Chapter 2618: Bargaining

Aside from plague, smallpox was the deadliest infectious disease of this era—so virulent it could even influence whether Manchu raiders would risk crossing through the passes. The Senate had accordingly made prevention a priority. From the earliest days of the Fubo Army's conquests, work teams established "Vaccination Bureaus" in major rural markets, using folk art performances and village theatricals to persuade locals to get inoculated. Results had been encouraging. Jiujiang sat astride major trade routes where merchants constantly passed through, making smallpox a frequent visitor. Locals had suffered bitterly from it—fully a third of adults bore pockmarks on their faces. Hence the local proverb: "A child born is only half-raised; only after surviving smallpox is the count complete." In recent years, vaccination efforts had dramatically reduced infant mortality from the disease. Silk banners of gratitude already hung throughout the Vaccination Bureau, testament to the Senate's growing acceptance among the villagers.

Education, however, told a different story. Beyond the government schools, scholars preparing for the Ming imperial examinations had always relied on private academies (Sishu) and clan schools run by local families and lineages. With Confucian classics as their standardized curriculum, traditional teachers were plentiful, forming an educational industry of considerable scale.

The Senate had abolished the imperial examinations and implemented modern education, but found itself trapped by resource shortages. New-style teachers were scarce, and schools even scarcer. Nanhai County, one of the most populous in the Pearl River Delta with hundreds of thousands of residents, had managed to build only a single National Model School—in Dali. A culturally prosperous region like Jiujiang didn't even have one. This was tantamount to cutting off the future of the vast majority of scholars. Trouble would come sooner or later.

The Education Department's position was pragmatic: besides providing teacher support and funding to schools suitable for conversion into junior primary schools, the Senate would recognize the legitimacy of the countless existing private schools (Sishu) and community schools (Shexue), just as they had initially done in Hainan. There would be no forced closures. Instead, they would promote cultural proficiency examinations—anyone who passed the Level B Cultural Certificate would be certified as having junior primary school academic ability. Government-subsidized textbooks would be sold widely, encouraging these community schools to adopt them. Free short-term teacher training would be offered, providing new-style education instruction to private school teachers and aspiring educators, who would receive "Simple Normal School Certificates."

But these policies remained too complex for the local great clans. The abolition of imperial examinations had left them adrift. Without the examinations, how were scholars supposed to advance?

Many nearby clans had therefore sought to invite Magistrate Zhang Xiao for extended stays, hoping to discuss their families' futures. After Zhang declined, the clan heads decided if the magistrate wouldn't come to them, they would come to him. They gathered at Jiujiang Great Market, ready to offer their counsel.

In the marching tent, Zhang Xiao sat cross-legged on a camp chair, one hand wrapped around a large glass mug. Brown tea stains on the inner wall testified to long use. The words "For the Senate and the People" were printed on the outside. He blew across the surface, took a tentative sip to test the temperature, then clamped his teeth together to strain out the leaves and drained the cup. Unfortunately, two leaves still stuck to his front teeth. He picked them off with his fingers and flicked them back into the mug.

The gentry watched in silence. No one dared complain, but all privately found it an affront to decorum.

The pre-Ming Longjing tea from Hangzhou Station was Zhang Xiao's favorite. Cups had also been placed before the natives seated on either side. The visiting gentry were all elderly men, and letting them talk for half a day without offering a drink would have been inexcusable.

Guan Boyi sipped his tea to moisten his throat, then spoke in Mandarin colored by a Cantonese accent, his voice slightly hoarse: "The Parent Official has excellent taste. This tea is fragrant and sweet, mellow and smooth on the throat. After drinking, one feels a Great Harmony Qi lingering between the teeth and cheeks. This must be fine West Lake Longjing."

The other gentry murmured agreement.

Guan Boyi was the current patriarch of the Guan Clan's Shimei Hall. His younger brother Guan Jiyi, a Jinshi from the same examination year as Chen Zizhuang, had resigned his office and returned home, shutting his doors to all visitors. But for the clan's future, Guan Boyi had dragged his aging body to Zhang Xiao's tent.

"This student is bold enough to plead on behalf of our young talents," he continued. "We hope the Parent Official will petition the court to restore the imperial examinations and select worthy men to serve the nation, so that the ten-plus years of hard study by tens of thousands of Lingnan scholars will not have been in vain."

"The Great Song Senate has returned to the Divine Land to reconstruct Huaxia and rescue the common people. Rest assured—the Senate's door stands open. We refuse no collaborators." Zhang Xiao drew out the pause. "We simply require that everyone follow our rules."

After the Senate had occupied the Two Guangs, many had clung to hope, expecting the examinations would soon be restored. But two years had passed without a sign of it.

Song Guowei, patriarch of the Song clan, spoke carefully: "The Parent Official spares no effort upon taking office, traveling to the countryside to understand the people's circumstances—truly the fortune of our locality. The National Dynasty runs new schools and implements new laws; the atmosphere is refreshed. We are all encouraged. However, this township is remote. Our young generations have no opportunity to study at the Nanhai National Model School or serve the National Dynasty. We hope the Parent Official will convey our sincere hearts to the court."

"I understand your intentions. My visit here does include inspecting potential sites for new schools." Zhang Xiao set down his glass mug. "However, a hundred matters await revival, and expenses are needed everywhere. Training tens of thousands of troops costs a thousand gold daily. The Guangzhou plague forced the city to close for months. The Senate, sympathizing with the people's suffering, not only collects minimal taxes but exempts many small merchants entirely. Last year brought severe drought in spring and summer, then heavy snow at year's end—the Senate opened the granaries for disaster relief. Take this very Vaccination Bureau: inoculations are provided free, without a single coin charged. Though the Senate possesses all within the Four Seas, it cannot conjure silver from thin air. Whether this school gets built depends on the sincerity of everyone present."

