Cutting over the end of the Ming Dynasty: a dog-leg knife at the beginning

Chapter 8 I Didn't Do It On Purpose
Yang Menglong woke up early in the morning, awakened by the sound of chopping firewood.He rubbed his sleepy eyes, patted his face a few times, stretched himself, put on his clothes and went to the kitchen, wanting to see who was so nasty, chopping wood there early in the morning, so he couldn't even sleep.

In the end, Xiao Yufang saw Xiao Yufang struggling to split the firewood with a blunt hatchet, beads of sweat appeared on her forehead.Yang Menglong immediately put on a sunny smiling face: "Beautiful...uh, good morning Miss!" He was startled that the word "beauty" was wrong just after he uttered it, so he quickly changed his words.You know, this is ancient times and the Ming Dynasty. The concept of the ancients is different from that of modern people. If you call a beauty in public, the eyes of the people around you will definitely make you into a sieve. The first reaction was not happiness, but shame and annoyance, thinking you were molesting her.It doesn't matter what you call them in those places of fireworks, but you can't call a woman from a good family a beautiful woman. Of course, if two people are lovers, it doesn't matter. After all, I made a mistake yesterday, if I still shouted like that at her house today, maybe a hatchet would be thrown at his forehead.

Xiao Yufang was taken aback. Seeing that it was Yang Menglong, she breathed a sigh of relief, panting slightly, and said, "Master, did you wake up so early? Why don't you sleep a little longer? I'll call you when the meal is ready."

Yang Menglong said: "How can you do this kind of rough work? Let me do it!" Without any explanation, he grabbed the hatchet and started chopping wood.

It is always good to have someone to help, Xiao Yufang hesitated for a moment, and said: "Then I will have Mr. Lao." Gently wiped the sweat from her forehead with a handkerchief, opened the lid of the cylinder, and took out a large bowl of sorghum noodles from inside. , it seems that they plan to make pancakes with noodles, but the firewood hasn't been chopped yet, so naturally they can't heat hot water, so they can't knead noodles.Yang Menglong hacked twice, but failed to split the firewood. Hey, it must be a problem with the knife.He pried out the hatchet and scraped the blade with his fingers, and for goodness sake it was blunt!He said "Wait" and ran back to his room to get a dog-leg knife. With one stroke, the firewood with the thick mouth of the bowl and an arm's length snapped into two pieces, and then stood up again and cut it into four pieces.Xiao Yufang was so surprised that she opened her small mouth slightly, but couldn't close it. It was the first time she saw such a sharp knife.

After a few knives, a pile of firewood was chopped out, which was much more efficient than Xiao Yufang.However, the next process of making a fire made Yang Menglong depressed. His lighter has been used up in the past few days. There were sparks flying everywhere, but there was no way to start the fire.Xiao Yufang pursed her lips and chuckled lightly, and after a few strikes with the scythe and flint, the bundle of straw ignited flames.Yang Menglong blushed, the good young man of the 21st century was despised by an ancient woman who didn't even know what MP3 was, what a shame!But he can't be blamed for this. After getting used to lighters, who would bother to learn how to use fire scythes and flints, which are extremely inefficient and troublesome antique fire tools?

If you don't learn, you won't know it, so you are despised.

Get up wherever you fall. Yang Menglong rushed to light the fire, vowing to get back his face.Well, Xiao Yufang couldn't wish for it. After all, lighting a fire is not an easy task. It's a trivial matter to get tears from the smoke, but it's troublesome to get burned. Someone can do it for you, that's the best.However, she obviously overestimated Yang Menglong's IQ in life. He didn't know how to light a fire at all. In less than 3 minutes, the kitchen was filled with thick smoke, and the flames squirmed feebly there, refusing to jump up, killing Yang Menglong and Xiao Yufang was so smoked that tears flowed down her face.Xiao Yufang couldn't care less about being polite, and called out, "You...cough cough...will you start a fire!?"

Yang Menglong kept blowing air into the stove with the torch, coughing while blowing, tears and snot coming down his nose, he was in a state of embarrassment: "A little while...a little while...cough cough...that's it..."

Let him go on like this, and the mice will be smoked out.Xiao Yufang pushed him aside, took out some firewood from the tightly packed stove, fiddled with it a few times, and blew a few more breaths, the flames rose up, and the thick smoke began to dissipate.At this time, the culprit had been smoked into a big tabby cat, sniffing his nose, and said with lingering fear: "This fire is so hard to burn!"

