As Ma Qian analyzed, Wang Yihe did not seem to know about the Wang family's media to propose to the Meng family. As soon as the river opened, he began to go out on patrol, anxious to select a place where the silt was the smallest possible to open the water inlet. Finally, the water inlet is fixed at the opening of the water. Here the water is turbulent, the north bank is low, and it is a very cyclic loop of the Tao River, which leads to inverted water. The mouth of the canal has been selected, and a way out of the water has to be found. Generally speaking, it retreats to the Wujia River and wuliangsu sea to form a hydraulic scouring system that leads up and down, keeps the flowing water flowing smoothly, and there is more than enough to advance and retreat.
Before the start of construction, Ma Qian was very concerned about the sediment deposition problem at the mouth of the canal, and after the Zhaohe Canal was dug into the private canal of the Hongge family, every year the opening of the river to wash the canal mouth with personal strength was insignificant, and the cost of using everyone's strength was not insignificant. He lingered near the mouth of the water in The Water Inlet for more than a month, and one late one night, he rode back to Yihelong and hurriedly knocked on the door of Wang Yihe's house. Jia Ding looked at the money and said with a look of displeasure, so urgent to report the funeral? I didn't wear a filial piety hat. Ma Qian ignored Jia Ding's unreasonableness, he said to inform the old owner quickly, I have an urgent matter to discuss with him. The old owner Wang Yihe put on clothes to meet him in the cabinet room, he pulled the sleeve of the old owner and drew a picture on the ground for the old owner to see. Ma Qian has such an idea: above the grass gate below the mouth of the canal, the section of the canal where the sediment accumulation is most serious after the Yellow River is sealed, open a sand canal from the east bank, and take advantage of the yellow river's trend of high in the west and low in the east in this section, and merge with the Yellow River below five miles. In this way, part of the sediment at the mouth of the canal sinks into the channel, and part of it falls into the main trunk of the Yellow River, which can greatly divert the silt and sand at the mouth of the canal and reduce the pressure of washing the canal in spring. After the spring thaw, this sand canal can also adjust the water consumption, if the amount of water is too large, you can divide part of the water into the Yellow River, if the amount of water is small, make a gate at the mouth of the sand canal to prevent the diversion. Wang Yihe twisted his goatee and paced on the ground, and when it was almost dawn, he asked his family to prepare horses, and he and Ma Qian ran to the mouth of the canal. For several nights in a row, the old and young masters lit a few horse lanterns, lay down in the area where the sand canal was ready to open, determined the slope of the terrain and the proportion of slope, and grasped the feasibility of this idea.
At the moment when he decided to use Ma Qian's plan for the sand canal, Master shook Ma Qian's hand, and Ma Qian saw that Master's eye instantly opened, like a lamp in the night.
The red sun is blowing out on the horizon of the Loop Plain. The warm and humid ground air is like countless vibrant earthworms arching out from the ground that has begun to be soft, and the air is really fragrant. Ma Qian opened his arms to the sun, stretching his body and mind, and letting the sun illuminate his whole. But Master Wang Yihe suddenly squatted on the ground, smashed his chest and cried, he said, I am sad, I am happy, I have never thought of something in my life, you have come up with it, how good it would be if I had such a son.
Ma Qian lifted up Master and said, Master, you have worked hard, it is time to rest for a while.
Wang Yihe straightened his waist and said that as long as I stood on the back of the canal, I would never get tired. Tomorrow we will start work.
5
The Zhaohe Canal was dug for three years.
The laborers they employed were disaster victims from Shaanxi, Jin, Lu and Hebei and local peasants, totaling 4,000 people, forming 200 classes of 20 people in each class. Each class selects a squad leader, the leader, the supervisor, the earthmoving, the estimated wage, and the total canal head. Every ten classes select a canal head, which can be contracted in sections and managed as a whole.
