Southern Ming: A boy soldier at the beginning, supporting the world

Chapter 61 School starts

In this war-torn era, General Cen Danchu, with his extraordinary courage and foresight, quickly organized the night school. That morning, he ordered the entire army to assemble, hold an opening ceremony, and start the first class.

Since Danchu took charge of the Left Guards, the army has gathered more frequently and in a better order, mainly to implement rewards and punishments, training reviews, pre-war agitation, and ideological mobilization...

It was the first time for the Left-wing Association of Supervisors to gather for the purpose of running a school and teaching. All teams were very fresh and gathered in advance.

According to the rules set by Danchu, the teams first competed in singing military songs to see which team sang more in unison and louder:
"Clouds follow the dragon, wind follows the tiger, fame, wealth and honor are all dust and dirt. Looking at China, the people are suffering, and thousands of miles of fertile fields are all barren. Looking at the world, it is full of Tartars, and the incompleteness of heaven can only be repaired by ordinary people..."

Usually, the third team sings the best, followed by the first team, the second team, the musketeers, and the center. The Boy Scouts are small in number and do not participate in the general assembly very often, so they are ranked roughly between the musketeers and the center.

Military songs are trivial, but they represent morale, and morale represents combat effectiveness. This ranking can also roughly reflect the combat effectiveness of each team.

However, this is not always the case. For example, Ferreira's musketeers, which consisted of thirty foreign soldiers, were not as strict as the three cavalry units in normal times, but once they stepped onto the training ground or the battlefield, each member was like a different person.

When Danchu stepped onto the general platform, Feng Lin, the battalion commander of the Central Army, signaled the end of the military song and gave a brief commentary: "Team One was the best in the military song just now, Team Two was second, Team Musketeers was third, and the Central Army was last."

He was a taciturn old soldier from northern Shaanxi, not good at speaking on the battlefield, and his comments were always brief.

According to the custom of the Ming army, matters such as assembling the troops and counting the number of people were the responsibilities of the camp officer of the central army.

Danchu intended to let the officers of each team take turns on duty so that they could get more comprehensive training. Considering that Ferreira was a Portuguese, Danchu also changed a lot of regulations, and this matter has not been finalized yet.

Feng Lin ran towards the platform in small steps and bowed to Dan Chu.

According to the Ming army etiquette, the commander of the central army had to kneel twice and bow once when meeting the commander of the camp. Of course, the kneeling and bowing of the Ming army were not the same as kowtow. Soldiers wore armor and carried weapons, so it was inconvenient to kneel and bow, so they often bent one knee or half a knee to perform the military salute. This etiquette later evolved into the greeting and kowtow of the Qing Dynasty. Sometimes, the Ming army would also use the hand-clasping salute as a military salute.

Danchu was young and admired the Taizhou School. He hated the kneeling ceremony and implemented the hand-clasping ceremony in his own army. This was also supported by the officers of the various teams, especially Ferreira.

Danchu returned the greeting and heard Feng Lin report: "Report to the commander, the entire battalion has assembled. There should be 462 people, but there are 421 people. Thirty-four are on sentry duty, six are sick, and one is a medical worker. Please give your instructions."

Danchu also attached great importance to the system of requesting instructions and reporting. He personally reviewed the reports and sent them to the officers of each team for reference and implementation.

"Sit down!" Dan Chu gave the order, his eyes sharp as he looked around at the soldiers of each team.

"Yes!" Feng Lin obeyed the order, turned around and ran to the front of the entire camp, and ordered: "Sit down!"

The officers of each team sat on the ground in front.

Danchu sat on the chair and said loudly: "My fellow comrades, we are gathered this morning for two main things. First, we will hold the opening ceremony of the enlightenment night school. Second, I will give you the first class."

Most of the soldiers were illiterate and could not understand Mandarin, so Danchu tried his best to make it easy to understand:

"Some people may ask, soldiers fight, not go to school, so what is the point of holding enlightenment night schools in the army? It is of great significance! Back then, our great ancestor was a commoner, so poor that he had to beg for food as a monk, but he was always learning, so that he could defeat the heroes and conquer the world.

