The Rise of the Writers of the Republic of China

In the British Concession of Tianjin, a small western-style building on Racecourse Road is very lively.

Li Shoumin's colleagues in "New Tianjin News", "Ta Kung Pao", Tianjin Telephone Bureau, Tianjin Garrison Command Secretariat, as well as his relatives and friends in Tianjin, plus many guests invited by the woman, sat at nearly 50 banquet tables .

Since "The Legend of the Swordsman in Shushan" sold well, Li Shoumin also had some savings, probably more than 10,000 yuan. This money is more than enough for the wedding banquet, but it is definitely not enough to buy a garden house in the British Concession.

Sun Zhongshan was more concerned about face, so he had to force his son-in-law to prepare a wedding house, and the house should not be too shabby. Li Shoumin really couldn't afford that much money, so Sun Zhongshan simply bought a house himself, but the owner wrote his daughter's name.

Li Shoumin felt very humiliated by this, and he would rather rent a house with his own money.

The wedding, which was originally scheduled for early May, was delayed until the end of May because they couldn't agree on the house. Sun Zhongshan allowed Li Shoumin's mother to move into the new house, but Li Shoumin's two younger brothers could only continue to rent a house.

"Bow to heaven and earth!"

"Second obeisance to the high hall!"

"Husband and wife pay their respects!"

"Let's all enter the bridal chamber!"

The wedding is a traditional Chinese ceremony, because neither the Li family nor the Sun family believe in religion.

To be honest, the development of traditional weddings in the period of the Republic of China has been very simplified, without so many red tapes. In addition, both the bride and groom are from Sichuan, and rituals such as worshiping ancestors in the ancestral temple are completely omitted.

During the "worship to the high hall", the couple serve tea to their parents and kneel down. The father-in-law and mother-in-law say some blessings and give the bride jewelry gifts (family bracelets and the like). The bride must wear it immediately after receiving the gift, and then the couple will serve tea to other relatives and elders.

The "husband and wife worship" ended, and the couple was sent directly into the bridal chamber, and did not come out to accompany the toast.

Li Shoumin was wearing a red silk woven short gown and a red skirt. He led the bride and was surrounded by a group of young men making a bridal chamber up to the second floor.

"Fu Gan, don't you want to go up and make trouble?" Zhou Hexuan asked with a smile.

"Forget it, I'm not familiar with the bride and groom. Cough, cough, cough..." Ba Jin suddenly coughed loudly as he spoke, and his whole face flushed from coughing.

Zhou Hexuan asked: "What's wrong?"

"It's okay, it's an old problem, it's much better now." Ba Jin waved his hand.

Ba Jin was so weak and sick since he was a child that he didn't even go to elementary school, so he could only ask his husband to teach at home. At the age of 14, he was finally admitted to an English cram school, but dropped out of school due to illness after only one month of study. At the age of 17, he finally took care of his health. After two years of middle school, he went to apply for Peking University, but was found to have lung disease during the physical examination.

Ba Jin only studied in school for three and a half years, two of which were middle school, and the remaining one and a half years were spent studying in France.

But it is such a frail self-taught person who became one of the best writers in China and lived to be 101 years old.

Zhou Hexuan said: "I know a famous doctor in Tianjin, and I will ask him to help you see it another day."

"No need, I can only get rid of this problem slowly." Ba Jin was quite open-minded.

In fact, Ba Jin suffered from lung disease very much. In his novels, the protagonists often suffer from lung disease or other diseases. For example, Du Daxin, the protagonist of "Death", had the idea of ​​assassinating the warlord because of lung disease, hoping to relieve the pain of the disease.

Zhou Hexuan knew a little about Ba Jin's situation, and he insisted: "I still want to ask Doctor Ding to come and see, and help you prescribe some medicine for recuperation."

"Thank you." Ba Jin felt that Zhou Hexuan was really nice to his friends.

The banquet had already begun, and from time to time someone came to toast Zhou Hexuan, as if he was the groom.

Hu Zhengzhi sat by and watched the show for a while, and said with a smile, "Mingcheng, I'm going to Shenyang next month to open the Shenyang branch of Ta Kung Pao."

"Don't worry, let's open the Wuhan branch first." Zhou Hexuan said.

