When Zhou Hexuan returned to Tianjin by train, Fairbank and Fei Weimei also went to Tianjin. The two foreigners were going to travel around China. Fairbank was to get familiar with Chinese customs and customs, while Fei Weimei was to inspect Chinese folk architecture.
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Their first stop is Tianjin, and then they prepare to head south to Shanghai, Fuzhou, Xiamen, Shantou, Hong Kong and Guangzhou.
These cities were all treaty ports in the late Qing Dynasty. Fairbank worked very hard to write his doctoral thesis. He had to visit all the treaty ports, search for and read customs historical materials from that year, and also check the local chronicles of each city.
We have to admit that Fairbank's research on modern Chinese history has left a valuable asset to the field of Chinese history. He worked tirelessly and traveled throughout China all year round and collected many precious historical materials. Many of these materials were used during the Anti-Japanese War.
It was destroyed entirely due to Fairbank's efforts, so that future Chinese historians can get a glimpse of it.
This has resulted in a very helpless phenomenon. When Chinese scholars study modern Chinese history, they often have to read the works of John Fairbank, an American.
When Zhou Hexuan took Fairbank and his wife back to Sanletang, except for Meng Xiaodong who went to Shandong to sing opera, several other women were at home.
Although "Mrs. Flower Stamina" was banned in Nanjing, it is extremely popular in the north. These days, "Mrs. Flower Stamina" has almost become Meng Xiaodong's masterpiece, widely circulated in North China, and even adapted into a drama performance by patriotic youths.
No way, the allusion of this Peking opera is too strong. Audiences with a little bit of brains will know that it is satirizing the non-resistance policy. As a result, Meng Xiaodong's fame has become more and more famous, and she is almost as famous as Mei Lanfang.
No, even Han Fuju from Shandong sent a telegram to invite Meng Xiaodong to perform, saying that he wanted to sing a birthday party for his wife.
Ji Hongchang seemed to want to win over Han Fuju to fight against Chiang Kai-shek and the Japanese. He also disguised himself as a troupe and followed Meng Xiaodong to Shandong. However, Zhou Hexuan was not optimistic about Ji Hongchang's action.
Han Fuju was the first general of the Northwest Army to betray Feng Yuxiang. He hung up Yan Xishan and beat him during the Central Plains War. This man was a selfish old-fashioned warlord who wanted him to rebel against Chiang Kai-shek and resist Japan. Unless he could show what he could see and touch.
This is a huge benefit, otherwise it would be useless for me and the King of Heaven to persuade me.
Now Han Fuju has become the local emperor of Shandong. Except for Qingdao, the entire Shandong is under the control of Han Fuju. Even Chang Kaishen cannot reach out to seize power. In the past two years, Zhang Zongchang wanted to make a comeback and quietly started trouble with the support of the Japanese.
As a result, he was directly killed by Han Fuju.
But to be honest, Han Fuju's ability to occupy Shandong is actually a good thing for the people of Shandong.
Shandong has experienced successive years of wars and famines, bandits are rampant, and warlords are everywhere. It just needs local strength like Han Fuju to suppress it.
According to statistics, from the Revolution of 1911 to the early 1930s, 84 of the 107 counties in Shandong Province were troubled by bandits. Among them, there were more than 370 large bandit gangs. Some bandit forces numbered tens of thousands at their peak.
many.
After Han Fuju occupied Shandong, the first thing he did was to recruit small groups of warlords, and those who did not agree to the recruitment were directly punished as bandits. The second thing he did was to suppress bandits, integrating the army, police and militia forces, and carrying out attacks on bandits in various counties.
Joint suppression.
Chang Kaishen ordered warlords from all over the country to "clear the countryside", which was actually to arrest the Communists in the name of "clearing the countryside". After Han Fuju received the order from the Nanjing government, he was really "clearing the countryside", specifically to eliminate bandits and bullies, and also to
He linked the suppression of bandits with the performance of civil servants. He successively promoted more than a dozen local officials who were effective in suppressing bandits, so that the grassroots officials in Shandong were like chicken blood. They would kill bandits when they saw them. Every bandit was a living person.
political achievements.
Banditry in Shandong has become a disaster. In some places, the entire village is full of bandits. They can use earthen buildings and earthen forts to fight against the army. Han Fuju's methods of suppressing bandits are extremely bloody. Faced with such a bandit village, his order is: bandits
In addition to women and children in the district, all men between the ages of 15 and 50 who were not "connected to the environment" were shot, and villages hiding bandits were directly burned.
