August 28th, the sixth year of Chongzhen, the autumnal equinox.
It was raining continuously in Hehuang. Liu Chengzong was sitting on the porch with his eyebrows in his arms and wearing a half-sleeved woolen short coat. He had a small diamond lying at his feet, watching the rainwater gathering in the courtyard and flowing out of the mansion along the stone canal.
Today was supposed to be the day of joint camp drills. He was going to parade outside the city. However, because of the rain, the camp drills were canceled and the military law test was changed. It was very quiet outside the city now. Only the faint sound of gunshots could be heard from time to time in the direction of the arsenal.
.
Rain is an experimental time for the arsenal. It was when He Xin and I were trying to use the rain cover to lift the gun.
The sound of horseshoes hitting the ground could be heard in the street, and several fast horses were galloping in the rain.
Liu Chengzong listened carefully, he came from the east.
Not long after, the sound of horse hoofbeats stopped suddenly outside the government office, and Tianbao reported outside the Chuihua Gate: "Commander, this is Dongguan Commander Wu Panlong, bringing a letter from Dongguan General Li, requesting to enter the government."
Liu Chengzong nodded, looked up at the heavy rain curtain, and walked towards the front hall.
Not long after, Wu Panlong, who had changed into a raincoat, and his cloth-covered armor was still stained by rain, entered the front hall and saluted: "Wu Panlong, a humble official, please see the commander-in-chief."
"Sit down and drink a bowl of hot tea."
Liu Chengzong, who was sitting in the main seat, excused himself and invited him to sit aside: "It's raining and the road is difficult to walk. Why did Li Wanqing ask you to come here?"
Wu Panlong was born as a child in Zhenyuan County. He first worked as a guard of horses in Xining. Liu Chengzong always admired educated people in the army. During the Hehuang War, he made military exploits as a team leader under Yang Yaobiao and was awarded an official position.
, he was assigned to Dongguan as the general manager.
After the conferment of official positions, the Marshal's Mansion was designed to have several military systems.
According to the grade, from low to high are Hehuang Five Towns, Caiguan Camp, Field Camp, Huben Camp and Tunmu Camp.
The five towns are rural soldiers, the officers are the regular army, the field officers are the elites, and the tiger warriors are the officers. The tuenmu camp is independent of this system and is similar to the chieftain.
The chief commander of the five towns is of the sixth grade, and at the same level are the chief commander of the Caiguan camp and the chief management team of the field camp.
This grade-level official position system was established to select generals and to cultivate a recruitment system. Although it objectively lengthened the promotion process from soldiers to officers, it also gave soldiers the opportunity to be promoted without merit in combat.
To become officers, their soldiers need to serve in the Five Towns, Caiguan, and Huben in sequence, and then return to the Five Towns to become team officers.
The same is true for officers under normal circumstances. They need to rotate through three systems to gradually master all the basic knowledge of an officer.
Wu Panlong took a sip of hot tea, warmed his hands with his tea bowl, and said with a smile: "Thanks to the rain, the commander-in-chief is in the yamen, otherwise he would have to go to the military camp to find the commander-in-chief... This is General Li
letter."
The letter sent by Li Wanqing from Hehuang mainly informed the situation of the confrontation between the two armies.
At present, the autumn harvest on both sides of the Yellow River has ended, and as the grains are returned to the warehouse, they and the imperial officers and soldiers are no longer so nervous.
However, Li Wanqing said that Lanzhou General Shi Xiang seemed disappointed that there was no fight.
Liu Chengzong smiled, and he would not be disappointed next year. However, as he continued to look down, the smile on his face suddenly solidified, and he frowned and looked at Wu Panlong: "To the east, is there a disaster?"
This question is actually a bit redundant in this era.
He said it as if there had been no disaster in the east earlier.
But Wu Panlong did not dare to neglect, and nodded very cautiously and said: "Well, the drought in Shaanxi this year is not that severe, but as soon as our messengers arrived in Pingliang, they encountered a locust plague, covering the sky and the sun, and Han Fan's farmland was gnawed by locusts.
More than half."
Wu Panlong sighed. He was originally from Pingliangfu Town, and he knew very well how resistant his hometown was to drought and locust plagues.
He continued: "I asked you to come back to Lanzhou to find Shixiang and asked him to ask about the situation in the east, but I didn't expect that it would be better not to ask."
"What's wrong?"
"This year the food supply in Longdong is completely over. Only Lintao and Gongchang are free from drought, locusts, and waterlogging. Pingliang Fengxiang is suffering from drought and locust plague, Hanzhong Prefecture in the south is suffering from waterlogging, and Weibei is also over, just like Pingliang Fengxiang."
This made Liu Chengzong's eyes widen. When he started the uprising, Yaozhou, Tongzhou, and Qianzhou in Weibei were like fairy places. He had thought that there would be a drought there, but he didn't expect it to happen so early.
But thinking about it, even though there are many rivers there and the drought has little impact, it still can't withstand a locust plague that covers the sky.
