I am Emperor Wanli

Chapter 775: This is what the Ming Dynasty’s prosperous era was like!

Shu Youliang squeezed past the legs of the Taoist priest and the businessman who were sitting there, pressed to the side of the car window, stuck his head out to look hard, and exclaimed in amazement.

"Ah! What a wonderful day it is!"

Many passengers also leaned out of the windows and talked about it.

“Such a long line!”

"It's magnificent. This family has some money."

"It's probably all the help from relatives, friends and neighbors, so everyone can share in the good fortune."

"Oh, the horse the groom rides is tall and mighty, a really good horse."

"Of course the horse you ride for a wedding should be tall and mighty. Are you going to ride a donkey?"

"Don't tell me, in the past, brides were welcomed on donkeys. My father married my mother on a small donkey from Baoding."

"That was in the past. Now the Ming Dynasty is all around Mongolia. The cattle, sheep and horses on the grasslands are pouring into our country like they are free."

"It's just a joke to say you don't want money. The big horse the groom is riding is worth some money. A good horse is always valuable."

"So now the Mongolians outside the borders are living a comfortable life. They have hundreds of sheep at home and can make a lot of money by selling any of them."

"Yes, if I had known that I could live a good life by submitting to the Ming Dynasty, why would I have fought before? Fighting so hard, all for the sake of three meals a day!"

Listening to the passengers' discussions, Marcelo half understood and half confused, and Leon was also dizzy. What was even more troublesome was how to translate these spoken words mixed with a lot of slang, which also contained new terms that Leon did not understand.

It is really difficult to be an interpreter in the Ming Dynasty!

The official Chinese language of the Ming Dynasty is too difficult to learn.

Shu Youliang squeezed back in, and Marcelo was about to ask him when a sharp beeping sound came over, like some kind of horn.

"The suona sounded."

"Suona?"

"Yes, we are a kind of wind instrument. Three years to play the qin and five years to play the xiao, and the erhu will break your waist; a thousand years to play the pipa and ten thousand years to play the zheng, and a lifetime to play the suona."

Marcelo and Leon listened attentively. Although the shrill sound of the suona was piercing and faintly sad, the music it produced was cheerful, warm, and unrestrained, full of joy, like fire and wind.

The public carriage stopped at the intersection. Traffic police wearing navy blue uniforms and orange vests stood at the intersection and stopped the cars on the north-south road to allow the wedding procession to pass.

Walking in the front was the band, wearing a small red-faced, black-bottomed guala hat, a blue gown, and a red belt. They held four suonas tilted toward the sky and played them joyfully.

The people behind were dressed in the same way, and they beat the four drums and two gongs loudly.

The person following closely behind was holding a red-painted wooden sign with four carved patterns on it. Shu Youliang introduced that this was a ceremonial notice board.

The two front sides are inscribed with "Harmony of Heaven and Earth" and "Celebration of the Locusts".

On the back two sides are written "Zhou Family Welcoming the Bride" and "Zhang Family Marrying off a Daughter".

Behind them were people carrying a pole box in pairs. It was a long pole that two people carried on their shoulders, with an open wooden box underneath.

It is 1.8 meters long and 1.2 meters wide, with low edges. Various objects are neatly stacked on it, and the top is covered with a piece of red paper with double happiness printed on it.

Rolls of colorful cotton fabrics, in a variety of bright colors; rolls of silk satin, in bright red, blue and green, with patterns mostly of single flowers of different sizes; beds of thick cotton inner tubes that took up four boxes.
Shu Youliang looked at the items being carried over and tutted his tongue, "That's right, when my daughter gets married in the future, I'll have to collect this much dowry for her."

He pointed at those items and introduced them to Leon and Marcelo: "Those floral fabrics are used to make clothes. They were sent by the bride's parents to make new clothes for the newlyweds. Well, so many floral fabrics are enough for the newlyweds to make three sets of clothes for spring, autumn, summer and winter.

Those thick cloths and silks are used to make bedding and quilt covers, and they are used to match the quilts at the back. "

The next box that came over was piled with lacquered wooden boxes, which looked very exquisite.

"These are the bride's jewelry boxes. The one with a single piece of red wedding paper on the front is the bride's dowry, and the one with two pieces of red wedding paper on the back is the bride price from the husband's family."

"bride price?"

"Yes. It is the gift that the man gives to the woman when she gets married. If the betrothal gift is large, the dowry given by the woman's family will also be large. The betrothal gift can be large, exceeding the dowry. However, the dowry generally cannot exceed the betrothal gift, otherwise outsiders will think that the man is marrying into the woman's family, which is not good."

"Master Shu, it sounds complicated, huh?"

"Yes, the wedding ceremony of the Ming Dynasty cannot be messed up. The three books and six ceremonies can be simplified, but they cannot be omitted."

