Forty-eight years of Qianlong

The towering Tianshan Mountains are covered with snow.

After a sudden snowstorm, under a clear blue sky, the towering Kaerlik Glacier is like a silver dragon, lying on the vast Gobi sea, staring coldly at its feet.

Zhenxi Mansion in the early winter was very desolate and cold, and the earthen walls of Huining City, which had been eroded by wind and sand for many years, looked particularly dilapidated.On both sides of the post road outside the city, there are poplars, willows and elms scattered with winding branches, and the bare branches are densely intertwined.If there is any scenery here, apart from the snowflakes flying all over the city, I am afraid that there is only Lake Barkul, which produces thenardite.

At noon, the sunshine on the plateau was extremely dazzling, and the howling north wind was much weaker.On a small road more than 80 miles west of Huining City, Uighur Sodick is walking staggeringly.

He was carrying a beautifully carved five-string Gurewapu, and the wooden stick used to explore the way kept pointing back and forth on the snow in his hand.On his head was a leather hat that was so worn out that its material could no longer be seen, and his gray and white fluffy long hair was exposed under the hat; he was wearing a homemade cloth loop full of holes, and a pair of homemade trousers covered with patches on his lower body , and there is no pair of shoes on the feet, only hay and cloth are wrapped.I don't know if it was scratched by the stones in the ice and snow, or because he had traveled hundreds of miles in the Gobi wasteland, every step he took, the footprints on the snow behind him were stained with mottled red.

"The water in Barkule Nur is bitter and salty, and the tears of sorrow flowed. Lailiguli went to heaven, and heartbroken, I took Rewapu away. All the bitter water turned into blood, Oh, God, I sigh with sorrow."

As she sang, tears flowed from Sodick's dry eye sockets.He stopped, raised his hand to wipe it, and was about to move on when he suddenly heard the sound of horseshoes behind him.He listened for a while, guessing that there should be more than a dozen horses, and someone was talking faintly, but it was too far away to hear clearly.

Sodick was a little flustered, but he thought again, even if he meets officers and soldiers, what if he can push himself, a blind man, to the ground and beat him up?
When the sound of hoofbeats approached, more than a dozen people on the horses reined in unanimously, and looked Sodick up and down.

These people are all dressed up as Mongolians, wearing thick sheepskin robes, covered with dust, fluffy snow caps on their heads, and a pair of old leather boots on their feet; Also wearing a mask.

After a while, a man on a yellow puma pulled down the mask that covered half of his face, and asked curiously, "My fellow, why are you here alone? Were you the one singing just now?"

fellow?Sodick's hometown is Hami, which is located in the throat of the post road connecting the Western Regions and the customs. There are many merchants, officers and soldiers who come and go. He has heard and seen for a long time. He can listen and speak some Chinese, but he has never heard anyone call himself that. .

"God bless! My lord, I'm a wandering singer who can't see day and night, and goes from village to village begging for food."

"Master? Hahaha, we are not masters."

The other party's voice was very loud, and he sounded young.The man laughed a few times, and then asked, "My fellow, where are you going?"

"I, I want to go to Wujiazhuangzi."

"Oh, come with us then."

Before the man finished speaking, Sodick heard another person shouting: "Timur, quickly get a blanket and cover it with him! You know you are blind, don't you see that he is shivering from the cold!"

"Yes!" Timur replied, jumped off the horse, took the rolled wool felt from the back of the saddle, shook it out and put it on Sodick's body.

Well, Timur is the Mongolian man mentioned earlier.The dozen or so of them were a small team, deliberately disguised as a Mongolian caravan selling smuggled goods, and took Wujiazhuang as a temporary stop.

After the first brigade of the Northern Navy Cavalry went south from Khobdo in the mid-autumn month of August, it took more than [-] days to attack nearly [-] miles long-distance, and conquered Kai’an City, Gucheng City, and Qitai County in the first ten days of October. He Mulei City and other important places caught the Qing army by surprise.At this point, the two lines from Hami via Balikun to Urumqi's Beijiang Station were completely cut off, making it impossible for the Qing army to flee north.

Immediately afterwards, Samusu dispatched another battalion of vanguard troops, led by several guides, to forcibly cross the Kaerlik Mountain in the eastern Tianshan Mountains and go south along the west side of Balkul Lake.Their main task was to cut off the station line from Balikun to Turpan, and the "Xiaonan Road" station line from Hami to Urumqi via Turpan, relying on the post station, and stick to it until the arrival of large troops.

