Ordinary clear day

Chapter 77 Summer
In the next few days, Shu Ning tried to find out what her mother said, using the reason that "I haven't seen the big western ship that my brother wants to see" as an excuse, and finally got permission to go to Baietan Thirteen Nearby, take a look at the foreign ships moored there.

It's a pity that she didn't go alone, not only Chun Xing followed, but also a group of bearers led by Wang Er and his wife.When she got near the pier, she could only get out of the sedan chair and take a few glances from afar.

The thirteenth row is actually a few two-storey small buildings with a certain western style, half-timbered and half-brick structure, next to a row of completely Chinese-style houses.There are many people walking on the street in front of the house, and not far in front is the pier, where many western ships are parked, and there are also many single-sail Chinese cargo ships coming and going, and many small boats shuttle between the big ships.

As described in the books she read before crossing, the hulls of western ships are somewhat like an inverted trapezoid, but the ends are very long, with several heavy white sails, and a round rudder can be vaguely seen in the direction of the bow.

There are wooden boards between the docked boat and the land, and many porters are carrying the goods back and forth, and some men who look like businessmen are holding paper pens or abacus, recording and calculating something.A few blond-haired and blue-eyed foreigners were either negotiating with Chinese businessmen, or looking into the distance, or walking to the shore.

Shuning recruited Wang Er and asked him to find out which countries' ships were docked at the pier.Two quarters of an hour later, Wang Er came back and said: "I asked, the ship unloading in front is a ship from France, and the ships to the west are all ships from a small country called Holland, I don't know about the other ships. "

Shuning hurriedly asked: "Is there a ship from England?" Wang Erdao: "Not really, I heard that one just left a few days ago, it is from this English...English chicken...English."

Shu Ning was a little disappointed. Now is not the era when English can be spoken all over the world. She can't speak French or Dutch, not to mention there are a lot of people following her. She has no choice but to speak again when she has a chance in the future.She looked at it for a while, then went back home.

Although it was just an excuse, she still carefully drew the appearance of the western ships and prepared to show it to Duanning when she wrote a letter to him in the future.

Two days later, Mrs. Tong invited Liu's sisters to visit her home and asked them how they were doing at home.

Mrs. Liu said indifferently: "I have my own body, and I don't need them to support me. I just want to live together for convenience. Besides, my uncle is still there, so the woman dare not do anything."

Tong Shi asked her: "Don't you really want to marry again?"

Mrs. Liu paused, and said with a wry smile: "Sister Tong, do you think she's looking for some good marriages for me? It's just that she is rich, and her character is not trustworthy, and she is a petty person. I am not that kind Waiting for a stubborn person, if someone betrays me, I will not guard him for the rest of my life, but I have suffered enough to be a small loser, if I want to remarry, unless someone takes me through the door in eight big sedan chairs to be the main house, otherwise I would rather live alone forever!"

Her expression was firm in her words, Tong Shi sighed, and stopped persuading her, but asked Xiao Liu Shi: "Then what about you? You are still young and good-looking, it will be much easier to remarry."

Little Liu said with red eyes: "I'm just a Kefu's life, why should I marry?"

Da Liu raised her eyebrows and said, "Who said you were Kefu?! It's your aunt who wanted to plot the little money left by your dead man, and instigated your in-laws to drive you out!"

Little Liu lowered her head and said in a low voice: "Even if I don't want Kefu, he was good to me before he was alive, and I don't want to lose to him. What's more, I can't see my son now. If I remarry and have a child, wouldn't it be even worse?" Forgot Xiaobao?"

Mrs. Liu stomped her feet, and Mrs. Tong couldn't continue talking.

After sending them away, Mrs. Tong deliberately found a famous doctor in the market, and asked him to treat Uncle Liu's family for a fee.She knew that the couple's net worth was actually not that much, so she sent some things over from time to time to help them.

