Bianhe Town, this is where Li Zhang and Douzi and his children sell roe together and struggle to survive. However, since they moved to the capital, Li Zhang has not come back for a long time. The charity house of that year is still there, but it seems even more dilapidated. In fact, later Li Zhang wanted to buy the charity house and build it into a villa. He could bring his family to play when he had time. However, he thought that the charity house was too unlucky. Even if he didn't care, his family probably wouldn't agree, so he had to give up.

As one of the hubs of the capital's river transportation, Bianhe Town has become more prosperous in recent years. The area of ​​the town has expanded several times. In addition to shops, there are many more residential houses. After all, the land prices in the capital are soaring, and there are too many people, which has forced many people to move outside the city to settle down. Bianhe Town is a good choice.

Li Zhang walked on a familiar and somewhat unfamiliar street with his wild dog. He returned to the capital last night, but because it was already dark, the city gate had been closed. Although Li Zhang had suggested to Zhao Zhen to completely lift the curfew in the capital, the matter was still under discussion, so Li Zhang could not enter the city gate, so he simply stayed in the inn in Bianhe Town for one night.

He revisited the old place, so Li Zhang did not rush back today, but just took the wild dog here for a while. The wild dog hadn't been here for a long time. He was also quite moved when he thought of the scene when he met Li Zhang here.

The Bianhe Wharf is still as busy and messy as before. The coolie with her upper body is wearing shoulder pads, loading and unloading goods like worker ants. There are various vendors around the wharf. Li Zhang also saw the sign of Cooking Biao Liu from a distance. He remembered that when he was selling roe and braised pork, his favorite food was their cooked cake. Later, Li Zhang entered the capital and handed over the braised meat business at the wharf to Cooking Biao Liu and his son.

"Do you eat the pancake?" Li Zhang asked at the wild dog next to him with a smile.

"Fifteen!" said the wild dog with a smile. This was his previous appetite. Only fifteen cooked cakes with a big head can barely fill his stomach.

Li Zhang laughed when he heard this, so the wild dog walked over. The stall of Cooking Biao Liu Liu was now a fixed store, and there was also a braised meat shop next to it, which was also theirs. The braised meat was also entered from the braised meat shop of Li Zhang's family in Beijing. After so many years, the two families still maintained business exchanges.

There are tables and chairs outside the braised pork shop, and they also sell porridge part-time. It is now the busiest time of the morning, but there are still many people eating here. Li Zhang and the wild dog found a seat to sit down. After asking for four bowls of porridge, Li Zhang went to cook cakes again, and the wild dog went to buy braised pork.

"How many cook cakes do you want?" The middle-aged man in the cook cake shop immediately greeted him enthusiastically when he saw Li Zhang. Li Zhang also recognized the other party as Cook cake Liu's son. He hadn't seen him for so many years, and Li Zhang grew up from a child again, so it was normal for the other party to not recognize him. As for Cook cake Liu, he had not seen him. He probably was old, so he left the business matters to his son.

"Sixteen big cooked cakes!" Li Zhang smiled and took out eight copper coins and said, not knowing each other.

Seeing the copper coins given by Li Zhang, Chai Biao Liu's son was also stunned, and then he couldn't help but smile and said, "Customer, one copper coin is the cooked cake in the small shop."

"The price has increased? Didn't it be a penny or two before?" Li Zhang asked unexpectedly when he heard this.

"That's all the price for the old age. Now everything in Beijing has increased. The flour is more expensive than before. Small shops can't lose money to do business, right?" Cai Bing Liu's son could only explain.

Li Zhang slapped his forehead when he heard this. It was true that it had been so many years, and it was impossible for the cooked cakes to be the same as the price of the past, so he also smiled and added eight copper coins, and then sixteen cooked cakes were piled up in bamboo baskets and delivered to him.

When they returned to their seats with bamboo baskets, Wild Dog also bought their own braised pork. The two of them got up in the morning and didn't eat breakfast. They had originally planned to eat in the town. Now they encountered a shop of Chicai Liu, so they naturally solved it here. According to Wild Dog, the price of braised pork has also increased. Li Zhang really didn't pay attention to this. Although the business belongs to him, the business at home has been handed over to Qingzhi for a long time, and he has no time to ask about it.

