During the Mid-Autumn Festival in the sixth year of Chongzhen's reign, the family banquet at the Marshal's Mansion was particularly lively.
During the Mid-Autumn Festival in previous years, not to mention the banquet, even dinner was very simple in their family, because either the ancestral brothers were away, or even if they were, they would finish the meal as soon as possible and then leave to be with the army.
Only this year, Liu Chengzong planned to spend the entire Mid-Autumn Festival at home, so Mrs. Cai was very happy and started holding a banquet half a month before the Mid-Autumn Festival.
Since they entered Xining, the two sons have been busy fighting, but every new year and festival is an absolute big event for the whole family.
Whenever there is a family reunion, Liu Chengzong does not have to be away, but Mr. Liu must write invitations, and Mrs. Cai must also be busy making arrangements, and invites a lot of people every time.
Yang Dingrui's wife and children, Cao Yao's wife, Fan Sanlang, Bai Liuxi, Yun Jiaoyue, and his in-laws Wang Kun's family, as well as the family's grooms, guards, and servants, are all members of their own family, let alone during the holidays. , we usually have meals together.
Mr. Liu mainly writes invitations to the families of the generals who are leading the war, such as Luo Rucai's uncle Luo Daien's family, Basang's wife Mei Duo, or those close to him such as Liu Jiusi, Li Wanqing, Shi Chengwo, He Xin, and Li Humble, as well as people like Xie Erhu who have a very obvious intention to integrate, are all included in the invitation.
Of course, people who are not invited can also come. Many people are not invited just because they have clan members, like Liu Guoneng. If there is a large family, Mr. Liu will not cause trouble.
This year's situation is different from previous years.
This was the first time that the Marshal's Office did not fight during the Mid-Autumn Festival, nor was it prepared to go to war after the Mid-Autumn Festival, nor was it worried about being attacked during the Mid-Autumn Festival. There were many generals who were close to them.
It was also the first time that several Mongolian nobles who would need to be relied upon in the future, such as Batur Hutaiji, Qututaiji, and the national advisor Khan who was recovering from his injuries, all lived in the new city, not to mention the eight wives of Chahar.
In Mr. Liu's heart, these eight ladies are a bit similar to a mental illness.
Although the three brothers had all decided to marry their Mongolian aunt, Liu Xiangyu also knew that this was a necessary step to stabilize the situation in Mongolia, but he just felt uncomfortable.
This has little to do with the second marriage, and it has little to do with the bloodline, but the bloodline plus the second marriage has become Liu Xiangyu's heartache.
When he dreams at night, he always dreams about Liu Chengzong's grandfather. There is a temple in the old cemetery that has been moved out of Heilong Mountain for some reason. He is always punished to kneel in the corner of the temple, saying that from now on, his descendants will all be second-rate sons.
However, a disease of the heart is a disease of the heart, and a dream is a dream, but Liu Xiangyu told no one about this worry.
Mrs. Cai said that what else could the eight of them write invitations for? She just called them to her home a few days in advance to prepare them and entertain the guests together.
"No." Liu Xiangyu said, "Even if you want to get married, you haven't come through the door yet. When you come, you will be treated as a guest. How can you ask the guests to follow you and entertain them? What is the way of hospitality?"
"Then Sanniang, Liu Niang, and Yun Niang haven't come to visit either, so why don't you write invitations to them?"
"Isn't that my daughter-in-law..."
After blurting out, Liu Xiangyu blinked and found that his careful thinking had been caught by his wife, so he could only laugh and said: "I thought they were the three of them."
No matter what, the soldiers and civilians in Hehuang are indeed full of joy this year. Although the news from various places has only been reported to Liu Xiangyu, people have made speculations about the harvest.
Such good times deserve a celebration banquet.
Then Liu Xiangyu discovered that he had not considered it carefully when he built the Shuai Mansion Yamen.
It's not that he has low vision, Liu Xiangyu was the county magistrate of Mizhi during the years when he was a pianist. He has seen many things even if he has never enjoyed them, and even if he has never seen them, he has heard of them.