He asked: "What about Yan'an Mansion?"
Wu Panlong shook his head and said: "I don't know about this humble position. I don't think it will be any better. There is news about Yan'an Prefecture, but it has nothing to do with the locust plague and drought."
"What news?"
"In the official document, in July of this year, there was a great war in Yan'an. It seems to say that Gao Yingxiang, the king of Chuang who had caused trouble in the early years, had been dormant in Yan'an. He broke out again this year. He fired more than 100 artillery pieces in Ganquan. Together with General Yang Yanchang, he commanded Ren Quan'er.
Fight."
Gao Yingxiang came out.
Liu Chengzong's heart was raised and he immediately asked: "How is the battle going?"
He longed to hear about the heroic demeanor of Yan'an's unrivaled general Yang Yanchang, but he didn't.
Wu Panlong said: "Everyone has his own victory or defeat. One of the officers and soldiers died, Qianhu surnamed Lu, but unfortunately King Chuang did not take advantage. A man named Zhong Douxing died in the formation. Does the commander know...
”
As soon as he finished speaking, he saw Liu Chengzong's face turned livid and he exhaled from his nose gloomily.
Wu Panlong asked cautiously: "Does the commander recognize this Zhongdou star?"
"More than just knowing each other!"
Liu Chengzong lost the desire to talk, stood up and walked outside the hall, looking up at the sky through the heavy rain curtain.
He wanted to set up a cannon and blow a hole in God.
The middle star is Gao Yingxiang's younger brother Gao Yingen. When they met, he commanded Gao Yingxiang's most elite deserter unit.
Qianhu, whose surname was Lu, was Lu Bin from Laomiaozhuang. Chengyun personally sent him to the Yan'an Guard. Also sent to the Yan'an Guard were many wounded soldiers who had served under Liu Chengzong in the early years, and even many descendants of the old Liu family in Heilong Mountain. This battle was different from the previous battles in Yan'an Prefecture. They fought with real swords and guns.
Wu Panlong had no idea what was going on. He thought Liu Chengzong was just a good friend of Gao Yingxiang, but in fact, in terms of distance, Yan'an Guard and Yan'an Camp were closer to the Marshal's Mansion.
The so-called conflict between soldiers and thieves does not exist in Yan'an Prefecture.
They had lived in harmony for several years, and Liu Chengzong believed that Ren Quan'er and Gao Yingxiang would try to avoid fighting if they could avoid it, but they started fighting.
There is no doubt that living in harmony is no longer enough for everyone.
Liu Chengzong felt that God was really cruel. First there was a severe drought, which made it impossible for people to survive. People who barely escaped lived by the water, reclaimed the riverbanks that they had not looked at in the past, and worked hard to build water conservancy projects, barely surviving.
A big locust plague, if it's done, it's all for nothing.
When Liu Chengzong went outside the hall, Wu Panlong didn't dare to sit in the hall by himself, so he had to follow him outside. Liu Chengzong asked, "Is our messenger still in Pingliang?"
"It should still be there. There are locusts everywhere and I can't move."
"It's best to be in Pingliang. I want to write a letter and send it to Yan'an Mansion."
Liu Chengzong wanted to write a letter to Ren Quan'er and ask what the situation of the battle in Yan'an Mansion was like, but he didn't expect Wu Panlong shook his head and said: "Commander, I'm afraid I can't send it. There is a plague in Kelan Prefecture, Shanxi.
”
Liu Chengzong was not too surprised when he heard the news.
In other words, it’s hard for him to be surprised by any news now. There’s just so much bad news.
"What plague?"
"I don't know about my humble position." Wu Panlong shook his head and said: "I only know that this year's drought in Shanxi has exceeded previous years, and there has been a military disaster. The official document said that the people of Kelan Prefecture crossed the Yellow River into northern Shaanxi, and asked the officers and soldiers to block the people along the way.
Only then did we mention the epidemic in Shanxi."
Wu Panlong was not too vigilant about a plague that occurred far away, but Liu Chengzong's expression was particularly serious. It was not clear whether it was the worry in his heart or the coldness of autumn that made the hairs on his cheeks stand up.
But he knew very well that the last time he had this feeling was in Yuhebao, where his brother told him about the mutiny of the Guyuan border troops and the civil uprisings in various places in northern Shaanxi.
At that time, he knew that the great uprising in the late Ming Dynasty was coming.
At this moment, he knew that the great plague sweeping the world in the late Ming Dynasty was coming.
The word "epidemic" in "Shuowen Jiezi" explains that all people are ill; but in "Zi Lin" written in the Jin Dynasty, the meaning is clearer and means that the disease is prevalent.
Because of the characteristics of this highly contagious disease, there are not many diseases that can be called epidemics...only plague, smallpox, cholera, malaria, measles, typhoid, chickenpox, dysentery, sore throat, diphtheria, etc.
Among them, plague, smallpox, and cholera are the most serious diseases.
