Chapter 43: The Situation

In mid-March of the eighth year of Chongzhen, Xie Yike came again to Jingbian Fort.

She wore the emerald-green silk slant-front jacket Wang Dou had given her, her expression somewhat timid, clearly afraid that Wang Dou would scold her again.

Wang Dou sighed and simply let her stay in the fort, but demanded that she not overwork herself this time, nor secretly go about doing the fort’s chores.

Seeing that Wang Dou was letting her stay in the fort, Xie Yike happily agreed.

Thereafter she stayed by Wang Dou’s side, doing his laundry and cooking, and sometimes going with Tao Shi and the others to deliver meals to the military households repairing the walls.

The military households in the fort all knew the relationship between Xie Yike and Wang Dou, and everyone who saw her respectfully called her Young Lady.

Wang Dou asked about matters in Xinzhuang, and Xie Yike said that all was peaceful in the village and at home, but she brought up Xu Yue’e.

It turned out that Xu Yue’e had indeed been violated by the Later Jin troops the previous year, and had become pregnant; by year’s end her belly could no longer be concealed, and on New Year’s Eve she was driven from her home. She built a thatched hut outside and lived there alone, with no one knowing how she survived.

The villagers all gossiped and ignored whether she lived or died; only Lady Zhong pitied her and from time to time had Xie Yike bring some rice, flour, and silver money for her to get by. Before coming to Jingbian Fort this time, Xie Yike had gone to see Xu Yue’e and urged her to move into Jingbian Fort to live.

Jingbian Fort had taken in a group of women who had suffered brutal calamities, which had also drawn much criticism and gossip from outside the fort, but Wang Dou naturally had no interest in paying attention.

Yet toward Jingbian Fort’s actions, Lady Zhong was very approving. Her mother-in-law’s words and deeds inevitably influenced Xie Yike, and Xie Yike also felt that what Wang Dou was doing was very good, providing a place of refuge for those pitiable women.

But in response to Xie Yike’s urging, Xu Yue’e only shook her head stubbornly and lived silently alone in her thatched hut.

“Mother is truly a kindhearted person.”

Speaking of these matters, Xie Yike said reverently.

Wang Dou nodded silently. This Xu Yue’e was merely one of the many victims of the Later Jin soldiers’ ravages. Of the many captive women he and Han Chao and the others had rescued that day, as well as those women freed from the bandit stronghold at Siqingliang, most of them had a hard time after returning home, and one after another many took their own lives. Most of these women later came to seek refuge at Jingbian Fort.

Hearing Xie Yike’s words, Wang Dou sighed and said, “They are all neighbors; help where you can. Mother did very right, and you have done well too.”

Hearing Wang Dou’s praise, Xie Yike beamed with joy.

…

In mid-April of the eighth year of Chongzhen, the construction of Jingbian Fort’s walls was still in full swing.

It seemed that Zhong Rong’s son had fallen ill, so he asked for leave to go home and look after him for a few days. Several days later he returned to Jingbian Fort, but his expression was grim.

Wang Dou asked with concern how his son’s illness was. Zhong Rong only said that his son was not seriously ill, and that after seeing a physician he would likely recover in a few days, yet his expression remained despondent.

That evening, Zhong Rong brought a jug of wine and sought out Wang Dou to drink, declaring that today they must drink until they were thoroughly drunk.

Wang Dou found it somewhat strange. Zhong Rong was ordinarily proper and courteous, not particularly fond of drink — what was the matter today?

At this time, Xie Yike and Wang Dou were both living in the residence behind the official hall, so Wang Dou instructed Xie Yike to stir-fry a few dishes to go with the wine. He and Zhong Rong sat casually in the hall, drinking and talking.

Zhong Rong lifted his cup and took a fierce gulp, wiped his mouth, and said, “Fine wine, fine food, so pleasant. It seems that since I was a child, I have never felt so at ease.”

As he spoke, he picked up a slice of meat and put it in his mouth, chewing vigorously.

Wang Dou observed that today he seemed somewhat unhinged, as if he had suffered some blow.

He smiled and said, “Childhood? Judging by Mr. Zhong’s age, that would have been during the reign of the Illustrious Emperor?”

Zhong Rong said, “Indeed, it was precisely during the Illustrious Emperor’s reign.”

His eyes seemed to be reminiscing: “That was truly an era of peace — tranquil, prosperous, leisurely. The cheapness of food and goods is unimaginable now. I remember that since my childhood, my father loved most at dusk to gather a few close friends, to talk freely and expansively together, full of laughter every day. And of course, we children would stand to the side picking up things to eat, which was also a delight.”

He laughed and recounted childhood memories and amusing incidents one by one, his voice seeming to carry an infinite nostalgia for that era.