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The weather is getting hotter and hotter, but it hasn't rained all the time, as if the rainy season is over after the first wave of rain called "Dragon Boat Water".There were bursts of cicadas singing in the backyard, in the garden, and from the trees outside the fence, which became louder every day, making people feel restless.

Shuning's family is from the north, and they have lived in Fengtian for a long time, so they are not used to the hot and muggy weather.During the day, Tong could only stay in the room and play a fan, and didn't want to go outside at all.She felt that the straw mat she usually slept on was not cool enough, so she specially asked someone to buy a good Shuzhou bamboo mat.

Zhang Bao has never been used to taking a bath every day. Even if he gets drenched all over during the rainy season, he just wipes his body with a hot towel.But now that the weather is so hot, as long as you don't take a bath for a day, the smell of sweat on your body will be unbearable.Tong's family loves cleanliness and cleanses every day, so she can't stand Zhang Bao's smell.Poor Zhang Bao just moved back to the upper room for less than a month, and was driven back to sleep again.

He himself doesn't care much about his own hygiene and cleanliness, but he is bothered by the fact that his body will itch if he doesn't take a bath for two days.

Shuning saw that he was always frowning and scratching his back, and thought it was funny, so she asked someone to cut a few knots of bamboo, made a "Don't Ask for Help" and gave it to her father, and said with a smile: "Although this thing can scratch itches, but It’s just treating the symptoms but not the root cause, Ama should take a shower more diligently.” Zhang Bao scolded her and kicked her out of the room.

There are still bamboos left, Shuning thinks about it, she might as well make all of them into utensils.She drew a few pictures, namely the pen holder, the five fingers, the massager and the ball foot massager, and then handed them over to the bamboo craftsman. Within two days, they were all made. Among them, the beads of the ball foot massager were all made of wood. made.

Tong was most interested in the two massagers, so she took them directly to her room. Zhang Bao took the pen holder and five fingers without asking for help. Shuning only got a short pen holder, which was made by a bamboo craftsman with a small piece of bamboo left over. into.

The bamboo craftsman refused to take money, but asked Shuning if he could sell those massagers.Shu Ning originally wanted to follow the previous practice of cleaning and cleaning suits, but after thinking about it carefully, now Ermo is not here, and her family is not familiar with Guangzhou, so it is not convenient to collect money like before.Besides, these are just some simple and easy crafts, which can't make much money and are easy to be imitated.Now that the family is getting richer and richer, she can have one or two taels of pocket money every month, so she doesn't have to earn such a small amount of money.So she told the bamboo craftsman that if he wanted to sell it, he could sell it, but he would only charge for the materials for the work she told him to do in the future.The bamboo craftsman responded immediately.

Similar bamboo products appeared on the market soon, and there are many more tricks. I heard that they are quite popular.When Shu Ning heard the news from A Song, she didn't react, but was attracted by another matter.

Before the Dragon Boat Festival, the raincoat made of boots, which was only popular in government offices, is now being sold on the street, and there are other materials and colors to choose from, including long-length, half-length, sleeved, Short-sleeved ones, rigid ones, soft ones, with hats, without hats, solid colors, trimmed... There are so many options for you to choose from.Although it didn't rain, Lingnan's summer is rainy, so it's always a good idea to buy it in advance.Within three days, all the raincoats were swept away, and the merchants happily put away the store boards, and after a few days, they put out another two or three hundred pieces.

Shu Ning was dumbfounded again, admiring the ancients' business sense and quickness of action.She was very interested, and asked someone to buy some clothes. In addition to the clothes for the servants, there were also "children's clothes" for herself.

Just a few days after I bought it, the raincoat came in handy.After half a month of hot and muggy weather, the sky suddenly began to rain.Just when Shu Ning and Tong Shi thought they could cool off for a few days, the wind suddenly blew up again, and raindrops as big as beans splashed down. They all ran away.

Typhoon is coming.

The typhoon ravaged the city of Guangzhou with heavy rainfall.Shuning listened to the sound of wind, rain and sand hitting the window frame outside, and worried whether the window would be broken.