The bench led a hundred squads to excavate upstream, Ma Qian took a hundred squads to excavate downstream, and on the fifteenth of each month, they returned from the construction site and reunited with the old Erji Hongge to report on the progress of the project, exchange difficulties encountered in the construction, and total the use of silver and rations. The two pieces of millet and silver they prepared were enough for a year. In order to overcome the difficulties in the construction of funds, the Ma Qian brothers discussed that they should dig as little earth as possible in the construction and reduce costs. The way to save the earthwork is to excavate the channel according to the temporary small section slot, release water in time to irrigate, and use water to wash and expand the section. The dry platform is left on both sides, becoming a duplex shallow groove section. The part of the earth that the water washes away is brought to the field, and some of it remains in the channel, and the amount of earthwork is reduced, and the humidity of the canal that can flow through the water is high, and it is still laborious in the excavation process. This is a cost-saving first aid method. In the irrigation season of the following year, they released water at the right time, and all the watered land was calculated according to the area of Zhangqing, and at the end of the year, the water fee was levied twelve yuan per hectare to maintain the expenditure of the following year. Despite this, the funds are still seriously insufficient, and the collectors even go to the old cabinet to ask for it. After the freeze, the hemp money bench brothers could have taken a breather, but in order to save labor, they went out to collect water bills by themselves, and Chinese New Year's Eve to come back. In this year, the newly collected water fees plus the land rent silver of the big calf totaled 10,000 taels, and the grain was 5,000 stones. Due to the excavation of branch canals and sand canals in the third year, the amount of work is large, and it is imperative to borrow money.
In the past three years, Hongge has grown from fifteen to eighteen years old, and her body has matured, and there is more charm in the simplicity. By the third year, when Ma Qian and the bench saw the red grid for the last time, they found that she was quickly beautiful to the extreme, like a red flower, making ma qian and the bench hang their eyes in a hurry. Later, they recalled what the expression of the red grid was at that time, and the two men who fell in love with the red grid at the same time could not tell.
The man who was waiting for the red grid never came. The Second Young Owner of the Wang Family entrusted some clothes to come, and the old Erji saved them all, she did not want to fold the face of the Wang Family too much, and she would definitely borrow silver from the Wang Family in the project, and the Meng Family really did not want to offend the Wang Family. Every fifteen, Lao Erji would go into the cold room, and the cat would fish out a few pieces of cured pork from the urn, and she would stew potato noodles and tofu waiting for the brothers to come back and eat. When she was dead, she grabbed an old hen. The old hen flew all over the yard, and she chased after her and gasped, and she sat on the millstone to catch her breath and muttered, Don't fly, in a moment the hair will be on the duster. Hongge heard that the yard was tossing and turning, so she put down the needle and thread and came out to help Lao Erji catch the chicken, and she jumped on the chicken shed and grabbed it with her hand. Old Erji took the old hen in his arms and said, When I was young, I was as dexterous as a chicken feather, and I didn't realize that I had grown up like this. After that, I went to the neighbor's house to find a man to help kill the chickens. Neighbors joked with her that the son-in-law came to the door, the hen had a headache, and relatives came to the house? Old Eji's face smiled into a flower and said, My family's two descendants are coming back, the canal will be dug up this year, the babies are too hard, I have to give them a better meal. The neighbor said old Eji, you are alive and well, these two descendants have no problem raising you, you are old and use it well. Old Ejile came back from the neighbor's house, and she was busy in front of the stove with her bulky body, when she accidentally burned her robe in the hearth. Red Gege came over and put out the fire and said, Old Erji, you rest me to do it. Lao Erji put the dough cake on the pot gang and said, the two offspring love to eat the pot stickers I made (a kind of home-cooked noodles in Hetao, one side is like steamed, the other side is like roasted), Ma Qian loves to eat this side of the roast, and the bench loves to eat the steamed side. I like either of these two offspring, if I have two red grids, how good it is. Hongge blushed and said, Old Erji, don't nag, you are resting on the kang. Old Eji sat on the firewood, huffing and pulling the wind box and saying, I can't rest on the kang, and if I rest on the kang, it means that I am old, waiting for the coffin. And I am alive, and when you have a baby, it is not too late for me to bring you a few older ones and die. Hongge said, don't you say, they are fast entering the door. Old Erji heard that the two descendants were about to enter the door, stood up and looked into the courtyard and said, Where is it, I can't see it. Hong Gege said, Shangyi and the bridge. Old Erji hurriedly spit some spit into the palm of his hand and smeared it on the red checker's hair. Hong Gege cried and laughed and said, Oh old Erji.
Ever since Old Eji refused the Wang family's offer and said that to the Maqian Bench brothers, the relationship between the two brothers has undergone a subtle change. They rose up, and none of them made contact with the red grid alone, as if they were avoiding the suspicion of melon field and plum descent. As a convention, they would come back fifteen every month, and after discussing things, rest in the compartment. I saw the red checker sitting in front of the window making them cotton clothes and shoes, and the sixty-four eyes window was pasted with white linen paper, reflecting the silhouette of the red checkered. They lay on the kang and could not sleep. The more I can't sleep, the more I want to turn over, and I am afraid that the other party will know that I am not asleep. So one pretended to snore, the other pretended to grind his teeth. Torture yourself to the point of exhaustion.
