Chapter 74 Chicken and Rabbit in the Same Cage
Zhao Sicheng also winked at Xiao Wan, and stood in a row with other gardeners, each of them with a pot of flowers in front of them.
This was the solution he and Xiao Wan had discussed. As long as he could enter the Xiao Mansion, the two of them could spend every day together.
Soon, the selection began.
Each of the gardeners is very experienced. Holding scissors, the flowers and plants seem to come alive in their hands.
Their skills vary. Some are as light as the wind, with the scissors flying up and down in their hands, while others are steady and powerful, and every cut is extremely precise.
But Zhao Sicheng seemed a little clumsy, and the scissors in his hand seemed to be out of control.
After a few snips, a pot of orchid looked like it had been chewed by a dog.
Xiao Wan pretended to examine them carefully and walked past each of them.
She looked at the potted plants being tortured in Zhao Sicheng's hands, and the corners of her mouth twitched slightly.
I looked at him and asked: Didn’t you say you practiced at home?
Zhao Sicheng: I really practiced! If you don’t believe me, go ask my dad!
Xiao Wan glared at him angrily, thinking about what to say next.
Soon, everyone finished trimming the flowers and plants in front of them and let Mrs. Xiao and Xiao Wan take a look.
Mrs. Xiao looked at their work and nodded continuously. Professionalism is indeed different.
She stopped in front of an old gardener, whose work was the most meticulous here.
Mrs. Xiao asked him how much he expected to earn a month.
"Madam, I was previously employed by the prefect, and received four taels of silver per month."
Mrs. Xiao maintained her smile, nodded, and looked away calmly.
Four cents of silver, why don’t you go and rob it!
As she asked, she sighed in her heart. The cheapest of these people earns two cents a month.
It’s not that I can’t afford the price...but I always feel it’s unfair.
Finally, Mrs. Xiao came to Zhao Sicheng and looked at the potted plants in front of him, with a hint of confusion in her eyes.
Then he looked back at others.
She clearly asked the maids to place similar orchids so that they could be compared.
Why do other people's pots have flowers, but his is just full of leaves?
Then I felt something under my feet, and when I looked down, I saw some crushed flowers.
Zhao Sicheng looked a little embarrassed.
Although his skills are... well, not very good.
But to be fair, isn't the potted plant even one percent at fault?
"Mom, let's choose him. I think he cuts...very well." Xiao Wan's expression looked like she almost believed it herself.
Mrs. Xiao glanced at her worriedly, wondering if the child was too tired from studying and had problems with her eyes or brain.
Who would trim a flower and end up removing it?
Xiao Wan continued to lie with her eyes open: "Look, mother, how thoughtful they are. They knew that my daughter didn't like orchids, so they cut them all off."
Mrs. Xiao was a little surprised. Why didn't she remember Wan'er saying that she didn't like orchids?
However, the fact that he knows how to inquire about his master's preferences shows that this guy is smart and capable.
Mrs. Xiao hesitated again.
"Madam, please choose me." Zhao Sicheng's eyes were burning and his tone was firm.
"I don't want wages, just food and lodging!"
Madam Xiao's eyes lit up. Is there such a good thing?
That night, Zhao Sicheng moved into the Xiao Mansion.
However, because he was still a student of the academy and did not need any wages, the work was not too heavy.
Just come a few days every month.
He mainly wanted to see Xiao Wan during holidays and weekends.
…
Soon, Ouyang Ye really found someone to test Qiao Youyou's mathematical ability.
At Qiao Youyou's suggestion, Ouyang Ye also allowed them to enter the Wulei Pavilion and hold an open competition, and students from all over the academy could come and watch.
The teachers in the academy are all old pedants who study the Four Books and Five Classics. They can talk about all kinds of things fluently, but they get a headache when it comes to mathematics.
So Ouyang Ye invited a folk expert, whose surname was Fang. He was a scholar in his forties. He specialized in helping the common people with their accounts and was quite famous in Jiangzhou city.
For example, some people don’t understand how to calculate the interest on borrowing money from a money shop, some people don’t know how to keep accounts when doing small business, and they don’t know how much tax to pay to the government.
You can go to him for help; he can calculate quickly and accurately.
In the past, the competitions held in the academy were all about poetry and songs, and everyone was tired of them.
This time, when the students heard that there was some kind of mathematics competition, they found it very interesting and filled the Wulei Pavilion early in the morning.
"Math? Isn't it just counting? Who can't do it..."
"Yeah, what's there to compare? Who can count faster?"
“That’s not true. My father once told me that mathematics is a profound subject with endless research.
There's a crazy guy next door to my house, and he went crazy just by learning this stuff!"
At this time, on the podium of Wulei Pavilion, Qiao Youyou and Fang Xiucai each had a desk in front of them, with paper and pen on it for recording questions.
There is also a tube of wooden counting sticks used for calculations.
Mr. Fang yawned. Who was he looking down on by asking him to compete in mathematics with a little girl?
You know, even when the Jiangzhou government encountered difficulties, they sometimes had to ask him for help.
Why use a butcher knife to kill a chicken? If it weren't for the great reputation of Ouyang the abbot, he wouldn't have bothered to come!
The person who set the question is Ouyang Ye.
Of course, he did not make up the questions himself, but went to Wanjuan Tower to find a book called "Mathematical Classics" written by his predecessors, which covered a wide range of mathematical problems.
He only needs to extract questions from them and make slight changes.
"The first question--" Ouyang Ye was about to start reading.
Behind him was a large blackboard. Yes, the blackboard invented by Zhu Lan and his colleagues has now become an essential teaching aid in the entire Longchang Academy.
The teachers all said it was good after using it.
While Ouyang Ye was reading the questions, Ding Xiaoqiu stood in front of the blackboard, picked up a piece of chalk, and quickly wrote the questions in large characters.
Let everyone present see it.
"Now there is a field with a width of 16 steps and a width of 18 steps. How many steps does the field have?"
It is so easy to find the area when the side length is known.
"Two hundred and eighty-eight steps." Qiao Youyou and Fang Xiucai blurted out the number at the same time without even writing.
The two looked at each other and both felt that the other had something special.
There were students in the audience counting on their fingers.
"Second question: There are pheasants and rabbits in the same cage. There are thirty-five heads on top and ninety-four legs on the bottom. How many pheasants and rabbits are there?"
There were chickens and rabbits in the same cage. Qiao Youyou didn't even think about it and quickly wrote out a linear equation with two variables on paper.
Mr. Fang rolled his eyes and started doing mental arithmetic.
Assume that all animals lift half of their legs at this time, that is, each chicken lifts 1 leg and each rabbit lifts 2 legs, then there are only 47 legs in the cage at this time.
35 heads and 47 legs. Each chicken has only 1 leg, so the extra ones are all rabbits.
That is to say, there are 12 rabbits in total.
Subtracting the number of heads, we get 23 chickens left.
"Twenty-three, rabbit twelve." The two answered almost at the same time.
Fang Xiucai was only half a beat slower than Qiao Youyou.
He looked at the teenage girl with surprise.
He has been dealing with mathematics all his life and has encountered many such problems.
It would take an ordinary person a long time to calculate using the leg-lifting method, but he was able to come to the conclusion so quickly only because of his extremely high level of proficiency.
How come this girl is faster than me?
Mr. Fang couldn't help but stand on tiptoe to take a look at what she wrote on the paper.
There are several lines of strange symbols, crosses and a mess.
can't read.
Mr. Fang stood up straight and no longer dared to show any contempt.
Qiao Youyou curled her lips, feeling a little bored.
That’s it?
It seemed that there was no need for Archimedes to take action.
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