The task of Timur and his team was to monitor the movement of the Qing army around Huining City and report to the battalion headquarters in time.

Although the wool felt had a strong smell, for Sodick, his body, which had been blown so cold by the cold wind, suddenly warmed up a lot.He stretched out his left hand tremblingly, groped and knelt down in the snow, and said, "Thank you kind people! Allah will bless you all!"

"My fellow, what are you doing? You told us that we are not masters, get up quickly." Timur helped him up as he spoke, and turned to the squad leader, "Squad leader, why don't we take him with us too? We have a surplus of horses."

The man nodded, and said to a young man beside him, "Wang Dan, go get a horse."

Although Sodick couldn't help refusing, Timur couldn't help but put him on the horse.Although he was a little puzzled, he didn't think that these people would have malicious intentions; he had to know that he had been wandering around for so many years, and many times he had to rely on the help of kind people to carry him down.

After a group of people walked south for more than 20 miles, a small village appeared in front of them, and Wujiazhuang arrived.

This place is located in the foothills of the southern foothills of the Kaerlik Mountains. At the entrance of the village, several jagged stone hills stand upright on the snow field, shining blue-purple in the gray winter sun.The surrounding fields are shrouded in smoke-like tree shadows, and the houses and courtyards are scattered among them.There was a chill in the air, and the dry and decayed grass trembled in the cold wind, sighing.

Timur and his entourage came to an adobe compound at the east end of the village. The walls of the compound were in disrepair for a long time and were crumbling here and there. Several earthen houses faced south and there was a large livestock enclosure. Surrounded by miscellaneous trees, there is a field of hay clippings and frozen animal dung, and there are seven or eight camels tied in the corner.

Just as they were leading their horses to the courtyard, a nearby courtyard door creaked open, and a head wearing a dirty sheepskin hat poked out from behind the shabby door panel, seeing that Timur and the others had returned, A smile appeared on his face, then he leaned forward and bent towards them, as if bowing.

"Brother Wu!"

Timur waved his hands in a grandiose manner, which was regarded as a greeting.The yard they lived in was rented from each other. The rent was two sheepskins and a pack of black tea.Although Wu Dacai thinks that people like Timur are not kind, he is also willing to use his broken yard to make some extra money.

It is said that several decades ago, in the Majiling area of ​​Wuchang Prefecture in Hubei Province, there was a big family surnamed Wu, who had been entrenched for generations.At that time, in order to eradicate the disaster, the Wuchang government moved more than 28 households of the Wu family, with nearly a hundred men and women, to Tianshan North Road in three times in the [-]th year of Qianlong, and placed them in Wulumuqi, Balikun and Gansu respectively. Anxi Mansion.

This Wujiazhuang in Balikun is composed of the second batch of seven households who moved here. Afterwards, other families were gradually added, and finally formed the scale of more than [-] households today.

Wu Dacai closed the courtyard door, fastened the latch, and ran back to the warm house with small steps, muttering in his mouth: "These Mongolian barbarians go out early and return late every day, making such a big noise, if they are reported to the government Trouble."

Timur and the others tied up their horses, and then brought Sodick into the house.These rooms are all built of earth kangs, with stoves and fire walls.Because there are people on duty in the yard, as soon as you enter the house, you will be greeted by a wave of heat, and at the same time, there will be mixed smells of dead grass, sheep smell, broken fur, tobacco leaves, livestock manure, and human sweat and feet.But for Timur, Sodick and others, warmth is the kingly way, and the others are nothing.

It gets dark early in winter, and when it’s dark outside, a simple dinner is ready, barley cakes and milk tea.Everyone, including Sodick, was hungry and devoured hungrily.Sodick had never drank Mongolian milk tea. It tasted salty and fragrant, and he felt hot in his stomach after drinking it.

After dinner, Timur's squad leader Yun Yan went to the room next door where the goods were stored, and when he came back, he carried a pair of wool felt boots and a pair of cotton socks that were probably new, and put them beside Sodick.

"Brother Sodick, after you finish eating, I'll ask someone to apply some medicine to your feet, and then put this on."

Sodick frantically stuffed half of the pancake into his mouth and swallowed it whole. He stretched his hand towards the boot, held it in his arms and touched it for a while, then said in surprise, "Is this for me?"

