Eldest Sister, Why Haven’t You Married Yet

Chapter 60: Dig a canal

Views:

At noon the next day, not long after the Su family finished their lunch, there was a knock on the door. Young Jin took the handkerchief to dry his hands, and then went forward: "Come on!" He still thought that the person who came here should be Chen Yaren.

Sure enough, standing outside the door was Chen Yaren who had returned from Houjiawan.

When he saw You Jin, he smiled and cupped his hands and said, "Miss Su, this is done." The owner of the 16-acre fertile land in Houjiawan was waiting for the money. Although Young Jin kept the price down, But it was still within his acceptance range, so he reluctantly nodded and agreed: "Only one point, the crops grown in the field must belong to his family, and the land will not be returned to you after the autumn harvest, what do you think?"

You Jin is not the kind of person who wants to count all the money. If you want to come to that family to sell the land before the food is harvested, she must be in a hurry to use the money in a family emergency, right? He nodded in agreement.

Both the buyer and the seller agree, and the deal is done. Youjin went back to the room and took a 100 taels of silver and the other 10 taels of silver came out to Chen Yaren: "And Uncle Lao Chen helped me run this trip and exchanged the red deed to come back."

Chen Yaren didn't expect that the Su family still had a silver note looking at the tattered, and was stunned for a while. Hearing what You Jin said, he hurriedly took the money: "Miss Su, you are being polite, isn't this what we are supposed to do?"

Chen Yaren's work efficiency is also fast, and the red deed was sent to him in the afternoon of the second day, and he also refunded a few taels of fine gold: "Miss Su, the field money is one hundred and forty taels, and the tax for the red deed is exchanged. The fee is one tael or six, and the other person pays you three dollars, and the total is 105,290." Dafeng's custom of buying and selling things is that the buyer and the seller pay one share, like Chen Yaren. This kind of matchmaking sold 16 acres of land, and the sum of the money from the two sides was half a tael of silver.

Youjin smiled and accepted the broken silver and the red deed handed over by Chen Yaren. Seeing that the three characters "Su Youjin" were written upright on the top of the red deed, he squinted his eyes with a smile: "Thank you, Uncle Chen."

Chen Yaren smiled and said, "If Miss Su needs anything in the future, feel free to come to me, and I will naturally try my best to find a good field for the girl at the right price."

You Jin nodded with a smile, and then sent away Chen Yaren.

He put Hongqi on the table in the main room and showed it to everyone in the Su family. Everyone stared at it, as if a flower could be seen above.

Mrs Su swallowed her saliva and asked incredulously, "Have you bought all these 16 acres of land?" When Chen Yaren came to the house, in order to avoid suspicion, Mrs. Su did not show up, but only vaguely knew that her daughter was going to buy it. Land, never thought that she bought 16 acres of land in one go!

Youjin nodded with a smile, then put away the title deed, and said, "Even if our family has no money in the future, we still have more than ten acres of land in our hands, right? There will never be no food, right?" Xiao Qi in his arms no longer has such dry and yellow hair, and said with a smile: "I have to save some dowry for my sisters!"

Hearing what You Jin said, several sisters who didn't know anyone laughed coaxed, but it was Su's surprise that the eldest daughter was paving the way for the future of several children! Remembering that he had not had a single dowry to marry into the Yue family, and that he had been in tight hands for more than ten years, he completely agreed with his daughter's actions: "Don't we still have money in our hands? Should we buy more land?" Su Shi Having grown up in the village all my life, I naturally feel that the land is the most secure. After the eldest daughter said this, I also had the idea of growing more land.

"Mother, we now have 16 acres of fertile land, plus there are four acres of wasteland and several acres of lowland in front of our house!" You Jin said with a smile: "The silver in our hands always needs to find ways to continue to produce silver. You can’t just sit and eat.” Now I still have more than 500 taels of silver in my hand, and I will be able to buy a small shop facing the street in Luohe Prefecture. They are all weak women. .

After hearing what her daughter said, Su Shi no longer expressed any opinions. After all, the money was earned by her daughter, and You Jin can spend it as he wants.

***

As for Xiao Linyu, this time he came to Luohe Prefecture for the purpose of repairing the ancestral tombs, so that he could return home to worship his ancestors next year; and secondly, for the establishment of an inland waterway in Luohe Prefecture. Although the Xiao family did not make a fortune in shipping, they have been involved in inland waterway shipping since Xiao Linyu's father's generation, and now the second uncle of the Xiao family is an official in the Ministry of Households. More to eat. This time Xiao Linyu went to Luohe Prefecture from the north of the capital because there was news in the DPRK that the Sage wanted to connect the inland waterway to Luohe Prefecture, so the Xiao family rushed back to Luohe Prefecture one step ahead.

Now, the widest waterway near the towns of Luohe Prefecture is the Luo River, which is not suitable for inland navigation due to its rapid water flow. There is also Wuliqiao, a river that is only four or five meters wide. Site selection, or digging canals. Before Xiao Linyu came, the second uncle had said that the sage still wanted to dig the river, but the cost of digging the river was quite high, and he had not made a decision for a while, so Xiao Linyu went to Luohe Prefecture for the past ten days, while waiting for a letter from Beijing. , while on the other side is exploring the places near Luohe Prefecture that can open up inland wharfs.

