Raising chickens and pigs and digging for wild vegetables, the county magistrate's promotion wa

Chapter 74 Ningyang County, Yang the Corrupt Official, Scours the Land Three Feet, Yet Claims to Be

The people of Zhongyuantangkou have always believed in repaying even the smallest kindness with the greatest gratitude.

If these local gentry had treated the villagers even slightly better, the people of Ningyang County wouldn't have been so ungrateful, and they wouldn't have gone to the trouble of riding horses to beat them up after distributing their land.

If these people had known things would turn out this way, would they have regretted it?

Magistrate Yang sighed slightly: "Look at these people, which one of them isn't a local gentry with a reputation for miles around, and which one of them doesn't own several hundred acres or even more of land?"

"But they changed their names to Mongolian and became sworn brothers with Mongolians and Semu people. They would rather let the grain rot than give even a single grain to the poor people in the village."

"They went to great lengths and used every means to seize the land from the people, and now what? The land is gone, the grain is gone, what do they have left besides the gold, silver and valuables they took with them?"

Limpy Five chuckled and said, "Look at what you're saying, Magistrate. They still have whip marks from the younger ones and hidden injuries from being beaten with sticks. How can you say they have nothing?"

Magistrate Yang glanced at the lame man, then looked at the grain in the cave and said, "Have someone transport all the grain back to the county government's warehouse and store it. We won't distribute this grain to the people for now; we'll deal with it after the autumn harvest."

After a moment's thought, Magistrate Yang added, "Select some good seeds from this grain, grind last year's and previous years' wheat into flour, and sell it to steamed bun shops for seven coins per pound."

Lame Wu immediately agreed and then organized the yamen runners to transport grain to the county yamen by oxcart.

After emptying all the caves where the grain had been hidden, as revealed by the local gentry, Limpy Wu picked a windy day and gathered several able-bodied men to winnow grain in front of the county government office.

The so-called winnowing is a process in which young and strong men stand upwind, use wooden shovels to scoop up wheat grains, and forcefully throw them downwind in an arc. The less desirable grains will fall into the air earlier, while the plump and heavy grains will fly farther.

Fortunately, or perhaps unfortunately, the gentry stored only hulled wheat grains that had been thoroughly sifted and were free of impurities. This meant that when winnowing the wheat, they didn't have to worry too much and could simply select the best grains.

As the young and strong men shoveled wheat grains into the air one shovel after another, the slightly less desirable grains gradually gathered into piles, while the plump and heavy grains in the distance were swept into small mounds by experienced farmers.

There was no other way. In the days before scientific seed selection and breeding, using wind power to winnow the grains and select the plump and heavy ones was the best way farmers could think of to select grains.

This is a kind of idea similar to "like begets like". In the minds of ordinary people, if the plump and heavy wheat grains of the previous generation are used as seeds, the wheat grown by the next generation will also be plump and full, and the family may have more food to eat, especially in years of disaster, when the family may have more hope of survival.

Growing grain can sometimes be the lifeblood of an entire family.

It is precisely because of this kind of thinking that the saying "I'd rather starve my parents than eat the crops I grow" came about.

After the winnowing and sorting of wheat seeds were completed, Magistrate Yang had some wheat seeds that Wang Qiong had sent earlier brought out and compared them with the wheat seeds that had been winnowed and sorted.

As Magistrate Yang had predicted, the final comparison results showed that the wheat seeds selected from the winnowing process were fuller and heavier than those sent by Wang Qiong. Even the second-best wheat grains from the winnowing process were not much worse than those sent by Wang Qiong!

Magistrate Yang spat angrily, "You dog, your heart is black as hell!"

Limpy Five also looked distressed, gazing in the direction of Yanzhou Prefecture and cursing, "They've hoarded so much good grain and so much gold and silver; these bastards have truly lost all conscience!"

After cursing, Limpy Five suddenly chuckled and said, "It's all thanks to these bastards for hiding the grain and stuff, otherwise, given the Tartars' character, they would probably have taken all of it."

"Now all the grain, flour, oil, salt, spices, and the gold and silver they didn't have time to take are in the hands of the county government. The county magistrate can use these things to do more things, and these scoundrels will be heartbroken!"

That's absolutely right.

With the flour left behind by these local gentry, Magistrate Yang Shaofeng was able to have the women of Ningyang County make more fried noodles, which they could then sell to Xu Da and Chang Yuchun.

With the salt left behind by these local gentry, Magistrate Yang was able to put the matter of pickling vegetables, salted duck eggs, and salted chicken eggs on the agenda, and then sell them to Xu Da and Chang Yuchun.

To put it more bluntly, Magistrate Yang Shaofeng could have used the resources of these local gentry to make more money for the Ningyang County government.

Once the Ningyang County treasury has more money, Magistrate Yang can begin to study a series of plans, such as road construction, digging more artificial lakes, building large reservoirs, constructing paper mills and community schools.

After pondering for a moment, Magistrate Yang put the grain seeds back in his hand and instructed Lame Wu, "Replace all the grain seeds with the new seeds that have just been blown out, and replace the ones that Wang Sheren sent with them."

……

Magistrate Yang suddenly became famous.

A few days ago, a strange wind suddenly swept through the road from Yanzhou Prefecture to the capital.

Some say that Yang Shaofeng, the magistrate of Ningyang County, appears to be a good official who loves the people like his own children, but in reality, he is a heartless and corrupt official who would do anything, such as forcibly seizing the people's land, abducting women, and forcing confessions.

evidence?

Those dozen or so gentry who walked step by step to Yingtian Prefecture to file a complaint with the emperor—look at their clothes, which were tattered from being whipped, and the wounds on their bodies, even the women and children, which were covered in bloody welts. Aren't they living witnesses?

There's also the children's rhyme, "In Ningyang County, there's a corrupt official named Yang who smears the land three feet from the ground, yet he claims to be a just official, leaving the common people unable to sleep peacefully." Could this also be a fabrication by the people to smear Yang, the corrupt official?

If he is not severely punished, how will ordinary people survive?

But as they walked, the wind changed direction, blowing from the direction of Xuzhou to the direction of Bianliang.

The reason is simple: Emperor Zhu Chongba is not currently in Yingtian Prefecture, but is on his way to Kaifeng Prefecture in Henan Province.

Emperor Zhu's visit to Kaifeng was not only to hear reports on the military situation from frontline generals such as Xu Da and Chang Yuchun, but also to see the real living conditions of the people in Henan.

After learning that Emperor Zhu was going to Kaifeng, Liu Hongchang, Master Geng, and others naturally decided not to go to Yingtian Prefecture. Instead, they changed their route to Kaifeng, intending to intercept the emperor and plead their case before he arrived.