The Third Prince has been quite depressed since his last attack of wind.
You know, rheumatism is not the same as smallpox.
Smallpox is the kind of disease that will never come back once you get it, but rheumatoid arthritis is just the opposite. Once you get it, it is very easy to get it again.
So, how should I put it? If some of my previous ideas were 30% certain, now even half a point is too much.
How could the Third Prince not hate this!
But in his extreme resentment, there was also extreme fear. He was really afraid of this "Lady Fu".
So when he encounters something like her, he will be doubly cautious.
If it had happened before, he would have pretended to be stupid and went to the door himself, but this time, he brought the fourth prince and the fifth prince with him.
Several people had the same idea, which was whether they could meet the Lady of Fortune.
They have been thinking about this matter for a long time, and they started thinking about it as soon as they heard about it.
...
...
But before this, Emperor Ming Yan had never mentioned this Empress Fu explicitly, and they couldn't figure out what the emperor meant, so they could only pretend not to know.
Now that everyone in the government and the country knows about it, it won't be too strange for them to ask.
The prince just smiled and said, "Enfu is now living in the hot spring manor and has not yet moved into the Lady's Mansion. It would be rude of us to visit her. It would be better to wait until she moves into the Lady's Mansion and then send a letter to visit her."
Since when does a prince need to submit a letter to obtain a third-rank title?
But think about it, she is a woman, if she is more polite, it won't lose face.
The third prince said, "I wonder when she will move in? I've always wanted to thank her for the wind-healing wine!"
The prince smiled and said, "Since Third Brother is so willing, then prepare the invitation."
It sounds like it’s just these few days?
Several princes understood the meaning and dispersed.
Emperor Ming Yan went to Fuyuan in the afternoon. Tang Shiyue was directing people to send Gungun there first. When he saw him coming, he ran to greet him: "Aye, why are you here? Didn't I say that I would move to the city tomorrow?"
Emperor Mingyan said, "We are finally moving. You should feel sorry for your father! It takes more than an hour to come here every day."
Tang Shiyue was stunned for a moment, and then she really felt guilty. She hugged Emperor Ming Yan's arm and acted like a spoiled child: "Father," she dragged out her voice, "What you are walking on is not the road, that is the heavy father's love!"
Emperor Ming Yan was amused by her and tapped her nose: "You are the only one who talks too much! How can I really care about you?"
He sat down, and Tang Shiyue personally brought him a cup of tea. He then asked, "Did you cause trouble again yesterday?"
Tang Shiyue retorted: "I didn't! Someone else provoked me first! It's just a competition of fathers! I'm not a coward!"
Emperor Mingyan was amused by her and glanced at her: "Duke Chengguo came to the palace to see me yesterday."
"What?" Tang Shiyue was very dissatisfied: "Why is he the first to complain? Just because I'm smart, I can speak, my insights are shocking... he can't forget who provoked me first? If you dare to provoke, you must dare to bear the consequences!"
Emperor Ming Yan drank a sip of tea and said, "Have you ever thought about how women with bound feet will deal with your criticism?"
"I thought about it!" Tang Shiyue said, "I thought that although Zhou Li Niang was annoying, most women with bound feet were still very pitiful, so I said something at the end to round things off."
Emperor Mingyan sighed, "But in this case, the blame will be borne by the girl's parents."
Tang Shiyue paused. She pulled his sleeve and shook it: "Then, Father, what should we do now? I think foot binding is indeed a bad habit, but in this process, it is inevitable that some people will be unhappy."
Not only is it unpleasant, the queen also has bound feet!
If you do this, the label of "unkind" will be put on the father-in-law's head. If I hadn't stopped you, the Queen would have issued an imperial decree to interrogate you!
Emperor Mingyan touched her head and said, "Don't worry, Aye is here!"
Tang Shiyue felt very guilty, and went up to him to try to please him. She was trying hard to massage Emperor Ming Yan's shoulders, when she suddenly had an idea.
So she stopped immediately: "Aye!"
Emperor Mingyan was startled by him: "Huh?"
Tang Shiyue's eyes lit up: "How could a good and considerate girl like me ask my father to clean up the mess for me? Since this matter started among the people, it should end among the people. There is no need to take an official stand so early."
Emperor Mingyan smiled and said, "What good ideas do you have?"
Tang Shiyue smiled proudly: "Of course I'm going to find someone to take the blame!"
So she called Xu Wenqu over and started talking to him. Xu Wenqu was full of talent, so he naturally finished it in one go.
Emperor Ming Yan took it and looked at it. He thought that although this thing was really weird and messy, it was quite useful, so he took it and left.
The next day happened to be the day of the grand court ceremony.
As expected, many imperial censors reported that Lady Enfu County was spreading rumors and misleading the public, and behaving in a domineering manner... The higher the official, the more daughters with bound feet there were in her family. It was not an exaggeration for these people to report the matter on the rumors. How could they not fight back when being scolded?
There was quite a buzz for a while.
Then Chen Daliang... yes, Chen Hong Chen Daliang, he weakly stated that he was friends with Lady Enfu County's teacher, and that this person had written an article yesterday specifically discussing this matter. He thought it made sense, so he took it and boldly presented it to the king.
A minor official like Chen Daliang was usually not qualified to attend court, but since the emperor summoned him, he had to come. Naturally, the censor criticized him again, saying that it was extremely disrespectful to present common people's things to the emperor.
Emperor Mingyan said calmly: "It is just a trivial matter among the people. What's wrong with listening to the people's voice?"
So I brought it up.
Although Xu Wenqu's article is very long, its meaning is actually very simple.
He first said that parents bound their daughters' feet so that they could marry the right man in the future, which was a reflection of their love for their children and was very touching.
And what Lady Enford said was also very reasonable and was meant by kindness and love.
But little do people know that
The custom of foot binding began in the Sui Dynasty. Although its true origin is unknown, according to folk legend①, the story goes like this:
When Emperor Yang of Sui traveled east to Jiangdu, he recruited a hundred beautiful women to pull the oars for him.
Among them, a woman named Wu Yueniang was chosen. She hated the tyranny of Emperor Yang of Sui, so she asked her father, a blacksmith, to make a lotus-petal knife three inches long and one inch wide, and wrapped the knife under her feet with a long cloth. Then she carved a lotus on the sole of her shoe, and a beautiful lotus would appear every time she took a step.
Emperor Yang of Sui was delighted by her beauty and called her closer, wanting to play with her little feet.
Wu Yueniang slowly untied her foot binding and suddenly pulled out a lotus-shaped knife to stab Emperor Yang of Sui. Emperor Yang of Sui quickly dodged but his arm was already stabbed. Seeing that her assassination attempt failed, Wu Yueniang threw herself into the river to commit suicide.
It is said that Emperor Yang of Sui issued an edict afterwards: in future beauty pageants, no matter how beautiful a woman was, "women with bound feet would not be selected." So women from the countryside began to bind their feet in order to avoid being selected into the palace.
But now we live in a peaceful and prosperous age with an upright ruler and virtuous ministers. God is merciful and will not bear to see such mutilation of limbs...blah blah.
In short, the parents were not wrong, the woman with bound feet was not wrong, Lady Enfu was not wrong, the only one who was wrong was the great tyrant Emperor Yang of Sui of the previous dynasty!
In just one sentence, the points and motivations of the censors' criticism were all eliminated with a single move, and then the issue was implicitly raised to a political level, meaning that you were still binding your feet at this time because you thought the emperor was something else?
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