The test papers of the candidates were not delivered to the examiners immediately after they were collected.

Before that, one must first go through a series of processing and preliminary screening by the outer curtain officials.

First, the "receiving office" will hand over the collected test papers to the "sealing office". The sealing officers will carefully check the test papers for any signs of cheating, such as folded corners or pinholes.

If there is, pick out the test paper and your name will be on the blue list.

Then the ink scrolls with no problems were folded, sealed, named, and numbered accordingly with the blank red scrolls, and then sent to the next place - the transcription office.

The 'transcription office' is the most important institution among the four outer curtain offices. It is responsible for transcribing the candidates' answers on the ink rolls onto blank red rolls word for word with a red pen.

The examiners behind the curtain do not touch the candidates' ink papers, and they use the transcribed red papers when marking the papers.

This is to prevent the examiners behind the curtain from identifying the candidates who have passed the exam from their handwriting. Therefore, all the wrong characters of the candidates who have passed the exam must be copied exactly as they are. And the number of characters that have been altered in the black paper must be marked on the red paper...

If the total number of typos and erasures exceeds one hundred words, the test paper will be picked out and the name will be listed on the blue list.

In addition, those who introduced their family background in the article and did not submit a draft paper will also be singled out, with the reasons stated and sent to the blue list.

After the test paper is transcribed, it must be handed over to the "reading office" for proofreading.

The reviewers are divided into groups of two, one for the ink scroll and the other for the red scroll, and they must proofread every word carefully.

After confirming that there was no difference between the two copies of the papers, he wrote on the red paper: "So-and-so reads red, so-and-so reads black, and there is no difference between the two copies."

If any omissions or transcription errors are found, they should be corrected with an ochre yellow pen.

Both transcription and reading require a large amount of manpower, which cannot be accomplished by officials alone, so students are asked to take on the task.

If there are mistakes in the transcription or the handwriting is so illegible that it cannot be read, the student will be punished and become a clerk.

That’s right, you are not allowed to study anymore and will be sent to work as a director in the government…

Actually, it’s not bad.

~~

After this series of rigorous processing, the test papers are finally handed over to the 'waishouzhangsuo'.

The official in charge of collecting the documents outside will check the numbers of the red and black scrolls again. After confirming that they are correct, the black scroll will be left in the office for temporary storage.

Then the red-colored papers, which bore neither the examinee's name nor any special mark, were divided into eighteen bundles, numbered, and packed into boxes. Two examinee officials sealed them, put them under seal, and personally delivered them to Feihong Bridge.

Feihong Bridge is the dividing point between the Imperial Examination and the marking of papers.

South of the bridge, the entire examination process and the processing of examination papers by the four outer curtain offices were under the overall responsibility of two officials in charge of the imperial examinations, and all officials were called outer curtain officials.

Qiaobei was responsible for marking the papers and determining the rankings, which was done by two chief examiners leading eighteen examiners, who were also called inner curtain officials.

According to the iron rule of the Imperial Examination Hall, officials behind the inner curtain were not allowed to go to the south of the bridge, and officials behind the outer curtain had to go to the north of the bridge. The two sides had to be absolutely isolated from each other.

The chief and deputy chief examiners of this year's imperial examination are Gao Yi, the Minister of Rites, and Wan Shihe, the Right Vice Minister of Rites.

After the second exam, at noon on the 15th, the two men led the officials of the external collection office to escort 4,300 exam papers packed in nine large boxes to the south side of Hongqiao.

There were a total of 4,500 candidates who entered the examination hall at that time, so nearly 200 examination papers were rejected at the outer curtain for various reasons other than the essays, and they could not pass the Rainbow Bridge.

On the north side of Hongqiao, this year's chief examiner, Li Chunfang and Yin Shidan, had already led the officials of the "Neishou Zhangsuo" and had been waiting for a long time.

