Late Ming Dynasty: Oops, I am surrounded by the Donglin Party

The eleventh year of Chongzhen, the twenty-sixth day of the twelfth lunar month, Henan, Zhangde Prefecture, Anyang City.

Old man Zhang had been wandering outside the grain store for a long time. He was wearing an old cotton-padded jacket that was tattered in many places, and his hands were tucked into his sleeves.

From time to time, he glanced into the grain shop, reached into his pocket and took out an equally worn handkerchief. Wrapped in three layers of material, the handkerchief contained the change he had saved for more than a month.

He counted them many times and found that there were eight and a half cents in total. In addition, there was a handful of copper coins.

The New Year is approaching, and even if he is reluctant, he has to buy some rice in advance to improve the food for his little grandson at home.

His grandson has been eating rice bran for several months, and he is so thin that his bones are visible. As a grandfather, he feels sad when he sees him like this.

The reason why he hesitated was that he still wanted to buy a piece of coarse cloth and a few pounds of cotton to make a cotton-padded jacket for his grandson.

But there was only so much money, and after buying rice, there was no extra money to buy cloth.

He hesitated for a long time, but finally walked into the grain store. He thought that clothes could be bought later, food was the most important thing.

Although the price of grain has been rising in the past two years, eight cents of silver can still buy forty to fifty kilograms of grain. If the grandfather and grandson eat sparingly and add some rice bran and wheat bran, they may be able to survive the winter.

"Where did you come from, beggar? Go away and beg for food!" The grain shop clerk said with disgust, holding a stick.

Old man Zhang hurriedly explained:

"I am not a beggar. I am here to buy food. I have money."

With a flattering smile, he took out the silver coins in his hand, shook them, and immediately put them back into his arms.

The shop assistant only took a glance and said with a sarcastic smile:

"How can you buy food with just this little money? You look so poor!"

Old man Zhang frowned when he heard this. He looked at the board with the grain prices written on it, but he couldn't read, so he could only ask in a flattering way:

"My dear, has the price of food increased again?

But even if it goes up a bit more, I still have more than eight cents of silver here."

Upon hearing this, the shop assistant said arrogantly:

"You old beggar are quite knowledgeable. The price of grain went up ten days ago."

Old Man Zhang's face immediately turned bitter when he heard this. He thought to himself that these profiteers were raising prices at random near the end of the year. However, he still asked cautiously, "We need food for the New Year."

"I wonder what the current grain price is?"

"Doesn't the sign say that? One dan of rice costs four ounces, six cents and two cents.

Seeing how poor you are, you certainly can't afford one stone. One dou costs four coins and six cents of silver.

With just this little bit of silver you have, even two dou is…"

The clerk in the grain shop was still speaking disdainfully, but Old Man Zhang was shocked when he heard this and said:

"Wasn't the price of rice only three ounces and five cents of silver last month?

The price had just increased not long ago, why has it increased again now, and by so much?

How can we ordinary people survive if you raise the prices like this? "

The guy's face immediately darkened when he found that he was interrupted by this beggar-like old man.

"What do I care how you live? This is the price. If you can't afford it, don't come.

Get out of here, don't get entangled here!"

As he said this, he picked up a stick and tried to chase the man away. Old Man Zhang quickly dodged.

At this time, the shop owner came out from behind the counter and said to the shop assistant in dissatisfaction:

"Wang Ergou, how can you treat guests like this? You must be unreasonable!"

The shop assistant did not dare to say anything after being reprimanded by the shopkeeper. The shopkeeper walked up to Old Man Zhang and said with a fake smile:

"Old man, let me explain to you that the price of rice is indeed three taels and five cents of silver per stone.

In order to let the people have a good New Year, our store did not plan to raise prices even though it is the New Year this year."

Old man Zhang frowned and said:

"Why did it go up again? And it went up so much. With this rate of increase, we ordinary people have no way to survive!"

Upon hearing this, the shopkeeper sighed and pretended to be sad and angry:

“I don’t want to, but the court issued a decree a while ago to impose a large commercial tax on all goods in the city.

The old man should know that no one would do business at a loss.

So, don’t blame me, old man. I don’t want to raise the price. If you want to blame me…”

As he spoke, the shopkeeper looked outside and saw that there were no government officials. Then he whispered to Old Man Zhang:

"If you want to blame someone, you should blame the imperial court. It is the imperial court that does not want you to have food."

"Blame the court..." Old man Zhang muttered.

"The imperial court doesn't allow us to eat food."

This made him extremely puzzled. Why wouldn't the imperial court want them to have food? If so, wouldn't the imperial court be forcing them to rebel?

I heard that the thieves Zhang and Li rebelled because they couldn't survive.

"That's right, it's the imperial court's arbitrary taxation that has made it so that you can't afford food.

Old man, you probably haven't been to the city to buy things for a while. Not only food, but also cloth, grain, oil, and everything you can use have gone up in price.

If you don’t believe me, go and take a look around the city.”

The grain shop owner pointed to other shops outside the street.

Old man Zhang frowned and looked suspicious as he staggered out of the grain shop.

"Wang Ergou, remember this: next time ordinary people come to buy food, you must reply according to what I just said, and you must not be rude to them again!"

The shop owner said very seriously.

"Yes, yes, I'll remember that." The shop assistant didn't dare to offend the shopkeeper, so he replied quickly.

"Please repeat it once more. If you can't remember it, pack up and go home as soon as possible. I don't want to keep useless people here." The shopkeeper said bluntly.

The shop assistant was immediately terrified. The current year was bad and there were starving people everywhere. If he lost this job, not only would he starve, but his family would also suffer.

Thinking of this, he frowned and thought about what the shopkeeper had just said, and then he even learned the hypocritical gentle demeanor.

“The court has issued a new decree to impose a huge commercial tax on all goods in the city.

No one wants to do business at a loss, and we don't want to raise prices.

If you want to blame someone, you should blame the imperial court. It is the imperial court that does not want you to have food to eat."

……

Old man Zhang held the small amount of silver tightly in his hand. He first asked a cloth shop, picked out the cheapest coarse cloth and asked the price.

The price had indeed gone up by nearly 30% just as the grain store owner had said, and the cloth shop clerk's statement was the same as the grain store clerk's.

If anyone is to blame, they should blame the imperial court, because it was the imperial court that did not allow them to have enough food to eat and warm clothes to wear.

Then he went to ask other shops, and they were all the same as the grain shop and cloth shop.

Old man Zhang finally squatted in a corner of the city, with his hands inserted into his sparse gray hair, looking extremely painful.

"Why? Why doesn't the court want us to have enough food to eat? Why?"

However, the only answers he got were the bone-chilling cold wind and the silence of the earth.

He squatted in that corner for a long time, and like those people who were worried about the rising prices of New Year's goods like him, he walked towards the grain shop again.

At this time, there was already a long queue at the grain shop.

People, after all, need to eat food.

……