Lin'an Never Night

Chapter 17: Yingge changes hairpin into hat

"The Jin dynasty sent an envoy to Lin'an to celebrate the 'Tian Shen Festival'."

When Yang Yuan saw the title, he became excited and started reading it carefully.

On April 26, Wanyan Quxing, the young prince of the Jin Dynasty, went on a diplomatic mission to the Song Dynasty to congratulate the Song Dynasty on its "Tian Shen Festival".

Since the standard of the envoys sent by the Jin Kingdom this year is particularly high, in previous years they would send an official from the Ministry of Rites.

But this year the team was led by a prince, so the tabloids made a big fuss about the news and put it on the front page with very detailed content.

The tabloid not only contained detailed information about the main members of the Jin Dynasty delegation, but also included information about the family background of Jin envoy Wanyan Jun and the current status of his family in the Jin Dynasty.
The newspapers mentioned some rumors about Wanyan Quxing's family and the warm hospitality they received in the Song Dynasty.

Moreover, it is vivid and colorful. After all, it is not a court bulletin, so the content is much more light-hearted.

Yang Yuan read the news carefully several times, and there was no mention of Ugun Yingge in it.

I think she only came to the Song Dynasty as Wanyan Quxing's fiancée and was not considered a formal member of the Jin Dynasty's official delegation, so she was not mentioned in the newspaper.

Yang Yuan picked up a piece of Dingsheng cake and chewed it slowly, digesting the information he had learned from the tabloids, and gradually formed a judgment in his mind.

Wanyan Yong's faction and the Ugurun clan were the targets of suppression by the Jin Emperor Wanyan Liang, so the two families decided to marry.

Once the two forces combine, Wanyan Liang will have to be cautious when taking action again.

In this case, it is difficult for external forces to destroy the marriage between the two parties because it is no longer a matter between a man and a woman.

To put it bluntly, even if Wugu Lun Yingge really cheated on Wanyan Quxing yesterday, I'm afraid Wanyan Quxing's family would not prevent the two families from getting married.

For the sake of family interests, personal interests can be sacrificed.

In such a large family, this is the life of women, and it is the same for men.
Therefore, it is necessary to find a political reason for both parties to take the initiative to cut off the possible marriage.

This reason is actually not difficult to find. All we have to do is move the purpose of the marriage between Wanyan Quxing's family and Ugulun's family from the backstage to the stage.

Even though the Jin Emperor Wanyan Liang was overbearing, he could not stop the two parties from getting married without reason.

But if the purpose of the marriage between the two parties was to counter the Jin Emperor Wanyan Liang, and this purpose was made public so that everyone knew about it?
A smile appeared on Yang Yuan's lips. Grasping the key and solving problems one by one made him feel more relaxed than conquering a beautiful woman.

He repeatedly pondered the feasibility of this plan, but he could not work out some details at this time because the information he had was very limited and he needed to learn more from Ugun Yingge.

So Yang Yuan put the matter aside for the time being, relaxed, and browsed casually.

On March 12, the people of Huaibei and Huainan suffered from floods last year and have just resumed farming this year, so their rent and taxes were exempted. In addition, the silk money for Pingjiang Prefecture was exempted for three years.

On March 21, the government distributed medical books to the welfare bureaus in each state.

On March 23rd, hail fell, and the taxes that had been in arrears for many years for households in Jiangsu, Zhejiang, Jinghu and other places were exempted.

On April 17, money was allocated to the Dali Temple, the three yamen, and the prefectures and counties to be used for the treatment of sick prisoners with mixed medicines.

Tsk! They are quite humane to the prisoners.

Yang Yuan sighed lightly and continued reading.

On April 23, there were military bandits in Qianzhou who plotted rebellion. A total of nine people, including Wang Tianguang, were publicly executed.

Seeing this, Yang Yuan chuckled.

Having come to the Song Dynasty for more than a year, Yang Yuan has already understood the reason for the frequent "rebellions" in the Song Dynasty.

The Song Dynasty defined rebellion in a very broad manner:
Three or five soldiers rebelled against the barracks, that was a rebellion; eight or nine bandits robbed the road, that was a rebellion; a dozen craftsmen surrounded the county government office to demand wages, that was also a rebellion...