The wind and rain were so strong that all the doors and windows in the house had to be closed tightly, as long as there was a gap, the rain would pour in.Anyone who walks through the Chaoshou veranda in the backyard under an umbrella will be half-soaked.Tong felt that it would be too inconvenient to continue living in the backyard, so she simply locked the upper room and moved to the first room with Zhang Bao with her youngest son.

The rain in the yard often flooded the corridors. Chang Fu ordered several middle-aged servants to use a few benches and bed boards to make beds in the front hall and stairwell, and sleep on them to keep watch at night.If the rain really flooded the porch, they would immediately get up and put on raincoats, brave the storm, remove the garbage accumulated on the drain in the yard, and then sweep all the water under the porch.

The typhoon raged north for only two days, but the rain did not stop until three days later.

Zhang Bao hurriedly took Mr. Su and Changgui to the yamen.He was going to inquire about the damage in the city, and he had to go outside the city to inspect farmland and fish ponds.

The servants of the whole family were busy drying things and repairing the house. A Yin was worried about the situation at home, so she asked Tong's leave to go home.In order to repair her own house, Ahua Adi will not come here for the time being.Shuning accompanied her mother back to the room, feeling a little depressed.

Tong Shi asked her what was wrong, and she said: "I went to the back garden just now, and all the flowers I planted before were drowned. I just planted lotus flowers for two or three months, and only a few flower buds showed, but now they are all gone."

Tong's voice said softly: "If you don't have it, you can plant it again. The lotus is born in the water, and it won't die just because there is too much water. And wait for a while, it will grow again."

Shu Ning nodded, and smiled again: "Now I finally know what a typhoon looks like. The strong wind that blew in Fengtian that year, my brother said that there was no stronger wind than that. Who knows that compared to the wind in Lingnan? A typhoon, that strong wind is nothing at all."

Tong Shi laughed at her: "You have only seen a few typhoons, and you know that this is the most powerful one? Maybe there will be even stronger winds."

That's true, at least she hasn't seen anything like a tornado or a hurricane.

She whispered next to her mother: "I don't know what my brother is doing now? I wonder if he has received the letter I wrote to him?"

The expression on Tong's face softened, and he said: "If you are either reading a book or practicing martial arts, Mr. Liang's messenger is fast, and he must have already arrived in the capital."

========================== I am the dividing line thousands of miles away ==================== =======
However, Tong's guess was not correct, Duanning was not reading a book, nor was he practicing martial arts.

He and his second cousin, Shun Ning, are accompanying his grandfather to someone else's house as a guest.The purpose of this trip, apart from reminiscing with the older generations of the family members in various prefectures, is to see if they can find a suitable marriage partner for Shun Ning, and by the way, to find out the tone of each family, to see if anyone is willing to accept Fang Ning , It doesn't matter if you continue to fill the room.

Fang Ning was rejected in the first round of the draft, but fortunately, he did not suffer too much trouble during the process.Probably because everyone knew that she was unlikely to be selected, so they focused all their attention on others.

In this way, Fang Ning's decision-making power for life-long events returned to her family.After discussing with his wife, old lord Halzi decided that if even a few acquaintances were unwilling to accept Fang Ning, he would send her away from the capital as well, and come back after a few years when things calmed down, or he could simply stay in the Many people from other places.

Duan Ning originally followed as an accompanying guest, but in the middle of the conversation, he was surprised to find that others were more interested in him, and prayed in his heart that his grandfather would not be confused for a moment and make an engagement for him.

Fortunately, Harqi had his own ideas about Duanning's marriage, and he didn't intend to make a decision too early, so he reasoned that the child was still young and his parents were not around, and he would wait until the marriages of his two cousins ​​were finished.

As soon as he said this, Duanning secretly heaved a sigh of relief, and looked at Shunning, both of whom were smiling wryly.

(End of this chapter)