As an important town on the canal, Cangzhou has always been one of the most densely populated cities. And according to the statistics of the registered population compiled by Zhang Shou during his time in the Changlu County Government, it shows a smoothly rising curve.
At the beginning of the Ming Dynasty, the population of Hejian Prefecture was 210,000 and the population of Cangzhou was 30,000. Obviously, this was the result of the chaos at the end of the Yuan Dynasty. By the beginning of Emperor Yingzong's reign, the population of Hejian Prefecture was 370,000 and the population of Cangzhou was 60,000. Compared with the population growth rate of the entire Hejian Prefecture, the population of Cangzhou grew faster.
In the tenth year of Yongchen, when the world registered its population again, the population of Cangzhou was 80,000, while the population of Hejian Prefecture barely exceeded 410,000. From this perspective, the population of Cangzhou has indeed been growing steadily at a higher rate. Even though the change of the throne once caused various disturbances in the capital, it did not affect this important canal town.
By the way, in the tenth year of Yongchen, the year when Zhang Shou and Zhu Ying were born, the court re-counted the number of births. That was the first major event personally presided over and implemented by the current emperor. The various messy decrees that the young emperor had made that aroused dissatisfaction among court officials and eventually led the royal family to believe that they could stir up unrest were of course not included.
Although the population of Cangzhou has not been counted again, according to Zhang Shou's speculation, seventeen years have passed. Because the current emperor is the longest-reigning emperor in recent years, there have been no major changes in the government, and there have been occasional wars on the border, but most of them have achieved good results. Therefore, the people of the world have multiplied and the population of the entire Cangzhou, including hidden households, is likely to exceed 100,000.
Of course, it is impossible for all these 100,000 people to live together in Cangzhou city. The three counties under Cangzhou had a registered population of more than 20,000 in the 10th year of Yongping, and now it has exceeded 30,000 at least. In addition, many people have been diverted from various towns and villages, and Cangzhou is a plain area, so there can be a maximum of 40,000 people in Cangzhou city.
If it were placed in an important city in the south, such as Suzhou Prefecture, with a total population of two million and a city population of over half a million, Cangzhou would naturally be an extremely small city. But in the north, a city of thirty to forty thousand people is already considered prosperous.
Therefore, when Zhang Shou found out from Zhu Er that the places to be investigated were Shuishi Street and Washi Back Street - the former was to take advantage of his connections with Lao Xianyu, and the latter was to take advantage of Lao Xi's ability to deal with all kinds of people - he knew that although the two samples assigned to Zhu Er had certain reference significance, he had to wait for Zhang Chen's results to come out before making a final judgment.
But even so, he still asked for specific numbers, and Zhu Er was very happy to show his results.
"There are a lot of people living on the back street of Washi. There are 74 middle-aged men without land or jobs. Most of them are single because they cannot support their families. There are 193 people who make a living by doing odd jobs, including their wives and children, because they also make a living by doing odd jobs. Men work as dock laborers, and women do laundry..."
Zhu Er just wanted to get ahead of Zhang Chen at this moment, so he spoke in a natural and logical manner, and it was obvious that he had put in a lot of effort.
After talking about the back street of Washi, he started talking about Shuishi Street where the shop of Old Salted Fish was located: "Shuishi Street is full of shops. The thirty-two people without land and jobs are mostly beggars sleeping nearby, and some idle people in the market... By the way, my eldest brother just cleaned up a group of them with his ruthless hands, and even killed two of them..."