In the book, I was fed by my sister

Yang Yihe was at a loss for words, but children are easy to fool, so he quickly changed the subject: "What do you think of your family's harvest this year?"

As he walked along, he found that this village seemed unusually wealthy compared to the villages he had passed before.

One third of the houses in the village are covered with tiles, there is almost no wasteland in the fields, and crops are everywhere that are about to be harvested.

And those oxen were grazing leisurely on the grass, as if telling him that this year would be a year of bumper harvest.

However, Li Zi shook his head, his eyes full of worry, "Not good, my mother said that if we still can't grow crops next year, we will have to eat bran."

Rice bran is used to feed livestock, but when food is scarce, people can only use it to cook vegetable leaves to fill their stomachs.

Yang Yihe was in disbelief. He could not imagine that this girl who looked the fattest could no longer afford rice. He asked the other children, "Is it the same in your family?"

"My mother never said that." The other children shook their heads.

"I...my mother also mentioned it." Chuanzi hesitated for a moment, but still said it.

He turned to Li Zi again, "Then do you know why?"

"I don't know." Li Zi's four-year-old brain can only accommodate three meals a day, so how could he know so many adult matters.

"Young people don't know sorrow," Yang Yihe sighed, and turned to look at Li Xuechuan, "Then do you know why?"

Chuanzi scratched his head and replied, "My father said it was because there were too many people in the family."

Yang Yihe asked, "How many people are there in your family?"

Chuanzi counted on his fingers, "My parents, my grandparents, two brothers, an older sister, and I have a younger sister."

Yang Yihe nodded and said with emotion: "That is indeed a large family."

"And more! And more...there are six people in my uncle's family and four people in my uncle's family." Chuanzi continued counting.

Yang Yihe did some calculations in his mind and exclaimed, "So, there are 20 of you in total."

Song Li was listening to this and couldn't help but be surprised. With so many people, just thinking about cooking every day was a headache.

Yang Yihe asked in confusion: "Then why don't you try to reclaim the wasteland? Since there are many people eating, there should be many people working."

Today, the imperial court is vigorously encouraging the reclamation of wasteland and even providing free seeds for people to use.

Li Xuechuan shook his head. "My father said that the amount of food grown on wasteland is pitifully small, and the land is as hard as stone. It's exhausting just to clean up the stones and weeds. Not to mention, if the court makes a mistake in grading the reclaimed wasteland, then all the food that our family has worked so hard to grow all year may have to be used to pay taxes."

After hearing what Li Xuechuan said, Yang Yihe frowned and asked in confusion, "That shouldn't be the case. As far as I know, land reclaimed from wasteland does not need to be taxed within three years. And the classification of land is a very strict matter. How could it be possible that the crops grown are not enough to pay the tax?"

Li Xuechuan curled his lips, "Three years is not enough to maintain the land." He explained, "Our family does have the same size of land, and the grain produced is about the same, but the grain delivered is not the same."

After listening to Li Xuechuan's explanation, Yang Yihe still insisted on his point of view: "This is impossible." He knew very well that the grading of land was related to the livelihood of farmers, and the slightest mistake could cause an uproar.

"It's true! It's true!" The other children also echoed one after another.

Yang Yihe suddenly felt his scalp tingling. He waved his hand, signaling everyone to be quiet: "Let me ask a question. Who among you can speak clearly?"

"Dongmei!" Li Rongrong pushed Dongmei out. She spoke impatiently, and Li Zi, Miaozhen, and Song Li were younger than them. Jin Jiao was a dull girl, and only Dongmei spoke like an adult.

"Then tell me, how was your family's harvest last year?" Yang Yihe asked gently.

Dong Mei answered without hesitation: "Yes, I can't help when my family threshes the rice, but I can go and pick up the rice ears. I know how much grain each field has produced."

Yang Yihe nodded. Sure enough, the little girl who was pushed out spoke clearly. He had walked through several villages, and many of the children he met were too shy to talk to him. Even some adults just perfunctorily dealt with him and were unwilling to have in-depth exchanges with him.

He continued to ask: "Then can you tell me how much tax your family paid last year?"

Dong Mei continued, picking up her fingers, "In total, our family paid seven shi and two dou of tax grain. Our best field was near the river, and we harvested one shi and one hu of grain, so we paid three dou of tax grain. The worst field was the wasteland that was just opened up last year, and we only harvested one bale, and the harvest was probably only a winnowing basket of rice."

Yang Yihe nodded. The imperial court collected three-tenths of the tax, so this piece of land was not enough to pay the tax.

Li Dongmei seemed to understand what Yang Yihe was thinking. She explained, "Sir, our family has not paid less tax. There are so many fields along the river, but only that one of ours is of upper-middle grade. More than half of our fields are on that hillside, and many of them may have to pay more than half of the tax."

Although she didn't know how the land was divided into grades, she and her brother had calculated that if the actual amount of tax was collected, their family would have paid more. So she was not afraid of the official investigating their family. It would be best if they investigated thoroughly, so that their family would not have to pay more taxes.

Li Dongmei's words reminded Yang Yihe. He turned to the other children and asked, "Do you have any fields near the river?"

Except for Li Rongrong who said that her family had a field by the river, the other children shook their heads to indicate that they did not have one.

In fact, Song Li's family also had two pieces of land, but she didn't know the exact location of her land, so she kept silent.

Yang Yihe continued to ask: "Then do you know who owns these fields along the river?"

"I don't know." The children shook their heads and said they didn't know. "The people doing the work are not from our village."

Yang Yihe frowned, he had already thought of the trick here.

The classification of land was chaotic, and gentry often used their status and influence to seize the best land for themselves, but paid taxes according to the middle-grade land.

Some of the people benefited, while others suffered losses. The most important thing was that there was no educated person in the family, so it was difficult to calculate how much loss they had suffered.

Anyway, the adjacent fields all paid taxes according to the same level, so everyone shared the losses and took advantage of the profits. No one stepped forward, for fear of offending the gentry.

He was sent to work as an official in a foreign country, and his father repeatedly told him to make it through the three years smoothly. After returning to Beijing, his life became smooth.

But he didn't want to be an official as his father had said. At least he hadn't yet practiced the moral principles taught by his teacher.

"I already know. I will go around and take a look around. Thank you for informing me." Yang Yihe thanked them solemnly and turned to leave.

"My lord, wait!"