Chapter 9 Nisai Village's first thorough investigation
On the parchment is a table drawn by William with a quill.
The names of the male owners of each household are written on the vertical rows of the table. There are seventy-three lines in total, that is to say, there are seventy-three households.
On the horizontal row of the table, there are three categories: population of each household, cultivated land of each household, and household property.
William asked Old John to fill in the blanks with the data obtained after conducting door-to-door surveys in the past few days.
The bottom row is the total.
At a glance, all the data in the village are clear and clear.
From this table, William knew that there are 73 families in the current small village of Nisei, and the village has a population of 363 people, with an average of 5 people per household. Of course, some families have a larger population and some have a smaller population.
The cultivated land area of the whole village is 168 crookes.
Crookt is the area unit of the Principality of Fadir.
1 Crooked is equal to 4 Bevits, and 1 Bevit is equal to 6 Fuggets.
The Fogate is the most basic unit of area. One Fogate is roughly a 30m*30m square, which is approximately 900 square meters, equivalent to 9 acres in William's previous life.
By extrapolation, 1 bervit is 54 acres, and 1 crooked is 216 acres.
The cultivated land area of the whole village is 168 keruket, which means that the cultivated land area of the whole village is 36288 acres, which is close to 364 hectares.
There are 73 households in the village, so each household has an average of 4.9 hectares. If converted into the mu unit system that William was more familiar with in his previous life, then there are about 72 acres.
On average, a household has seventy-two acres of land.
However, in terms of family property, there are relatively few villagers who have filled in the information.
Old John noticed that William's eyes were focused on the villagers' family property. He didn't find it strange. Every lord was interested in every penny in the villagers' pockets. On the contrary, Old John also felt that this was a manifestation of William's maturity. Parchment
There was only simple data on it, which was not specific enough, so Old John opened his mouth and explained to William in detail.
"Lord Baron, in the village, the Adams family has a stone mill that grinds flour for other villagers. Of course, he also charges a certain fee."
"Grete's family has two draft horses. Generally, if the village needs to send messages to people in other places, it must be entrusted to Grete's family. Of course, haha, this is not free!"
"The Morton family, the Husted family, the Potter family, and several other families have cows for plowing the fields. Oh, by the way, sir, the Adams family has two cows. He thought they were temporarily placed in other people's homes.
I wouldn’t have known... Haha, what a stupid pariah..."
"..."
William carefully read the contents on the parchment and had a basic understanding of the situation in the village.
He smiled and said to Old John beside him, "Thank you, Old John, for bringing me this detailed information!"
"Lord Baron, it is my honor to serve you! I..." William's thanks caught Old John, who was used to being humble, a little off guard, and he hurriedly saluted and replied.
"John, I am lucky to have your help!" William looked deeply at old John and said in a low voice.
"Master William..." Old John was a little tearful and said with emotion while wiping his tears.
William smiled faintly again, helped old John wipe the tears from the corners of his eyes, and said, "Okay, John, cheer up, I still have something for you to do! Otherwise, I will find someone else!"
"
Old John immediately straightened his body, looked straight ahead, and said firmly, "My Lord Baron, I am at your service at any time!"
"Okay, Old John! I need you to help me summon all the villagers. I want to give a speech!" William said.
"Yes, sir!" Old John said with a heavy pause. After a pause, he asked again, "Sir, do you want to collect taxes from those villagers tomorrow?"
"Collect taxes?" William looked at Old John in confusion.
Old John was also stunned, "Lord Baron, didn't you want to collect taxes, so you asked me to investigate the property status of those villagers? The harvest moon is coming soon, which is convenient for us to collect taxes!"
William actually didn't mean it that way, but now that it was mentioned, he became interested and asked by the way.
"Old John, what kind of tax do you think I can charge them?"
"Lord Baron, you can collect a lot of taxes!" Old John smiled meaningfully, "The birds flying in the sky, the beasts running on the ground, and the fish swimming in the river, as long as they are in your territory, they will all be taxed.
You have to pay taxes! Hunters have to pay you hunting tax, fishermen have to pay you fishing tax, and convoys and people passing through your territory have to pay you road tax."
"Also, all the land here belongs to the principality. The principality entrusts it to you, which means you are the only owner of this land."