"Yes. In such a cold day, you can't do without a pair of boots. You'll suffer from frostbite."

Sodick was stunned for a while, his eye circles gradually turned red, and suddenly he knelt down on the kang and kowtowed in the direction of Yunyan.

"What are you doing? Speak up if you have something to say!" Seeing this, Yunyan hurriedly helped him up.

At night, everyone was exhausted after a long day of running around, but everyone was not sleepy, and listened attentively to Sodick's stuttering Chinese, telling about his past.

He used to be a Taiji hereditary long-term worker in the Huiwang family of Hami. When he was young, he was a stubborn and scheming young man.More than ten years ago, he secretly fell in love with a maid who worked with him.The girl has a handsome appearance and a slender figure, but it's a pity that her delicate body is wrapped in ragged clothes.Sodick composed and sang many songs in praise of the girl, and the melodious singing spread across both sides of the Hami River.

On a summer evening, Taiji, who had just returned home, heard Sodik’s singing, and called him and the girl over the next day, planning to teach the two slaves who had no family law a lesson and make them repent.But when he saw the girl's moving face, his eyes immediately burst into obscenity.So he changed his mind and ordered the servants to beat Sodick hard with forty boards, kicked him out of the house, and ordered the girl to change and freshen up.

Sodick couldn't bear to see his sweetheart being ruined, so before Taiji dragged the girl into the bedroom, with the help of his friends, he took the girl and ran away.But it is a pity that the two were caught back soon, and Kazi, who was under the king, tied a big stone around their necks and threw them into the Hami River for the crime of breaking the canon.

Sodick was lucky, and was rescued by a shepherd downstream, but the girl died.In order to find the body of his sweetheart, he ran along the river bank for more than ten days in a trance like a tramp.Afterwards, he went to the Xifu Yamen of Balikun Town to file a complaint. Unexpectedly, he was punished with [-] boards and then imprisoned for ten years under the pretext of "damaging Taiji's reputation and causing loss of women's reputation". .His piercing eyes were blinded in the dark prison.

Since then, Sodick could no longer rely on his strength to earn money. He could only play the Rawafu given by his friends, traveling from village to village, and became a performer singer.

". Year after year, I can feel winter and summer, and I can't tell the difference between day and night."

Sodick took a sip of the hot water from Timur, and continued: "I have traveled all over the vast Gobi, pastoral villages, but I did not die. There are many kind-hearted people in this world, and they extended a hand of friendship to me. , I didn’t hesitate to give out pieces of naan to satisfy my hunger. In order to sue, I went to Huicheng, and even went to Dihua City. Throwing me away like a dog, scolding me to go away, calling me an asshole, I deserve it! After a few years, I finally understand that what the rich say is unreasonable and justified, and what the poor man says is justified and unreasonable. But I’m not reconciled! If I don’t gouge out the eyeballs of my enemy, I’ll die without eyes!”

After Sodick finished speaking, he reached for his own Rewap and began to play and sing softly.

"I have experienced the suffering of people all my life, wandering and wandering everywhere in order to survive. The world is as dark as the bottom of the pot, and everyone's heart is full of sadness. Who has ever seen a carefree person? The broken heart replied, that can only be Dreams! This world is so absurd, why doesn’t Allah open his eyes to see it? The heart of the poor is bleeding, why is it so difficult to survive?”

The house was quiet, and the firewood and wood in the stove crackled, and everyone felt like a big stone was blocked in their hearts.Although they couldn't understand what the blind singer was singing, they could feel the grief and indignation in the other party's tone.They thought that their days as arrows for the Qing court were hard enough, but who would have thought that the common people here would be even more miserable than them.

They still don't know at the moment that the Uyghurs in Xinjiang East Road are the most miserable group of people under the Manchu Qing rule, especially in the Hami area, and in some respects they are even inferior to the serfs in Tibet.Since Hami adopted the Waizasak self-government system and the military government system, even though there were Manchu officials who disliked the cruel rule of King Hui, they could only ignore it or even cover it up.

Nowadays, there is a folk song circulating among the people: "A drop of wine from King Hui is a drop of our blood; the clothes on King Hui are our skin; our blood and sweat feed and fatten King Hui's body; our bones build a paradise for King Hui." .”

Timur was moved by the other party's singing, and his eyes gradually became moist. He couldn't help but think of his own Siqin, and what Company Commander Wang had said to him, that only by smashing the old world thoroughly can the poor have a way out.