Lu Quan's voice was a little low, and at this dawn when the sky was just turning white, it made people feel a bit chilly for no reason.

"The rebels in Huaicheng heard that there is movement. Huaicheng is only more than a hundred miles away from us. According to shopkeeper Li's calculation, the rebels will take action by the end of August."

The three grown men squatted quietly on the bow of the boat and spoke in a low voice, without disturbing the other people on the boat.

Li Sixi was a little confused: "Why is it the end of August?"

Brother Zhang San is much smarter than Li Sixi: "It's because grain can be harvested in early August. Even if it's later, every household's grain should be collected in the warehouse at the end of the month, and all the public grain should be paid, right?"

The rebels were all poor, and they rebelled because they had no food to eat.

The government is different. They have a natural sense of superiority. If the government cannot defeat them and retreat to the capital, they will never leave the food they are about to receive to the rebels.

When the time comes, a fire will be lit in the ground. These officers and soldiers will be like gangsters and will not care about the lives of the people below.

Lu Quan nodded and sighed lowly: "Yes, the rebels also need food. If we fight now, the food in the field will be ruined!"

"Isn't there a garrison in Nanyang?"

Li Sixi moved her body and got closer, "Nanyang has such a high city wall and thousands of garrison troops. Even if the rebels come over, they can't capture Nanyang."

However, the rebel army could not pass through Nanyang and had to pass through Honghu Lake. Although Jiangjiaba was nearby, it might not be safe.

Speaking of the garrison in Nanyang County, Brother Zhang knew a little bit: "I heard that part of the Nanyang garrison went to the capital, and part stayed in Nanyang. Not all of those who stayed in Nanyang were guarding the city in the city, they were all sent out..."

Seeing Lu Quan and Li Sixi both looking at him, Zhang Sancai lowered his voice and explained: "We have all been sent out to suppress bandits. They say they are suppressing bandits, but in fact they are just raiding big households. Hey, you said that we poor people have a difficult life, why are those big households

Are you having a hard time too?"

Lu Quan's expression became more and more ugly: "So the big families in Dongyang County ransacked their homes and ran away. Even Shopkeeper Li is leaving. It seems that the rebels are really coming."

"But now that there's a fight, Yangzhou isn't safe either."

Li Sixi scratched his head severely. No matter how unsafe Yangzhou was, it was safer than Jiangjiaba. Jiangjiaba was on the main road for the rebels to the capital.

"Do we have to buy food now? Can't we wait any longer?" Li Sixi was still a little unwilling.

Can we wait any longer? When the autumn harvest is over, food prices will definitely drop.

Although the current price of food is not as high as last year, it is not cheap either. In the past, a pound of brown rice only cost twelve cents, but now it costs twenty-five cents.

When new grain comes out, brown rice and old rice will definitely be cheaper.

Lu Quan gritted his teeth, feeling as if his heart was dripping with blood: "I'm afraid that if the rebels fight, the price of food will rise instead of falling. The government is not a fool, they don't care about the life and death of the people. If they knew about the rebels' actions after the autumn harvest,

Do you think they will leave food to the rebels?"

"No wonder they want to raid big businesses now." Zhang San gritted his teeth, "These beasts don't have the ability to defend a city, they only know how miserable the common people are."

"So we need to buy food?"

Lu Quan cautiously took a look at the movement nearby before speaking, "If the rebels come, we will run away regardless of whether we can fight or not. A dozen of us will find a boat in the wild lake and tie them up next to each other, and we will tie them up one by one.

Five months will be no problem. When things settle down, no matter who is in charge, they will have to give the people a way to survive. We will come back then."

This is why those who sail boats are more convenient than those who farm. If they really want to run, having a boat is more convenient than running on two legs.

Of course, the prerequisite is that there is enough food.

Li Sixi looked at Lu Quan, then at Brother Zhang, and suddenly started to cry: "This is a good time, and I still want to have enough money to buy land and build a house, and get married to Tantan..."

The last words were drowned out by the crying, which made Lu Quan and Zhang San feel sad.

They have to flee when the rebels come, and they may have to flee even if the government comes.

If he didn't escape and was drafted into the army by the government, he would probably have a narrow escape from death.

People like Lu Quan and Chen Ping'an, who only have one strong working man in their family, would probably be left to die if they were taken away by the army, as were the old, weak, women and children.

Like Li Sixi and Zhang San's family, although their son is already half a grown-up, who is willing to let his son die?

In the eyes of outsiders, those who sail and fish have a lower status than those who farm. They have no house or land, and their income is precarious. In the past, fishermen were of the lower class. They could not even go ashore to buy land and build houses after earning money.

possible.

Fishing for a lifetime, fishing for generations.

Honghu Lake has very developed water and land transportation, and even those who have land and are near the water will buy a boat to earn some money in their spare time or fish for pocket money.

When times were good a few years ago, there were many families with fields and boats.

Just like Lu Quan, Zhang San, and Li Sixi, they used to have land, houses, and boats. However, their land and houses were flooded, and they could only live on fishing boats, but they were not fishermen. But they are not.

Real fishermen also have to pay taxes. They have to pay taxes and perform labor service.

In order for future generations not to become one of the untouchables, they would not dare to give up their current status even if they sold their children and daughters.

This is why Mr. Qiu has always thought about going ashore to buy houses and land.

Not just the Qiu family, there are dozens of fishing boats in Honghu Lake, and every family wants to go ashore to farm, and no longer wants to make a living by fishing.

Early in the morning, the fishermen at the dock got the news.

We will not cook the eel cages until we finish this batch. This batch of eel cages is almost enough to fill two boats. When the time comes, we will go with shopkeeper Li and his family.

As for whether we will continue the eel cage business in the future, we will probably have to wait until next spring to decide.

Everyone had just earned some extra money, and suddenly heard that the eel cage business was about to be discontinued, and they immediately fell into confusion.

Why didn't you do it?

It’s not easy to do fishing business in summer. Fish die easily when they are out of water. The faster they die, the faster they stink.

In spring and autumn, if you catch fish that cannot be sold, you can still pickle and salt the fish. When the time comes, you can sell it to the dry goods store in the town, and you can buy some copper coins.

In summer, fish that cannot be sold must be eaten, given away, or thrown away. We cannot let dead fish and shrimps rot on the boat.

Autumn is better, but autumn is so short and winter will come soon...

Why did the days that we were looking forward to just now suddenly disappear?

Lu Sheige stood at the bow of the boat, looking at the people talking on the river bank.

It is obvious that the energy that I had a while ago seems to have suddenly dissipated.

Everyone started to talk about why they didn’t make eel cages anymore and why shopkeeper Li wanted to go back to Yangzhou.

Slowly, the sounds became less and less.

Now, almost no one is talking, everyone is racing against time to make the eel cage.

You know, if you make more horn eel cages, you can get more copper coins.

With more copper coins, the family can buy more food.
Chapter completed!