The small village of Nisei is located on the border and has a territorial dispute with the Kingdom of Golden Rose. It is close to the Dark Forest and Shadow Swamp. There is no oil and water, and there are endless dangers. No lord is willing to come here and suffer!
Therefore, it has always belonged to the territory directly under the principality’s name!
It’s just a territory in name only!
"These untouchables, the principality did not send lords to manage here before, so these untouchables have not paid any tax. However, Lord Baron, now that we are here, everything will change. All villagers must pay you land
Use tax!”
"And all tax rates will be decided by you!"
"So much tax? It's really 10,000 taxes!" William was stunned, paused, and then asked, "Old John, tell me, how much tax should I say?"
"Lord Baron, I think you can show your tolerance by collecting 45% of the harvest from the villagers! Moreover, the harvested grain must be ground into flour by the villagers before it can be handed over!"
William clicked his tongue, "Forty and a half?"
Nearly half? What a shame!
Old John thought that William was dissatisfied with the tax rate, and quickly explained, "Lord Baron, I know that this tax rate is relatively low for the principality, but we have just arrived and need to operate slowly. Next year, the tax rate will not be this!"
"Tax increase next year?" William's eyes widened.
William said it in a shocked tone, expressing "With such a high tax rate, taxes will be increased next year?"
However, Old John heard the tone of dissatisfaction and interpreted it as "Can we only increase taxes next year?"
Old John suddenly broke out in sweat on his forehead, and he hurriedly explained to William, "Baron, how about we collect 50% of the tax this year! And, sir, you can not only collect land use fees, you can also collect other taxes! Even
, you also have the right of the first night, and the brides of serfs must dedicate their first night to you, unless they redeem it with money."
The small village of Nisei had never had a lord before, so naturally there were no serfs. They were all peasants, free peasants.
But when William thought of those unkempt freedmen, thought of their habits of urinating and defecating everywhere, and thought of the spectacular sight he saw that day, William almost felt like vomiting.
He quickly stopped Old John and said, "Old John, okay, that's all for today. You go and notify the villagers first."
Old John had no choice but to swallow the rest of his words and said, "Yes, Lord Baron!"
Old John bowed respectfully and stepped back.
After Old John closed the door and left, William stood there for a while. When he heard Old John's footsteps disappear, he said lightly in the language of the "Snow White" world, "Magic Mirror!"
"Yes, my master." The light on the magic mirror on the table flashed, and the voice of the magic mirror spirit appeared in his mind.
"Can you search the nearby forest to see if there are any plants suitable for making brooms?" William ordered.
The surface of the magic mirror flickered and darkened, as if it was searching. In less than a second, the magic mirror answered William, "Master, we found a total of three plants suitable for making brooms in the nearby forest.
As the Magic Mirror Mirror Spirit spoke, these new plant images appeared on the mirror.
The first plant, William estimated, has a stem height of seventy or eighty centimeters, with a yellow-green body and full of green caryopsis.
It was quite suitable for making a broom, but William psssed this plant off right away!
This is the rye grown by the villagers, which is the food source they depend on for survival. By using it to make brooms, does William want the villagers to rebel?
Another plant appeared on the surface of the magic mirror. The plant was oval in shape, with dense clusters, many and thin branches, and green and red colors.
"This one." William was not very satisfied, "Magic Mirror, are there many plants like this nearby?"
"There are fewer at the edge of the forest and more in the depths of the forest!" the magic mirror answered honestly.
"Forget it!" William gave up immediately. The forest in this era was not the developed forest in the previous life.
The forests in this world are authentic, with all kinds of ferocious animals and strange plants. Even knights entering there are in danger of their lives, let alone ordinary people.
A third plant appeared on the magic mirror.
This plant is taller than rye, about 120 centimeters, with upright, slender stems, flat leaves, and golden yellow color overall.
William fell in love with it as soon as he saw it. It was the ideal broom plant in his mind, and asked, "Magic Mirror, are there many plants like this around?"
“Master, this plant is everywhere!”
"Very good!" William looked happy.
"Master, I must remind you that if there is no new energy replenishment, with your current frequency of use, I can probably maintain it for 32 days before entering a deep sleep state."
"Yes, I understand." The cheerful mood disappeared again, and William's face sank.