From Robinson Crusoe

The Zuo Zhuan says that the most important affairs of a country are sacrifices and warfare.

The ancients believed that war and sacrifice were etiquette for interacting with gods and were related to destiny.

In that backward era, grand festivals were not only a worship of ghosts and gods, but also a means to unite the people and establish national spirit.

The so-called family and country feelings and sense of identity were gradually formed and perfected in the grand sacrifices, etiquette and spiritual heritage passed down by saints and philosophers.

In fact, modern society no longer attaches as much importance to sacrifice as in ancient times, but this does not affect Chen Zhou's knowledge of the importance of sacrifice.

Perhaps he had many evil thoughts in his mind before he began the worship.

But once the preset sacrificial process began, they moved forward accompanied by loud gunshots and the sound of metal friction from armor on their bodies.

As the heavy temple door was pushed open, the bright image of the mighty god shrouded in the intersection of light and darkness appeared. Even he, a staunch atheist, couldn't help but fall into the solemn atmosphere and became silent and serious.

The silence lasted until the two natives followed him back to the cave and he broke it.

……

"You can go and finish your work for today."

Wearing the iron pagoda to go back and forth to the cave, Chen Zhou felt stuffy even though he set out in the early morning, which was not the hottest time of the day.

He took off his helmet, said something hurriedly, and then he couldn't wait to return to the cave to change into his daily clothes.

……

The two natives were inexplicably awakened, inexplicably participated in a sacrifice, worshipped a god they had never worshipped before, and inexplicably returned to their cabin.

They thought they were about to face a brutal war, and they were still a little dazed until Chen Zhou told them to do the work on their own.

Watching Chen Zhou walking back to the cave with heavy steps, Duodu Lu scratched his head and gently touched Atun beside him.

"You said, after dinner last night, we went to worship the gods today. Are these two things actually one and the same?"

Ah Tuan shook his head, pushed open the door of the wooden house, and hurried to change his unwashed old clothes.

“I don’t know, Dodoru.

But I’m really scared…”

The comfortable life, abundant food, and kind gods, these luxuries he had never possessed have made him dependent on life here.

If possible, Atun hopes to live a peaceful life here all his life, farming his land and raising his sheep.

Of course, it would be nice to have a party like the one last night occasionally.

The God taught them a very important truth:

Many things can be mastered through learning and imitation, whether it is farming or herding.

Ah Tuan believed that as long as he worked hard, sooner or later he would be able to cook a meal like the one he made last night.

……

When Chen Zhou returned to the cave, he was still not sure whether the sacrifice was successful or not. He only knew that as a priest, he was very tired.

The leather lining inside the iron pagoda was wet with sweat, and as the temperature rose, it emitted a strong smell of sour sweat.

"Looks like we need to wash these leather linings.

But leather products are not easy to clean directly with water, so you can only use some detergent and white wine to scrub them, which is really troublesome."

After hanging the armor on the armor rack, Chen Zhou deliberately opened the window to allow the "marinated" iron pagoda to ventilate and dissipate the smell.

……

After the natives were able to help him share most of the chores, he did have more time, but he could also feel that each day was not as fulfilling as before.

Once a person's body is idle, he or she will involuntarily use the brain to think about the future or look back on the past.

The so-called sadness about spring and autumn is mostly caused by too much idleness.

Chen Zhou is not afraid of being idle. No one would think that not having to work is a burden.

He was just afraid that he would think too much and start to miss modern life.

He had only been on the island for more than two years, but he already began to miss modern life. The next twenty years or so would drive him crazy.

……

Now that the tedious and repetitive work is done by someone else, he is free and no longer bound between the fields and the sheep.

After thinking it over, he felt that this freedom was not for him to lie at home all day, waiting for the crops to mature, and then eating and drinking to his heart's content for the rest of the time.

Instead, it allows him to arrange his work and rest time more casually according to his own interests, thereby improving his productivity and quality of life in a more efficient way.

……

However, Chen Zhou feels that the most important issue that needs to be addressed right now is the education of the indigenous people.

He plans to compile a practical textbook specifically for the indigenous people.

The content of this textbook includes the names of common animals and plants on the island, natural creations, and the pronunciation and writing of words such as mountains, rivers, wind, rain, sun and moon.

Some advanced knowledge on farming and animal husbandry will also be written in this book.

