Chapter 236 Pig
The old maid replied, "Cheng'an brought it early in the morning. It's a deer leg. He said it was sent by the family that the master gave the book to before."
"Send a book?" Concubine Fan looked at her husband.
"Another delivery of meat?" Zeng Sanlang was a little surprised, but when he thought about the fact that the people from Daxing Village could go in and out of the Shanlin Gang Yamen and bring people out, he understood: "Let's do it."
After the nanny left, he saw that his wife was still waiting for his reply, so he went into the study and said, "Yes, the book was delivered. The person who delivered it is the person from Daxing Village you just mentioned."
He told the story of growing yam in Daxing Manor, and briefly described the events during the provincial school entrance examination, saying, "There are only a few dozen people in this manor, but quite a few people came to the provincial school for the examination, and many of them passed. It is not easy for common people to have scholars, and the emperor is also pleased to see them."
There is no need to elaborate on what she was happy to see. Although Concubine Fan was a woman in the inner palace, she was also aware of the court and the current affairs. This was a compulsory course for girls from aristocratic families. Even though no one from the Zeng family had entered the officialdom for decades, her understanding of these things was as good as anyone else.
Zeng Sanlang, however, recalled Sang Luo's origins when he spoke of this. "Oh, by the way, Chen Lie's wife is half from the same hometown as you, from the Sang family of Dongjun. It was she who taught us how to grow yam. The yam seeds that are now distributed to the surrounding counties were also obtained from farmers in Daxing Village and nearby areas who had been taught how to grow yam by her."
"Have you ever heard in your boudoir that the Sang family of Dongjun is good at farming and mulberry?"
Concubine Fan shook her head: "I know Sang, but I have only been to Dongjun a few times and have never had any contact with her. It sounds like Sang is a generous person."
At that time, if people had anything in their hands, from the wealthy families to the common people, they would all hold it tightly in their hands and wish to pass it down from generation to generation.
"Isn't that generous?" Zeng Sanlang smiled as he recalled the trip to Daxing Village that day. "When Chu Qichang mentioned the yam cultivation method to me, he said it was grown by the Shen family. I asked him very seriously, but he was not bad. He didn't take the credit for it, but said it was his wife, Professor Sang, who taught him."
"One of them is upright and honest, and the other is kindhearted. I am very happy to give him this book."
Fan finally understood that the Shen couple were just the right people for her husband, and they were upright and open-minded... Fan smiled, and considering the Zheng family's mischief and Shu Di's contribution, she understood why her husband gave the book to someone.
"What book did you give me? I remember you didn't bring many books with you."
Before he was appointed as the governor of Shezhou, Zeng Sanlang had been serving under the King of Qi for several years and had fought in various battles. Naturally, every time he left home, she led the maids to pack his luggage.
Zeng Sanlang casually pointed to the desk and said, "Those volumes."
Fan glanced through it briefly, her eyes slightly rounded as she asked, "You just gave your grandfather's book away like that?"
"Do you think Grandfather would care?"
Concubine Fan thought about the old man's temper and burst out laughing. Then she said with a malicious intent, "I'm afraid my father-in-law will be angry for three to five months if he finds out."
Zeng Sanlang heard this and curled his lips: "It's not bad to be angry for three to five years."
Concubine Fan couldn't help laughing.
…
Outside the governor's mansion, Gan and others were queuing up to choose poultry.
Facts have proved that Sang Luo was still thinking too optimistically. It is impossible for her to buy chickens, ducks and geese and then achieve the goal of exchanging them for geese.
The number of poultry that were safely transported over a long distance is limited, and some were distributed to the counties below early this morning. Now each household can only purchase one.
One, no need to think, Chen Ning and Shen Jin directly chose the goose. As soon as Chen Ning bought the goose, several other families in the village followed suit and chose geese. Firstly, each family had enough chickens and ducks, and secondly, what Chen Ning chose was determined by Sang Luo, so it was right for them to follow.
Each family has a goose, like the Xu family. Wei Lingzhen held the household registration of three families in her hand. She asked Chen Ning why she chose geese. She heard that chickens and ducks were raised on the mountain to prevent weasels. She handed Wei Qinghe's household registration directly to Chen Ning: "Two are enough for my family. You can use this to buy another one."
Just as unsold as cattle are pigs. It's okay for families in the provincial capital to raise chickens and ducks, but there is really no land to raise pigs, and the villagers in the villages cannot afford to buy piglets.
In line with the eldest sister-in-law's instructions to buy what she could, Shen Ning asked the official if she could buy a pig after buying poultry, so she bought it without thinking, and also bought one for Shen Jin: "If you don't raise it, this one will be ours."
Shen Jin chuckled: "Yes, yes, yes, I want to raise it!"
Wei Lingzhen looked at the pig and felt a little troubled.
