Chapter 210 With a flick of the scythe, Kuku goes for it!
(Thanks to Fat Tiger 10 for casting a monthly vote.)
Li Shiyue had no idea how Jiang Huai had tricked Li Wangshui into revealing information, or how honestly Li Wangshui had told him everything.
However, Li Shiyue didn't really care what Jiang Huai was doing behind the scenes.
Whether he secretly inquired about the situation and recorded the events in Liujiatun, or whether he was acting as Jiang Huijun's informant to spy on her, and then reported back to Jiang Huijun, it didn't matter to Li Shiyue.
As long as he, as a teacher in the school, teaches the children well, and in his spare time is willing to teach the men and women in Liujiatun how to write various documents and how to do accounting, that's enough.
In Li Shiyue's view, everyone has their own little thoughts and ideas, which is perfectly normal.
As long as her interests aren't affected, what does it matter if Jiang Huai was a spy while she and Liu Tan were still on the same side? Does it even matter?
It's not important.
The most important thing now is the autumn harvest!
Those who worked alongside Li Shiyue during the spring planting season, following her arrangements, all understood why they had to work together.
Concentrating both human and animal power can indeed improve production efficiency.
They might not understand the word "production efficiency" when you talk to them, but they do understand that they not only finished their work on their respective plots within the allotted time, but also reclaimed more than ten acres of wasteland!
You should know that when they first arrived at Liujiatun, the land official said that no taxes would be paid on the wasteland for the first three years!
Even if the wasteland is cleared, the harvest in the first three years won't be much, but even a little is still food!
Even if it's just an extra bushel of grain per acre, that's still extra profit!
Therefore, those of Li Shiyue's own people who had experienced spring plowing all trusted Li Shiyue's words.
However, Li Youfu and the Li clan members on his eighth uncle's side were somewhat unwilling.
As for the Wang family, they did not show any unwillingness.
The leader of the Wang family, Old Man Wang, meant: "Since Li Shiyue has said so, we have no other choice but to listen to him."
As time went on, I realized that Li Shiyue wasn't a bad person. We lived in the same village, and she never forgot about us when something happened.
She's capable; let's do as she says.
In short, when the autumn harvest came, all the men, women, and children of Liujiatun were in place. As Li Shiyue had arranged in advance, each team took their post early.
Li Shiyang and the yamen runners had already led the men who came to work on the road repairs away.
The people from Sunjiayao and Zhaoyou's families had also received their wages and returned to their own villages a few days ago, as they were busy with their own autumn harvest.
Therefore, now everyone in this area of Liujiatun is a local.
The huge threshing ground next to the ancestral hall had been prepared and divided into sections in advance, with the women and children of each family standing in their assigned section waiting.
In the north and south corners of the drying ground, there were windmills and stone mills respectively. The windmills were not very big, and three of them were placed at a distance in this corner.
That millstone was truly enormous; it took about ten men working together to install it when it was being hauled to the threshing ground.
Only Shi Tou was the only male member of the Li family at home. Li Shiyue, Li Qiutian, and Li Xiatian, the two sisters, went straight to the fields, while Li's mother and Zheng Meiniang were sent to the drying ground by Li Shiyue. Right now, they were standing on their own plot of land waiting.
Yan Jiuniang, who had stayed at the Li family for a while, went to work in the fields with Li Shiyue.
Li Shiyue originally intended to keep Yan Jiuniang, Li's mother, and Zheng Meiniang on the drying ground to do some lighter work.
For example, on the other side of this drying ground, three large stoves have already been set up: one for boiling water, one for stewing vegetables, and one for steaming rice.
For farmers, the only times they can get a full meal are during the busy farming season and the New Year.
Since we're all working together, we'll naturally be eating from the same pot.
Lighting the fire in the stove and making sweet soup with hot water were the easiest jobs in the whole village, in Li Shiyue's opinion, and she wanted Yan Jiuniang to do them.
It's called a sweet soup, but it's really just a little bit of crushed sugar in each bowl; at most, it's just sweet.
Li Shiyue originally intended to add more salt, but then her mother suggested that they simply add more salt to the stew.
“Some families can’t even afford a single piece of candy all year round. If you add salt to sweet water, what kind of taste will it have?”
In the end, Li Shiyue listened to her mother and told Erdan's mother, who was in charge of cooking, to add more salt to the stew. She explained that the toll collectors would lose a lot of salt working under the scorching sun for half a morning, and they needed to replenish it.
Don't let the autumn harvest make people sick from exhaustion.
However, Yan Jiuniang was unwilling to do the easy task of making sweet soup and insisted on going to the fields with Li Shiyue.
Li Shiyue is not someone who insists on others listening to her. She is someone who doesn't care what others do as long as they don't infringe on her interests.
Therefore, Yan Jiuniang eventually followed Li Shiyue and the others down to the ground.
Fifty sickles were distributed to fifty people. It wasn't that Li Shiyue looked down on Yan Jiuniang, but the difference in strength was too obvious. There were really not many women who could match her strength, Li Qiutian's strength, and Li Xiatian's strength. At least Yan Jiuniang couldn't do it.
"You can't use this knife even if I give it to you. You'll feel uncomfortable after swinging it a few times."
"Look, be good, listen to me, you stay here with them," Li Shiyue pointed to the third aunt, Liu Laozhang and Liu Pozi over there, "and together we'll move these things onto the cart and transport them to the drying ground."
I can see you've already learned how to catch the train. If you feel tired, go and rest at my mother's place. Don't push yourself!
I've been very busy these past few days and haven't had time to take care of you.
Li Shiyue patted Yan Jiuniang on the shoulder, then picked up his sickle and headed down to the field.
She shouted "Let's get to work!" to the men beside her, then got down on the ground, swung her sickle, and got to work!
The power of the collective is immense!
After working for only half a morning, those men who were initially reluctant were now squatting in the shade of the drying ground, eating their meals. At this moment, they felt that Li Shiyue's method was really brilliant!
Unity is strength!
Li Shiyue has essentially set up an ancient version of the Liujiatun Cooperative, with collective autumn harvesting, which can minimize the waste of labor and significantly increase production efficiency.
The men lay in the shade, rubbing their round bellies, when suddenly someone said, "This method is actually quite good."
After a few moments of silence, a man finally spoke up: "They've done so much in just half a morning. If we had done what they said in October, all the land in our village would probably have been finished in less than half a month."
"I think that windmill is easy to use; it should be ready in less than half a month."
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