Wang Dou too was moved. The Wanli years could be considered a golden age for the Great Ming. Although there were the Three Great Campaigns, the realm was generally at peace, and especially the urban and commodity economies were highly developed. For the common people, it was indeed a golden era. And the reigning Wanli Emperor was honored in the popular novel *Stories to Caution the World* as a sagely and enlightened sovereign.

After the Ming fell, the *History of the Woodcutter*, written by a remnant subject, still fondly recalled the prosperity of that time:

“…Ever since the Wanli era, to say nothing of other benefits, just take firewood, rice, oil, salt, chicken, goose, fish, meat, and all manner of daily provisions — which of them was not cheap? Take a household of several mouths: every day eating large fish and large meat, the expense would be no more than two or three mace of silver, and that was considered extremely sumptuous. Then there were the poorer households, those who carried loads on shoulder poles; earning twenty or thirty cash a day was enough to get by for a whole day. In the evening they would still drink some wine, tipsily tell jokes, sing Wu songs, listen to storytelling, warm themselves by the fire in winter and enjoy the cool in summer, and amuse themselves in a hundred ways. In those days, great households and small alike were so very happy, and it was the same throughout the Two Capitals and Thirteen Provinces. Even now, when the elders speak of those days, how they sigh and yearn for them.”

The two men sighed with emotion for a while, then Zhong Rong’s expression turned grim. He lamented, “Gone, all of it gone. Since the Illustrious Emperor’s time, the days have grown worse and worse, and now the Great Ming is in dire peril!”

He gravely took out a court gazette and pointed to it, saying, “Xingyang has fallen, Fanshui has fallen, Gushi has fallen, Fengyang has fallen. The bandit hordes are so mighty — is our dynasty’s three-hundred-year realm to perish just like this?”

Although Wang Dou had a fairly good understanding of late Ming history and knew of these events that occurred in the eighth year of Chongzhen, seeing them in black and white in the gazette with his own eyes still gave him a shocking, horrifying feeling. Only now did Wang Dou understand why Zhong Rong’s expression was so grim. For literati like them, the fall of the Central Capital, Fengyang, was an immense blow.

And Wang Dou also suddenly realized that although he had a fairly good grasp of late Ming history, he ought to be constantly gathering current intelligence as well. For instance, collecting these court gazettes would allow him to stay abreast of the realm’s developments at any time, so that he could make the most correct responses.

Wang Dou stared blankly. Zhong Rong pointed again at the gazette in Wang Dou’s hand and said, “The bandits grow ever more numerous, the government troops suffer defeat after defeat — it is the local common people who suffer!”

Zhong Rong raised his voice: “Killing, plundering, massacring cities — what will these bandits and rebels not do?”

He grew more and more agitated: “When the bandits attacked Shucheng, the government troops defended tenaciously, so the bandits seized several thousand naked women beneath the city walls; whenever their assault faltered, they would dismember them.”

He shouted fiercely: “What crime had those women committed? To be stripped naked and dismembered? The bandits are so vicious and cruel — do they have any human nature or conscience left?”

He wept aloud: “Such is the situation. If the Exalted Emperor knew of this beneath the earth, he would surely weep bitter tears.”

Wang Dou silently looked at the gazette in his hands. Hearing Zhong Rong speak of such grievous matters, his own heart grew heavy.

Over the past year, although the Baoan area had been relatively calm, the outside world was already in utter turmoil. At the beginning of the first month, the peasant armies — Gao Yingxiang, Zhang Xianzhong, Old Hui, Luo Rucai, Geli Yan, Left Golden King, Gaishi Wang, Sheta Tian, Hengtian Wang, Hun Shiwan, Guo Tianxing, Jiutiao Long, Shuntian Wang, and others — thirteen great camps and seventy-two battalions in all, held a grand assembly at Xingyang with immense momentum.

After the Xingyang assembly, they adopted Li Zicheng’s strategy of “dividing the troops and fixing their directions”: Geli Yan and Left Golden King would strike the Sichuan and Huguang troops; Hengtian Wang and Hun Shiwan would engage the Shaanxi troops; Luo Rucai and Guo Tianxing would hold the line along the Yellow River; Gao Yingxiang, Zhang Xianzhong, and Li Zicheng would plunder the east; Old Hui and Jiutiao Long would move back and forth in support. The Great Ming transferred seventy thousand northwestern frontier troops and southern troops to Henan for a major battle, and also ordered the Viceroy of the Five Provinces, Hong Chengchou, to march out of the pass and take overall command, with the Provincial Governor of Shandong, Zhu Dadian, assisting in the attack.

Yet during this year, the peasant armies’ combat strength had already undergone a qualitative change. In a memorial that year, Hong Chengchou stated: “Before, the bandits fled to avoid battle; now they face the troops and engage the enemy, laying ambushes left and right and rotating their attacks in succession — hence the difficulty of exterminating them. Every bandit has a fine steed, some riding double mounts, while the government troops are three-tenths mounted and seven-tenths on foot — hence the difficulty of pursuing them.”

