Chastity Layman

When the sky was slightly bright, the street drums on Chang'an Sixth Street began to sound.

The Zuo Jinwu Guard guarding the nine gates also ushered in the changing robes. After staying up all night, everyone was a little tired. At this time, they were finally able to yawn, tidy up, hand over and return to the camp to rest.

In the west of the city, Jinguang Gate is the middle gate of the West Three Gates.

After the handover of the Zuo Jinwu Guard, the city gate opened.

Outside the gate, countless merchants and common people were waiting in line to be allowed to enter the city. And beside the city, the water gate fence was also slowly raised under the pull of the winch.

On the Cao River, countless boats also began to line up for inspection.

This canal, like Guangyuntan, was presided over by Qin Lang when he was a transshipment envoy. Before Zhenguan, Chang'an City was known as eight waters surrounding Chang'an, and there were three other canals, namely Longshou Canal, Yong'an Canal and Qingming Canal. It was built first after the construction of Daxing City in the Sui Dynasty. These three canals lead into Lifang and Chiyuan, and finally into Shanghai Water and Weihe River. They not only supply urban water, but also play a role in flood diversion.

After Qin Lang took office as the transfer envoy, he planned, designed and excavated two canals, the Yellow Canal and the Cao Canal, mainly to strengthen the water transportation capacity of Chang'an City, forming Chang'an's eight water canals and five canals, and dredged and excavated many branch canals to make Chang'an City have water. At the same time as it is convenient, there is also a convenient water transportation system, which makes Qujiang and many other Chang'an pools have smooth water and beautiful scenery.

Just like the Cao Canal outside Jinguangmen, it undertakes the important responsibility of land and water transfer. Every morning, the boat departs from Guangyuntan Wharf, enters the city through the Jinguangmen water barrier, and arrives at Xishi Caoqu Wharf. There are tens of thousands of sheep each.

In addition, there are tens of thousands of tons of raw fish every day, as for chickens, ducks, geese, etc., and a large amount of fresh vegetables, dried goods, etc., basically go through this green channel, which is convenient and fast, and avoids being blocked at the city gate. It is also faster, directly reaching the West Market, and distributing it to various neighborhood markets through various branch canals and streets.

In the afternoon, the canal began to transport wood, fuel charcoal, coal and other fuels into the city, and sent them to various markets and warehouses. In the afternoon, grain was transported by water.

The Jinguangmen Cao Canal has become an extremely important logistics line among the eight water canals and five canals in Chang'an.

Ships full of hogs passed the inspection one by one. Basically, every morning, the first batch of pigs entering the city were hogs, at least 10,000.

Although pork is cheap meat in the eyes of the nobles, for the millions of people in Chang'an City, pork is an indispensable daily necessities.

Chang'an is a consumer city. There are the most powerful consumer groups in Tang Dynasty, nearly 100,000 imperial guards from the north and south, 50,000 to 60,000 officials, tens of thousands of court personnel, and countless noble bureaucrats and their families, servants and slaves. There are tens of thousands of craftsmen, civilian husbands, and many monks and priests, not to mention countless businessmen, scholars, officials from other places who came to Beijing, foreign envoys, business groups, etc.

The daily flow of people is also huge.

Its spending power is even higher.

In many places, there are not many people who eat public meals, and the officials in Chang'an City have a salary of 50,000 to 60,000, and the Beiya Forbidden Army has tens of thousands of soldiers. These people are considered to have relatively high spending power in the Tang Dynasty.

In the past few years, the Tang Dynasty has repeatedly won foreign countries and destroyed many enemy countries. At the same time, the country has become more stable, with good harvests year after year.

A Beiya Imperial Guard can earn at least 50 guan a year, not to mention the officers.

Chang’an spends a lot of money and food every day, and everything is supplied from outside. The food is mainly shipped from the Central Plains, Jianghuai and other places outside the Guan, but the non-staple food, especially fresh vegetables, chickens, ducks and pigs, etc., are mainly supplied by breeding in Guanzhong and Gyeonggi. .

During the reign of Wude, the world was uncertain, the frontiers were restless, and disasters continued. The supply of food in Guanzhong was often insufficient, let alone poultry meat and non-staple food. hard days.

Live fish with tails are not bad.

But in recent years, this situation is constantly changing.

······

At the Caoqu inspection point, a group of officials are carefully inspecting the approaching ships, carefully counting and inspecting the pigs, sheep, chickens and ducks on board, not only to check the registered quantity, but also to check whether the seals are stamped on these animals.

When Guangyuntan departed, it had already been pre-inspected there, and all livestock and poultry to be transported into Chang'an City for slaughter had to be inspected and stamped first, to confirm that they were disease-free and healthy, and to prevent plague and epidemics.

"Which ship is this, and there are a lot of pigs and sheep today?" A checkpoint official was so busy all morning that he didn't even have time to take a sip of water.

"It's not about the Dragon Boat Festival, so the demand is naturally a lot more. The saint wants to reward hundreds of officials and Habayashiro, and the court also rewards officials and soldiers of the North and South Army. Even the workshops have to prepare for the Dragon Boat Festival, besides Now, the common people are also starting to prepare in advance."

"Usually there are about 10,000 live pigs a day, but today there are at least 20,000. More than 30,000 sheep have been transported today, and they are still being transported."

"Is the slaughterhouse busy?"

"What are you doing with your mind? There are three hundred and sixty lines in Chang'an City. This slaughterhouse has grown in strength in recent years. There are quite a few butchers registered in the association. It is said that the slaughterhouse only collects membership fees for a year, and it can scare a person to death. "

Some officials even envied the people in the slaughterhouse. Of course, what they envied were not ordinary butchers, but the directors of the slaughterhouse.

