I Love Farming

Northumberland is not much different from other territories. There are thousands of households living here. Apart from nobles and knights, the largest number are serfs, some freemen, and slaves.

The serfs paid land rent and various taxes with labor, goods, and currency. Although they had a little bit of their own land, they could not leave the master's territory and were greatly restricted.

Freemen is a general term. In Northumberland, what people refer to as freemen often refers to yeoman.The owner farmer cultivates the land by himself, pays the land rent, and has to cultivate the land for the lord.Excluding them, those craftsmen, craftsmen use their own crafts to make a living, and they are much better than serfs.

And slaves are the worst. They have neither their own land nor freedom. They are the master's personal belongings, and everything does not belong to them. No matter what they do, they cannot be rewarded.

If you owe money to the lord, you may become a slave, steal things, or become a slave, or you do nothing, just because your territory is occupied by other nobles, you also have to be a slave.

In Northumberland, there are nearly a hundred such slaves. They do what the master tells them to do, they are beaten every day, and they have no hope of life.

Of course, after the new master came, their life became better, because the master didn't like to beat people, but only cats, maybe their numb calls couldn't please the master.

And recently, when the shepherd dogs introduced in Northumberland got used to it and started working here, some slaves who were responsible for taking care of livestock and grazing were freed.They thought they would be taken to gather oats, but in fact the lord took them all into the great hall of the castle, where he was to teach them: handiwork.

All slaves doubt their ears.

Craftsmen are people who live better than some less wealthy owner farmers, but they are just slaves, how can they learn manual work?

Looking at the carpenters and tailors, they don't look good either.They didn't want to agree, this is a handicraft for subsistence, it was passed down to them from their ancestors, and no outsiders knew about it.

But the lord asked the knights to threaten them with long swords, and they had to agree, and later the lord said that if they taught these slaves, then the rent they got from the farm tools made by the slaves could be given to them a little bit.

Anyway, here they are sitting together now, teaching slaves how to make horse harnesses.

The baron said that oxen were used to draw the horses, but the horses' necks were long and sloping upwards, and the yokes put on them strangled them.

Change the horse harness to a leather shoulder harness, and then make a crossbar at the front to tie the harness, so that it is more convenient for multiple horses to pull the cart and plow together.

Not to mention the fact that the master threatened them with his life, this horse harness is really convenient. I don't know if it is their illusion. After having this, the horse seems to have more strength when doing work.

The master also prepared a lot of raw materials for them to practice. He stood on the steps himself and said, "I will reward whoever can produce a complete and usable horse harness first."

He looked around for a week, and all the slaves were staring at him. The best reward they could think of was a full meal.

However, the baron said: "For the delivery, I will reward the slave with a piece of property, which is the horse harness he made. When the horse harness is rented out, the rented slave can own half of it."

Cui Qichao still carefully considered the acceptability of the slaves. He didn't say that I would release you and you would be my serf, but that he would give birth and give specific property.

Unexpectedly, it was this, which threw the slaves into surprise, and they couldn't recover for a long time.

Can you get the master's confinement?This is what they usually dare not even think about!Everything owned by the slaves belongs to the lord, half of the income from renting a horse harness...Thinking about it, the faces of the slaves blushed. Looking at the harness as a demonstration, their eyes glowed, and they wished to see how it looked. Carve it to your heart.

Under this unimaginable reward, the slaves studied with one heart.Although it would be difficult to get started because he had never touched it before, Cui Qichao believed that someone would be able to enlighten him.

At this time, the wheat also began to be harvested.The yield of wheat is larger than that of oats. It may be because of drinking more water for a few days, and the land is not saline-alkali, so the effect is even more obvious.

Of course, it is still limited to the wheat in the lord's land, and what other people's wheat should look like.

Harvesting crops is a long-term job, after all, the population is small.

During this period, before the plowing of the autumn sown fields needed to begin, a serf named Harry made a complete, working harness for a horse.

Cui Qichao fulfilled his promise, and in front of everyone, asked the person who kept the farm tools to record that Harry owned half of the income from this horse harness.

Harry fainted with joy on the spot. Of course, there are many reasons for his perennial hunger, but everyone in the manor still focused on describing his joy when they mentioned it.

In Northumberland, it is not that there have been capable slaves who could please the master, but the master before had really never thought of rewarding his humanoid tools.

For other efforts, Cui Qichao also encouraged, "The next person who makes the horse harness can get half a bowl of oatmeal, and cash it on the spot."

So when the fallow land came to be plowed, the horses' harnesses were sufficient, and all the castle stood by the plow, and watched the eight horses pull the plow together.

