The Moon Over Tang Dynasty

Chapter 95 The inexplicable firewood, rice, oil and salt

On the 19th day of the first lunar month of the sixth year of Yonghui, the emperor issued a book announcing to the world that he would appoint the prince Li Hong as the acting king and the prince Li Xian as the king of Lu. At that time, Li Hong was three years old and Li Xian was just one month old.

When the news reached Duke Ying's mansion, Mrs. Yang, who had just returned from the palace the day before yesterday, did not show much joy on her face. The book had been sent to Menxia Province before she left the palace, and it was just a formality at this time. It's just officially announced. It is not a rare thing for a prince to be crowned king. For Mei Niang, it is more of a compensation - because of this impatient child, she cannot accompany her to visit the imperial mausoleum and miss such a great opportunity!

However, when Mrs. Yu who came to visit said that Liuli's marriage had been scheduled for April 17th, but she had never taken care of the house, Mrs. Yang couldn't help but sigh, "It seems that I was negligent. Although I have taken her through some human interactions these days, I didn't think about asking her to handle the daily necessities, but you are more considerate. Fortunately, Liuli is a smart person. For two months, she is generally always You can learn almost everything, but you have to figure out the rest later." He turned back to Liuli and asked, "Can you settle accounts?"

Liuli thought for a while and replied, "I don't know how to use calculations. If I want to calculate the income and expenditure of money and food on weekdays, Liuli knows some calculations by barbarians."

Mrs. Yang nodded, "There is nothing wrong with me here. Mei Niang is still a little unwell, and I'm afraid she will have to go to the palace more often. Just go to Mrs. Yu's place and live in peace."

Liuli already knew about this. She gave birth to three children in three years in a row, and there were twists and turns during the birth. Even if Wu Zetian's body was made of iron, she would have to take good care of herself. This was the first time Mrs. Yu heard about it and she hurriedly asked about it. Hearing that he was just a little weak, he nodded and sighed.

As we were talking, a maid came outside to report, "Mrs. Ge has arrived."

Madam Yang smiled and said, "Please come in quickly." She turned around and smiled at Madam, "It's Yuan Yushi's wife. She handed in the post yesterday. She and Ahua have always been on good terms, which you have never seen before. "

It was nothing more than Mrs. Yu, but Liuli was moved in her heart. She had met Yuan Yushi's wife twice at the banquet of Wu Mansion and Mrs. Hua, and she couldn't help but be deeply impressed, because when they met for the first time, she used "" from time to time. Liuli's critical eyes covered her from head to toe, but when they met again the second time, she looked at Liuli as if she were looking at a transparent person... At that time, Liuli felt puzzled, and now she heard that she was here again , but I am a little curious, wondering what Mrs. Ge's attitude is this time.

Out of habit, she wanted to stand up and help Mrs. Yang welcome guests, but Mrs. Yang hurriedly said, "Sit down yet." Liuli was startled, then smiled and sat down. In the past, her position in this mansion was a bit awkward, so half As a guest, since Mrs. Wu didn't like to socialize, some of the etiquette things that she was supposed to do in the past fell on Liuli. Since they made plans to get married, Liuli's identity was determined. It was Mrs. Yang who invited her. How can a female guest who comes to stay at a house have the right to greet guests?

Not long after, the lady in charge led Mrs. Ge up the steps. Mrs. Yang greeted her at the door with a smile. The four of them greeted each other and sat down. They exchanged a few words with each other. Mrs. Ge looked at Liuli and said with a smile, " Madam Yu is so lucky after not seeing her for a few days."

Facing the enthusiastic smile on her round white face, Liuli felt almost a shiver on her arms. She met many people, and there were naturally many people who were picky, indifferent, and enthusiastic, but the combination of the three The only person who had transformed into one body without leaving a trace was Mrs. Ge in front of her. She felt so baffled that it was simply indescribable.

Madam Yu naturally didn't know what was going on, so she laughed and said, "How can a kid from a kid's family deserve such praise from Madam?"