"Three books and six ceremonies?"

"The three books refer to the engagement letter, the gift letter and the wedding letter. The six ceremonies include accepting the bride's proposal, asking for the bride's name, accepting the bride's good wishes, accepting the bride's betrothal gifts, asking for the date and welcoming the bride.

What we are seeing now is the wedding reception. The previous ceremonies have been completed. Today is the most lively and important step. "

"It's really troublesome for you Ming people to get married."

Shu Youliang glanced at Marcelo and Leon. "Trouble? Life only happens once, how can we not make it grand? Besides, marriage is a major human affair, it is about following the will of heaven and earth, combining yin and yang, and procreating offspring and spreading the family line, so it must be taken seriously."

Marcelo asked curiously, "Master Shu, you Ming people can marry multiple wives. Do you marry each wife like this?"

"Several wives? I want to, but it's just a dream!

Old Ma, let me tell you again, our Ming Dynasty practices monogamy. A man can only marry one wife, called the principal wife, and only she can have such a grand wedding ceremony.

Only the children she gave birth to are called legitimate sons and daughters, the genuine legitimate bloodline, and the rightful heirs to everything in the family.

The rest are called concubines, which means taking in concubines, not marrying them! Therefore, there will not be such a grand wedding ceremony for the main wife, and the children born to concubines are called illegitimate sons and daughters.

Only when there is really no legitimate son in the family can the ancestral hall be opened to report to the ancestors, and the concubine's son will first be adopted by the wife and then become the legitimate son. Then a written document will be submitted to the government, and only then will he have the same inheritance rights as the legitimate son. "

The wife, concubine, legitimate son and illegitimate son.

Marcelo and Leon's heads were buzzing.

Mr. Shu, what you said makes me so confused.

This is the bad thing about civilized countries with a long history. The rituals and customs they have passed down are extremely complex and have their own stories.

At this time, another box was carried over. The object placed on one of them was particularly eye-catching. It was square with a smooth table top, like a small dining table. There was a strange thing on the table, with a metallic luster, like a hen stretching its neck and sticking its head out.

There is an iron frame under the table, and a large round wheel next to it. The whole body exudes the unique cold color of metal. A red cloth wrapped around it suddenly weakens this cold color, making it hot and festive.

"Master Shu, what is this?"

"A sewing machine."

"Sewing machine?"

"Yes, it's a great tool for sewing clothes. Wow, it's actually the Butterfly brand sewing machine from the Lulong Manufacturing Bureau Group. It's a brand name." Leon wanted to continue asking what kind of tool sewing machines were, but Marcelo interrupted, "Lulong Manufacturing Bureau Group?"

"Yes, Daming had two machine manufacturing groups in Luanzhou, the Lulong Manufacturing Bureau Group, which produced mostly small and medium-sized civilian machines, ranging from threshers and rice transplanters to water wheels, sewing machines, and pumps.

Kaiping Manufacturing Group manufactures mostly large machines, from steam engines to port cranes, from marine equipment to forging presses.

In fact, there is another manufacturing bureau group in Luanzhou, that is the Yongping Manufacturing Bureau Group, which is located in Yongping City, which was renamed from Luanzhou City.

It is very powerful, surpassing the Kaiping Manufacturing Bureau.

But it is very low-key because it manufactures important national equipment.

From new steam engines to various machine tools, from secret clocks to hydraulic presses, from instruments and equipment to boilers, people who know the inside story say that the Yongping Manufacturing Bureau is the mother of Ming Dynasty machinery manufacturing.

But Shu Youliang kept it in his heart and did not say it out loud. He had been with Hai Rui for many years and had received long-term confidentiality training, so he still had some awareness of confidentiality.

Marcelo hesitated and asked, "Can I go and see?"

"Haha." Shu Youliang smiled.

It's a good thing for people to have dreams. I'm already married and have children, but I still want to have two concubines like my master.

Seeing Shu Youliang's expression, Marcelo understood what he meant and stopped making trouble for himself.

Leon continued to ask his question: “Master Shu, how does a sewing machine sew clothes?”

Shu Youliang spread his hands and said, "I don't know either.

Although my family also bought a sewing machine, it has always been used by my wife. Most of the clothes I am wearing now, as well as the clothes of all sizes in the house, were made by her using that sewing machine.

But if you ask me how to make clothes with a sewing machine, I can only tell you that it is made that way. "

Mr. Shu, what kind of answer is that?

A passenger standing nearby replied, "I work in a clothing store, and I know something about sewing machines."

Leon's eyes lit up, "Please speak."

"There are many different opinions on when the sewing machine came out. Some say it came out in the first year of the Wanli reign, while others say it was already in the Longqing reign. But everyone knows that the sewing machine was first used in military uniform factories."