Hu Zhengzhi was puzzled and said: "Shenyang is under the cover of Commander Zhang. It will be much easier to run a newspaper. There will be a war in Wuhan soon, and it will be very troublesome to operate. Why do you have to sacrifice the easy and ask for the difficult?"

Of course, Zhou Hexuan could not say that little Japan would occupy the Northeast next year. He made an excuse and said: "Wuhan is located in an important place, and the establishment of the Wuhan branch will benefit the distribution of newspapers in the upper and middle reaches of the Yangtze River. Moreover, fighting wars also has the benefits of fighting, which happens to be nearby. Interview the situation of the war."

Hu Zhengzhi pondered hard. He felt that what Zhou Hexuan said made sense, so he nodded and agreed, "Alright then, let's open the Wuhan branch first."

"Has the amount of silver apportioned by Yan Xishan been determined?" Zhou Hexuan asked again.

"It's confirmed, 100 yuan of military expenses will be apportioned every month." Hu Zhengzhi smiled helplessly, "It's cheaper than when Chu Yupu was the commander-in-chief."

As long as you are born in China, no one can easily fight a war.

Regardless of the fact that Shanxi's civil affairs construction is doing very well, primary education has been popularized, and various factories have been established, the financial situation of the Jin army is actually extremely bad. Because Yan Xishan controlled the territory of the six northern provinces (cities), the stalls were very large, the military expenditure was huge, and the newly occupied provinces such as Hebei were extremely poor.

This time there was going to be a war, the first thing Yan Xishan's generals did was to send a telegram complaining that they could not be allocated due to lack of military funds.

Yan Xishan can only go around to raise food and pay. Some of the Jin army's miscellaneous troops are so poor that each soldier can only be allocated 5 rounds of bullets.

What made Yan Xishan even more troublesome was that before the official war started, the value of Jin banknotes had been depreciated by one-third crazily. When it really starts to fight, it would be nice if the 2 yuan Jin note can be 1 yuan lower than the ocean.

The devaluation of Jin banknotes has also brought about skyrocketing prices, and the price of grain and rice is one day, and the people of Shanxi are complaining.

In order to solve the financial difficulties, Yan Xishan decided to issue military coupons in Taiyuan and at the same time send additional special military donations. These taxes (mainly grain and rice) are difficult to apportion for a while, and can only be raised directly in rural areas.

It would be good if the poor can fill in their stomachs, but where can they get it? This has brought about a series of serious consequences, such as the poor borrowing food from the rich to pay donations, the interest cannot be repaid and they can only sell the land, and those who have no land sell their sons and daughters, land mergers have become more serious, and farmers' lives have become more difficult .

Yan Xishan also targeted wealthy businessmen. Taking Tianjin as an example, the Tianjin General Chamber of Commerce is helping the Jin army raise funds, otherwise everyone's business would be impossible.

In addition, Yan Xishan also wanted to mortgage the Tongcheng and Cangshi railways to the United States and Japan for a loan of 20 million yuan, and mortgage the tax revenue of Shanxi to borrow 20 million yuan from the United States. It is a pity that the United States and Japan are inclined to the Nanjing government, and these loans have not been negotiated.

Even Tianjin Customs and Changlu Salt Bureau were occupied by Yan Xishan, who wanted to withhold customs and salt tax money. Bell, the tax director of Tianjin Customs, resolutely opposed Yan Xishan's approach, collected the tax by himself, and deposited it in the banks of Britain and the United States.

In the next few months, due to the struggle between the Nanjing government and Yan Xishan, the Tianjin Customs and the Salt Administration almost ceased to operate. I don’t know how much national tax was lost. Even if the tax was received, it was all transferred to foreign banks. Later, when the Nanjing government took back the Customs and Salt Administration, a lot of the money disappeared, because how much tax was collected depends entirely on the foreigners.

This was the case with the warlords of the Republic of China. Once there was a war, they would sell the interests of the country in various ways, and the people would become more and more impoverished. How could the national power develop?

The Northeast, which was originally rich, has been impoverished by Zhang Zuolin, and Shanxi, which was originally rich, will soon be impoverished by Yan Xishan.

As for Sichuan, Shandong, Hebei, Henan and other provinces, which were severely affected by the war, it is not uncommon to sell children and daughters.