It was probably because the State of Song was too lenient towards officials of scholar-official origin, and once a rebellion occurred in a local area, the local officials were rarely held accountable.

On the contrary, they were most active in the subsequent policies of pacifying the people. Therefore, when local officials reported that someone was rebelling, they would not be punished too much or even not punished at all, but they could take the opportunity to ask for a large sum of money for pacifying the rebels.

Even if no money or grain is allocated, there is still reason to apply for tax reduction or exemption next year.

In this way, local officials can not only maintain their reputation and gain a good reputation, but also "benefit the people" and enrich the local treasury. When he leaves office, it will be a natural thing for him to get a Wanmin Umbrella or something.

This way, everyone will be happy, so naturally everyone will be keen on reporting the rebellion.

Anyway, it was the interests of the imperial court that were damaged, and his personal future was achieved.

The result was that rebellions in the Song Dynasty occurred one after another.

Of course there were real rebellions, but there were even more exaggerated ones.

As a result, there were countless rebellions, both true and false. Yang Yuan had only been in the Song Dynasty for a year, but he had already heard of many of them.

If we use their strict standards, there were 102 riots of varying sizes in southern Jiangxi alone during the Ming Dynasty. If all of them were counted as rebellions, how many such riots were there across the country?

At this time, the tea doctor came to serve him tea.

A waiter pushed a tea cart and brought it to his seat.

There was a clay stove on the tea cart with a blazing charcoal fire in it, and an iron kettle on top.

There is a chopping board next to the clay stove, on which are various tea-making tools.

A pretty and quiet female tea doctor followed beside them. After the waiter left, the tea doctor started to get busy.

In the Song Dynasty, all industries were developed, and there were many occupations that women could engage in.

Cook, boat girl, tea doctor, needlewoman, embroiderer, waitress, Kabuki etc...

In particular, many wealthy families would keep Kabuki performers, and the income from them was particularly high.

For example, Xin Qiji's family had eleven singing girls and thirty-six dancing girls.

These Kabuki girls are not concubines, they really only sell their art but not their bodies.

Of course, people working in the entertainment industry face too many temptations, and few of them can remain chaste.

But that is a lover relationship established with a satisfactory customer only when both parties are in love with each other.

Therefore, women had a high social status in the Song Dynasty. Some families that favored boys over girls mostly considered the inheritance of the family line, and rarely did so because having a daughter would be a burden.

In the Song Dynasty, especially in Lin'an, drowning of baby girls was extremely rare. Many families even preferred to have daughters rather than sons.

The female tea doctor took the tea cake and crushed it into powder with a stone mill. She was about to order tea.

Before the Song Dynasty, the mainstream way of drinking tea was to brew tea, but in the Song Dynasty it became to make tea in small amounts.

The tea-making method used by the brothers Yang Che and Yang Yuan when they practiced martial arts in the courtyard of the Song family snack shop is the same tea-drinking method used in later generations.

However, the method of drinking tea has not yet become a trend, and the roasted loose tea needed for brewing tea is mostly low-quality tea.

This method of making tea, like the method of brewing tea in the Tang Dynasty, involves adding many strange ingredients.

Yang Yuan was afraid that the female tea doctor would put some onions, ginger, garlic or something in his tea to make it difficult to swallow, so he specifically told her to drink "clear tea".

The female tea doctor agreed softly, and Yang Yuan continued reading the newspaper.

Sitting between bamboo curtains and flowers, eating snacks and reading tabloids, with a quiet, pretty and graceful girl beside you, she will go through the process of ordering tea for you with very graceful movements. It costs a lot of money, but it is indeed grand and comfortable enough.

At this time, a young man walked slowly into the teahouse with a little servant.

A waiter came forward and greeted him warmly, but the young man ignored him and just slowly glanced with his almond-shaped eyes, staring at where Yang Yuan was.

Then, his tender red lips slightly opened up, revealing a row of neat white teeth. The ivory folding fan between his fingers spun around and pointed towards the corner where Yang Yuan was.

"I have an appointment."

(End of this chapter)