"Military uniform factory? A factory that makes uniforms for the army?"

"Yes. It is said that the Shanghai Huangpu Military Uniform Factory was the first to use it, and it was very good.

A skilled tailor can only make one piece of clothing a day even if his hands are smoking. However, with a sewing machine, the process is divided into plate making, cutting, sewing and ironing. Ten people on a production line can produce dozens of clothes a day.

Later, other military uniform factories, including the Tianjin Military Uniform Factory, Liaoyang Military Uniform Factory, and Lulong Military Uniform Factory, all started using sewing machines and new garment-making techniques, and their output increased rapidly.

Sewing machines are also constantly improving. The Butterfly brand sewing machine that this family brought as a dowry should be the third generation. It is twice as effective and very easy to use. It is said that the most powerful Tianjin Military Uniform Factory can produce 6,000 to 7,000 sets of standard spring and autumn uniforms for the navy and army every day.

"Six or seven thousand sets?" Marcelo and Leon were both shocked.

The other passengers turned to look at them.

What's so strange about this? Ever since the emperor led everyone to develop industry and commerce and started the Industrial Revolution, how can a factory that has spent a lot of money to equip itself with advanced machines make money if it doesn't have such high production capacity and efficiency?

The sound of the celebratory instruments outside the car was deafening, and the silence of Marcelo, Leon and others inside the car was also deafening.

The groom wore a bright red embroidered yisha, a gold-painted black gauze hat, and rode on a big horse.

The big horse wore a red silk flower on its head, its bridle was a red cloth strip, and the saddle was covered with red cloth.

The groom riding on it held the reins, looked left and right, and looked very proud.

Behind them was a red sedan chair with embroidery, carried by four people. The bearers wore small hats with flowers on their heads and robes tied with belts. The bearer in the front was singing the lyrics loudly, which was very charming and humorous. He walked along the sidelines, making the people on the street laugh, the men grinning and the women smiling.

At the same time, he and the other three staggered and fell in tacit understanding.

The large sedan chair was shaken up and down and swayed from side to side.

The people watching on the streets cheered and applauded. The helpers of the wedding party quickly took four red envelopes and stuffed them into the arms of the four sedan bearers.

The sedan bearers shouted happily: "May you love each other and grow old together. May you have a son soon and may your family live forever!"

The people around cheered excitedly, and the applause became louder, as if they were welcoming a bride. Some even shouted loudly: "The groom is so handsome!"

The groom riding on the horse bowed proudly towards that side.

Someone else shouted, "Groom, use all your strength tonight!"

The groom's young face was as red as a red lantern, and the people around him smiled even more happily. Even the band in front beat the drums and gongs louder and played the suona brighter.

After the wedding procession passed, the traffic police let the carriage go and it slowly started moving again.

Marcelo and Leon couldn't help but sigh as they watched the wedding procession go by through the car window: "Such a lively and grand wedding procession, is this family an official or a wealthy businessman?"

After hearing Leon's question, Shu Youliang hadn't answered yet, and a passenger sitting next to him replied: "No!"

Shu Youliang turned and looked at him, "Do you know these two families?"

"I know. The Zhou family and I both live in Banzhu Hutong, and the one getting married is the second child of their family.

Their family used to make a living by delivering water. Later, the head of the family went to work at the Beijing Water Plant, and the eldest son joined the Beijing First Construction Company. A few years ago, when the South City was being renovated, he went to work there.

The second child studied at Xicheng Middle School for three years and was admitted to Tianjin Cotton Textile Technical School. He will graduate next year and have a stable job. "

The passenger was quite familiar and told the story in great detail.

"The Zhang family, whose daughter was married off, lived in Huoshen Hutong and made a living by selling tofu. The head of the family was called Tofu Zhang.

It is said that he had a cousin who was serving in the army in Northeast China. When he came home to visit his family, he introduced him to soybeans from the Northeast Agricultural Reclamation Bureau, which were good and cheap. In addition, he had great skills and was famous for selling tofu in Xicheng District. He saved some money and bought a yard with a shop in front and a workshop in the back. His business was getting better and better.

Marcelo couldn't believe it. "Just ordinary people? Can ordinary people in Ming Dynasty arrange such a wedding? With so much dowry and betrothal gifts?"

Leon couldn't believe it. With such a situation and so many items, who could handle it in Europe?
If we only consider the number of people and the pomp, any noble with some strength can do it.

However, these Ming people thought that the dowry items were ordinary, and even the King of Spain, who had huge mines at home, could not put together enough.

More importantly, the heartfelt joy and happiness of the wedding procession and the onlookers are rarely seen in Europe.

After hearing what Leon couldn’t believe, Shu Youliang smiled and raised his head and said, “That’s right.

This is what the Ming Dynasty's peaceful and prosperous era was like! "

(End of this chapter)