"Grandfather Taizu thought it was difficult to study when young, so he ordered the establishment of schools across the country. There are community schools in the countryside and military schools in the garrisons. We run this enlightenment night school, just like the military schools run by the garrisons, which can give soldiers an opportunity to study and make progress.

"Most of us come from poor families and have no chance to go to school since childhood. I am the same. I am an orphan in the standard camp. My parents died early and no one cared about me. Fortunately, Marshal Jiao took pity on us and hired a private school teacher to teach us how to read and write." "The reason why I was able to achieve some military merits and command the Left Association of the Du Biao was that Marshal Jiao gave me the opportunity to read and write."

As soon as these words came out, the soldiers were delighted. In just a few months, Danchu rose from a boy soldier to a deputy general, and all the soldiers in the camp were amazed and envious. He attributed all this to his literacy and to Jiao Lian hiring a tutor for the boy soldiers.

It can be seen that the ancient saying "Books contain golden houses, books contain thousands of bushels of grain, and books contain beautiful women" is true. As long as you study hard, all fame, wealth, luxury, and beautiful women can be obtained from books.

Danchu continued, "There are many benefits to learning to read and write! If you can read, you can better identify flags and understand military orders, which makes you qualified to be a team officer. If you can read more, you can read, understand the national justice, understand why and for whom you are fighting, and the officers and soldiers will be more united.

"In the future, even if you retire, you will have another way out. Even if a soldier with education retires with injuries, it will be easier to arrange a living. For example, you can arrange for him to work as a clerk in the state government, which is enough to support his family.

"Even when looking for a wife, educated soldiers are more popular. If you were a virgin girl, and two families came to propose marriage at the same time, with the same other conditions, one was educated and the other was uneducated. Would you choose the educated one or the uneducated one..."

This statement couldn't be more common. Yu Houji, who was sitting in the audience, also grinned. The governor was really puzzling. He was always reading, like a scholar, but in front of the soldiers he was so approachable and popular. Was he a hero? Was he a tyrant?

The impromptu mobilization had already aroused the soldiers' desire to study. Then, the commander of the central army and the officers of each team came on stage one by one to receive writing brushes, ink, paper and inkstone.

Although the conditions in Guni Pass were remote, Danchu tried his best to ensure that each team received ten sets of pens, ink, paper and inkstone.

Danchu continued, "As you all know, I set up a boy team in Zuoxie and let them study full-time. All parents in the world want their children to be successful, and I am the same. I have very strict requirements and high expectations for the boys.

"When the boys are in class, I often go over to supervise them. If I see any naughty ones who don't study seriously, I will punish them by standing in the corner or by beating them with a stick. You are all veterans now, so it is not convenient for me to punish you.

"However, I'll say this in advance. Opening an enlightenment night school is a major military event. Those with good academic performance will be regarded as having made meritorious contributions on the battlefield and will receive preferential treatment in terms of awards and promotions. Squadrons, sentries, and teams with good overall performance will be regarded as having good combat effectiveness and will gain advantages in evaluation and ranking..."

Since ancient times, soldiers have been evaluated and awarded based on combat in wartime and based on training in peacetime. If we say that soldiers are evaluated based on academic performance, it can probably be said to be Danchu's original idea.

This brought great shock to the soldiers and undoubtedly stimulated their enthusiasm for learning and progress.

After the ceremony, Danchu personally gave the soldiers their first lesson:

"Everyone, we are all soldiers of the Du Biao Zuo Xie. This first lesson is to learn the four words 'Du Biao Zuo Xie'..."

Two bodyguards jointly lifted a wooden board with four characters "Du Biao Zuo Xie" written on it in charcoal.

"The first character, 督, consists of a shu (shu) on top, which means uncle, and a mu (mu) on the bottom, which means eyes. You can understand it this way: your uncle is staring at you, supervising you and urging you to study hard at any time.

"...

"The fourth character is 协 (traditional Chinese: 協). There is a ten on the left, the ten of a cross, and three forces on the right, one force on the top and two forces on the bottom. You can understand it this way. We, a group of ten people, need to work together to defeat the Tartars..."

Traditional Chinese characters are too difficult to learn and teach! If there is a chance in the future, we must popularize simplified Chinese characters!

(End of this chapter)