But the son started a rebellion with a hungry army, and he did not follow the route of a bandit who would be finished after a happy incident, so from the beginning, he was very restrained in extravagant ostentation.
Their family is very generous to generals, troops, and students, especially wives like Mrs. Yang and Mrs. Cao whose husbands are away from home. Every season, Xining Mansion has new jewelry, rouge, and clothes of the best fabrics delivered to their homes. .
But taking turns is no longer the same thing for him. Now the whole family does not wear silk. If you don't count the military uniforms and Liu Xiangyu's official robes, the most luxurious clothing in the family is Chengyun's satin robe that he only wore for a few days.
Presiding over the construction of this new city and the Marshal's Mansion was Liu Xiangyu's most extravagant act. Even so, although its architectural decoration was the same as that of the royal palace, the interior was actually a large government office, and it was a military government office.
There are more than 70 rooms, 18 of which are for the guards alone. There are also six rooms that are three rooms wide like the county government office. The layout is exactly the same as the enlarged county government office. Once you enter, there are two halls for processing. For government affairs, the back hall is the courtyard where people live, and the actual living space is not as exaggerated as the palace.
This resulted in the design of the Marshal's Mansion, which only had two side halls that could accommodate twenty people, and did not consider a banquet hall with more than eight tables at all.
But on the night of the Mid-Autumn Festival, it was a bit cold to set up the tables in the yard. Finally, I decided to move all the furnishings in Erjin’s main hall to the warehouse and map room. Then I successfully set up ten tables, and they were still there. Enter the front hall and prepare six tables in case an official from the Ministry comes to visit and there is no place to sit.
Liu Xiangyu called this a pity. He felt that he would only be responsible for building a large house like the Marshal's Mansion only a few times in his life. Maybe now that he has experience, he would not have much chance to build it in the future.
After all, Mr. Liu is very clear about the current strategic goals of the Marshal's Mansion. If he marches eastward and captures Longxi within two years, Xining's geographical location and transportation environment will not be suitable for managing the entire territory.
Lanzhou is a more suitable center location, and there is Prince Su's Mansion in that place; even if we go further and enter Guanzhong in the future, Xi'an will naturally become the new center, and there will also be Prince Su's Mansion there.
Before the world is completely pacified, they may not have the capital to carry out large-scale construction projects like they did during the Marshal's Mansion.
Therefore, the demand for this banquet hall has increased with basically useless experience for Liu Xiangyu.
In the evening of the Mid-Autumn Festival, after the guests had arrived and people were seated, Liu Chengzong appeared in the middle hall in a rare appearance in regular clothes, greeted everyone with fists, and then sat down at the main seat with a smile.
When people saw him sitting down and knew what he was going to say, they all looked forward to it. He smiled and said to everyone: "Brothers, uncles, sisters and sisters-in-law, there are some who left our homes and careers with me three years ago to go west. It’s the third year since we started traveling together in Xining!”
"Three years ago I said that I would lead everyone to find a way out."
Liu Shizi took a deep breath, raised his head and said, "Before the Mid-Autumn Festival, the twenty township guards in the five towns of Hehuang and the 73,000 acres of military farmland west of Xining have all reported their land properties."
"In the Huangshui River Valley east of Xining, there are 650,000 acres of grain fields for 100,000 people, with a grain output of 726,708 shi!"
As soon as Liu Shishi finished speaking, the roof of the yamen of the Marshal's Mansion was almost lifted by the sound. The generals attending the banquet, especially the generals who had followed from northern Shaanxi, were whispering to each other and applauding.
This grain output is not high for the Huangshui River Valley, but Liu Chengzong had a very satisfied smile on his face.
He paused for a moment and continued: "The 73,000 acres of military farmland west of Xining has also produced 47,000 shi of grain. Before the spring of next year, another 70,000 acres of irrigated fields will be opened in the Yaoshui River Valley. We We have established a firm foothold in Xining!"
In the midst of great joy, Liu Chengzong accepted the toasts from his generals and their families, and the entire Marshal's Mansion was immersed in an atmosphere of joy.
