bookrebus Chapter 82 Nanping Village
Chapter 82 Nanping Village
The construction team split into three groups: one group began drawing lines about ten feet away from the official road, while another group drew lines along the riverbank where Nanping Village and Wenjiatiandi met.
Another team went to the riverbank where Wenjiatiandi and Niutou Village meet to draw lines. The hundred acres of sandy land along the riverbank were not within the marked area, nor did they need to be marked on the cliff side.
Wen Yuxia, along with Bei San and Bei Si, rode a mule cart back to Nanping Village to find Village Chief Li Yang. "Is Village Chief Li home?" they asked. The mule cart stopped outside Li Yang's courtyard gate, and Bei San stepped forward and gently knocked on the gate.
"Who is it?" Li Yang's wife, Ye, came out of the house and asked loudly. Before the person outside could answer, she quickly opened the courtyard gate.
Upon seeing that the visitor was Wen Yuxia, Madam Ye said warmly, "Miss Wen, please come in and sit down. I'll get you some water."
"Aunt Ye, is the village chief home?" Wen Yuxia gestured for Bei San to present the gifts, and asked with a faint smile.
Ye accepted the gift and went to the kitchen to make Wen Yuxia a bowl of sweet soup: "Miss Wen, please have some water. The old man has taken the villagers up the mountain. I'll send someone to call him back right away."
"Then I'll have to trouble you, Aunt Ye," Wen Yuxia said with a light smile. Aunt Ye quickly sent her son to the mountain to find Li Yang, and soon Li Yang hurriedly returned.
"Miss Wen, I'm sorry to have kept you waiting," Li Yang said with a simple, honest smile, rubbing his hands together.
“I just arrived, Village Chief Li. Master He is currently marking lines in the field. Please inform the villagers to come and dig the foundation tomorrow morning. Also, I would like to discuss the timber matter with the village chief,” Wen Yuxia stated her purpose directly.
"Work starts tomorrow, Miss Wen. Don't worry, I'll let them know shortly. Miss Wen wants to buy timber from our village, right?" Li Yang said confidently.
The only place with trees in Wenjiatiandi was the mountainside near the cliff, but those trees were only suitable for firewood and not for building beams.
Wen Yuxia mentioned yesterday when she came to Nanping Village that after the wall was built, houses would be constructed. Li Yang was certain she would come to Nanping Village to buy timber, so he started organizing villagers to go up the mountain to cut down trees yesterday.
“Yes, but I still need to check the quality of the wood,” Wen Yuxia said earnestly.
“Of course, Miss Wen, you can come with me to take a look now,” Li Yang said, leading Wen Yuxia and the others towards the back mountain. Pointing to the pile of timber on the ground, he said, “Miss Wen, please look, these are the big trees we cut down yesterday.”
After carefully examining the item, Wen Yuxia was very satisfied. "Village Chief Li, regarding the price..."
"Miss Wen, we're all straightforward people, so we'll give you the lowest market price. If you ever need any work done in the future, just remember to ask someone from our village to do it."
Wen Yuxia smiled upon hearing this, and the two sides quickly reached an agreement. Just then, a villager rushed over and shouted, "Village chief, look, this was found in the woods!"
"Yang Dong, what are you holding in your hand?" Village Chief Li asked, looking disdainfully at the lumps of mud Yang Dong was holding.
Yang Dong chuckled and said, "Village chief, we found this on the slope over there in the woods. Nobody recognizes it..."
Villagers rarely go to the slope over the woods. Today, when Du Bo was cutting down trees, he accidentally pulled up a string of clods of dirt on that slope. No one knew if they could eat them, so they decided to have Yang Dong take them back to the village to ask the village chief.
Whether or not clods of dirt are edible can be determined by letting the chickens at home try them. If they are, then the villagers will have another food source. If they are not, then at worst, they will just lose an old hen.
In order not to betray the villagers' trust, Village Chief Li decided to offer up his old hen. He gritted his teeth and ordered in a deep voice, "Old woman, go wash two clods of dirt, cook them, and feed them to the chicken."
