Chapter 284 - Disaster Relief (1/2)

Yu Xiaocao replied in a justified and confident manner, “The emperor is doing it for the future of his country, and the young royal prince wants to successfully complete his task. What do you think I’m doing this for? Aren’t I doing this to earn more money so that my family can eat well, wear warm clothes, and not suffer from poverty? Our family has over ten mu of farmland, but we didn’t even plant one mu of grain. Grains are really expensive right now ah! The locust plague hasn’t ended yet. If we want to plant grain, we have to wait until at least the beginning of spring next year and harvest them in the summer. During this period of nearly one year, we would have to constantly purchase overpriced grain. Although our family has made some money, it’s still not enough for our family to use it in this way for a year!”

Madam Liu thought about the price for coarse grain in town, which had risen to over one hundred copper coins. Moreover, the price was inflating day by day. It was already considered good if the food they hoarded could last them until the autumn. Although these corn and potatoes were high-yielding crops, they didn’t have any control over the disposition of them at all and had to hand them all to the imperial court. After hearing her younger daughter’s words, the whole family became downcast, and the originally delicious potatoes turned tasteless in their mouths.

Taking in everyone’s expressions, Zhu Junyang ate a piece of potato from the braised pork dish, slowly swallowed it, and then said, “It makes sense! But you missed a point!”

“Missed what?” After shouting, Yu Xiaocao felt relieved and started eating the ‘sour and spicy shredded potatoes’ in big mouthfuls. In her previous life, this dish was her favorite, and she would never be tired of eating it.

“You forgot that this prince is here!” Seeing that she was eating with relish, Zhu Junyang also grabbed some with his chopsticks and put it in his mouth. He continued, “This prince never mistreats the people who works for me! Do you see the two carts of goods in the yard? One cart of white rice and one cart of wheat flour! There are at least two thousand catties. It should be enough for you guys to eat for a while, right?”

The Yu Family members were stunned when they heard this. Over two thousand catties of fine grain ah! If each person ate fifteen catties of grain per month and there were currently twelve people in the family, they would need about two hundred catties of food each month. With two thousand catties, it would be enough for them to eat for more than half a year!

“Almighty Young Royal Prince!” Yu Xiaocao almost jumped up with joy and kissed him a few times on his face. However, she remembered that it was ancient times now. If she did that, it would be extremely shocking. It was better to keep a low profile!

Zhu Junyang looked at the young girl, who had a fawning expression, snorted and said, “The emperor personally bestowed this prince with the position of the Minister of Disaster Relief. The imperial court has already allocated money and food, and it will soon be distributed to all the prefectures. This prince has already checked. Tanggu Town is a serious disaster area, and we will prioritize providing disaster relief to the more severely affected regions.”

Yu Xiaocao worriedly asked, “But, the capital was also affected. How much food can the imperial treasury provide?”

“This isn’t something you need to worry about!” Zhu Junyang took another bite of the ‘sour and spicy shredded potatoes’ and had fallen in love with the taste of the sour and spicy food. He said, “The fleet has already set sail. In these past two years, the weather has been good in the south and they have an abundant amount of grain. There will be enough food for the disaster relief!”

After hearing this, the Yu Family finally felt relieved. They were very grateful for and had a lot of good words to say about the emperor, who loved his country and people.

With more than a dozen free laborers, they finished rubbing off the kernels for all the corns in the Yu Residence and packed them in uniform-sized sacks in three days. In the ten mu of land, they harvested a total of nearly eighteen thousand catties of crops, which also meant that the average yield per mu was one thousand eight hundred catties.

One must know that the current grain output was very low right, so a harvest of five hundred catties of wheat per mu was considered very high. What did it mean to have a yield of one thousand eight hundred catties per mu? For example, if the income from one mu of farmland could support a family of two, then this one mu of farmland could support six or seven people! Just think about it, with such high-yielding crops, would they still have to worry about the common people not being able to fill their stomachs?

After a discussion, Yu Xiaocao’s family decided to sell the potatoes and corn at the price of improved varieties. One catty of corn cost one hundred copper coins. Out of the eighteen thousand catties, Zhu Junyang only took fifteen thousand catties and left the remaining three thousand to the Yu Family as seeds and grain ration. In this way, the Yu Family received one thousand five hundred taels as income with just corn alone. Potatoes were sold at the price of two hundred taels per catty, so five thousand catties of potatoes cost one thousand taels.

To the present Yu Family, two thousand five hundred taels didn’t mean much compared with the dividends that Yu Xiaocao earned from Zhenxiu Restaurant. But, on second thought, it was definitely the first time in the Great Ming Dynasty that anyone had earned more than two thousand taels in one year for their harvest in eleven mu of farmland. Ahem, of course, that was with the exception of the Yu Family’s early-maturing watermelons.

Right now, besides the two thousand catties of fine grain that the young royal prince brought over, the Yu Family also had three thousand catties of corn and six to seven hundred catties of potatoes. In addition, they also had the grain that they hoarded in the storage room. Yu Xiaocao no longer had to worry about losing the money in her hands due to buying high-priced grain.

The Yu Family’s corn and potatoes weren’t affected by the disaster, and they still had a good harvest. Moreover, there was a high yield too! Zhu Junyang couldn’t sit still anymore. After hastily arranging the matters of the disaster relief, he took a few carts of corn and potatoes back to the capital to receive his reward for accomplishing his task!!

The food for the disaster relief arrived in the Jinwei Prefectural City three days later. The prefectural magistrate knew that the Minister of Disaster Relief, Royal Prince Yang, was in Tanggu Town, so he naturally sent the grain to Tanggu Town first. Five days later, a cart of food for disaster relief arrived at the county yamen in Tanggu Town.

County Magistrate Zhao was also born from a poor family, so he could deeply understand what natural disasters meant to the common people. He worked tirelessly with the officials sent by Royal Prince Yang to distribute the food for the disaster relief to every village. In particular, the four villages that were more seriously affected received larger portions of food. Dongshan Village was one of them.