Since ancient times, the wise concealed their wealth. At the mention of silver, the gentry naturally began pleading poverty. Zeng Xingxiang, patriarch of the Zeng clan, spoke in a trembling voice: "Parent Official, please understand. To this student's knowledge, our township has roughly seven hundred-some qing of land. Tax per mu of field is three sheng; land, two sheng; ponds and Monk Summer (Seng Xia), five sheng each. In the tenth year of Wanli, Magistrate Zhou Wenqing came down to survey and measure the fields. His bowmen (Gongshou) reported that our ponds and lands were interwoven like embroidery, impossible to distinguish precisely. Zhou then implemented the 'Mixed Measurement' (Hun Zhang) method. Later, the whole county showed a deficit of one thousand eight hundred twenty-eight qing. Each mu was assessed an additional fake tax of one fen six li four hao, called the Fixed Bow (Ding Gong). Jiujiang petitioned for exemption on grounds of 'Mixed Measurement.' Public outcry mounted, but we never obtained relief. All forts suffered the surcharge of one fen six li four hao together—and on top of that, our township additionally bore the burden of having two-sheng lands taxed as five-sheng ponds."

Wei Bifu had already told Zhang Xiao about the "Fixed Bow Fake Tax," but Zhang hadn't expected Jiujiang to have this additional "Mixed Measurement" story. He waved Huang Xiyin over and asked quietly, "What is this Mixed Measurement method they're talking about?"

Huang Xiyin leaned close and explained in a low voice: "When Zhou Wenqing surveyed the fields during the Wanli period, he found Jiujiang's ponds and farmland too difficult to distinguish. So he simply taxed everything as ponds. Fields and lands that weren't actually ponds became ponds on the Fish Scale Book. The tax rate for ponds is far higher than for fields."

"Ah—" Zhang Xiao nodded and turned back to the gentry. "The Fixed Bow Fake Tax is indeed unreasonable. That's accumulated abuse from the previous dynasty. Cooperate with the Senate in re-surveying the fields, and you'll pay taxes based on actual holdings. As for Mixed Measurement, however—fifty years have passed. In the Wanli era, this area may have had ponds and farmland interwoven like embroidery, difficult to tell apart. Now I see Jiujiang is eighty percent fish ponds, twenty percent fields. The name has become the reality."

This transformation from the Wanli period to the late Ming showed that Jiujiang's fish-raising ponds had expanded at tremendous speed—stimulated, of course, by Zhou Wenqing's survey policies. If landowners hadn't converted their fields into higher-yielding mulberry-dike fish ponds, they would have faced crippling tax burdens or outright losses.

Zhang Xiao had also observed during his inspection that late-Ming Jiujiang showed no trend of mulberry-dike ponds replacing fruit-dike ponds. The core challenge facing dike-pond agriculture at this time remained the development of low-lying areas and the fish farming industry itself. Crops like mulberry, fruit trees, and rice were all expanding rather than displacing one another. And whenever raw land development was involved, the efficiency of small farmers fell far short of organized groups like clans or agricultural reclamation battalions.

Seeing the gentry fall silent, Zhang Xiao continued: "Rest assured. The Senate doesn't engage in zero-sum games. Making the cake bigger is our way. Follow the Senate faithfully, and you won't suffer for it."

This string of novel terms left the old men bewildered. Huang Xiyin had previously discussed such concepts with Zhang Jiayu, so he stepped forward to explain: "Magistrate Zhang means that the Great Song Senate possesses various advanced technologies. So long as you hold sincere hearts toward Great Song, the Senate can help you grow more grain, raise more fish, and produce finer cocoons. What you invest today will yield tomorrow's harvest."

Guan Boyi said: "This student is unworthy, but willing to listen with all attention."

"Old Master Guan—is the Fish Flower trade in this township managed mainly by your clansmen?" Zhang Xiao flicked open a folding fan with one hand and fanned himself a few times. The pure white face bore no ink painting or poetry, only a few plain characters: Air Conditioning is Better.

Guan Boyi wasn't sure what Zhang Xiao was driving at. He answered cautiously: "Indeed it is. After Huang Xiaoyang's rebellion in the previous dynasty, the Dan boat people fled entirely. The West Sea fish tax had nowhere to settle, so it fell upon our township's villagers. The ration silver all comes from the West Sea Fish Flower trade. My clan has strict family traditions—successive generations have always prioritized completing tax and grain payments first. Since the National Dynasty changed the mandate, we haven't delayed or owed anything."

Zhang Xiao asked again: "Then do you know how many Fish Flowers Jiujiang catches each year?"

Guan Boyi said: "Like stars filling the sky—uncountable."

"Wrong." Zhang Xiao snapped the fan shut and tapped it against his palm, the corners of his mouth rising. "There are one hundred and fifty thousand mu of ponds in Nanhai County. Calculating based on stocking twelve hundred fry per mu, roughly one hundred and eighty million Fish Flowers are needed. Not all of those one hundred and fifty thousand mu are mulberry-dike ponds—there are still many Sky-Gazing Ponds and Wild Ponds with lower stocking rates—but Jiujiang's Fish Flowers are traded as far as Fujian, Guangdong, and even Huguang. Accounting for all that, this township's annual Fish Flower production should be no less than two hundred million tails. Factoring in losses during catching, transport, and farming, the annual catch should exceed three hundred million tails." He paused. "Is there any error in what this County has said?"

(End of Chapter)