Relatively speaking, the risk of smallpox is the lowest among the three diseases. Although smallpox is also very serious, its dominant symptoms and the principle of infection were already well known to doctors in the Ming Dynasty, and a vaccine was even created based on the characteristics of these symptoms. p>
Cholera ranks second because it is highly dangerous and has a high fatality rate, and because it is a newly introduced disease, people still do not know the source of its disease. Various treatment methods have been tried, but they are completely ineffective. Most of the treatments
It can only alleviate the pain.
Cholera existed in ancient times. At least in the Han Dynasty, the word cholera appeared. However, the cholera at that time was not the same disease as it is today. Cholera at that time often occurred in the army, causing vomiting and diarrhea, and losing combat effectiveness.
Nowadays, the more severe cholera can kill a large number of people with diarrhea.
People are helpless to deal with this kind of patients. The so-called alleviation of pain means that if you have this disease, you will have diarrhea for five days before you die of diarrhea. If you take some medicine, you will die of diarrhea in two days.
However, the characteristics of cholera are also very obvious. It usually does not reach a large river and is a very strong regional disease. As long as people leave a dangerous area, the problem will not be big.
The most terrifying thing is the plague.
It's not like he has never had this disease before. Long before Liu Chengzong joined the army, there was a plague in Yuhebao in the last years of Wanli, which took away many people and made the newly born Meijiangzong the orphan of Zhonglie.
But the plague comes and goes, and people don’t know why it comes, they don’t know why it spreads, and they don’t know why it goes away either.
In this world, only Liu Chengzong knows that it is called plague, and it can be spread through the mouth droplets of rats, fleas, and virus carriers.
A person carries a secret that only he knows in the whole world, which in itself means a huge responsibility.
"Don't leave for these two days. Just stay in the Yamen. I will write a few letters and wait for you to return to Dongguan." Liu Chengzong paced in the hall and turned around and said, "Send someone to send these letters to Yan'an. These letters must be sent to Yan'an."
Hand it over to the recipient."
Wu Panlong has already said that it is difficult to travel to the east. There is a plague in Shanxi. We don’t know what the epidemic is. It is very likely that it will be infected in northern Shaanxi. In other words, northern Shaanxi will become an epidemic area.
He realized that the letter Liu Chengzong wanted to send must be very important and required their own soldiers to enter the epidemic area.
"I will choose a few confidants. I wonder how many letters the commander will send?"
Wu Panlong was thinking in his mind that he would have to use the Zhenyuan Township Party to deliver the message this time, so as to ensure safe passage through Pingliang Prefecture, and he could enter Yan'an as long as he passed through Qingyang Prefecture.
But considering that when the messenger arrived in Yan'an, he was afraid that the plague had already spread there, two people must travel together on every road.
If one falls, there will be another one who can deliver the message.
"Two letters." Liu Chengzong paused after saying that, then shook his head and said: "Send two books, a book on famine relief and epidemic prevention."
Wu Panlong blurted out: "This is our book!"
He had read the book on famine relief and epidemic prevention compiled by Liu Chengzong. Although this book was only distributed to local doctors and academies after printing, and only senior officers had such basic knowledge, in fact, all the literate officers in the Marshal's Army basically read it.
Passed.
In addition to military laws and regulations, their marshal has compiled such a serious book. It is said to be effective, not to mention a medical book on preventing infection. Even if it is a book on opera, the Marshal's Mansion will be popular among everyone.
And to be fair, Wu Panlong has always believed that this book on famine relief and epidemic prevention is the greatest weapon for the Marshal's Mansion in the Eastern Expedition, because plague and famine are more formidable opponents than the imperial army.
This book has little to say about the treatment of plague, but it provides a popular introduction to drought-resistant and locust-resistant crop types in the north, explains the site selection and construction of small water conservancy facilities, and a preliminary understanding of plague, isolation and prevention.
The most important point is that Liu Chengzong described the thing that causes plague in the book as a virus, which is a poisonous insect that is smaller than a mayfly and invisible to the naked eye.
The widespread use of these in the military means that when they are stationed in an epidemic area, no matter what kind of epidemic is breaking out locally, they can greatly reduce the impact of the plague on the army, and at the same time stabilize the panic of the people as quickly as possible.
Wu Panlong had always believed that dead people were the biggest source of plague, but he personally experienced the battle against smallpox in Hehuang next to Yang Yao, which made him realize that dead people were not the biggest source of plague.
Living people are.
In other words, panic survivors who are difficult to control are the biggest source of the spread of the plague.
The dead are very well-behaved. They lie there, motionless. No one can mess with them, waiting for their bodies to die together with the poisonous insects.
"This is our book. We and the imperial court are one mountain and two tigers." Liu Chengzong did not refute Wu Panlong's words. He just said: "But even if the two tigers fight, the mountain is here. If the mountain collapses, the battle will be won.
So what?"
"With or without the plague, we can run rampant across the world!"