A Good Landlord in the Tang Dynasty: Starting from the Village Chief

Chapter 770 Self-written Epitaph
Although the Grand Astrologer Fu Yiping had studied books on Yin-Yang numerology throughout his life, he did not believe in them himself.

Ten days off,
Fu Yi's usual practice was to have his servants prepare plenty of hot water so he could enjoy a thorough bath. He was used to bathing every three days and his body every five days, and on his ten-day rest days, he would naturally take a good bath.

Fu Yi, who is 69 years old this year,
She doesn't look old; her hair is still jet black, and she's not thin even when she takes off her clothes.

His rosy complexion and robust physique are inseparable from his daily practice of swordsmanship, which begins at the crack of dawn.

Fu Yi is clean and hygienic. He used to like to use the Medicine King's Daughter Bath Beans, but now he prefers Li Situ's Pomegranate Soap.

It has a good cleaning effect and a refreshing pomegranate flower scent. Whether used for shampooing or bathing, it can effectively remove oil and dirt and even leave a long-lasting fragrance.

The price is similar to that of bath beans like Qianjin Bath Beans.

Bathing and changing clothes.

The afternoon sun was warm.

Fu Yi sat under the north wind on the veranda, basking in the sun, while a maid helped him dry his hair.

It's almost November.

The weather is still so warm.

Fu Yi was deeply worried.

"Go ahead and get busy," he waved away the servants, and had a servant bring over a desk, pen, and ink, and began to annotate Lao Tzu.

Fu Yi's commentary on Laozi is an ancient version.

In the fifth year of the reign of Emperor Gao Wei of the Northern Qi Dynasty, people in Pengcheng opened the tomb of Xiang Yu's concubine and discovered a copy of the "Tao Te Ching". This version of the "Tao Te Ching" was older than the version currently in use.

Over the past few years, he has consulted nine annotated editions and revised them into an ancient version.

His commentary on the ancient version of Laozi preserves many ancient sentences, phrases, and characters.

"My lord, Minister Li has sent a servant with a letter inviting you to a meeting at the Inner Palace."

Fu Yi stopped writing.

After receiving the post,

He sighed deeply, "I am about to die!"

The servants were completely bewildered.

He sat down again. "I'm probably going to die. Bring me some wine."

The servant brought him a gourd of wine, which he opened, tilted his head back and drank it all in one gulp. His face turned red, and he was half-drunk.

He tossed the empty wine gourd aside.
He dipped his brush in ink and began to write on the paper.

"Fu Yi, a man from Qingshan Baiyun, died from drunkenness. Alas!"

The servants looked at this line of text and became even more bewildered.

Fu Yi put down his pen and pointed to the line of text, "This is the epitaph I wrote for myself. Let it be engraved on my tombstone after I die!"

"Ah Lang, why do you suddenly utter such ominous words!"

The servants were terrified.

They couldn't understand why their master, after receiving Li Situ's invitation, said he was going to die and even wrote his own epitaph.

Fu Yi gave a few bitter laughs.

He summoned a maid and said, "Put your hair up and fetch your official robe to change into!"

The servant worried that he was drunk, but he said it was good to be drunk, because then he could speak his mind freely. "If I die," he said, "I'll say I died from drunkenness!"

Fu Yi went out.

He rode his blue mule, laughing heartily, towards the palace.

Taiji Palace
In the Inner Secretariat of the Former Dynasty, Li Yi was reading a book in his private room.

Fu Yi's "Biography of Gao Shi" is a ten-volume book with a total of over 100,000 words, and it is a handwritten copy.

Li Yi has been reading this book lately.
This book is quite interesting. It is a compilation by Fu Yi of the remarks made by anti-Buddhist figures since the Wei and Jin dynasties.

Reading this book is like seeing old man Fu Yi acting as a standard-bearer for Taoism, cheering for Taoism and launching an attack on Buddhism.

Many of the arguments made by anti-Buddhists since the Wei and Jin dynasties in this book are actually quite reasonable, pointing out many real problems with Buddhist monks.

Just like the anti-Buddhist remarks Fu Yi made to Emperors Li Yuan and Li Shimin after the establishment of the Tang Dynasty.

Fu Yi was not only anti-Buddhist, but he also offered many useful suggestions on the national system.

He truly lived up to his reputation, serving under four emperors of the Sui and Tang dynasties and working in officialdom for fifty years.