Mrs. Yang somewhat understood in her heart: when Geshi met Liuli for the first time, the marriage between Liuli and Pei Shouyue had not yet been made public. Ahua vaguely revealed that this was the second son of Mrs. Yushi. Because he was lame and had no hope of becoming an official, and he could not inherit the family business, he was quite embarrassed about marriage, so he wanted to find a beautiful and intelligent woman with a lower family background. Although Mrs. Yang knew that this was impossible, she only said a few vague words. She didn't expect that Ge Shi really looked at Liuli dozens of times when he came to the banquet. The second time at Mrs. Hua's banquet, General Su had gone to propose marriage, so she naturally told Ah Hua about it. Somehow, Mrs. Ge seemed too surprised, and she looked a little annoyed for a moment. This time he came to visit him as soon as he returned home, obviously to save things.

With Mrs. Yang’s age and experience, how could she care about such a trivial matter? She immediately started talking to Mrs. Ge with a smile on her face.

 Mrs. Ge put aside some of her thoughts and smiled more relaxedly. However, from the corner of his eye, he saw that although Liuli didn't speak much, she had a smile on her lips and a radiant look on her face. She snorted coldly in her heart: I heard that Pei Xingjian will be appointed to the fifth rank of Chang'an Order soon - how old is he? Isn't his husband Yuan Gongyu a famous and talented man? He spent many years in Dali Temple before entering the fifth rank? It's strange that Pei Xingjian doesn't even care about the family and wants to marry such a charming wife, but there is such a good thing waiting for him! After all, it was too late for me to act, which made me lose face at home, but Mrs. Yang must win over her now.

At that moment, Ge Shi was even more energetic. He flattered Mrs. Yang a lot with the newly published book. Mrs. Yu listened to the flattery and couldn't help frowning. It was easy to wait until Ge When Shi's words came to an end, he quickly found an excuse to stand up and leave. Mrs. Yang gave Liuli a few more instructions before letting her follow Mrs. Yu back to the Su Mansion. On the morning of the second day, just after Liuli had had breakfast, Yu took her to the hall outside. She saw a thick stack of account books placed on the tall table in the hall. Yu chose two books and said to Liuli, "You don't need to learn anything else today. Let's start with this account book. If you can clearly calculate their annual salary, it will be considered completed."

Liuli was feeling dizzy looking at the stack of account books. After hearing this, she nodded and smiled, feeling relieved: Although she is not very good at mathematics, she has to figure out how much the annual salary of Su and his son is, such a simple addition. You can’t always understand multiplication, right? But when she opened the account book and took a quick look, she was immediately dumbfounded. She read a few more lines carefully, and listened to Mrs. Yu's explanation of a few sentences. One of her heads had become three big--

It turns out that officials at this time did not have a salary at all, but it was divided into several items, and each item had a number of physical objects. Taking Su Dingfang as an example, his salary included: 300 shi of rice per year. Because he was equipped with 32 people in the defense pavilion, he had to distribute eight plates of daily food every day. Each plate included two liters of fine rice and two cans of japonica rice. , two liters and four liters of noodles, one and a half liters of wine, four quarters of mutton, four halves of sauce, four halves of vinegar, three melons, some salt, soybean, green onions, ginger, sunflower, leeks, charcoal, and wooden skewers; in addition, there are With 600 acres of farmland, he can harvest several hundred shi of food every year, not to mention the rewards of colored silks, gold and silverware at the end of each year. There are more than twenty kinds of income in kind, which are either paid by year or by day, each is different, and the amount of charcoal is also different every quarter. The only thing that is not seen is money... Liuli is almost ready to cry without tears. Is this a salary? This is obviously toying with people!

When she was at Anjia, Liuli had seen Mr. Shi handling housework, but perhaps because he was a Hu businessman, all transactions were based on money and silk, so Liuli didn't find it difficult. Now he was suddenly faced with the physical transaction route. The official style of Datang is simply at a loss.

It took a long time before Liuli could clearly calculate the income of various things, and also learned to read the extremely complicated account book. She felt that her head was as big as a bucket. But she didn't know that Mrs. Yu was already amazed in her heart: She said she would settle the matter in one day, which was already making things difficult for Liuli and made her even more aware of the difficulty. She even specially brought a bag of calculations and planned to spend a few days teaching Liuli how to calculate, but she didn't. Thinking of Liuli, she took a pen and daubed some weird symbols. Sometimes her calculations were even faster than her, an old calculator!

