Farming and reading family

The eldest brother usually looks calm and mature beyond his actual age, but if you look closely, he is just a child.

"Okay." Chen Zhengyan happily ran to find Jin Chao.

Seeing Chen Zhengyan so excited, Yun Zhou also wanted to go over, and his body shook slightly twice unconsciously.

Gao E saw Yun Zhou was a little anxious and said, "I just want to ask you something."

Yun Zhou immediately turned around and looked at Gao E seriously.

"Do you know your family's secret recipe for making charcoal?" Gao E asked directly.

Yun Zhou nodded, "I know." He also didn't hide the fact that "the eldest daughter in the family must memorize the secret manual by the age of fourteen, and the eldest son by the age of sixteen."

Gao E was surprised: "You can remember everything?"

"Yes." Yun Zhou answered seriously, "But the daughter-in-law who marries out is not allowed to tell her husband's family about the secret manual. If the eldest son in the family has an accident and there is no time to tell his younger brother, the daughter-in-law who marries out will pass on the secret manual."

"If there are no male relatives in the family, a woman who marries out can adopt her own child into the Yun family and pass on the secret skills." Yun Zhou did not hide anything.

Gao E thought that this would allow her to preserve the secret book to the greatest extent possible, and she would always be a blood relative of the Yun family: "Your sister left your family's secret book to me, do you want to take it with you?"

Yun Zhou bowed and said, "Sister gave the secret book to Madam as a token of gratitude for saving my brother and me. When I turn sixteen, I will copy a copy."

Gao E didn't expect Yun Zhou to be so frank: "Then what's so special about your Yun family's secret book?"

"There must be." Yun Zhou guessed, "It's just that the special features need to be passed on before death. My father passed away suddenly, and this secret book is just a memory for our Yun family." Yun Zhou's expression was a little sad when he thought of his father.

"My condolences." Gao E didn't ask any more questions.

Yunzhou nodded in thanks.

"Okay, go ahead." Gao E felt that Yun Zhou didn't know either.

Yun Zhou bowed and left. When he reached the threshold, he suddenly stopped and turned around: "My Yun family has a special request for transcription."

"Huh?" Gao E was puzzled.

"Father once said that when firewood is put into a huge furnace, it will undergo thousands of changes that cannot be controlled by people outside the furnace. However, as long as the kiln, firewood and fire are precisely controlled, one can get infinitely close to the desired result. Therefore, no matter how many times the secret book is copied, the position of each word cannot be changed." Yun Zhou only knew that his father asked him to remember this sentence.

Gao E thought for a moment and nodded: "Your father is a man of great wisdom."

Yun Zhou saluted again.

After Yunzhou left, Gao E began to think about what Yunzhou said, and then took out the book and read it again.

After reading for a while, she still felt dizzy and put the book down with a bang.

Suddenly, I realized why I felt dizzy.

She was used to reading horizontally, but this book was in vertical format. When she read the vertical version, she subconsciously read it horizontally, and then found that horizontal format seemed to work too. The confusion caused her to feel dizzy.

Thinking of this, Gao E suddenly remembered what Yun Zhou said, that men can only memorize the secret book when they are sixteen and women when they are fourteen, and he meant memorize it.

By this age, people have already formed certain rules and regulations, and their thinking is relatively fixed.

In the end, he said that the position of each word can be changed...

After analyzing these, Gao E immediately picked up the book and read it horizontally. It really made sense to her. The book did record the charcoal-making method mentioned by Du Weiqing.

It’s just that the Yun family added a warning on it, thinking that this was the Yun family’s hard work and they wrote it down, and it must not be reproduced for fame and fortune.

Gao E laughed after reading it. So that's how it is.

"What happy thing happened to you, my lady?" Chen Ke came in from outside and saw Gao E smiling.

"It's nothing. Master An installed the children's beds today. Would you like to go and have a look, my husband?" Gao E stood up.

"No need. The nights have gotten colder these past two days. Do you have any bedding at home?" Chen Ke came back to get the bedding.

"Yes." Gao E had forgotten this.

Chen Ke saw the book on the table and asked, "Madam, are you reading?"

"Well, Jin Ruyi is here to teach Yu Ning and the others etiquette and rules. They must learn to read first. I wonder what they should use to start learning to read." Gao E changed the subject to prevent Chen Ke from paying attention to the book on the table.

"Something like "Nu Jiang" would be best," Chen Ke suggested.

Gao E sneered inwardly, "Although the Instructions for Women is good, it was written by the wives of the nobles and aristocrats. It mostly talks about honor and disgrace. Ordinary women can barely afford food and clothing, so talking about honor and disgrace is like denying them a way to survive."

Chen Ke thought the same thing: "That must be Buddhist scriptures or something like that."

"The Buddhist scriptures are profound and there are many different interpretations. What if we accidentally lead them astray?" Gao E worried.

Chen Ke thought it made sense: "After hearing what my wife said, this matter really needs to be carefully considered."

"If it really doesn't work, let them learn elementary school as well, so that they won't be unable to understand the most basic things when asked about them later." Gao E suggested.

This is the same as boys.

Chen Ke didn't expect to fall into Gao E's trap. "That's right. In that case, Mr. Du and I will copy a few copies of the elementary school textbooks for them to use."

"Thank you, my husband." Gao E was happy.

When Chen Ke talked about this with Du Weiqing, Du Weiqing just smiled and said nothing.

Women and men reading the same books?

That Gao E really dared to think so.

Even high-ranking officials would give their daughters different books to read than to their sons.

Gao E didn't think this was an exaggeration. Before going to bed, she and the children decided how to divide the beds and reached an agreement.

Gao E had no objection to this.

And each child has his or her own cabinet where they can put his or her things.

Gao E only reminded them about using fire and getting up at night, and she didn't ask anything else.

Now Que'er still lives with her. Fortunately, Que'er has no worries even though she has lost her memory. She falls asleep as soon as she closes her eyes at night and wakes up at dawn in the morning. She is so carefree that she almost forgets about Zheng Xiaoshun.

Chen Qing's actions

Soon, a few people were found to collect pine needles, and soon the mulberry seedlings were covered with a thick layer.

As the grass and trees turned yellow, Gao E also collected the yellow pumpkins and taro.

I didn't think there were many before, but now I have picked them all and brought back two flatbed trucks. I gave two to each family and told them that if they like to eat them, they can keep the seeds.

The villagers cooked and ate it that same day. It was sweet, sticky, and had a high yield. It could also be grown on slopes. The entire village immediately decided to plant more next year so that they could eat it as food.

Since Gao E didn't give away as many taro as pumpkins, she planned to eat the big ones and save the small ones for seeds so that she could plant more next year.

These are high in starch and can be eaten as food. At least they are better than eating wild vegetables when food is scarce.

This made Gao E want to find sweet potatoes and potatoes, with which the ordinary people would have a better chance of having enough food and clothing.

By the time white frost appeared on the tiles in the village, there was nothing left to do in the fields, and everything that could be picked up from the mountains had been picked up.

Lei was busy soaking and grinding acorns, and he even asked two people to help him.

After Yang finished making the winter clothes, she began to prepare for Chen Yuning's wedding.

Peng Can had given a lot of betrothal gifts before, and Yang didn't want the dowry to be too shabby, but she definitely didn't have that much money, so she could only prepare something else.

And Peng Can was busy counting chickens.