Xiao Yufang rolled his eyes at him, is it difficult to burn the fire or you don't know how to burn it at all?She can see that this guy is basically a master who stretches out his clothes to eat and opens his mouth. The eunuch from the Five Dynasties and Ten Kingdoms period has already helped put the rice and water into the pot, and the firewood into the stove. It can be cooked on a low fire, but in the end there is no fire, staring at the pot and stove by the lamp, and the emperor who starved to death in the end is the same number. It is a bit difficult to expect him to cook.But she was a guest after all, and she was kind enough to help, so she couldn't say anything, so she said: "Don't add too much firewood to it at one time, leave a little space, so that the fire can burn well...I'm going to make dough, you Help watch, don't let the firewood sticks and charcoal fall out of the stove door and set the firewood on fire."

Yang Menglong nodded vigorously.Isn't it just to look at the fire and add more firewood when the firewood is about to burn out? It's easy!If he doesn't do this job well, he'll buy a piece of tofu and kill him!He stayed in front of the stove, warming himself by the fire, watching Xiao Yufang's work.Xiao Yufang mixed sorghum flour, cornmeal and a small amount of white flour together, then fetched hot water and started kneading the dough and pasting the cakes. Her hands and feet were quick and skillful. It was obviously not the first day she had done this work.Yang Menglong asked: "Miss, are you doing all this work alone?"

Xiao Yufang hummed: "I can't afford to hire a servant, so I have to do it myself. Anyway, it's just a meal for two people. It's easy, but it's a little more troublesome during the busy farming season. At noon, I have to take care of the day laborers. There are dozens of mouths. I'm so busy that I can't even finish my work until my back hurts."

Yang Menglong's heart ached inexplicably.For such an elegant woman, she should live a prosperous life, with her ten fingers not touching the spring water, and she should be with poetry, songs, music, chess, calligraphy and painting all day long. However, the worsening family situation forced her to shoulder the burden of life You know, she doesn't even have the strength to chop wood!He couldn't help asking: "I heard from Mr. Xiao that Xiao's family has hundreds of acres of fertile land, and their life should be pretty good. How could it be so..."

Xiao Yufang said: "The family background was not bad at first, but since my father was forced to leave Jinling and come here after being sued by a lawsuit, he began to fall. Six years ago, my father passed away, and we were the only two siblings left. I don’t know how to run a family, the land rent is too much to collect, the family has no fame, the tax is getting heavier every year, and there are frequent thieves, it’s getting worse day by day. Two years ago, I could afford a few servants. Later, one of them stole a sum of money and ran away, so I couldn’t afford to hire any more people, so I had to do these jobs myself, and when the farming season was busy, I would hire some short-term laborers, and then I would give them some money after the work was over.” She said again. Wiping off his sweat, he shook his head and let out a sigh.The hardships of life are all condensed in this sigh.

Yang Menglong still didn't understand: "That's not enough, you have hundreds of acres of fertile land..."

Xiao Yufang turned her head and looked at him in surprise, like looking at an idiot: "Do you really not know or are you pretending not to know?"

Yang Menglong shook his head honestly: "I really don't know. You have so many fields, so you should be living a good life!"

Xiao Yufang said: "What's good, the tax is getting heavier and heavier. Just last year, the tax was increased again. At least half of the output has to be handed over. Tenants also have to keep rations. Some rascals can't live or die. If they are willing to pay the rent, I have nothing to do with them, once they come and go, they can collect [-] or [-] shi rent a year, which is already thankful, and I sell some of them to subsidize the family, and the rest is barely enough for us to eat."

A landlord with hundreds of acres of land can only collect two to three thousand catties of grain a year!

Yang Menglong was dumbfounded, completely bewildered.He thought the history class was too boring, and he always fell asleep every time he took history class. Of course, he couldn't know how heavy the burden was on the peasants in the late Ming Dynasty.In the late Ming Dynasty, land consolidation was extremely serious. Ninety percent of the land in the country was concentrated in the hands of landlords who accounted for less than ten percent of the population. Peasants who accounted for more than ninety percent of the total population owned less than ten percent of the land. Is that enough?The worst thing is that most of those landlords didn't have to pay rent, because they were all famous, and at worst they were scholars. They belonged to the gentry class.Well, the gentry don’t have to pay taxes. Anyway, the grain output is so low, no matter how much they collect, they can’t collect much tax. So, can I charge more business tax and salt tax?The answer is no, any emperor who dares to collect business tax and salt tax is waiting to be pointed at the nose by the civil and military officials and scolded, and the civil and military officials said: "This is to compete with the people for profit, absolutely not!" So the emperor had to be tough Taxes are levied on the peasants, and as the country declines, the tax becomes heavier and heavier. In the end, even if the peasants do not eat or drink, it is not enough to pay the tax even if the peasants pay all the harvest for a year.So some farmers simply throw the land deed on the road, and then the cat is on the side of the road. Once passers-by pick up the land deed, they immediately jump out and say: "Congratulations, this land is yours!"