Unfortunately,
Fu Yi has a bit of an old-fashioned, angry young man vibe.

He cannot tolerate even the slightest imperfection.
Logically speaking, after fifty years in officialdom, he should have reached the rank of Grand Historian, which is at least a fifth-rank official position with a scarlet robe.

Doesn't it mean that if you don't know how to do things, you can't just go straight to the goal?

Even with a purpose and direction, there are still times when things take a detour, and sometimes you may even have to retreat or take a longer route.

Close the book,
Li Yi felt that Fu Yi, like the other characters in his book "The Record of High Knowledge," was actually a man of insight.

However, insightful people are sometimes not necessarily in line with the times.

"Minister, Ma Zhongxian has arrived," the clerk announced.

"please."

Imperial Censor Ma Zhou entered with a smile, bringing afternoon tea snacks.

"Freshly roasted sweet potatoes and boiled tender corn."

"I'll provide sweet potatoes and corn, you provide tea."

Looking at the steaming roasted sweet potatoes and boiled corn, Li Yi smiled and got up to fetch the tea canister. "The gift you brought for your visit is quite unique; I've never encountered anything like it before."

"I dare not bring any expensive snacks when I come here, for fear that people will say I am giving gifts or bribing you."

Li Yi took out a can of Wuyi Mountain rock tea.

A pot of Wuyi rock tea on a winter's day is the most comforting and warming thing. A small red clay charcoal stove...
Burning walnut charcoal, sitting in a silver kettle.

Ma Zhou looked at the glowing red charcoal fire, then glanced at the large charcoal stove in the corner.

"It's almost November, and there's neither wind nor snow."

"Hmm, it seems those people from the Bureau of Astronomy were right after all. A disaster is about to strike," Li Yi remarked.

We don't know how big this disaster will be.

Li Yi selected a set of white porcelain gaiwans produced by Xingjiao in Hebei. The small gaiwans, with a capacity of two and a half ounces of water, are most suitable for brewing rock tea. It is not suitable to use a Yixing teapot for brewing this kind of tea.

The water in the silver kettle was boiling.

Heat the gaiwan with boiling water, then add about seven or eight grams of dry tea leaves. Next, close the lid and pour in boiling water. After closing the lid, quickly drain the tea.
Lift the lid to smell the aroma, then divide the soup and enjoy it.

Watching Li Yi's fluid and graceful movements, Ma Zhou couldn't help but sigh, "In the entire Chang'an city, the most elegant and classy person when it comes to drinking tea is none other than Situ."

He picked up his teacup and took a sip.
Ma Zhou is fond of wine, even to the point of being addicted. He didn't know much about tea before, but since joining Li Yi's staff, he has been in frequent contact with tea and has come into contact with many fine teas. Now he is a tea connoisseur.

"This tea is good; it smells fragrant and tastes sweet. Is it new tea?"

"Yes, this tea is called Wan Gan Hou. It comes from the beautiful Wuyi Mountains and clear waters, a place where streams flow year-round and white clouds appear and disappear. It is harvested and processed when spring thunder rumbles and the rain is as soft as butter."

This tea embodies the harmony and righteousness of heaven and earth, as noble as a king, and has a strong aftertaste.

"Take a can home and drink it later."

Ma Zhou said with a smile, "I feel a little embarrassed to exchange two sweet potatoes and two corns for such good tea."

"It's just a box of tea."

“But your tea is something that money can hardly buy on the market. It costs more than an ounce of gold per ounce of tea.”

"I'm just drinking it myself, not reselling it!" Li Yi likes to drink tea and also likes to give tea as gifts. In fact, the Li family's tea business has been growing larger and larger in recent years.

They not only produce high-end loose tea, but also tea cakes and tea bricks.

In the south, people bought tea mountains and tea gardens, built tea workshops and tea factories, and traded tea by caravans.
Lower-grade brick tea was sold to the surrounding barbarian tribes, while high-grade tea was offered as tribute to the royal family and supplied to nobles.

A tiny leaf has been transformed into a huge industry.

The profit margin is also high.

Many high-end teas are more expensive than their weight in gold. A tael of good tea, after packaging and marketing, can sell for several taels of gold.

Take this new Wan Gan Hou tea, for example. It has a nice name, but it's just a rock tea from Wuyi Mountain.
To tell a good story, Li Yi personally endorsed this tea, and then used scarcity marketing.