In the Xiao Family Garden, Xiao Linyu read the urgent letter from 800 li in the capital in his hand and read it carefully, then put it on the candle and lit it, with a faint smile on the corner of his mouth, followed by the middle man standing in the middle of the hall. The young man said: "The Holy Master has made up his mind. The second uncle mentioned in the letter that he would dig along the river in the south of Luohe Prefecture. Now the river is only about one zhang, and it is estimated that the excavation will be five or six zhang wide and fifty miles to the south. After receiving it into the canal leading to the capital, in this way, the inland shipping of Luohe Prefecture can be considered as a pass.”

That middle-aged man was one of the Xiao family's right-hand man in business, named Xiao Han, and served by Xiao Linyu's father's side. Help him one or two. After Xiao Han heard the eldest young master's words, he said, "Didn't the second master say that there is a shortage of money in the DPRK, why do you still need to dig a canal?"

"Second uncle said that the Holy Master intends to let private merchants involved in inland shipping to raise funds to build the canal. After the canal is opened and transported, anyone who participates in the construction of the canal with an investment of more than 150,000 taels will be exempted from inland shipping tax for ten years and overseas shipping. Taxation for five years." Xiao Linyu told Xiao Han what was mentioned in Xiao Er's letter: "The annual tax payment for inland shipping is not much, but for overseas shipping, my Xiao family alone has a tax payment of nearly 30,000 yuan a year. Two, in this transaction, there is only profit and no loss."

Although overseas shipping is risky, it can be more profitable. A large part of the Xiao family's income comes from overseas shipping. If the tax on overseas shipping can be reduced or exempted for five years, it will be considerable. Xiao Han said, "The DPRK and China have to pay 150,000 taels in one go, and those small shipping people can't afford it. In this way, we are the only ones who can get a piece of the pie here. An old acquaintance."

Xiao Linyu nodded and said, "Once the news that Luohe Prefecture is going to dig a canal, the price of land along the coast will also rise. Uncle Xiao Han, you have to work harder these two days. You can take it first.” Now the land price outside Luohe Prefecture is not expensive, and if a few taels of silver per mu can be recovered, just waiting for the news of the construction of the canal to spread, it will be dozens of times more expensive.

The Xiao family moved fast, and the other families engaged in inland shipping were not slow, but within three or five days, the fields along both sides of the river outside Luohe Prefecture were all taken into their pockets. The fertile land that used to be only 8 taels of silver per acre has now reached 22 1 acres, and even the four acres of wasteland originally bought by the Young Jin family have now risen to 10 taels of silver per acre. Now Luohe Prefecture City Inside and outside the city, there were rumors that Luohe Prefecture was going to dig a canal, and many of those who had sold their fields earlier beat their chests and felt annoyed. For a time, the entire Luohe Prefecture was caught in a frenzied land purchase turmoil.

***

The Su family is now selling sour plum soup in the city, and such news will naturally not be missed. Today is the seventeenth time that You Jin heard a guest mentioning that the Wuli Bridge is about to dig a canal: "Su family girl. Have you heard that a canal is going to be dug over the Wuli Bridge! If your family had land by the river, you would be able to earn a lot of money!" This time the gossip to Young Jin was a familiar one. The woman probably knew that the Su family lived on the other side of Wuli Bridge.

You Jin smiled and sighed: "If our family had land, now I would wait for others at home with Erlang's legs crossed. Why would we sell sour plum soup under the sun, do you think?"

As soon as the woman heard it, she thought so, and sighed: "Yes, you say that everyone has their own destiny. Who would have thought that those wastelands can now be sold for a dozen taels of silver per mu? If I knew this was the case, I would I asked our head of the family to smash the pot and sell iron to buy a 10 mu or 20 mu." After drinking the sour plum soup, he packed a bamboo tube and took it away, and the woman left with a sigh.

As for Youjin, who "has no land at home", he is very fortunate that after he bought 16 acres of fertile land in Houjiawan some time ago, he bought another 6 acres next to his original wasteland. Ten acres of land. At that time, the news that Luohe Prefecture was going to dig a canal had not yet come out, so Youjin still bought it at a low price of 22 taels per acre, which was really unintentional.

A total of ten companies invested in the construction of the canal. In less than half a month, 1.5 million taels of silver were collected and handed over to the court. The money was enough, and the construction of the canal outside the Wuli Bridge was also on the agenda. It was only after the summer. When the dry season in autumn comes, the canal can be dug.

For businessmen, the construction of the canal is convenient for business, but for the frontier defense of the imperial court, Luohe Prefecture is a fortress north of Dafeng. Once a war breaks out, it takes more than half of the time to transport food and grass by water than by land. Today, although the saint is old, he is also very successful in military affairs. It is imperative to dig the Luohezhou Canal for the sake of Dafeng Wandai Jiangshan.

But ordinary people don't understand this. They only care about whether they can earn money and whether they can feed their stomachs. Naturally, the important affairs of the court have nothing to do with them, such as young gold.