the inspection office was not lost in the end, which was the credit of this little guy.
In addition, Xu He was a student of Li Zhijie, the judge who formed a temporary team with him. Who was Li Zhijie? One of the famous "Ten Sons of Ding Wei", a great talent who led the generation in poetry and prose, he was very curious about what kind of beautiful articles this great talent's students could produce.
At this moment, Xu He suddenly smiled in the eyes of the two people. He seemed to have gained something and started writing on the paper.
