Chapter 53： Cotton

Chapter 53 Cotton

The seeds I bought from the dealer before have sprouted and grown up.

A piece of leek grows out, and a dozen or so Chinese cabbages that can be cored.

Corn-wrapped Chinese cabbage is a northern vegetable that is durable in storage and is also a rare vegetable in small mountain villages. No one has ever grown it here.

A few months ago, when they first sprouted, these vegetables were transplanted by Yingbao and planted in the small vegetable patch in her yard.

The leeks are cut twice when they grow up, and are used to scramble eggs. They taste very delicious.

Now the Chinese cabbage grows more than two feet high. Originally, each cabbage was spread out in a large area. Later, Chun Niang wrapped them one by one with straw ropes so that they could better wrap their cores.

It’s snowing these days, so Chun Niang has cut down all the cabbage and piled it in the house.

The other two packets of Fanbang seeds have also grown.

There were actually more than a dozen cotton trees and a few unknown small vines.

 Yingbao first saw cotton in her previous life, in the garden of the Dudu Mansion, where it was regarded as an ornamental flower.

The flowers of the cotton tree are very beautiful and the color is bright pink. Because it is a Fanbang variety, a large area is planted in Fuzhong Garden.

It’s a pity that these flowers and trees only have a growth period of one year. After the flowers and fruits fade, their branches and leaves will wither.

At that time, Yingbao was relatively free in the house. Because she was interested in cotton wadding from cotton trees, she often went to pick it.

Finally, I picked a small basket, pulled out the cotton seeds inside, and used the basket of cotton wadding to make myself a cotton-padded jacket.

Later I learned that this kind of cotton tree was also planted in many aristocratic farms, and the cotton wadding collected was very valuable and could be used for spinning and weaving.

Now her dozen cotton trees have blossomed and bear fruit, and the fruits have burst open, revealing large, snow-white cotton buds.

Yingbao picked all the cotton wadding and piled it into a basket. A small basket was full.

She dug out the withered cotton stalks by their roots and piled them aside for burning the kang.

The cotton seeds were peeled out and planted again. They were all planted in the black soil. It is estimated that they will sprout soon.

By next spring, her family should have a large amount of cotton seeds.

Cotton cultivation in the Great Qian Dynasty has not yet become widespread. Even more than ten years later, it is still concentrated in the estates of a few noble families.

At this moment, it is estimated that not even the nobles are cultivating it. So she must seize the opportunity to grow cotton first.

You should know that most of the cloths on the market today are linen and grass cloth, a small part are silk and silk cloth that can only be used by aristocratic families, and there are also thick velvet blankets woven from miscellaneous plush fibers such as wool and rabbit fur.

Even though the Jiang family now has a lot of money, the fur quilts and mattresses are only stuffed with some reeds or loosely beaten straw and flax, which can barely keep out the cold.

As for cotton-padded clothes, wealthy people would fill them with animal hair and duck feathers, or use animal fur directly to make a cloak.

Most poor people only fill their homes with thorny reeds, linen, straw, etc.

Now that she is lucky enough to have cotton seeds from Fanbang, she would be really sorry for God's favor if she doesn't plant them.

“Dang! Dang! Dang! Dang!”

“Every household, listen! The imperial decree states that each household must pay two liters of rice for the upper-class fields! One liter for the lower-class fields must be paid in full within seven days. Violators will be punished as criminals!”

The countryman wearing a bamboo hat beat the gong and shouted over and over again. He walked in front of all the villagers' houses before moving on to the next village.

After the villagers left, the villagers walked out of their homes one after another, complaining.

“As expected, we have to requisition food again. Are you going to let people live?”

“Oh my God, our family only has two to three hundred kilograms of grain left. If we hand over all this, our family will not survive.”

“I’m going to ask Muramasa how we can live like this.”

Several villagers even covered their faces and cried bitterly.

"Let's go and ask Chen Sanyou. It's only been a few days, and food has been collected again." So, dozens of villagers came to Chen Sanyou's house and complained.

"His third uncle, where is the food in our family? Last time we paid taxes, we sold most of the food. Now we only have a little more than two dan left. Our family of seven or eight people live on this little food for the winter." , can you go and talk to Li Zheng, can we make up for it next year? "

“Yes, Sanyou, just go and talk about it.”

“We really can’t get through life.”

Chen Sanyou was so upset by the noise that he said impatiently: "Okay, okay, listen to me. This is a decree issued by the imperial court. What can I, a small village, say?"

“But you are also working for the imperial court, Sanshu Chen, you can’t ignore us.”

“Yes, Sanyou, go and ask Li Zheng. If we hand over all the food, the whole family will starve to death...”

“Muramasa, you can’t ignore our life and death.”

“Woo woo woo…his third uncle, please help us talk…”

“Uncle Chen, you are the only one who can talk to Li Zheng. Can’t you go and discuss it with him?”

Chen Sanyou was upset with everyone talking. He said solemnly: "Since you are not satisfied with me as Muramasa, my term will expire next year, so you can choose whoever you like."

He had had enough of this torture. After coming here several times every year, Chen Sanyou was exhausted both mentally and physically.

He was scolded by Li Zheng for failing to collect taxes and grain, and scolded by the villagers for pushing too hard. Hey, half of his body was buried in the ground, so why should he suffer this crime?

The Jiang brothers also heard the villagers urging them to pay for food. They calculated the amount they should pay, reluctantly measured out the full amount of food, and sent it to the town on a cart.

Jiang Sanlang has a total of sixty acres of fields, twenty acres of upper-class fields, and forty acres of lower-class fields, including mulberry fields in the north and dry land in the south mountains.

But regardless of whether these fields are used for growing grain or not, as long as you have this much land in your property register, you must pay taxes per acre.

In this supplementary levy, Jiang Sanlang had to hand over a total of 80 liters of grain, which is 200 kilograms.

Two big sacks of rice went out of the storage at home. He was heartbroken to the point of bleeding, but he had to hand it over.

In the past few days, the villagers who collected food had been beating gongs and shouting every day. After shouting for five or six days, there were still many villagers in the village who could not pay the food.

Early in the morning the next day, Sun Lizheng and a dozen or so villagers began to collect money from house to house.

In the cold winter, the villagers who had their food taken away wailed and cried bitterly on the snow.

Some people were beating their chests and feeling distraught, and the children beside them were also crying loudly. It was so miserable.

Yingbao held Youyou in hand and watched this scene, feeling heavy in her heart.

The remaining rations of these villagers were taken away, and they didn't know how they would live in the future, or how their family would survive the entire cold winter.

One of the families is the most miserable. There are several children in the family, the oldest is only twelve or thirteen years old, and the youngest is only three or four years old.

In his last life, this man was forced to go out to cut firewood and sell it in a snowy day. As a result, when he was carrying firewood down the mountain, he accidentally fell down the **** and was stabbed in the thigh by the firewood. He was found to have frozen to death on the mountain a few days later.

Later, the woman from this family also hanged herself, leaving four helpless children wandering in the village. The family begged for a spoonful from the family, and only the two older children survived.

Seeing the tragedy happen again, Ying Bao felt her heart congested and panicked.

Wilted returned home and locked Youyou in the deer shed. Yingbao went back to the house to sit on the kang and went into the cave to plant grain again.

Originally she didn’t want to plant it because she was too tired, but today’s scene made her heart palpitate and she realized the importance of rice.

There is no shortage of food at any time.

From now on, she must keep a large amount of rice and noodles in the cave so that she can feel at ease.

…

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(End of this chapter)