Late Ming Dynasty: So what if Emperor Chongzhen was inactive?!

Chapter 218 The wheat is ripe, and my wife is pregnant.
In late summer, the wheat in Xianghe County ripened, and the wind rippled through the fields like rolling waves. As it turned out, Uncle Fu's judgment was excellent; his new son-in-law, Li Wen, was indeed a perfect match.

Sure enough, not long after they got married, his daughter became pregnant. This made him very happy; a grandson is still a grandson!

Li Wen was also very happy. His wife was said to be a widow, but she was actually half a year younger than him, and the daughter he had gained was very well-behaved and sensible. Although she was only six years old, she could already do a lot of chores around the house.

With the dowry of eight taels of silver from his wife, their lives improved considerably, and they took out three taels of silver to buy a calf.

Uncle Fu was heartbroken and said, "The calf is unpredictable. Without an old ox to guide it, it will never learn to plow. We might as well buy a donkey; it can start pulling the millstone as soon as it's harnessed."

Li Wen said, "We can borrow government oxen to follow along in the future; it won't take more than a few days. The wheat is growing very well this year, and it would be a waste to use so much straw just for firewood. It would be better to use it to feed the cattle."

The calf is quite big now. After raising it through the winter, it might be ready to be used for plowing the fields next year. Besides, there's a shortage of cattle on the market right now; large cattle are simply unavailable. Raising a calf to adulthood will cost a lot of money.

"Sigh, whatever you want! I'm getting old, and you'll still be in charge of this household. Just hope that when I'm too old to walk, you won't kick me out. Just leave this old man some food to eat," Uncle Fu said sadly.

"Don't say that, I'm not that kind of person! Dad, don't worry, as long as there's food to eat, there will always be a pair of chopsticks for you at home!" Li Wen patted his chest and assured him.

Each person could rent a maximum of twenty mu of public land, but the amount of rent would be determined based on each individual's specific circumstances. If the rented land was abandoned, or used for slash-and-burn agriculture or other perfunctory practices, the officials who rented the land would be held accountable, and the tenant farmers who abandoned the land would have their rental eligibility revoked.

There's a shortage of land and a large population; if you don't farm, plenty of others will!

Li Wen rented eighteen mu of land, while Uncle Fu, being a bit older, only rented twelve mu. The young widow was also allowed to rent land; the official documents labeled her as a "strong woman," so she also rented ten mu. In total, their small family rented and cultivated forty mu of land.

Xianghe County is a very strange place. Since it was massacred by the Jurchens once, there's no guarantee it won't happen again. The common people's survival wisdom lies in seeking stability and security, and their attitude towards life is "if it can remain unchanged, then it can remain unchanged."

Because in their limited life experience, whenever the government introduced a new policy, it was never a good thing; the government would only increase taxes and levies, and nothing good would come their way.

Taking all factors into account, Xianghe County now has a total of just over 5,000 registered residents, so the competition for renting land is not fierce. Therefore, Li Wen's family rents only the best fields.

Logically speaking, since there are few people and a lot of land, it should be open to rent. However, the higher-ups have set the tone: better to have less than to have bad land. Those in charge have no choice but to follow the rules.

This year wasn't as dry as last year; there have been several light rains since the beginning of the year. Xianghe County, as its name suggests, has a river. Legend has it that this river was originally called "Changgou" (Long Ditch). Empress Xiao of the Liao Dynasty went on an outing here and saw many lotus flowers blooming in the river, exuding a rich fragrance, so she named it "Xianghe" (Fragrant River). Xianghe County has relatively superior irrigation conditions.

The grain yield in the north is already low, and the grain grown there doesn't even fetch a good price compared to rice. The yield of grain from low-quality fields might not even be one shi (a unit of dry measure) per mu (a unit of land area). So sometimes a family cultivates hundreds of mu of grain, works themselves to death all year round, and in the end, after paying taxes, they still can't even get enough to eat.

The situation in Shangtian is much better. This year, the grain yield in Shangtian is three to four shi per mu. When the land was rented, it was agreed that the land would be divided 30/70, so the government set the land rent for them at one shi per mu. Li Wen's family needs to pay forty shi of land rent, five shi of regular tax, and ten shi of Liaodong tax apportionment, for a total of fifty-five shi of grain.

The busiest time for farming is during sowing and harvesting, hence the term "busy farming season." Li Wen now has a wife and a child, so he has something to look forward to in his life and is full of energy.

The family of three adults and a little girl worked for ten days to finally harvest the forty acres of land, and then spent more than half a month drying and threshing it.