This is the private land belonging to the lord. It is different from the barren land in other places. Because of sufficient irrigation and a season of green manure, the color of the land turns black.

Generally speaking, everyone prefers to use a mixture of oxen and horses to pull the plow. Cui Qichao adopted an all-horse lineup, with slaves on the side setting up an hourglass to time the time. When using a cow harness, the speed has increased by at least [-]%!And at this time, the horses haven't moved yet!

Fortunately, there is more oat grass this year, and there is green manure grass to feed the horses, otherwise the consumption would be really high.

The agricultural officer also said intoxicatedly: "My lord, with these harnesses, when driving the horse-drawn wheat back to the warehouse, it can also bear a greater weight, which has quadrupled."

The horse will not be suffocated for breathing, and of course it will be able to exert more force, so that the original amount of running four times can now be run in one time, saving a lot of time.Time is food.

"Have you saved all the seeds?" Cui Qichao asked again after hearing him talk about pulling the wheat back.

He discovered that these people did not know how to properly preserve the seeds, and often half of the wheat was kept as seeds, because the germination rate was too low in the second year.Apart from the ground, it is improper preservation, and the vitality of the seed is lost.

Sow fifteen or twenty kilograms of seeds per mu. Isn't this a joke with Cui Qichao?

In Cui Qichao's understanding, to grow oats, at most four kilograms of seeds per acre of land are enough, and for wheat, six to fifteen kilograms of seeds are needed for one acre of land.After all, high-quality, active seeds have a germination rate of over 90.00%.

Although the conditions in the Middle Ages were a bit poor, the germination rate had to be kept at more than half, and it was impossible to reach [-] kilograms of oats.

Of course, Cui Qichao didn't say these words to the agricultural officer for the time being, so as not to scare the agricultural officer again.

In terms of seed preservation, Cui Qichao instructed the agricultural officer to choose a sunny day, spread the seeds first, and keep turning them during the period to remove [-]% of the water before piling them into piles.As for the warehouse, it must be dry, otherwise the seeds will absorb moisture and become blind.

The agricultural officer is now obedient to Cui Qichao. In order to complete what the master ordered, he personally guards the side of the drying yard, tests the temperature with his hands, and watches the serfs turn the wheat.The warehouse was also paved after he stared at and killed one side of the bug.

So now, the agricultural officer can proudly say: "Don't worry, I have arranged all the food properly!"

"Very good." Cui Qichao praised casually, "Go ahead and see the plowed field."

When they stepped forward, they saw that some of the blackened cultivated land was in a loose mass, somewhat moist and soft, not as hard as many cultivated lands. Even after plowing, it looked like a pile of hard soil.

Let any medieval farmer look at it, this is a piece of arable land with a lot of land!

Although this piece of land is fallow, in the past, half a year of fallow would never have reached such a state, and everyone knew it.

When the agricultural officer saw these lands, he thought of his own land, because it was in the same condition as the master, and it was very fertile. He said happily: "Now the serfs are vying for it, working under the stars, Dig ditches beside your fields, too."

Only by imitating the master can we have the same excellent land.

Mr. Cui held the soil in his hands, but he was still a little dissatisfied. The main body of this land is still khaki, with a little black. Some are big.These states of soil represent its drainage, aeration, moisture retention, and fertility.

From Cui Qichao's point of view, this piece of land is not up to the standard, but to others, it is already a rare fertile land, and with its full horsepower, today is a lot of good news.

……

Because of this year's bumper harvest, the church has successfully received the ten-one tax. In previous years, due to famines and other reasons, it may not be able to collect the full tax.

It was also at this time that Cui Qichao began to write a letter to his relative of the archbishop, and sent it along with the tax.

He claimed to have experimented with oriental farming methods on the land, but he did not expect it to be equally effective. It turns out that the land in the east and the west is the same, and now he attaches the crops bred this year.

Those methods of killing insects and fertilizing crops are what he calls herbal medicine, which is like healing the land.

Few people have been to the country where Cui Qichao arrived. The theory he fabricated and the seeds of supporting evidence made everyone who saw it believe it.

The archbishop couldn't wait to experiment on the church's land. At the same time, he wrote to his nephew to warn his nephew that he must keep the secret of the good harvest, seal the mouths of the people in the manor, and keep a close eye on every passerby. Secretly, the ear hears the message.You can't tell anyone about this, otherwise, there will definitely be thieves visiting your territory.

Cui Qichao thought, I will not be attacked if people do not offend me, and there is another last sentence, if people offend me, I will let the craftsmen not use farm tools or weapons...

