Republic of China: Guandong Ginseng King

Chapter 257: Root Lock and Grasping
After the Mid-Autumn Festival, Xiaogensuo will be exactly one year old.

The full moon, hundred days, and first birthday are all relatively important days, and people who pay attention to details will celebrate them.

Gensuo is the eldest son of the Qu family. Qu Shaoyang and Chen Xiuyun both attach great importance to their son's first birthday, so they agreed in advance to hold a first birthday party for the child.

So, on August 16th, Chen Xiuyun had a banquet prepared and invited relatives and friends to celebrate together.

It was the autumn harvest time and the men were busy harvesting the fields.

Besides, the child is one year old, so most families have arranged for the female relatives to come.

Among them, of course, there was Old Zhou’s wife, Yang. She did not bring her daughter-in-law, but her niece Qionghua from her natal family.

After such a long period of contact, Qu Jiang and Qiong Hua have already developed feelings for each other.

But Qu Jiang was too honest and was too embarrassed to speak to Qu Shaoyang.

In addition, the family is too busy with the recent autumn harvest and cannot take care of these things, so the marriage of the two has not yet been decided.

Chen Xiuyun and Lin Ruolan had been observing Qionghua for a long time and were sure that this girl was indeed good.

He is a very honest person, without any ulterior motives, and he does things seriously and steadily.

She is never vague about the things you tell her to do and is a good girl who knows how to live.

As a junior, Chen Xiuyun was not in a position to speak up about this matter, so Lin Ruolan took advantage of the time when others were chatting to pull Old Zhou's wife aside.

“Sister-in-law, I’ve been too busy with the autumn harvest recently and can’t take care of anything else.

Go and tell Qionghua's family later, and when the land is harvested, we will hire a matchmaker to propose marriage."

This is exactly what Old Zhou's wife was waiting for. When she heard Lin Ruolan say this, she clapped her thigh with joy.

"Oh, sister-in-law, I'm just waiting for a letter from your family. Then it's settled."

"Don't worry, I'll be the one to arrange the marriage, and I guarantee it will go well." Lin Ruolan responded with a smile.

There were so many visitors that Lin Ruolan couldn't keep chatting with Old Zhou's wife. After the two of them whispered for a few words, Lin Ruolan went to talk to someone else.

The guests arrived one after another, and everyone gathered together, waiting for Xiaogensuo's one-year-old birthday ceremony.

Li spread a red blanket on the kang, and placed some books, pens, inkstones, abacus, scales, gold ingots, seals, wooden swords, wooden guns, green onions, rulers and other items on it. Chen Xiuyun motioned her son to grab them.

Xiao Gensuo didn't dare to let go, so he crawled on the kang.

It crawled to the edge of the blanket and stopped moving, its big round eyes constantly looking at the things in front of it.

"Son, go catch them quickly. See what you like and catch it." Chen Xiuyun urged from the side.

No matter how his mother urged him, Gensuo just lay there and watched.

I don't know how long he looked at it. It seemed that he looked at all the things in front of him several times. Then he made up his mind and crawled quickly towards what he wanted.

Gensuo first picked up a wooden pistol, which Qu Shaoyang had carved specially for his son when he had nothing to do.

With the gun in hand, Gensuo grinned with joy. He turned his head to look at other things and picked up another book.

After thinking for a while, it seemed that it was not enough. Just then he saw a bronze seal. Gensuo crawled towards the seal and picked it up.

Then, the little guy sat down in the middle of the red carpet, holding a gun in his left hand and a book in his right hand, with the copper seal in the front pocket of his blouse, and started playing there.

It didn't even look at other things, and instead used its little feet to kick away anything that was in the way.

"Oh my god, this kid has a gun, a book, and is holding a seal. What is he going to do in the future?"

Li and others looked on in amazement.

When other children do the "Zhuazhou" ceremony, they grab one or two things at most. But this kid is different. He grabbed three things. What does this mean?
"Sister-in-law, is there anything else to say? In the future, this child will definitely be like his father, talented in both civil and military affairs, and a good candidate for an official position." Old Zhou's wife spoke first.

Others followed suit, praising the child. The Zhou-Zhua ceremony is just a ritual, with an auspicious meaning and good wishes for the child.

As for what the child will be like in the future, it depends on the education and training he gets after birth. How can it be determined by a one-year-old child grabbing a few things?
Anyway, the ceremony of grasping the week was quite successful.

Li took away all the other things except those three, and locked them up tightly so that no one could touch them, and simply left them for him to play with.

After the ceremony of grasping the first birthday was over, the banquet was ready in the kitchen, so Chen Xiuyun invited everyone to sit in the front hall.

Li put a piece of clothes on Gensuo and carried him to the front yard.

The Qu family's banquet was naturally extremely sumptuous. Everyone ate and drank happily and then left in the afternoon.

After the guests had left, Lin Ruolan called Qu Shaoyang and his wife over and talked about the marriage of Qu Jiang and Qionghua.

“I have observed that girl for some time, and she is indeed quite good.

Your third brother is not young anymore, so hurry up and let him get married and settle down.

You don't have many close friends here, this is your brother, you have to take good care of his marriage." Lin Ruolan instructed Qu Shaoyang.

Qu Shaoyang followed his master's wife's instructions and went to find his third brother Qu Jiang to ask what Qu Jiang thought.

What can Qu Jiang say? He was ostracized by his brothers in his hometown and couldn't find a wife, so he came to the Northeast.

Now that I have a girl who shares my feelings with me, naturally I want to settle down as soon as possible.

Qu Jiang only has Qu Shaoyang as a relative here, so naturally everything is arranged by Qu Shaoyang.

So the two of them discussed it and decided to ask a matchmaker to propose marriage after the autumn harvest, and get the wedding done in the winter or twelfth month.

After Qu Jiang got married, they didn’t have to move out. They could just be given a small courtyard of their own.

Nowadays, brothers should stick together and work together to live a good life. They should not separate easily.

September has arrived in a busy month. The crops in the fields have been harvested, and the flour mills and wineries have started operations one after another.

Over at the gold factory and the mountain field, the frames of the large wooden houses have already been built.

As long as the walls inside and outside are covered with mud, a kang is built and a stove is set up in the house, people can be arranged to move in.

Through the big pillar, Qu Shaoyang found his old friends from the mountain field.

Li Changliang, Dalin, Ermaozi, Lao Cui and others were very happy when they heard that Qu Shaoyang had become the inspector of the Yalu River and opened a mountain farm.

So they each brought some familiar wooden handles to join them. There were sixty or seventy of them alone.

In addition to those recruited by Xingye from other places, there are also local people from Maoershan who want to find work to spend the winter.

Counting all the people together, there are nearly two hundred people, a real big mountain field.

It is not easy to manage such a large mountain area.

Qu Shaoyang hired Li Changliang as the second counter manager, Dazhuizi as the head of the counter, Dalin as the second head of the counter, Lao Cui as the sled manager and Ermaozi as the trough manager.

The so-called sled head is the person who is specifically responsible for pulling the sled in the forest.

The mountain farm is close to Maoer Mountain, and most of the people we found locally have livestock such as cattle and horses at home.

In order to make more money, these people would bring cattle and horses into the mountains and use the livestock to collect wood.

In this way, manpower is saved and work is done faster. Those who bring livestock into the mountains to work are called "taohu".

The sleigh head is the person who manages all the sleighs and livestock, and it is not an easy job.

(End of this chapter)