Raising chickens and ducks was fine, she had gradually learned these things in the mountains over the past few years, but raising pigs was really not for Wei Lingzhen. Not to mention her, the old lady at home hadn't suffered this hardship for more than ten or twenty years.
She held the household registration book in her hand and stared at the piglets for a long time. She felt that she really couldn't do this job. She turned around and saw Shen Ning and Shen Jin selecting pigs with shining eyes. She walked over a few steps and asked, "Aning, your family also wants to buy pigs?"
Shen Ning nodded: “I bought it. My sister-in-law said that I would buy everything I could.”
have to.
Wei Lingzhen gave her the household registration in her hand: "Santou, do you want it? If you do, I will give it to you for your family use."
“Yes, yes, yes!”
Shen Ning responded repeatedly.
They really are siblings with Shen Jin.
Wei Lingzhen laughed, handed over the household registration, and asked Shen Ning: "Did you bring enough money?"
"That's enough, that's enough, thank you, auntie."
After taking over Xu's household registration, he happily went to buy piglets.
The pigkeeper who was in charge of the piglets saw her and Shen Jin, two children, and asked for five piglets at once. He looked at Shen Ning in astonishment: "How many?"
"Five." She raised the household registration in her hand and said, "I bought some for my neighbor as well."
"Neighbor, did you, a young girl, come to buy pigs?" He bought pigs from five families by himself. What a careless neighbor.
The swineherd didn't believe a word of it.
Shen Ning pointed at Wei Lingzhen and said, "Look, my aunt, I'm just here to choose the pig."
He pointed to the distance and said, "Look, they are leading cows to buy wheat seeds. They are my brother, my neighbor uncle, and my neighbor grandfather!"
Swineherd: I’m convinced.
"Okay, pick it."
Shen Ning pulled Shen Jin and walked around the fence where a group of squealing piglets were kept. He didn't care that the pigpen was smelly and picked the pigs very carefully. After he had made his selection, he asked Shen Jin to keep an eye on the five pigs first and asked Chen Po to come from a distance to help her judge them.
This time the swineherd really believed it. There really were a bunch of uncles and aunts here.
Mrs. Chen had raised pigs before, and she thought four of the ones Chen Ning had chosen were good, except for one that looked weak, so she pointed to another one and asked Chen Ning to change it.
After they finished choosing, he quietly asked, "Why did your sister-in-law ask you to buy so much?"
Shen Ning nodded confidently: "Sister-in-law said, buy whatever you can!"
"Okay, it's right to listen to your sister-in-law."
…
Daxingzhuang has a bumper harvest.
A cow, eight piglets, and nine geese, and wheat seeds were not left out of every household. On the way back, I didn't know how many envious eyes I attracted.
Chen Ning smiled so much that her eyes curved like crescents. She looked at her geese and pigs, feeling so satisfied. She then listened to the adults discussing using the cowshed on the farm to raise cattle, with each family taking turns to take care of them.
Well, their family also has a share of this cow.
They had been hiding in the mountains for several years and had eaten a lot of wild boar meat, but at this moment, Shen Ning felt that their family had become a wealthy family.
Cattle, sheep, chickens, ducks, pigs, just tell me what we need!
That's fun.
…
When they returned to Daxingzhuang, the Lin family's household registration had already been completed. Because Chen Dashan recommended it, Master Xing did take care of it. The registered residence was not far away, about five miles away from Shezhou City, and they lived in a village with several other families who had returned with the governor's wife's convoy yesterday.
When Chen Lie and his siblings returned home, Sang Luo was stunned to see Chen Lie holding a cage of piglets in each hand, while Manager Xu, Chen Youtian, and Zhou Cunzheng each helped to carry one.
“So many pigs?”
Shen Ning: …
"Sister-in-law, I'll buy whatever I can." He pointed to a small black spotted pig and said, "This one belongs to Xiao Jin."
Chen Lie and Shopkeeper Xu all laughed. The little girl had been so creative in the city just now that the money Chen Lie brought was not enough, so he had to borrow some from him.
It turns out that I still feel weak.
For fear of scaring the pigs, the pigs were kept far away from the house.
Sang Luo looked at the group of pigs grunting and pushing their way into the cages and nodded, "They are good buys. How did you buy so many?"
After the question was asked, he reacted and said, "The household registration was given by Aunt Xu."
Chen Ning nodded with a smile in her eyes: "Yes, my aunt also gave us a share of the household registration quota for the goose."
Sang Luo guessed so and thanked Manager Xu.
Shopkeeper Xu smiled and waved his hand, saying, "No need to thank me. No one in our family knows how to raise this."
He didn't stay long. After delivering the things, he went back with Chen Youtian and the others.
Sang Luo's eyes fell on the group of piglets again.