On the second day, Mrs. Yu told Liuli item by item how much the Su family would spend on each item each month based on the seventy people in the Su family. What should be done with the surplus? If there was not enough, which item should be taken from? For example, one stone of chestnut rice can be exchanged for five liters of salt or five liters of vinegar, or for one piece of silk... When Liuli heard this, she felt dizzy and hurriedly scratched her ink and wrote down each item one by one. , think about it later. Fortunately, at this time, apart from household expenses, the slaves' expenses were only to take care of food, shelter and make a few clothes, which was considered economical. No wonder even the Su Mansion has more than sixty slaves.

Even though there is no need to pay wages to the servants, the Su family relies on the salary of Su and his son, but it is not enough. Su Dingfang has two villages in his hometown of Shiping, and Mrs. Yu also has dowry fields, so that the balance of payments can be balanced. Thinking of the fact that a family like the Su Mansion, which was not particular about anything except food, needed land subsidies, Liuli understood even more why the Hedong Duke Mansion would cling to Pei Xingjian's family's property in Luoyang and not let go.

After the income and expenditure matters were basically calculated clearly, Yu took her to handle daily housework. Housework arrangements, favors, purchasing matters, banquets, and many other matters were all handled in front of Liuli, carefully. Tell her carefully why she is doing this.

These things are all trivial and complicated, but they cannot go wrong. For example, the arrangement of seats during banquets, and the status of honors during banquets in halls and pavilions are completely different. If they are wrong, at least it will be a joke, and at worst it will be a grudge... Liuli Although her temperament is quite delicate, these are the things she fears most in her life, but she knows that they can't avoid them. She is not a lady, and there is no loyal maid or nurse around her to share her worries. There is only one Ani, who is a slave of the Wu family. . Even if she could buy some slaves who could read and write and settle accounts in the future, how could she dare to leave these matters to them without a year or two of testing? At this time, we can only pay attention to everything except remembering it, and ponder it over and over again.

After working hard for nearly a month, Liuli was finally able to be aware of the discrepancies in her family's accounts, and she was able to generally take good care of the etiquette of relatives and friends. Even on Chunshe Day, she helped Mrs. Yu to entertain relatives and relatives, except for saying she missed it when she was too busy. Apart from saying one sentence, everything else was done properly, but her whole body lost weight just before her eyes. Yu was relieved and felt a little distressed, so she thought that the 20th was the day when the Su family and his son were taking a break. It's a beautiful day in spring, and it's time for the whole family to go out and have some fun.

On February 19th, Mrs. Yu took Liuli again and asked her to see how she distributed the carriages, horses, slaves, and maids, and prepared food, drinks, and nothing else. The tall desks, wide stools, curtains and other items that Su Jiaguang pulled out from the warehouse Just one cart was loaded, and in the evening, another cart was prepared for drinks and food... Everything was just ready in this compartment, but a maid hurried over, "Madam, Alang has something to do, please go back quickly."

Mrs. Yu and Liuli looked at each other, a little puzzled, and hurriedly left everything behind and went to the upper room together. They saw Su Dingfang, who usually had a smile on his face, striding around the room with a serious face. Su Qingjie looked excited and shouted to Luo Shi. He said something loudly, but Luo Shi lowered his head and remained silent.

Liu Li was surprised. Su Dingfang looked up and saw Mrs. Yu. He paused for a moment before saying in a deep voice, "Today the imperial court received an urgent report that Goryeo and Baekje joined forces to invade Silla. They have captured thirty-three cities in a row. The King of Silla An envoy seeking help has arrived at our court, and the Holy One has decided to let me assist Governor Cheng Mingzhen in sending troops to Korea to relieve the siege of Silla!"

Many thanks to my dear classmates, My Past Is Gone, Jing Tianqing, Angels Are Crying, Benzhuzhu, Sunshine Sour Plum and chengcen1988. There was a great pink harvest yesterday!

 (End of this chapter)