Even as their combat strength increased, these peasant armies did not change their brutal methods.

In early January of the eighth year of Chongzhen, the peasant armies captured Fanshui and massacred the city for several days!

On the fifteenth day of the first month, the peasant armies captured Fengyang, killed tens of thousands of the city’s inhabitants, burned over twenty thousand houses, and even cut open pregnant women, pulling out the infants and impaling them on spear shafts for sport.

On the twenty-fourth day of the first month, the peasant armies attacked Shucheng, seizing several thousand women from Huoshan and Hefei, forcing them to stand stark naked beneath the city walls; at the slightest resistance, they would dismember them by slow slicing.

Still in the first month of that year, the peasant armies linked their camps for several dozen li and attacked Chuzhou. When the assault went poorly, they seized several hundred women from the villages, gang-raped them, then beheaded them all, burying their corpses upside down in rows with their private parts exposed toward the soldiers and civilians on the city walls, believing that this could suppress the fierce cannon fire from above.

In the late Ming, the discipline of government troops was rotten, and killing the innocent to claim credit was commonplace. But the way these late Ming peasant armies slaughtered and massacred cities at the slightest provocation, seized women and gang-raped them, and at the slightest resistance dismembered them by slow slicing beneath the city walls — this was truly horrifying to hear. Looking around in all directions, only the caitiffs beyond the passes could be mentioned in the same breath.

The Great Ming’s three-hundred-year realm had now reached a point where outside there were barbarian invaders running rampant, and inside there were roving bandits wreaking havoc, which added greatly to Wang Dou’s worries about the situation. He dared not imagine what would happen if his own family encountered such things. And thinking further that next year the Qing soldiers would invade and that Baoan Department lay in their path, an even greater sense of urgency grew in his heart.

…

In the end, Zhong Rong staggered away, still singing mournfully along the road, seemingly drunk.

And Wang Dou sat there in a daze for a long time!

…

“My lord, over these past several months, we have forged a total of thirty-five bird guns, fifteen waist sabers, and seventy-four long spears. Please inspect them, my lord.”

Although the construction of the outer fort walls was in full swing, Wang Dou still had Li Maosen lead those blacksmiths in forging weapons inside the armory workshop.

The weapons before them were the fruits of their labor over these past months.

Wang Dou’s guiding principle for weapon-making was simplicity, boldness, no frills — practical and serviceable would do. Looking them over one by one, indeed, whether matchlock or long spear, every piece before him was sturdy, thick, well-made, sharp, and keen. Wang Dou nodded with satisfaction. Under his system of rewards and punishments, these craftsmen had put in real effort, and the weapons they forged could all be called top-grade.

Wang Dou ordered the weapons taken back to the armory, then immediately rewarded the craftsmen. Everyone was delighted.

This time, Wang Dou had come to ask Li Maosen to forge a batch of armor — the first batch would be ten sets: five of leather armor and five of iron armor.

Li Maosen naturally had no problem with this. Back in his days at the garrison city, he had forged everything — matchlocks, blades, spears, and armor — and his workmanship was first-rate.

But then a troubled look crossed Li Maosen’s face. Whether making leather armor or iron armor, both required large quantities of leather and iron stock. Jingbian Fort clearly had very little of either in storage; they would need to purchase from outside, and not in small amounts.

Wang Dou roughly acquainted himself with the method Li Maosen and his men used to make armor. When they made leather armor, they first cut cowhide or other animal hide into strips, then stacked three or four strips together, applied resin, and finally bound them with leather cords. This made the armor both tough and durable.

When making iron armor, they first worked the iron stock into thin plates, one finger wide and one palm long. Several small holes were drilled into each iron plate, then every two plates were stacked together, and these plates were linked onto three leather straps. In this way, iron armor could be made. The same method could also produce horse barding or a man’s breastplate.

This method of armor-making somewhat resembled that of the Mongols along the frontier — simple, practical, no frills, and it could save quite a bit.

But by Li Maosen’s estimate, even so, a single suit of iron armor still required a great deal of iron stock. At present, ordinary crude iron in the Great Ming cost about three fen of silver per catty, but good iron that had been repeatedly forged and tempered cost at least one qian and six fen of silver per catty.

One suit of iron armor required at least several dozen catties of such good iron. Five suits of iron armor and five suits of leather armor — the raw material costs alone were no small sum.

But Wang Dou was already resolved to have these ten suits of armor forged. Over the past few months, he had already purchased several batches of iron stock from Dongjiazhuang and Shunxiang Fort. This time, the large quantity of leather and iron stock was clearly beyond what Dongjiazhuang could supply. It seemed he would have to make a trip to Shunxiang Fort himself.

Just before setting out, Wang Dou suddenly heard a piece of news: Xu Zhongjun, the Garrison Commander of Shunxiang Fort, seemed to be gravely ill.

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Old White Bull: There’s another chapter tonight, posting before midnight.

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