For example, knowledge about crop rotation, livestock breeding, preventing inbreeding and sheep castration, and even how to set traps based on the traces left by prey and how to use live traps to capture wild goats.

The purpose of compiling this textbook is not to cultivate so-called literary literacy or to enable the indigenous people to possess Chinese-style aesthetics and universal values.

It was just to turn the indigenous people into qualified laborers so that he could delegate power in the future and push out all matters involving mechanical and physical labor that required a lot of time and energy.

When he has enough personal time, he plans to design and build a windmill and a waterwheel so that the natives can more easily convert ripe crops into food.

In this regard, the small black box that can produce anthracite is undoubtedly a great help.

Pure wooden windmills and waterwheels are not wear-resistant, and easily damaged parts must be replaced frequently after a short period of use.

If you want it to be durable, you have to add metal parts.

There were quite a few scrap metals brought down from the ship. Some of the larger metals weighed as much as forty or fifty kilograms. They were cut into small pieces of metal that were easy to handle using the super-time and space cutting method, and then forged or melted.

The main reason why forging metal objects had not been attempted before was that the burning temperature of firewood was not high enough.

Moreover, Chen Zhou was overwhelmed with trivial matters and the island was disturbed by the rainy season. He could not spare time to build a charcoal kiln, nor could he try to forge iron products according to his needs.

Affected by various factors, as of January 1662, 1, Chen Zhou had not even built the necessary facilities such as anvils, bellows, and forges specifically used for forging metal tools, let alone the first hand-forged iron tool.

……

There is still one and a half months left before the rainy season arrives.

Chen Zhou thought that he should make good use of this time and build a charcoal kiln not far from the cave.

The coal production of the Little Black Box is too low. From September 1661, 9 to today, it has produced only 20 pieces of anthracite, totaling 103 kilograms.

He is a self-aware man. He knows that the metal forging procedures he has mastered from watching forging programs are only theoretical. If he really wants to put them into practice, he may have to go through hundreds of attempts before he can successfully forge a kitchen knife.

In this process of continuous trial and learning, the fuel consumed is definitely far more than the figure of 721 pounds.

It is best to first practice your skills with ordinary charcoal, and then use precious anthracite to forge metal tools after you have a certain success rate and are confident in your craftsmanship. Moreover, anthracite has many advantages that cannot be replaced by charcoal.

For example, anthracite has excellent high-temperature performance and its combustion temperature can reach over 1200°, while the upper temperature limit of charcoal is only around 1000°, which is difficult to meet the forging requirements of materials such as high-carbon steel.

For example, anthracite has stable combustion efficiency, continuous heat output, and does not require frequent fuel addition.

The stable release of heat is conducive to maintaining the furnace temperature and avoiding uneven internal stress of the metal caused by temperature fluctuations.

If higher requirements are required for forging metal tools, charcoal will never be as good as anthracite.

……

While thinking, Chen Zhou walked out of the cave and went to the yard to clean up the leftover dishes from last night.

The key to eating seafood dishes is their freshness. If you eat them overnight, the taste will be several levels worse.

The harvest from fishing was enough to feed the three of them, and fresh seafood was always available. Chen Zhou himself didn't actually want to eat the leftover fish and shrimp.

But when he saw the two natives eating last night, he felt that they quite liked Chinese food soaked in seasonings, so he took out a layered wooden box, put the dishes he didn't eat into it, and prepared to send it to the two natives later.

In addition to the dishes, there were also a lot of fruit platters and dumplings stuffed with lamb and green onions left.

Chen Zhou felt that he could not finish all the dishes, so he simply picked out some of each type, put them in two large wooden boxes, and placed them side by side at the gate of the courtyard.

"Delivering meals doesn't seem like a leader's job, so let them come and get it themselves."

……

Not long after, Chen Zhou finished cleaning up the mess and was about to go out to dig some white mud to make more white mud boards or select a site for building a charcoal kiln, but when he reached the door and saw two wooden boxes, he suddenly stopped.

“I don’t know what day the Lunar New Year falls on, so I’ll just celebrate New Year’s Day.

Those two guys had a big meal last night and were scared to death this morning. They probably still haven’t figured out what the New Year and other festivals are.

Since I have already given them two boxes of food, I, as a boss, cannot be too stingy. I might as well give them each a gift to make them happy..."

Thinking of this, Chen Zhou returned to the cave, walked into the storage room, and started to choose a suitable gift.

His first thought was to choose two of the useless mysterious rewards and give them to the natives.