Now that there is more food in the warehouse, Cui Qichao has more confidence. Everyone knows that the most important thing in fighting is tools and physique. Knights have weapons, but not everyone has the physical strength fed by enough food in this era. up.

He should be regarded as the most generous lord, after all, his love for the people made him wish he could even feed his slaves.

·

In addition to interplanting with the crops during the cultivation period, some green manure should also be pressed as a base fertilizer before sowing the crops.At this time, the ditches are all over most of the manor, and more water can be poured to let the green manure decompose quickly.

Of course, attention should also be paid to keeping seeds. In fields where grass seeds need to be kept, the grass should be harvested first, the seeds should be knocked out, and the stems and roots should be taken back and pressed.

These grass seeds are carefully placed in the same warehouse as the grain seeds. A layer of quicklime is placed under the storage container, separated with a fine cloth, and then the seeds are placed, and another fine cloth is placed on top, and plant ash is spread, and then covered. , the treatment is also very detailed.

The slaves who were assigned to do this work were secretly guessing that lime is usually used to build houses, and if lime is contained in the seeds, is it also to build barriers?

In a sense, they guessed right.

By this time, it was already the end of September, and all the crops were basically harvested, and the wheat was crushed by the master's mill.It's just crushed, so there will be a lot of broken shells, sand and stones inside.The bread that is made is black bread, so hard that it must be soaked before it can be eaten.

Ordinary people just eat it like this, and even the nobles will inevitably eat some black bread, but they will be sieved finer than ordinary people.If you live a particularly delicate life, or if you are rich, you are willing to have someone sift the wheat flour all the time to make white bread.

But even white bread, in the eyes of later generations, was too coarse to swallow.Anyway, after Cui Qichao came, he ate very little bread, and it was the first time he missed rice so much.

And these people who use the mill have to pay rent to the lord.

The good news is that this year, due to the proper pest control and good weather, although the production has not increased like the old man, the harvest is not bad.In particular, the master wanted to quickly repair the dams and ditches, and use paste to improve everyone's movements instead of sticks and whips, so that every day of work, the serfs who participated in the construction could have an extra meal and save some rations.So, these rents haven't been too much of a headache.

——In the days of poverty, these farmers are very lucky to have a little bit of affluence.

August and September are the best times of the year when the weather is warm and comfortable.Moreover, before the work of this season is finished and the sowing of the next season is approaching, the lord of Northumberland must, according to the usual practice, feast all the people on the land and reward them for their past labor, and also show that this year our The territory has a good harvest.

The content of this feast depends on the generosity of different lords. In some places, you may only eat a few cabbage leaves or beans.But no matter how good it is, it's not much better. Usually, it's just Zhuang's hair, and it's very likely that he will be deducted.

In terms of output, such a banquet is in line with the specifications.

This year, this year is different.

This was the first banquet for the new baron. He moved the kitchen to the grass and asked the women in the manor to help.The men, on the other hand, went to catch pigs in the woods.

Animal husbandry in the Middle Ages was as important as planting. The status of livestock was higher than that of slaves. Cattle, horses, sheep, pigs, chickens and ducks were in groups.

When catching pigs, the serfs didn't even think, not at all, that these were for them to eat.

Facing the opposition from the stewards, Cui Qichao brutally suppressed it. He said arrogantly: "I have already told my uncle about our good harvest. Maybe in the future, I will have more land and cattle and sheep. No, it's not that maybe , for sure."

The stewards were speechless, no wonder, usually the master was a bit extravagant, just to build speed, he gave the serfs beans to eat, and now he was so happy that he couldn't find the north, and wanted to slaughter the meat for the serfs to eat.

Their baron must be the craziest lord in the South.

Cui Qichao was afraid that they would gossip again, so he stabbed a duck to death with a sword on the spot, saying, "My stewards and soldiers have worked hard, and the serfs drink broth, and you will enjoy the most delicious barbecue."

On the one hand, the broth should not be too much to appear too abnormal, on the other hand, the serfs could not eat meat all year round, and they couldn't give big fish and meat as soon as they went up.In addition to broth, there are other vegetables.

The castle was silent for a while, and then burst into cheers.Who cares, who doesn't want to eat meat, the master told them to eat it, only a fool would not eat it.

……

Cows and horses cannot be eaten casually. Cui Qichao ordered pigs and sheep to be killed.To make meat, how can we do without oil? Cui Qichao didn't ask her to use olive oil amidst the cook's complaints, but said, "Refine some lard."

In the Middle Ages, people still used various vegetable oils, and the nobles especially loved olive oil. After all, livestock were rare, and meat oil was naturally difficult to become popular.

The cook didn't know how to make lard at all, and it was Cui Qichao who stood by and instructed.