The bench is dug from upstream to midstream, the closer it is to home, and the more it digs, the more it digs downstream, the farther it is from home. One night the bench really wanted to see the red grid, and returned to the Meng family in the evening. Old Erji and Hong gege were rolling noodles on a fire and were very surprised to see the bench come back. Hong Gege quickly looked at the gate, and Old Erji said, What about you Brother Ma Qian? The bench blushed and said, Brother Ma Qian did not come back, I am very close to home, I want to eat pot stickers. His tone of voice was somewhat hurried. He hurriedly took a flat burden from behind the door to carry water, and when he reached the door, Hemp Money came in through the gate. The brothers were embarrassed to see each other. The bench said, I'll come back and have a look when I'm close to home. Ma Qian said that the canal workers were making trouble, and I came back to get some silver to ease the contradiction. The faces of the two people were so red that they did not dare to look at the red grid. She yawned and said that the two offspring were simply twins in the mother's belly, one did what the other did, and you never came back alone like an appointment.
Of course, this was said to the brothers. But since then, the brothers have a little more thoughts in their hearts, and they have some precautions against each other. The next time I came back temporarily, Hemp Money and benches began to sing before they entered the village. Old Erji and Hongge knew when they heard the song that they had returned, and they had returned in a bright and upright manner. Old Eji was always happy to shed tears. She said, the two descendants of Duo Renyi, we have no children and no dependent families, people are so good to us, in the last life we were a person under the eaves, this life is also cut continuously. She lifted her shirt and blew her nose.
The last time Hemp Money and the Bench saw red checker was in the fall of the third year. In the final stages of the project, the design costs of the culverts and bridges were not settled. The workers' wages are owed to the next two years, and if they do not replenish the silver in time, the canal workers will be passive and sluggish, which will inevitably affect the progress of the project. If the project cannot be completed after winter, it is bound to affect the release of water in the washing canal in the spring, and ultimately affect the next year's input.
Wang Yihe is also very concerned about the construction period, and at this juncture, he does not eat the promise made three years ago, he said to the MaQian brothers, first take twenty thousand taels from me, let you open a silver ticket. There was the great butler of the royal cabinet, who listened to the instructions of the owner, and he was calculating the account with his nose glasses on, and his head was not raised. After Wang Yihe finished his command, he took a figure eight step. The Ma Qian brothers stood in front of the butler, somewhat overwhelmed.
For a long time, he raised his eyes to look at the money and the bench and said, "What do you two borrow money to pay back?"
The bench said, you know the Meng family's family business, but only temporarily encountered difficulties, we will use the land rent and water rent for the year after next year to pay off the debt.
The housekeeper sneered and said, ground rent and water rent? Is the ground yours or is the canal yours? Are the names of the land and the canals your two surnames?
Ma Qian said, you write an IOU, we take it back and let the owner draw the pledge.
The housekeeper said, Oh, what a big shelf. You take it back and take it back, so I know if it's a bet on a cat painting or a bet on a dog painting? Do you treat the silver of the royal family as a bead of sheep dung?
Helplessly, the Ma Qian brothers had to let Lao Erji and Hongge go to the Wang family. As soon as Old Erji and Hongge ge entered the door of the Wang family, the second young owner Wang Yetian greeted him, and he went forward to help Old Erji and said, Oh old man, such a little thing and you have to move your legs, they are all family, there is something you command a sound on the line. As he spoke, he aimed his eyes at the red grid. When it was time to paint the pledge, Old Erji stepped forward. Wang Yetian pulled Lao Erji aside and said, Even if this money is my dowry, you should not draw it. Old Erji said that the marriage contract between Hongge and Meng Sheng had not yet been dissolved, and I was afraid that the Meng family had the grand intention of the Negative Wang Family. Old Eji approached the butler again and held out his hand. But the housekeeper said, let the red grid draw, you are old. Old Eji said, are you afraid that I will die and rely on your account? I have been a housekeeper in the Meng family for so many years, and my painting does not work? Even if I kick my legs, you think my Meng family has no one to pay off debts?
In the end, in order to calm things down, it was still the red grid that drew the pledge. (To be continued)
Original: Xiang Chun
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