Among them, this year's grain output in the Huangshui River Valley made Liu Chengzong most happy because it increased his confidence in the policy of equalizing farmland and dividing land.
Especially in the five towns of the Huangshui River Valley, there were 20 rural guards in the five towns. Because the landowners were afraid of his robbery, they packed up their belongings and fled before the Hehuang War. This area passed through complete equal land, with an average of six to nine acres of land per capita.
In fact, their yield per mu is not very high. The land is divided into pieces. Specifically, each household is divided according to its mouth. In areas with poor land, each household is allocated two to three acres more, and in fertile areas, each household is allocated one or two acres less. In fact, almost every household has this income.
There are only more than 700 exceptions. They are Hehuang soldiers and officers in the seven field camps of the Commander's Mansion. As long as they have parents and wives in their place of origin, the township also counts these soldiers as Dingkou, and they can be allocated four to nine acres more land.
There were more than 4,000 Hehuang soldiers in the seven field camps of the Marshal's Mansion. However, because most of the soldiers surrendered, the land in the township had already been divided, so after adjustments later, more than 700 of them still had their household registrations in Hehuang.
The remaining more than a thousand households with families in the area have all moved from the Huangshui River Valley to Juerwan. There is land newly reclaimed by the Marshal's Mansion that can be allocated. The Marshal's Mansion pays 20 taels of lions per capita to build houses. Placed.
However, corresponding to the local policy of occupying soldiers' heads and allocating land, these soldiers will also lose the extra monthly rations provided by the commander-in-chief's government to encourage family formation.
Even so, settling down in a local area and dividing the land can bring more income than the extra monthly food.
The extra monthly ration itself is different from the military ration. The military ration is fixed, but the extra monthly ration to encourage starting a family is not fixed.
At first, according to the soldier's rank, the minimum was only fifteen kilograms of highland barley noodles per month. However, in addition to the soldier's rank, there would also be changes due to the garrison position. For example, if the Nanshan Fort garrison worked hard and the bird did not poop, it would be more. Basically, it would be one pound. One hundred catties of highland barley flour.
In other places, it is easy to obtain other foods, so they will substitute them with other things. Those near the mountains give tea, those in Haibei and Haixi give salt, and other places give tobacco and ghee.
This was the treatment that only veterans in northern Shaanxi received. Later, they were divided into field and pastoral areas, and military pay began. Extra monthly rations could be converted into lion coupons, silver taels, and highland barley according to the soldiers' wishes.
But in general, it is not as much as the land allocation when you start a family.
This means that for the 100,000 people in the Huangshui River Valley, the per capita raw grain is nearly 1,200 kilograms, and after processing, it is more than 800 kilograms of finished grain... This is a very high grain share.
For Liu Chengzong, the per capita possession of more than 800 kilograms of grain was even more significant in terms of achievement than any victory over the enemy head-on on the battlefield.
Because if land and grain possessions are not per capita, then in fact in an agricultural society, per capita figures are meaningless.
For example, if the per capita share of more than 1,000 kilograms of raw grain is the same, and the owner-peasants after land equalization are replaced by one landlord family and twenty tenant farmer families, the result will be the same, but people's living standards will be completely different.
Not counting taxes and apportionments, but simply calculating, the tenant rent is half, the landowner's family of four people accounts for more than 40,000 catties, and the tenant farmer family of eighty people accounts for more than 40,000 catties, which is equal to about 500 catties of raw grain per person in the tenant farmer family.
After all, the finished grain amount is less than 300 kilograms.
Of course, over three hundred kilograms... there will definitely be no problem staying alive.
After all, families generally have children and elderly people, and their appetites are not that big. The family will be slightly strapped for transactions and daily necessities, but it is not very bad. At most, it does not have the ability to bear unexpected risks.
But it was a good harvest.
This is also the reason why tenants must have cattle. The more land they farm, the more they work. With an average of seven or eight acres per person and twenty or thirty acres per household, it is difficult for a tenant to ensure a long-term livelihood. He must farm at least forty or fifty acres. , can we say that we have a long-term life.