Datang has a strong control over industry and commerce, and one of the most important moves is the guild.

It is stipulated that all walks of life must establish guilds. There are a total of 360 guilds in Chang'an City, which is an increase of 140 guilds compared to the 220 guilds in the Sui Dynasty.

In the entire Chang'an City, all those engaged in industrial and commercial sales must join the guild. The imperial court sent people to be responsible for the supervision and management of each guild, but each guild also had its own guild council, and some big merchants in the industry served as directors and were responsible for managing the industry, such as formulating industry rules and assisting the imperial court in purchasing corresponding goods. Guild merchants manage and so on.

The imperial court only stared at the big businesses in these industries, and then let these big businesses act as agents to manage the small and medium businesses below.

Just like this slaughterhouse, all butchers have to join the association, and they have to pay the membership fee to join the association. Only after joining the association can they be qualified to practice in the industry, and they have to accept the unified management of the guild.

Those directors are responsible for the review, and at the same time they have to bear the corresponding guarantee responsibility. If there is a problem, the court will find them first.

After the butchers joined the slaughter guild, they practiced their knives. Ordinary small butchers can only be hired, and the stronger ones can open their own shops for slaughtering and processing. And those with greater strength can be slaughtered, processed and sold.

As for the stronger merchants, they can control the slaughtering business of one square or even multiple blocks.

There are thirteen directors in the Chang'an Slaughtering Company, which are held by the thirteen most powerful merchants in the industry. They basically control the entire slaughtering market in Chang'an City.

Behind the directors of the thirteen families are actually people with backgrounds, such as Wei Ji, the most powerful member of the thirteen families. The slaves of the family, before Jiangdu's change, had already become generals, and later fled back to Chang'an with Xiaoguo, and went back to their old job as a bad handsome.

In the ninth year of Wude, he was lucky. He met Qin Lang, Duke of the State of Wei, and led the Xuanwu Gate to calm the chaos. From then on, he had a big backer, and now he is the founding uncle and the fifth rank of Scarlet Robe.

Because of Qin Lang's backing, Wei Ji secured the top spot in Chang'an Butchery. It is said that Wei Ji can earn more than 100 guan a day, and at least 50,000 guan in gross profit a year.

The shops run by Wei Ji are spread all over Chang'an, slaughtering and distributing, and the business is booming. In particular, although Wei Ji has a backing, his business is honest and he never sells overnight meat, which is highly praised.

The other 12 directors are actually similar to Wei Ji, and they all stand behind the wealthy families in Beijing. This is not only the case with Tu Xing, but also the 360 ​​Xing Xing in Chang'an.

Just like these boats that transport pigs, sheep, and vegetables, they belong to the Chang'an Water Bank, and the Water Bank is the largest guild with the most members in Chang'an. , They are all over the place.

An official took the form handed over by the boss of a water line ship, checked it, registered and stamped it, and then waved his hand to signal approval.

"There are also a lot of sheep sent into the palace today, 280 in the Taiji Palace, 100 in the East Palace, and 120 in the Da'an Palace..."

A green-robed ninth-rank official glared at the petty official, "Do you want to die? Are you shouting?"

The little official was very young, and he had just started this errand, but he didn't expect to be scolded.

"The expenses in the palace are also a secret, understand?"

"Remember, I'm just curious, did you eat so many sheep?"

An old official smiled and said, "You don't know now, pork is not used in the palace, so the main meat is sheep, and only a dozen pigs are brought in every day."

Of course, these two hundred and eighty sheep did not mean that the emperor ate it alone. After all, there were many court personnel in the Taiji Palace of the Tang Dynasty, thousands of people.

And the emperor goes to court every morning, if it will be held for a longer time, he will usually give the court officials a lunch. The main course of the lunch is made of mutton. The emperor will also give food.

In comparison, the East Palace has a hundred sheep a day, which is not too much. After all, the East Palace is also a small court with many officials, and the East Palace also provides lunch for the officials.

On the contrary, the Taishang Huang lived in Da'an Palace, and there were not many people in the palace, so he actually wanted one hundred and twenty dogs a day.

"There are many nobles in the palace, and they eat more sheep and lambs." The old official said again.

There are different types of sheep, big and small. A big sheep can yield 30 to 40 catties of clean meat, while a lamb can only produce a dozen or 20 catties. There is still a big difference.

"Once you can be promoted to a fifth-rank official, not only can you wear purple silver, but you can also have the benefits of nine sheep rewards every month. If you can become a third-rank official, you will have twelve sheep in a month. And if you can do it For grade two and above, twenty sheep will be given to you every month, and sixty catties of pork will also be given to you."

The old official said with an envious tone.

The green-robed officer also said with a look of yearning, "It's the old imperial calendar for you. This year, the sage has given grace to increase the salary of the Beijing officials and increase the clothing and food for the imperial army. This is a lot. For a first-rank Beijing official, the original monthly salary plus Miscellaneous use and others totaled eleven guan in January, and after this increase in salary, the total has reached 31 guan, a direct increase of 20 guan."

He himself is a ninth-rank petty official. His monthly salary was 1,500 renminbi before, but now it is 1,917 renminbi, an increase of more than 400 renminbi.

"The prime minister of the Zhengshitang also has a special reward. In addition to the monthly salary, there is an additional three hundred guan, 20 bolts of silk for spring and winter clothes, 30 bolts of silk, and 100 taels of winter cotton!"

The monthly salary of first-rank officials was increased from eleven guan to thirty-one guan, but the chancellors added another three hundred guan. Ten pigs will be upgraded to one per day, and pork will be changed from sixty catties a month to ten heads, and beef will be given one hundred catties a month."