Pigs are good things.
"Send all five geese to our old sheepfold and raise them there first. Put Xiao Jin's goose there first as well." He also instructed Shen Ning and Shen Jin: "First, find a place behind the house to raise the goose alone for a few days. When the goose is in good spirits, put it together with the chickens and ducks."
…
We had a simple and light lunch at noon. Before taking a nap, Zhao Si came with the drawings drawn by Sang Luo.
He was amazed when he saw that his boss had five more piglets. He wondered how much money this must have cost.
"My dear, you only dig holes, plant trees and build chicken and duck houses on this piece of land for raising chickens and ducks. Don't you turn over the empty land and plant vegetables?"
After the sheep shed was built, the two Zhao brothers turned to the land where they raised chickens and ducks. They can now work by looking at the map, but they didn't understand the work today. The fence is the same as the one at the sheep shed, and it's even denser. The fruit trees can also be roughly seen, but there seems to be no vegetable field on the map.
Farmers are fine with unclaimed land, but if they have, they feel uncomfortable just looking at the empty land. Zhao Si said, "If you are worried about the chickens destroying your vegetables, you can put up a fence around the inside so that the chickens don't run around."
Sang Luo smiled and said, "Uncle Zhao, we have a lot of land at home. You can start with other land instead of this one. I'll ask Chen Lie to go into the mountains to find some grapes for transplanting or cuttings in the next few days. When the fence and chicken coop are built, we'll fence off a small piece of land and put the chickens in there to raise them. When the grapes have taken root and grown, we'll let them move around freely. After a while, you won't have to turn the land over. The chickens will be able to plow it until it's soft and fertile in a few months. When the chicken coop and fence are moved, we'll plow another piece of land for them to dig. It won't be too late to plow this land and plant vegetables."
The fields and mountains add up to more than 70 acres. It would take a whole year just to turn over and cultivate the land manually, as well as do other farm work. It would be better to use the chickens' natural instinct to dig the soil, loosen the ground and apply fertilizer.
"So that's how it is!" Zhao Si's eyes lit up with surprise when he heard it.
Chickens can also be caught and used as laborers.
"That's good! That's good!"
He asked in detail where the mulberry vegetable farm was located, and after confirming that it was the large area between the sheep farm and the chicken farm, he carefully folded the blueprint and went back to the mountains to work.
Shen Jin went home and wrote an IOU and sent it over. He listened to the whole conversation between the two and his eyes lit up: "Sister-in-law, can I do the same with my chickens and land?"
The three brothers were too young, and it was already very difficult for them to cultivate the thirty acres of land. They had originally given up on cultivating the ten acres of mountain land and were just going to chop firewood, but they never expected that the mountain land could be used in this way.
"Yes, if you want quick results, you don't even need to enclose too much land. Cut down the bushes and enclose only a piece of land that is about ten feet long and wide. Put the chickens in it, and then you can do your own work in the field. When the chickens loosen up a piece of land, you can use it. It's much easier than clearing it yourself. The land you cleared is enough to grow vegetables and raise chickens, ducks and sheep. If you open up more land later, you can even send it to the city to sell."
Speaking of food for chickens and ducks, Sang Luo paused and remembered something, especially the fact that there were five more pigs in the family.
The pig manure from five pigs is certainly a good thing when used as compost, but pig manure actually has another use. It can be used as fertilizer and is also beneficial to raising chickens.
She suddenly asked Shen Jin: "Is Xiao Jin afraid of insects?"
Shen Jin was stunned by this change of topic: "I'm not afraid. What's there to be afraid of? Don't I catch insects and feed chickens and ducks every day?"
He not only fed his own family, but also went with Shen Yin and Shen Tie to catch insects to feed the chickens and ducks at his sister-in-law's house.
Sang Luo said: "I mean, a lot of them."
I dare not describe it in detail, anyway, she was afraid, and Shen Ning was not much better than her.
Shen Jin shook his head: "Don't be afraid, sister-in-law, do you want me to do something? It's okay, just tell me."
He thought it was a toilet, especially dirty and full of bugs, so it must be a toilet.
Shen Jin knew that his elder sister-in-law was very clean and was especially afraid of insects and snakes. As for Aning, she was actually afraid of them too. Over the years, his elder brother and Xiao An had taken on all the dirty and tiring work and never let his elder sister-in-law and Aning get involved.
Seeing that he was not afraid at all, Sang Luo smiled and waved to Shen Jin: "Xiao Jin, come here, I will teach you a method. Raising chickens can save a lot of vegetables and bran, and you can also raise them very well, grow meat quickly, and lay more eggs."
That's so beautifully said.
Then he changed the subject and said, "However, in exchange, you can also help supply the chickens I raise. Is that okay?"
Continue read on readnovelmtl.com
