Chapter 274: Diverting refugees to the east
"Good?" Fan Damu asked casually, "How good can life be?"
Having lived in the village for decades, he still knew this.
Black noodles with a bunch of vegetables, cook it, add enough salt, and fill your stomach with water, that's good.
Yes, the villagers followed Fan Jin last year and earned a lot of rice. Rice can be exchanged for silver, but that silver was used to build houses! How could there be any left?
This year, there was a flood before they exchanged a few times. After the flood, I'm afraid that Fan Jin's family will not have enough rice, and can only eat potatoes every meal, let alone exchange them with the villagers.
In the face of famine, how can they care about others.
There are only a few families in the village who grow potatoes. Can they not eat them for other villagers? You're dreaming, there's everything in dreams.
"They now have three meals a day, at least two dry meals, and they can eat eggs and meat from time to time. Their lives are much better than before." Fan Erzhu said angrily.
Although he didn't want to admit it, he had to admit that the lives of other families in the village were very different from before.
Fan Damu, who was originally leaning on the door frame, stood up straight, put away the carelessness on his face, and his voice became darker: "The rice grains were not harvested, the fertile fields were washed away, and winter wheat could not be planted. Can we have three meals a day? Can we still eat meat and eggs?"
The chickens, ducks and geese raised in the family can give birth to eggs, but in the past they were gathered together and taken out to exchange for salt!
Not to mention meat, there are only a few chickens, ducks and geese, and they will be gone if they are killed. How can we bear to eat them.
Are the people in the village crazy? Can't live like this?
He looked at the three people in front of him and asked in disbelief: "Did they sell their children? That's why they have food?"
The three people in front of Fan looked ugly and hesitated for a long time.
They were the only family in the village who sold their daughters. Wouldn't it be embarrassing to say it now?
Fortunately, Zhaodi was sold to his own brothers, not outsiders, and adoption was nothing.
Fan Qian said with a guilty conscience, "No, it was just that Baldy Zhang's family sold more than 20 mu of land to his sister-in-law, and exchanged for a lot of corn flour, enough for the family."
Fan Sanzhu hurried to explain, and said it in detail and clearly: "Last month, Mr. Bai hired people to transport potatoes to Nanning, and the price was quite good. Most families earned three or four taels of silver. At that time, the price of black flour had just increased, and it was not as expensive as it is now. People in the village bought hundreds of kilograms and stored them at home.
Now we have income from selling rabbits, so we don't need eggs to exchange for salt, and we eat them during the busy farming season."
When talking about eggs, he couldn't help swallowing his saliva. His playmate said that now the family picks up eight or nine eggs a day, and can cook seven or eight of them!
The mushrooms he picked before can also be exchanged for eggs at his second uncle and aunt's house. Black flour is paired with eggs, and even black flour is smooth and fragrant.
Fan Erzhu Fan Qian felt a little sad. Their family was the minority, earning only one or two taels of silver, but when he thought that Baldy Zhang's family didn't even earn this one or two taels of silver, his depression was swept away again.
"Busy farming season? What is the busy farming season now?" Fan Damu asked bluntly.
Potatoes have been planted in the first half of the year, so are we still planting winter wheat? But the fertile soil of the good fields in the village has been washed away, and the crops cannot take root in the remaining hardened plots. Not only is it a waste of effort, but it will also waste wheat seeds!
"The villagers are preparing to plant another season of potatoes at the end of this month or the beginning of next month. The old village chief and his people found an ownerless hill, and every household in the village carried the soil there to their own fields and planted winter wheat." Fan Qian felt that something was wrong with Fan Damu.
Why did he look so superior, always asking questions, only asking about the aspects he cared about, but he refused to say a word when he needed help.
But now that his family had something to ask of him, it was impossible for him not to answer.
Fan Erzhu and Fan Sanzhu had no objection to the matter of carrying soil, and they believed from the bottom of their hearts that the old village chief was right, otherwise the fields could not be planted and there would be no grain harvest, and no harvest would mean no food!
When they heard their father talking about the old village chief, the two of them straightened their backs with pride and agreed.
Fan Damu took a deep breath, and a hint of uncertainty flashed in his eyes.
All the families in the village survived without selling themselves or their children. Not only did they survive now, but they also had enough food in the future.
In other words, in the entire Shanshui Village, only his family sold?
He knew that his family's food would definitely not last until the next harvest.
On the day the flood receded, he went to the rice fields early to see the miserable mess. He didn't even turn back and went straight to the prefecture. He thought it was a wise move for him to sell his family first to save his family's survival, and wait for the villagers to sell their children one after another or even fail to sell them, and could only wait to die. As a result...
Wouldn't he become a joke of the whole village?
Shaking his head, he looked at the three people, squinted his eyes and asked: "How can only three or four taels of silver be enough? Didn't you tell me the truth?"
Which of oil, salt, etc. doesn't need silver! Other things can be saved, but these two things cannot.
There are more than a dozen people in a family. Three or four taels of silver may seem like a lot, but they are also spent very quickly.
"No! People in our village still raise rabbits. You know that, Uncle Damu. Several rabbits have been sold since last month. They have been sold this month. Those rabbits are very fat and unexpectedly sell well." Fan Erzhu said this with some bitterness.
Those rabbits are really fat, much heavier than wild rabbits. I don't know how they are raised.
Fan Damu thought of the rabbits Fan Jin gave him last time. They were so fat that one rabbit was as heavy as two or three wild rabbits in the past. He asked his wife to give two rabbits to his mistress, and he cooked his own rabbit for the steward. The steward kept praising it for being delicious and asked him to find a way to get another one for him to drink with.
Where can he get it? This is what others are trying to curry favor with him.
Hearing Erzhu's words, he remembered that Fan Jin's family did raise rabbits. At the beginning of this year, the villagers exchanged old hens with his family to raise rabbits. According to the calculation, the rabbits born can be sold.
"It's more than 100 coins a day. Three or four at a time, that's 400 to 500 coins. If you sell it once every ten days, you can make more than 1,000 coins a month. Uncle Damu, do you think they don't need chicken and duck eggs to exchange for coarse salt?"
Fan Damu was suffocating in his heart, and the more he thought about it, the more uncomfortable he felt.
It's not easy to be a slave. His family became slaves, but everyone in the village lived well...
There are so many refugees, why are there no refugees like them... refugees? Magistrate Wu has been worried about the disaster victims recently. If he can divert the refugees to the east, can he not only help his master relieve his worries, but also help him get rid of the flies in his heart...
After Xu Laosan, Fan Xiaoliu and the other two pulled the cart to the front of the county government office and looked around, they immediately gave up the idea of looking for Fan Damu!
The layers of people blocked the entrance of the government office so tightly that even water could not be poured in. With so many people, even if there was relief grain, could it reach them?
Moreover, if they could go through the back door, the county magistrate, the secretary and the yamen runners all had relatives and friends. They were just Fan Damu's fellow villagers, and it was impossible for them to be close to them.