However, although the price has increased, the cooked cakes and braised pork are still the same as they were back then. Moreover, the rice porridge of the cooked cakes and Liu's family is also cooked well. Li Zhang drank a cooked cake and ate a cooked cake and braised pork. The rest was all in the belly of the wild dog.

After breakfast, Li Zhang and Wild Gouyi walked around the town, but when they arrived at the east side of the town, they found a lively scene in front of them. Li Zhang also walked over curiously, but found that a river was digging here.

Because river water will bring mud and sand, which will deposit year by year, which will cause river channels to accumulate, it is necessary to clean the river channels regularly, that is, after blocking the upper reaches of the river, the river water will dry up, and then digging out the silt in the river. The digging of rivers is usually organized by the government to recruit nearby people to work free of charge. This is also a kind of corvee service. Even in the era when Li Zhang lived, this kind of corvee service still existed and was not completely abolished until the 1990s.

In general, corvee labor is the free labor of the people under the government's recruitment. Rich people can spend money to hire people to perform corvee labor on their behalf. This kind of corvee labor is generally extremely labor-intensive, such as digging rivers in front of you, and the construction of the Great Wall in Yanyun, and the reconstruction of Xinzhou City. Those civilians recruited are all in corvee labor.

I saw that although there was no water in the river, there was mud everywhere. People who had never done work may not know that mud was so heavy, and the mud had suction. It took several times more effort to shovel a piece of mud. The men in the river were also exhausted at this time, and their bodies were splashed with mud, looking like clay men.

Relatively speaking, it is relatively easy to dig a river. Although it is tiring, it is not dangerous. If you are conscripted as a military service, it will be even worse. Military service does not let you go to war, but is responsible for the transportation of materials and the construction of roads. These are all near the battlefield. If the enemy comes, you may even lose your life.

Looking at the civil servants in front of him, Li Zhang also thought of the recent criticism of current affairs by Song Qi, Han Qi and others. Now this trend has swept from the court to the people. When many scholars gather, they are no longer discussing poetry and songs, but discussing whether the Song Dynasty needs reform, what aspects should be moved, what risks will it cause, etc.

In fact, if it is normal corvee labor, such as digging a river in front of you, it will not have much impact on the people after taking a few days a year. After all, the country needs these water conservancy, and the people will benefit after the river is built. But the key is that the corvee labor in the Song Dynasty was too heavy, which has affected normal people's livelihood, and some people even went bankrupt due to corvee labor.

Corvée is only one of the internal ills of the Song Dynasty, and there are other ills, some of which are more serious than corvée, such as land annexation, which is also the main reason why Han Qi and others advocate for change. After all, if this continues, sooner or later, the Song Dynasty will repeat the tragedy of the late dynasties, and even come earlier and more violently than other dynasties.

Li Zhang knew the history of the Song Dynasty very well. Although he helped the Song Dynasty make many changes, especially the military weakness was completely reversed by him, and even recovered Yan Yun and defeated the powerful Liao Kingdom, the internal problems of the Song Dynasty were not eliminated, and some aspects were even more acute. If there were no changes, the Song Dynasty might take the old path in decades. After all, the inertia of history was too strong.

Thinking of the above, Li Zhang couldn't help but sigh. It seemed that he was destined to be a hard worker. He had just solved the external threat from the Song Dynasty, but internal problems arose. If Zhao Zhen really decided to clean up the internal problems, he would definitely need to worry about it.

Although he still doesn't know Zhao Zhen's attitude, based on Li Zhang's understanding of him, especially after defeating Dangxiang and Liao Kingdom one after another, Zhao Zhen's self-confidence has increased greatly, so he is likely to agree to attack the internal attack, just a difference between time and time.

"Go into the city!" Li Zhang immediately said to the wild dog beside him, and after that, he turned around and left the river bank. Since he had returned, he would have to face the above problems sooner or later.
Chapter completed!