Chapter 364.

After finishing the evening meal, Wei Ruo and Xiu Mei were organizing things in their room at the inn.

“Miss, although this Lin’an Prefecture is more prosperous than Taizhou Prefecture, there are quite a few more stragglers along the way than Taizhou Prefecture, and the number of stragglers gathered outside the city gates is about to catch up with the stragglers on the open land of Taizhou Prefecture.”

Xiu Mei couldn’t help but lament about what she had seen in the past few days. Lin’an Prefecture city is not many stragglers, but they are all blocked outside the city gates, those who do not have enough food to eat, and some of them even starve to death directly.

Lin’an Province as Zhejiang Chengxuan Buzhengji province is the whole Zhejiang Chengxuan Buzhengji most prosperous and bustling city, but now also a lot of ragged face of yellow skinny stragglers.

“The food situation has been bad for the past two years, and there are naturally a lot of victims.” Wei Ruo said.

“But hasn’t the court already sent the Sixth Prince to provide relief? Why haven’t we seen any improvement yet? Otherwise, we have to put these stragglers to settle down a bit, stop them all outside the capital city and watch them starve to death.”

Xiu Mei thinks more simply, thinking that human life is at stake, how to save people first.

Therefore, after seeing so many stragglers, Xiu Mei’s heart was vaguely dissatisfied with the Sixth Prince who came to provide relief.

“Then I don’t know.” Wei Ruo didn’t have much heart to care about how the Sixth Prince planned to provide disaster relief or relief, she just did her own thing.

Wei Ruo was looking at the map of Lin’an Province while talking to Xiu Mei.

“Tomorrow we’ll go here to check the situation.” Wei Ruo said, pointing to the northern outskirts of Lin’an Province.

“I’ll go wherever Miss says.” Xiu Mei didn’t even look, she followed along wherever Miss went.

“Then I’m going to sell you.” Wei Ruo joked.

“Sell it, if the price is right it’s fine, I’ll escape back and sell it again for Miss when she gets the money.” Xiu Mei replied with a smile.

“You’re good at business.” Wei Ruo was amused by Xiu Mei.

“That’s natural, after following Miss for so long, I am more or less business-minded.”

“My Meimei has more brains than me nowadays, I’m still doing a capitalized business, you’re doing well, a book of profits!” Wei Ruo said.

“The blue is better than the blue!” Xiu Mei said playfully.

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The next morning, the four of them set off from the inn to the north of Lin’an Province.

In order to more convenient action, today’s travel Wei Ruo and Xiu Mei are disguised for men’s clothing. In this way, a line of four people three people are changed clothes, only Xiao Bei top a face that is not too easy to be found out by mixing into the crowd are fearless.

Because he was wearing men’s clothing, Wei Ruo also didn’t take a carriage and rode a horse directly, making it a bit easier to move around.

After having a few horseback riding experiences, Wei Ruo now wouldn’t have her butt and thighs hurting as soon as she rode a horse like before.

Plus, Wei Jin also got her special stirrups with a thick layer of soft cushioning on top, making it a lot more comfortable for her to ride.

The four of them rode out of the city gates, and the scenery on the road became desolate; there were quite a few villages and farmlands along the way, but none of them looked as thriving as the present-day Taizhou Province side.

Upon further inspection, I found that the rice in the paddy field was not growing very well, with yellowed seedling leaves and poor hanging ears.

“How come the rice on this side of Lin’an Province looks so bad?”

Xiao Bei, who was following behind Wei Jin Yi and Wei Ruo, couldn’t help but let out a doubt.

Xiumei, who was traveling side by side with him, explained, “The weather hasn’t been very good this year either, and it’s not unusual for the rice to grow poorly.”

Xiao Bei was still puzzled, “But I see that the rice on the Taizhou Province side is growing quite well.”

Xiu Mei said, “A large number of seedling seeds over in Taizhou Province have been replaced with the rice seed promoted by my lady, which is resistant to disease and adaptable, coupled with the fact that behind it, the governor led the people in the government offices to organize the people together to chase fertilizers and prevent diseases and pests, so naturally it is going to grow well.”

Xiao Bei came to a realization, “So that’s how it is, I’m saying, how come they’re all rice, the difference is so big.”

Immediately after that, Xiao Bei added, “The harvests in the previous two years were already bad, and if this year is still the same situation, isn’t the disaster going to be even worse?”

Xiu Mei muttered, “Who says it isn’t, it’s better to hope for a better harvest, I really don’t want so many people to die.”

Xiao Bei nodded heavily, “Miss Xiu Mei is right!”

After traveling for a while longer, the four saw a group of government soldiers driving a group of ragged stragglers in one direction.

A few of the government soldiers still had whips in their hands, and from time to time they lashed at those stragglers, driving them forward.

Xiu Mei couldn’t help but be annoyed, “Which government soldiers are these, and why are they driving away and beating these stragglers?”

Xiao Bei was busy stopping Xiu Mei: “Miss Xiu Mei, keep your voice down, those are the Sixth Prince’s people, being heard will cause trouble.”

Xiu Mei lowered her voice and asked Xiao Bei, “Why did the Sixth Prince’s men drive away the stragglers so violently?”

Wei Ruo also looked over, having the same doubts.

Xiao Bei didn’t answer right away and hesitantly glanced at Wei Jin Yi.

Only after Wei Jin also gave a slight nod did Xiao Bei continue to explain to Wei Ruo and Xiu Mei, “The Sixth Prince seems to be learning from Missy’s method of disaster relief recently, arranging for the stragglers to go and open up the land for farming.”

Xiu Mei was even more confused: ”Learning from my young lady to open up land and planting why do you have to do this to the stragglers? Wouldn’t it be better to just tell them? Those displaced people will be happy to do so, we’ve already practiced it in Taizhou Province.”

Xiao Bei explained in a low voice: “Because the great young lady in Taizhou Province organized the opening up of the land for disaster relief to live and eat, the stragglers are naturally happy; but the sixth prince did this side of the neither to arrange for housing, it is said that even the food is very little, but also in order to catch up with the progress of the stragglers forced to do it from morning to night, very strenuous, naturally, no one would like to.”

Hiding in the wilderness and eating roots and grass clippings had a chance of survival; being taken into hard labor could kill you faster.

Wei Ru frowned and said, “If he has learned, why did he only learn a little bit, not all of it? No one has forbidden him to follow the gourd.”

This time it was Wei Jin who also answered for Wei Ruo: “Because he failed to persuade the people of Lin’an Province to contribute money and labor, and also did not have the ability to adapt the land to his needs. He already tried once earlier, but the land was not improved successfully, and it took some time but nothing grew on the land.”

Wei Ruo was able to revitalize the food-for-work program and get the entire Taizhou Prefecture up and down to join in, an important point was that she was able to convince everyone that she was able to improve the land successfully and make a difference.

If this precondition cannot be established, naturally no one will be willing to participate in it and contribute money.

The sixth prince learned Wei Ruo’s set of methods for disaster relief only learned a framework, failed to get through the key points, and naturally got a different effect.

Xiu Mei couldn’t help but say, “Then he can’t treat the stragglers like this, they are already suffering enough, what’s the use of persecuting them if they can’t grow crops?”