open sea

Chapter 1447 Teachings
The teachers in London are very poor, and the teacher in the county is called Li Qian.

He was not a scholar, nor was he a child. He was a small businessman in his family. Because his family was rich, he received a good private school education before serving as a soldier in Beiyang.

In addition to Li Qian, there are also two low-level teachers in the county. They are natives who are familiar with Chinese from Puli County, and they are resident in Westminster Academy to educate the people.

Li Qian was not in charge of the county edict. With his background in the Beiyang Banner Army, at least a professor from the prefecture would be considered, but now that London lacks talents, he can only be temporarily appointed as the edict until someone who can succeed him is trained. He works in the government, as a professor from the ninth grade to the low position.

While waiting for the theater to be repaired, Tang Xianzu occasionally came to the Chinese Literature Hall. Now more than 200 people from all walks of life in the city are receiving education in the Westminster Chinese Literature Hall. It is difficult for Li Qian to take care of them.

The Chinese Language School in London is not as formal as those in Poole County or Dongyang. The students who come to the class are not mainly children, but old feudal aristocrats and merchant new aristocrats.

Even if there is a children's class, most of them are children of nobles or wealthy families. Only children of nobles have time to study.

Especially after Ying Ming ordered the people in London to relocate to subordinate farms, the most common people in the city were artisans, and they couldn’t leave production at all. Help out at the craftsman's shop.

In addition, there are two other reasons for the composition of the students.

One is the simple feelings of the common people. Although they are unable to resist the Ming army after the nobles surrender, at least they can choose not to cooperate with the study before the Chinese Literature School becomes a mandatory requirement.

Secondly, the common people don't even know English, so expecting them to skip English and learn Chinese directly, isn't that a difficult thing for the strong.

William Shakespeare, who was a minority among the students, came to the Chinese Literature Class every afternoon for an hour and a half, rain or shine.

This person wrote his English name wrong the first time he came, and later wrote four names in different ways in a row.

When asked why he studied Chinese, he said that he wanted to earn money to support his family in the countryside, and he also wrote scripts in Chinese to pursue fame and fortune.

After half a month of teaching, Li Qian learned more about this student whom he named Weng Li'an.

Born in an urban-rural fringe area, studied in English primary school for several years and had no money to go to university, his wife was unmarried, conceived and married with a son.

He has opened a leather goods store, worked as a butcher shop assistant, gardener, groom and a series of miscellaneous jobs.

The deer and rabbits who poached the nobles were caught, and they left their hometown to London to seek a living with heavy burdens of life and moral burdens, and began to drift north to save money to buy a house.

According to Li Qian's point of view as a person of Ming Dynasty, his student Weng Li'an is a little hooligan or troublemaker with a lot of bad deeds.

But according to what Li Qian saw and heard in England, Weng Li'an can only be regarded as an ordinary person living a relatively hard life, and such a moral level is not considered bad among his compatriots.

Tang Xianzu, the prefect, took the time to observe the class in the Chinese Literature Class, and sat with Li Qian in the gazebo built in the courtyard of Westminster Abbey. Li Qian specifically mentioned this student: "His character seems to be as hard as a stone, but is like a rough jade, newer and older than that class. Nobles are more humble and studious, more sincere and ambitious."

When he said this, Li Qian pointed to Weng Li'an who was washing pens by the pool not far away, and said, "In a while, he should go back to the city to sweep the floor."

Holding a teacup, Tang Xianzu looked at the most worthy student that Li Qian found in London. He was young, not tall, with disheveled hair and fair skin. He looked easy to bully, squatting obediently by the pool Slowly wash a large handful of brushes.

After that, he hung the brushes by the sink, went into the school kitchen, got a few pieces of charcoal after a while and returned to the pool, smashed and rolled out a few simple brushes with linen cloth, and carefully put them away.

Then I picked up a brush and dipped it in water, and wrote something clumsily on the stone beside the pool, it looked like I was practicing calligraphy.

The aristocratic student with the horse-leading servant in the distance came back and took away the pens that were hanging out when he passed by Weng Li'an. Everyone who took the pens would leave him a few pieces of paper.

Li Qian explained: "People from wealthy families don't like to study. Weng Li'an washes the brushes on his behalf, and exchanges some paper from the school. He takes some of it back for his own use, and sells some to the literati in the theater for some money."

Paper is an expensive thing, and there are three main types of paper in England.

One is the most widely used cheap papyrus, which originated in ancient Egypt, was brought to England by the Romans, and was used for the cheap notebooks of students and priests.

The second type is parchment, which is made by stretching, thinning, and processing the skin. It is complicated to make and expensive. It is mostly used to write royal and noble orders to show solemnity.

The third type is a variant of Caihou paper, which was introduced to Morocco in the [-]th century and Spain ruled by the Moors in the [-]th century. England built the first paper mill in the [-]th century for the daily writing of churches and nobles. The price is equally expensive, the difference is that there is no bamboo.

Therefore, the papermaking tool is not a bamboo curtain, but a net made of wood and copper wire. Because there is no suspending agent, it is thick and smooth, suitable for writing with quill pens and dyes.

This one is also expensive.

As for today's Daming paper, it is not only expensive, but the price of this kind of paper has actually been decoupled from the value of the commodity. Only the people of the Ming Dynasty have and use it. Besides, only the students of the Chinese Literature School have a small amount, so it is a rare commodity. .

Tang Xianzu raised his eyebrows: "Is Li Jiaoyu dissatisfied with the lectures in the county?"

"I'm not dissatisfied, why did your lord say that?"

"Then why not restrict it and persuade people to learn from it."

"Returning to my lord, it's useless to persuade them. There should be no nobles in the world. These people rely on their family background and fall to the heavenly army. They get the opportunity for their children and grandchildren to go to school. They don't know how to cherish it. Why bother to persuade them?"

Even though Li Qian was just a county instructor who didn't even have a rank, he had been running and fighting in the military for many years, and he was used to obeying the orders of the officers, but other than that, the habit of being straightforward and saying what he said was also deeply ingrained.

Since this task was given to him and there was no other way, he did it with all his heart. Other than that, education matters had nothing to do with Tang Xianzu.

"The matter of culture and education is not a one-time achievement. These people have already made up their minds. They can teach what they can teach, and those who can't teach will be opened up in March. The key to culture and education in the Chinese Language School is still the boy."

Tang Xianzu was also used to this kind of emotion.

The county magistrates, county magistrates, master books, classics, medical training departments, yin and yang training techniques, official doctors of the Huimin Pharmacy Bureau, Ma Yiyi Cheng, ambassadors of the Taxation Bureau, and officials of the Hebo Office are all from the Eastern Banner Army. , but I understand the attitude of these soldiers towards the people of England.

In Asia, this attitude is not obvious, and there is almost no difference between the local natives and the people of Ming Dynasty; but here, although no one has done excessive behavior due to the constraints of military law, the attitude is almost the same as raising cats and dogs.

Tang Xianzu couldn't change the situation by himself, so he could only change the subject and ask, "Why does he keep those papers for his own use?"

"Weng Li'an wants to learn how to write scripts. He is very frank. He makes no secret of his pursuit of fame and fortune. He wants to be a script master. He wants to use this to write stories in the theater and attract those literati to teach him how to write."

Tang Xianzu smiled: "This is fishing, those who wish to take the bait. It's okay, I'm exhausted these days."

"Tomorrow, ask him to bring his own script. After class in the evening, send someone to the magistrate's yamen. I will see what kind of script he can write."

　Good morning!

　　
　
(End of this chapter)