In a place like the Huangshui River Valley, if one has a hundred acres of land and the family does not have many children, then during the harvest, the tenants can eat meat and drink as much as they want, and their families will have new clothes to wear during the New Year. There are also meat dumplings to eat...you can even raise a good family son.
A man of good family who can study literature and gain fame, and practice martial arts and go into battle.
For example, Wang Jinzhong's old father was originally allocated seven acres of land. But because he had a son who served as a soldier for the generalissimo, the family now has fourteen acres of land. When farming is busy, there will be help from the village.
Of course, help is not free. Not every household in the countryside has a cow. Generally speaking, looking at the population of each household, there are ten or five households with one official cow. Priority is given to military dependents and odd households who lack manpower. They share the rations for raising cows and farming. When cattle are used, the cost is the birth, old age, sickness and death of the individual households or military dependents, and other households have to help.
If an official cow is sick, it must be reported to the township, which has a veterinarian; if it dies, the township security must report it to the five towns through the express delivery shop on the same day, and the five towns will take away the cow carcass to measure the cause of death. Normal deaths have nothing to do with the locality, and other deaths depend on the situation. The compensation will be one to five taels.
For Mr. Wang, who owns fourteen acres of land, his life at home is equivalent to the life of a family of two who share a hundred acres of land.
What kind of day is this? With two thousand kilograms of raw grain alone, he would never be able to eat it all. He didn't need to prepare winter clothes. Even if he didn't consider finding a matchmaker for his son, he could eat one kilogram of mutton every day this year.
But in Hehuang, a narrow and densely populated area, if one family can rent a hundred acres of land, it means that there are ten families who don't have an acre of land; if a thousand families can rent a land of 100 acres, there are 10,000 families who don't have an acre of land.
The Huangshui River Valley is not a mountainous area, with only 23,000 households.
Equalizing land can allow everyone to have a good life in normal years, and also have the ability to withstand risks in occasional disaster years.
When the banquet ended with laughter and the guests were sent away, Chengyun found Liu Chengzong and Liu Xiangyu sitting in the hall. Both father and son looked solemn and worried. He couldn't help asking: "Second uncle, brother, what's wrong?"
"Juntian."
Liu Chengzong raised his eyebrows: "Can Tian Jun be implemented in other places?"
"It's difficult." Chengyun didn't drink much, and shook his head with a smile: "Not to mention the distance, Hehuang is not only in the valley, but also in the mountainous areas to the north and south of the valley, 400,000 native people and 3 million mountainous fields, even...all over Longxi, the manpower is even greater insufficient."
Chengyun pointed upwards as he spoke: "Our twenty township security officials can all set up towns, but this can only be enough for three or four counties at most. In the final analysis, there are not enough people to take root in each township, and the land cannot be used for equalization." With local petty officials, we don’t even know how many acres of land a county has.”
"How many people will be needed in the entire Longxi area?"
Chengyun was stunned by the question, swallowed his saliva, and glanced at Liu Xiangyu, but saw his second uncle, the old god, sitting next to him without saying a word. He had to say: "Based on forty counties, there are two hundred and eighty township protectors, two Thousands and eight hundred townships..."
He couldn't go on. For such a huge project, the work team would require nearly 20,000 people, and the veterinarians alone would need to prepare 3,000 people.
Unexpectedly, Liu Chengzong was not discouraged: "Lanzhou, starting from Lintao, use the land of Lanzhou per capita in Hehuang, recruit local officials from Lintao to learn from it, and share the land of Gansu, and in ten or eight years, give it all the land of Longxi." .”
Liu Chengzong stood up, shook his head, and opened his hands: "I want them to walk on the muddy dirt road with their shoes, I want them to cross the river through the rickety bridge in the mountain wind, and I want them to have an endless well of bitterness to drink from. Water, houses that are always leaking, and barren land where everyone works all day without rest.”
"I want people in the poorest places to live... like human beings!"
－－－－－－Digression－－－－－
Good evening!
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