Since the second anniversary gift package, he has received six mysterious rewards.

Among them is a blue and white Pixiu tea pet, laundry detergent, a multifunctional fire hammer, a stainless steel supermarket shopping cart, a set of whetstones with mesh sizes ranging from 1000 to 8000, and his iron pagoda armor.

Except for the tea pets and shopping cart, everything here is useful.

But the tea pets are made with fine craftsmanship and have a simple and cute appearance, so he is reluctant to give them away.

The shopping cart can be disassembled into parts and put in his hands, which is far more useful than giving it to the natives, and it cannot be delivered.

Looking back further, giving things like e-cigarettes to the indigenous people would definitely do more harm than good. If the indigenous people were trained to become smokers, they would suffer in the future.

Although metal nunchakus are weapons, the natives probably wouldn't know how to swing them without being taught. They might get themselves bruised and battered, and it would delay their work.

As for lipstick, purple clay tea sets, wooden metronomes, shoe horns, electronic wooden fish and mobile phone cases, some of them are not decent gifts, but some may come in handy.

……

Opening the boxes one by one and seeing the modern products one by one, Chen Zhou felt reluctant to take out any of them.

“Forget it, forget it. When I go out later, I’ll go to the camp at the foot of the mountain and get these two guys some glass beads and two ceramic dolls.

Anyway, they are all things they can’t make, so there is no difference.”

"But they work so hard for me every day without asking for a dime in wages, and even helped me clean up last night. It's really a bit too much for me to just give them a few broken glass beads."

With a turn of his eyes, Chen Zhou remembered the box of canned food that he had not finished eating.

"How about giving each of them a can?
Let them taste real modern cuisine.”

……

After completing the work of looking after the farmland step by step, the studious Ah Tuan returned to the wooden house, took out his white clay board, and began to silently review the pinyin he had learned yesterday.

Dodulu was making a fire and cooking outside the house. The two of them had already discussed that each of them would take turns cooking for a day. The other could learn more knowledge while his companion was cooking, and then teach his companion in the evening. This way, they could learn the language of "God" faster.

Communicating with God is a special ability that only priests have. Now that both of them have the opportunity to master this ability, they naturally dare not slack off.

……

The bonfire had been lit, and just as they were about to hang a clay pot half filled with water over the fire, the two natives heard a call from the direction of the cave.

Chen Zhou's orders are above all else.

Atun immediately put down the white clay board and followed Duodulu to the gate of the courtyard.

When the two arrived at the door, they were greeted by Chen Zhou's smiling face and two large wooden boxes placed at his feet.

"These two boxes of food are yours. You don't have to cook for lunch or dinner today. Just eat these leftovers!"

As he spoke, Chen Zhou opened the lids of two wooden boxes and showed the natives the food on the plates inside the boxes, indicating that it was a gift for them.

Before the two natives could kneel down to express their gratitude, he took out two small jars with a metallic luster from his back like a magician.

"This is for you too. Take the box and I'll teach you how to use it."

……

Soon, the two natives sat down obediently by the campfire, staring at the small jar in Chen Zhou's hand and watching his demonstration carefully.

"Look, this little jar can be used to hold water, and it's very light."

Chen Zhou held the empty can and gestured with it, demonstrating the advantages of the small can with actions and words.

“You can put it directly in your arms, and it is not afraid of fire. With the flint and this pot, you can make a fire and cook wherever you go.

Just like this…”

As he spoke, he picked up a few stones, arranged them into a simple stove, put some water in a small jar, took out a dried fish and threw it into the water, placed the can containing water and fish on the stove, and added two pieces of firewood.

“It won’t be long before the fish is ready to be cooked and eaten.

And it can not only cook fish, but also boil water, which is very convenient.

Set aside after the water boils.

Like this, you can drink it after it cools down, do you understand?"

……

The function of canning jars is almost the same as that of ceramic pots. The only advantages they have are portability and more novel materials and shapes.

The two natives had mastered the use of clay pots, so naturally they quickly figured out how to use the cans. They looked at their gifts with joy, their faces filled with happiness that was hard to conceal.

They were so happy that they never imagined that the gift Chen Zhou originally gave them was not just this metal can.

What's more important is what's inside the jar.

However, this generous "god" whom they respected was driven by greed at the last moment and gave up sending them the unopened canned food. He changed his mind and embezzled the food that originally belonged to them. (End of this chapter)