Li Wen was pleasantly surprised to find that they had harvested a full 120 shi of grain this year. After paying the land rent and taxes, they still had 65 shi of grain left.

Even if we calculate based on one tael of silver for two shi of grain, they would earn more than thirty taels of silver a year, which was unimaginable before. When he was a dockworker, he couldn't even earn ten taels of silver a year, and he was much more tired than he is now!
Moreover, it was only early autumn, and they could still plant some miscellaneous grains before winter. Sweet potatoes, for example, were quite good; everything from the seedlings to the roots was edible, suitable for both human consumption and livestock feeding. Li Wen packed the grain, and together with his father-in-law, they loaded it onto the cart. Then, they happily pulled the cart to deliver the grain to the government. Because they lived close to the capital, they didn't receive any discounts and delivered only unprocessed grain.

Their homes were close to the county government office, so they could take the grain directly there to pay their share. Fifty-five shi (a unit of dry measure) required many trips. Others who lived far away handed their grain over to the local grain station, where the grain manager would organize people to transport it to the designated location.

Hearing that the people at the grain depot were all retired veterans who had fought against the Tartars and were very fierce, Li Wen was glad that he didn't have to deal with them.

Upon arriving at the county government office, Li Wen discovered that the county magistrate was also present. Facing the magistrate, he was somewhat intimidated and dared not approach him for a conversation, only hoping to quickly hand over the grain and return home. Unfortunately, the magistrate recognized him!

Normally, a nobody like him wouldn't be worthy of being remembered by the county magistrate. However, what he did was quite significant. It was the first corruption case that Xu Yuanfang handled after taking office, and also the first of his three major initiatives as a new official. Therefore, Xu Yuanfang had a rather deep impression of this young man.

He strolled forward, and Li Wen instinctively lowered his head, but his ostrich-like behavior was ineffective; he was still caught and questioned by the magistrate.

"Your name is Li Wen, right?" Xu Yuanfang said to himself. "Tsk, whoever named you really messed up. The character 'Wen' is too grand; it wasn't chosen randomly. How was your harvest this year?"

Li Wen didn't know why his name was "Da" (meaning "big"). He thought the magistrate was dissatisfied with his name, but names couldn't be changed casually, so he could only pretend not to hear and hope the magistrate wouldn't pursue the matter.

He then replied, "Thanks to your blessing, the harvest is quite good this year."

Xu Yuanfang frowned, pointed at him helplessly and said, "You, you come from humble origins, and you don't learn anything good, only glib talk! What does a good harvest have to do with me? If you really want to talk about it, you should thank the founding emperor and the current emperor."

Li Wen felt he had said something wrong again, so he timidly lowered his head.

Xu Yuanfang was helpless, but he had gotten used to it. After becoming the county magistrate and visiting the villages, he realized that these people were too afraid of them. They would only answer half a sentence when asked a question, or even give an irrelevant answer. It was difficult to hear a complete sentence, and it was too difficult to have a conversation with them.

Being a county magistrate is indeed not easy, and being a good county magistrate is even more difficult. Xu Yuanfang learned by doing, little by little, by referring to books such as "A Guide for New Officials".

He had heard that tax collectors were ruthless and oppressive, so he personally supervised them to prevent them from bullying the people. He was afraid that the people would not have enough to eat after paying their taxes, so he planned to ask them about their harvest. However, the people were also cunning and afraid that if they told too much, the government would increase their taxes. So they either gave vague answers or exaggerated their plight, making it difficult for him to hear the truth.

Seeing that Li Wen was so obedient and not an experienced old farmer, Xu Yuanfang decided to scare the kid a little and then get some truth out of him.

Sure enough, Xu Yuanfang put on a stern face and said a few words to the boy, and he couldn't hold back. He spilled out all the information he needed, including that his wife was pregnant, his father-in-law's name, and where he was from.

After learning that Li Wen's family still had more than sixty shi of grain left, Xu Yuanfang was relieved. A person only eats four or five shi of grain a year. There are three adults, one child, and one even younger in their family. This amount of grain should be enough to have a good year. They can also sell some grain to buy some cloth to make clothes.

Xu Yuanfang saw that their family's land had not been fully rented out, so he planned to let them rent some more land. The land was no longer suitable for growing grain, but could be used to grow mulberry trees or sweet potatoes.

"Sir, I haven't thought it through yet. I plan to go back and ask my father-in-law before making a decision," Li Wen said timidly.

"Go ahead, come to the county office to find me when you've made up your mind. I'll let the yamen runners know in advance," Xu Yuanfang said with a smile. Civil officials always valued filial piety, and he felt that this young man did have some filial piety.

(End of this chapter)