It's positioned as a high-end, premium tea from the outset, so that most people can't even get their hands on it.

However, for Li Yi, tea is simply tea.
He was drinking tea that cost several ounces of gold per ounce, but he was eating it with tender corn. "At this time of year, is there still tender corn?"

"Yes, some were harvested late. In previous years, they would definitely be gone by now because of the cold weather. But today it's warm, so some of the late-harvested ones haven't frozen yet."

"How's the investigation into Fu Yi that I asked you to help with going?"

Ma Zhou finished his sweet potato, clapped his hands, picked up his teacup, and took a big gulp. "I investigated the accusation letter you gave me according to its instructions."
Fu Yi became a Taoist priest in his youth. Later, his Taoist temple fell into disrepair and collapsed. He wanted to repair it, but the temple had no money.
Through an introduction, he borrowed money from a nearby Buddhist temple.

However, the Buddhist temple charged extremely high interest rates and deducted money from various sources, leaving Fu Yi with very little actual money. Fu Yi was dissatisfied with this.
The monks at the temple simply refused to lend the money, which led to an argument between Fu Yi and them.

Later, the Taoist temple could not be completed, so he could only wander around.

Later, during the Kaihuang era, he was recruited by Yang Liang, the Prince of Han, under a false pretense.

"What about the accusation in the letter that Fu Yi seized the wife of the Taoist priest Wang Kui?"

Ma Zhou chuckled a few times. "Fu Yi is sixty-nine years old this year. In the first year of the Wude era, he was summoned to the capital by the retired emperor. That was six years ago. How old was he then? Sixty-three!"
His friend Wang Kui was an older Taoist priest, and Wang Kui's wife was over sixty years old at the time.

May I ask Situ,

Sixty-three-year-old Fu Yi received a summons from the new emperor, who appointed him as a sixth-rank official, Assistant Grand Historian. He was to stay temporarily at a friend's house.

How could Fu Yi openly take over Wang Kui's wife, who was over sixty years old, in just a few days, without even trying to hide it from others?

and,

Wang Kui was a Taoist priest, even if he practiced at home. Why would his nephew, a monk, be frequently visiting his house?

"So what's the truth?" Li Yi asked.

"The truth is completely fabricated. Daoist Wang Kui was indeed Fu Yi's friend, but Wang Kui's wife had been bedridden with a disease for six years and had passed away before Fu Yi returned to Chang'an from Fufeng."

Wang Kui did not remarry and had no concubines.

Most importantly, Wang Kui did not have a nephew who had become a monk.

"It is true that the accusation stated that the Grand Astrologer Yu Jian recommended Fu Yi to replace him, and that Fu Yi frequently ostracized Yu Jian after becoming the Grand Astrologer, but these were all disputes arising from differing opinions on internal affairs."

Yu Jian never harbored resentment towards Fu Yi; on the contrary, he repeatedly praised Fu Yi publicly for his straightforwardness.

Ma Zhou sighed, “I asked many of Fu Yi’s former and current colleagues and subordinates, and they all thought that although Fu Yi was somewhat straightforward, even stubborn, he was frank, open and honest.”

These things were exactly as Li Yi had expected, and he wasn't surprised at all.

"Since someone is framing you, then the Censorate should find out who is framing you."

Ma Zhou nodded and accepted the task.

“Binwang, Fu Yi will be coming over to talk to me soon. Do you have any way to persuade this old man to shut up for now, especially to stop using the unusual celestial phenomena to attack Buddhism and cause conflict between Buddhism and Taoism?”

Now is not the time to argue about these things, let's stop stirring up trouble!

Ma Zhou thought for a moment, "I heard that besides liking to study astronomy, calendars, and arithmetic, Fu Yi also likes to drink."

Situ has quite a collection of fine wines. I'll borrow two jars from him, and we can drink and chat; perhaps that will persuade the old man."

"A few jars of wine are no problem. Feel free to take any wine from my cellar!"

Li Yi hoped that Ma Zhou could persuade Fu Yi.

After all, the old man is sixty-nine years old, and what he said was wise advice, though somewhat inappropriate. We shouldn't punish or even demote him for that.

As long as Fu Yi cooperates, Li Yi will be able to continue to hold the position of Grand Historian.

(End of this chapter)