The butcher slaughtered the pig, and the women in the manor helped clean it. At this time, they still thought that the meat should be eaten by the knights and stewards, and they were also included in the banquet.

There is no difference between these pigs and wild boars. The suet on their bodies is only one-sixth to seven times that of modern pigs. The women cleaned the suet, cut it into large pieces, and then put it in a pot and boiled it over low heat.

At the beginning, all the oil came out was water, but gradually, the suet shrank and began to release oil, and the smell of meat gradually drifted away with the wind, and the women couldn't help swallowing.

The people who work here are basically serfs.Black bread is a rare delicacy for them, not to mention meat.

"Scoop out the oil." Following Cui Qichao's instructions, the cook scooped the lard that kept appearing into the jar, and there were still some impurities in it, but for this era, there was no condition or need to filter it out.

Refining until the suet turns into a golden and crisp oil residue, it is considered to be squeezed clean.At this time, the scene was also extremely silent, and the peasant women with dirty faces were all staring at the oil residue, but their expressions were like logs.

The cook pulled the oil residue into the wooden plate. Cui Qichao usually only dared to eat the dishes he made with his eyes fixed on him. He took the wooden plate and picked one and put it in his mouth. Although there was no salt, the oil residue smelled very good. Thick, creaking in the mouth, and oil comes out.

Xiaobai bounced around at Cui Qichao's feet, obviously wanting to eat too.

It's okay to eat a little in moderation.It's just that Cui Qichao couldn't give it to it openly, so he pretended to shake his hands and accidentally dropped one.Xiao Bai immediately jumped up and caught it with lightning speed.

All the peasant women sighed in their hearts, this lucky cat...

Cui Qichao handed the wooden plate to the cook, and said, "You take a bite, and each woman will give one."

This sentence was beyond everyone's expectations, and the peasant women couldn't believe their ears.

As for the cook, she knew that she had to cook broth for the serfs today. She was numb to the master's order. The aroma of lard made her reluctant to swallow it, she kept it on her tongue, walked to every peasant woman, and handed out lard residue.

Everyone was still silent, but their eyes lit up, following the steps of the cook, but they didn't dare to fight for it, they only dared to wait for the cook to distribute it.

Each person only has one, and like cooks, they put the oil residue into their mouths and hold it until it is completely softened, and there is no trace of oil before they are willing to swallow it.The rich aroma of lard and the soft taste made them fall into happiness all of a sudden.

Then look at the lord who rubbed the cat with his feet as if nothing had happened, what kind of treatment is this, there is no need to round up, it means that the lord personally gave them meat to eat!

Before the end of the whole year, even though everyone drank the broth afterwards, it did not prevent the peasant women present from frequently mentioning today's experience in front of others.

Sometimes food has nothing to do with taste, but with mood. In terms of their psychological feelings at this time, it is probably the best food they have ever enjoyed.

The last bit of greasy residue is the cook's, and she still has a lot to do.

The stewards were still enjoying their barbecue in the castle, and Cui Qichao should have returned to the castle with those stewards.But he was afraid that the broth would also be skipped, so he insisted on standing aside. According to what the stewards said, he must witness this carnival with his own eyes.

After the mutton soup was boiled on the grass, the housekeeper said to the serfs expressionlessly, "Now, you can all go home."

Although he was not short of meat and had convinced himself countless times that this was the master's decision, seeing their ignorance and thinking that they were about to enjoy the broth, the butler still hated it a little.

The serfs were relaxed, and as they expected, they could go back after helping the masters with their work. At that time, perhaps the head of the village could give everyone a bowl of oatmeal mush.

They took a lingering glance at the several pots of soup, and everyone present could clearly see how authentic and rich the broth was, and even oil was added.The mutton was stewed until it was soft and rotten, and a lot of herbs were added. Finally, the cook's spoon could poke the meat apart.

A portion of the slanted lamb leg bone with some minced meat hanging out from the thick whitish tempting soup can almost see the rotten bone marrow in the bone hole.The steaming heat goes straight into people's nose along with the smell of mutton, and there is no smell of mutton.

Although, I don't know why the cook put some carrots in the mutton soup. Doesn't this cook the carrots?There are also some cabbage leaves, which are also stewed and packed into a large pot.This way of eating is too strange.

When all the serfs were dragging their heavy feet, staring at the mutton soup, reluctantly preparing to leave——

The butler continued: "Then, bring the best container in your family, and all the cubs, to enjoy the dinner given by the baron. The broth is yours."

For a while, the entire meadow was deaf except for the chirping of birds.

The expressions of all the serfs froze: What happened just now?