The four bosses went up to the bridge at the same time and completed the handover formalities. The nine large boxes were then handed over to the Neishou Office.

~~

When the two examiners returned to Jianheng Hall with nine large boxes, Shen Shixing and other examiners from the other eighteen rooms were already waiting there impatiently.

It has been seven days since they entered the venue on the eighth day of the first lunar month. They have been doing nothing all day long, holding various banquets and eating and drinking at public expense. Many people have gained a lot of weight.

Looking at the young people who were eager to try, the two chief examiners exchanged glances with each other as experienced people, smiled secretly and said, your hard days have begun.

Li Chunfang then had someone bring a lottery box and asked the 18 examiners to draw lots respectively.

Whatever number you draw, you will mark that bundle of test papers.

After the examiners drew numbers, Yin Shidan tore open the seal, Li Chunfang opened the lock, and showed them the nine boxes of test papers.

So Shen Shixing and the others picked up the test papers they had drawn, sat back at their desks, tore off the envelopes, and laid out the more than 200 red papers in front of them.

The two chief examiners sat in the hall, watching the other examiners marking the papers at the eighteen tables below.

The inner supervisor, who was in charge of monitoring the inner curtain officials, sat with his back to the gate, facing the examiner from a distance, and remembered every move in the Jianheng Hall in his mind.

Each examiner was given 220 to 30 test papers. But in order to be fair, each test paper had to be reviewed by several examiners.

Therefore, each examiner has to mark thousands of papers for the first round alone.

And it’s not like grading college entrance examination essays in later generations, where you just take a quick glance, give a score and that’s it.

They have to read the candidates' essays word by word, find all the mistakes, and not make any mistakes themselves. Finally, they have to give comments with a blue pen.

Because after the results are announced, candidates can check their own papers.

Those who passed the exam were naturally overjoyed, while those who failed blamed everyone and everything, believing that there was something shady going on in the examination room and trying their best to find mistakes made by the examiners in marking the papers.

If they were allowed to pick one, at the very least the Ministry of Rites would have to give an explanation, or even report it directly to the Censorate.

Once the facts are verified, the examiners will be fined at the very least, or lose their jobs at the worst. The consequences are very serious.

Therefore, for every red paper they handled, the young examiners had to keep their eyes open and judge carefully.

In this way, at the end of the day, each person would be dizzy after marking a hundred papers.

Moreover, the Jianheng Hall would be locked immediately after dark, and the examiners would come back to mark the papers at dawn the next day. No test paper could be taken out of the hall, so it could only be marked during the day.

According to the regulations, the examiners only had half a month to mark the papers, and it would take more than ten days to sort out the scriptures and questions in the first round.

With only three to five days left, I have to finish marking two or three papers, so I can only go through them hastily, hoping there are no major mistakes...

Therefore, over time, examiners formed the bad habit of focusing only on the first exam. There was no way around it; they were forced to do so.

In fact, even for the first seven questions, the examiners did not have time to carefully study all of them. They tacitly put most of their efforts on the first question, the Four Books. On the basis that the other six essays had no major mistakes, they would carefully examine the first question, the Four Books, to judge the quality of the exam papers.

Therefore, when people later talked about the exam questions of a certain year and subject, they were referring to the first question from the Four Books. The other six questions were not worthy of having names at all.

~~

The examiner can only recommend to the chief examiner the test papers that he thinks are suitable for acceptance. The decision of whether to accept or not is made by the two chief examiners after consultation.

However, the examiner can argue for the excellent test papers he or she recommends. Of course, whether the two chief examiners will listen to him or not is another matter.

When both examiners approve the paper, the deputy examiner writes the word "take" with an ink pen. The examiner next to him also writes the word "pass" with an ink pen, and the paper is officially accepted.

So when your paper contains the seven colors of red, orange, dark green, indigo, blue and purple, congratulations, you have finally passed the high school entrance examination.

ps. It took me six full hours to write this chapter.