Xiao's family was more unlucky, for three generations in a row, not to mention high officials, they didn't even have a scholar, they couldn't be regarded as gentry, they could only be regarded as rich peasants, so they had to pay taxes honestly.The tax collectors probably thought that this family was honest, and they were outsiders with no connections. There is even a mountain of gold that cannot withstand such a toss.It is a miracle that this family has survived until now.

Yang Menglong knew nothing about these things. He was born with a golden key in his mouth, and he didn't understand the sufferings of the world. Telling him these things was nonsense, but he would soon realize the hardships of life for farmers in the late Ming Dynasty.While he was still thinking about something, Xiao Yufang shouted: "What are you thinking about? The firewood has fallen out, hey!"

Yang Menglong was taken aback, and when he saw it, it was true, the firewood had really fallen out, and a flame had already been lit on the wheat straw. If Xiao Yufang hadn't reminded him in time, he might have burned the kitchen.He hurriedly picked up the firewood and stuffed it back into the stove, and stomped fiercely to extinguish the flames on the straw.Seeing his flustered appearance, Xiao Yufang shook her head helplessly. I really don't know what this guy did. At his age, the average man has already married and started a business. He can't do anything, can't make fire, can't burn , I don't even know how to cook, even worse than her.She really wanted to ask: "How did you live so long?" In her opinion, it was a miracle that Yang Menglong didn't starve to death.But thinking about how mysterious this guy is, he can take out a bunch of things that she has never seen before and give them to Jun Xiao, so she doesn't think it's so strange. Someone who can take out an artifact that can play countless beautiful music , is it an ordinary person?

Thanks to Yang Menglong, an idiot in life, this meal was cooked like a world war, with dangers everywhere, not to mention almost burning the firewood a few times, and almost burning through the pot.Xiao Yufang frantically ran around to save him, the culprit showed four white teeth and giggled, she was so angry that she had the urge to pick up a hot pancake and slap him hard on the face!

When the pancakes finally came out of the pan, Xiao Yufang breathed a sigh of relief, it was not easy, it was not easy!She put breakfast on the dining table and went to wake Xiaojun up. The three of them sat down around the dining table and began to enjoy breakfast.

Breakfast is of course multigrain cakes, made of sorghum flour, corn flour and a small amount of white flour. It is baked until it is burnt yellow. It is considered a rare delicacy in the eyes of ordinary people. Even Yang Menglong, who is used to eating truffle caviar, is drooling .Xiao Yufang picked up a pancake for herself, and another for Xiao Jun, and said to Yang Menglong, "Eat it, you're welcome."

Yang Menglong sucked in his saliva and said, "Then I won't be polite."

Xiao Yufang said: "Eat whatever you like, treat it as if you were at home."

Before he finished speaking, Yang Menglong had already stuffed the whole pancake into his mouth, chewed it twice, swallowed it, grabbed another one and stuffed it into his mouth.I saw him opening his arms from left to right, stuffing one after another into his mouth, opening his cheeks, grinning his back molars, and devouring the food with a gust of wind, the joints of his palate snapping, and he was eating so fast!Xiao Yufang and Xiao Jun were both frightened and looked at him stupidly, forgetting to eat. In less than 5 minutes, all the pancakes were swept away by Yang Menglong. This guy was still not satisfied, licking his lips and looking at the pancakes in the hands of the Xiao family siblings.Faced with that wolf-like gaze, Xiao Jun finally turned around. Looking at the plate with not even a crumb of cake left, he wanted to cry from the bottom of his heart. His little face twisted and twisted, and tears gathered in his eyes. Finally, Tao let out a loud cry, crying even more sadly than yesterday.Yesterday I was just frightened and cried, but today I was frightened and angry, and tears of kelp burst out three feet away!
Yang Menglong scratched his head in embarrassment, what a pity, one of them was careless and ate all the food for the three of them, and both siblings had nothing to eat, so he would cry too!He looked at Xiao Yufang pitifully, Princess Tianxian, I really didn't do it on purpose, I was just hungry these days and couldn't keep my mouth shut, don't drive me away!

(End of this chapter)