The big bandit leader Liu Heiqi took advantage of the danger and fought with Han Fuju's army for more than 40 days. In anger, Han Fuju actually applied for aircraft support from the Central Army and beat Liu Heiqi until he fled to Tianjin to live in an apartment. This was not the end of it.
, Han Fuju hired an assassin to go to Tianjin to assassinate him, and shot Liu Hei seven or three times, but he did not kill the bandit leader.
With the help of Qingxiang and the suppression of bandits, Han Fuju, a warlord with a background in the Northwest Army, has completely controlled the entire province of Shandong, and his power has even penetrated into every county, town, and town.
Although Shandong under Han Fuju still had exorbitant taxes and miscellaneous taxes, his frenzied campaign to suppress bandits quickly stabilized the public security in Shandong, and the people did receive great benefits.
…
"This is my wife Zhang Leyi."
"This is my wife Wanrong."
"This is my wife..."
Following Zhou Hexuan's introductions one by one, Fairbank and Fairfax Weimei were stunned. Especially the appearance of Vivien Leigh made them feel incredible that there was such a beautiful British woman who was willing to marry a Chinese man as his concubine.
Since Vivien Leigh became pregnant, she moved into Sanlet Hall to facilitate the pregnancy. Facing the surprise of Mr. and Mrs. Fairbank, she seemed very natural and calm. She seemed to have been used to this situation for a long time. She took the initiative to shake hands and joked: "Mr. Fei, Mrs. Fei
Hello, you two. What a fate. My surname is also Fei. According to Chinese parlance, we are all from the same family."
"It seems so." Fairbank couldn't help but smile.
After everyone chatted for a while, Fairbank followed Zhou Hexuan to the study.
It has been almost 10 years since Zhou Hexuan traveled to the Republic of China. His study room is very large. There are several cabinets on the bottom floor, which contain famous calligraphy and paintings, antique cultural relics and unique ancient books. The middle shelf is filled with various important local historical materials, and the upper floor is densely packed with Chinese and foreign books.
masterpiece.
If we move in the future, we will need more than a dozen large boxes to pack just the things in the study.
Fairbank's eyes shone brightly when he saw it, especially the local chronicles and customs chronicles on the middle shelf of the bookshelf, which were the materials he wanted to get in touch with most. He couldn't help but rub his hands and said: "Mr. Zhou, I want to borrow some of your books.
"
"Of course," Zhou Hexuan said with a smile, "You and your wife can stay here first, and it's not too late to go south after checking out the information. The Lantern Festival will be in a few days, and maybe you can experience the traditional Chinese festivals."
"Thank you so much!" Fairbank said excitedly, holding Zhou Hexuan's hand.
Fairbank was just a Ph.D. student in the United States. After he came to China, he received selfless help from a lot of top Chinese scholars including Zhou Hexuan, Liang Sicheng, Lin Huiyin, Hu Shi, Jiang Tingfu, etc. This made Fairbank extremely emotional, and it also made him fall in love with China.
, he feels that this is a country full of human touch.
More than fifty years later, "Fairbank China Memoirs" was published. Chapter 9 of the second part, "Our Chinese Friends," contains more than 6,000 words about Zhou Hexuan. Fairbank wrote in his memoirs
"Mr. Zhou Hexuan is an interesting person. He has an open mind, a broad vision and a keen eye, but he is very traditional at heart. It can be seen from his family relationship. When I first came to visit, he said to
I introduced five wives. One was the daughter of a wealthy businessman, one was a drama star, one was the last queen of the Qing Dynasty, one was a Japanese female spy (I didn’t know Mrs. Liao’s identity until the 1970s), and another
The first was the future Hollywood superstar Vivien Leigh.
It is hard for me to imagine how these beautiful women can live in peace. It is probably as difficult as managing a city. This situation was very common in China at that time. Men with power and money often had many wives at home. One is
Wives recognized by law, others are called concubines, equivalent to concubines in the Qing Dynasty.
However, Chinese progressive scholars will not marry a concubine so blatantly. For example, my friend Mr. Hu Shi, I know that he has several lovers, but he only has one wife from beginning to end. This seems to be related to reputation, and taking a concubine and marrying a concubine is backward and reactionary.
Performance is to be condemned by progressive intellectuals.
Mr. Zhou Hexuan had no scruples about this. He never cared about other people's opinions, nor did he deliberately conceal the fact that he married his concubine. On the day of the Chinese Lantern Festival, he took several of his wives to go shopping in public, and even accompanied them to the Haihe River.
Lantern. I also made a lantern with my own hands, but unfortunately it seemed that my technique was not good, and it capsized in the river after being placed only a few meters away..."