When Zhu heard that her old hen was to be used for tasting, she immediately became unhappy. While washing the clods of dirt, she cursed and said, "You old fool, don't even think about ruining my chicken. You can eat the dirt clods yourself after you've cooked them."
"Okay, okay, okay, I'll eat, I'll eat," after many years of marriage, Village Chief Li knew all too well that Zhu was stubborn on the outside but soft on the inside, so he coaxed her gently.
Wen Yuxia, who was watching the play from the sidelines, didn't recognize what the clods of dirt were at first. After Zhu washed them clean, she recognized them as potatoes.
Oh, the wild potatoes from the Great Xia Dynasty are a tiny bit bigger than pigeon eggs, no wonder she didn't recognize them.
"Village Chief Li, this stuff is edible. I've eaten it before. You can boil it, stir-fry it, or braise it, but you can't eat it raw. There's a lot of it on the mountains back home..." Wen Yuxia said excitedly.
"Edible?" Village Chief Li rubbed his somewhat listless old eyes, picked up the washed potatoes, looked at them, and smelled them, his mind replaying Wen Yuxia's earlier comments about potatoes.
Raw potatoes are poisonous and must be cooked before consumption. Potatoes yield more per acre than wheat and rice, and can be planted in sandy and sloping soils. One potato can be cut into several pieces for seed.
Yang Dong brought back more than ten potatoes. Village Chief Li asked Zhu to wash them all and put them in a pot to boil. Everyone watched Zhu quietly as she busied herself in the kitchen.
Fifteen minutes later, Zhu came out carrying a small bowl of potatoes. Village Chief Li said cautiously, "Let's try feeding them to the chickens first."
Wen Yuxia walked forward with a grin, grabbed a few hot potatoes, popped one into her mouth, and then handed the other two to Bei San and Bei Si.
Village Chief Li didn't dare to breathe loudly, his cloudy old eyes fixed on Wen Yuxia and her two servants, fearing something might happen to them.
A quarter of an hour later, Wen Yuxia and her two servants were still standing unharmed before him. Village Chief Li finally breathed a sigh of relief and said in a light tone:
“Yes, they’re edible. Yang Dong, take some over and let everyone try them. We’re not cutting down trees today; we’re going to dig potatoes on the hillside. Tell everyone that no one is allowed to keep any potatoes; they’re all to be given to me.”
Wen Yuxia said that wild potatoes are small, while cultivated potatoes are large, and potatoes grown in sandy soil taste better. There is a lot of sandy soil along the river in Nanping Village, so Village Chief Li had the idea of growing potatoes.
"Miss Wen, could you teach us how to plant potatoes?" Village Chief Li asked tentatively.
Wen Yuxia said calmly, "Okay."
She muttered to herself, "The Great Xia Dynasty doesn't have potatoes or sweet potatoes. I've had sweet potatoes planted on the estate for several years now, but I haven't found a suitable opportunity to announce them to the public."
Potatoes have been discovered in Nanping Village. Alternatively, she could persuade Village Chief Li to report the discovery of the new grain crop in Nanping Village to higher authorities. This way, the sweet potatoes she has would also be reported without attracting attention.
Thinking of this, Wen Yuxia continued, "The potato growing cycle is about five months. Our southern climate is warm, so we can start breeding now and harvest it next March."
In my past life, in warm climates like Guangdong and Hainan, potatoes could be planted after the autumn rice harvest.
The area where she was now experiencing a mild winter, and seeing that the potatoes Zhu had washed were showing signs of sprouting, Wen Yuxia dared to say that potatoes could be grown now.
Upon hearing this, Village Chief Li looked at Wen Yuxia with some disbelief. He couldn't accept the idea of planting potatoes in winter and harvesting them the following spring and autumn.
“Miss Wen, I’ll put the potatoes in the cellar for now, and I’ll ask you to come and give me your guidance next spring,” Village Chief Li said, not wanting the hard-earned potato seeds to go to waste.