Chapter 391: One Stem Bears Two Fruits

Tug-of-war is an old custom in Nan Commandery — this isn't just Heifu bragging, it's a real tradition.

While he had the driver Sang Mu explain the rules to the Rong tribal chiefs with the officials, Heifu also said to Wang Wei, Di Chong, and the others: "Have any of you heard of Lu Ban?"

Wang Wei was young and had never left the northern lands, so he shook his head. Di Chong was older and had campaigned in the Central Plains, so he knew.

"Lu Ban lived two hundred years ago. He was a master craftsman of Lu. At that time, the King of Chu was contending with the King of Yue for supremacy in the Jiang-Huai region, so he invited Lu Ban to Chu to build naval warfare equipment for the state."

"So Lu Ban created devices called 'the Hook' and 'the Brace.' When the enemy was at a disadvantage, the Hook could latch onto their ships, and the soldiers would pull hard backward, preventing escape. When the enemy had the advantage, the Brace could block their ships, preventing pursuit. Once the Chu army had the Hook and Brace, they were invincible, routed Yue, invaded eastward, and expanded their territory all the way to the Si River..."

Wang Wei listened, utterly absorbed, and praised, "What an incredible craftsman!"

From that time onward, the people of the Jiang-Han region, who often served as tower-ship marines for Chu, would also practice the technique of pulling hooks and dragging whenever their lords conscripted them for military drills, so they could put it to use in naval battle. Slowly, it evolved into the folk "hook-pulling game." Though the state of Chu perished, the custom survived — this is the origin of tug-of-war.

And now, Heifu had brought this sport to the northern lands.

As they spoke, the ten warriors from the Ox-Slaughter Tribe and the Tiger-Trap Tribe had finished hearing the rules and taken the field, glaring wide-eyed at each other. The two tribes already had a grudge; the brawl a few days ago had started right here between them.

And the Rong tribespeople from villages for dozens of li around had also heard of the novelty happening at Pengyang Town. They came in droves, supporting the old and carrying the young, riding horses and driving carts — as many as two or three thousand people — gathering not far off to cheer on their own tribe's warriors.

They saw, on the open ground, a long hemp rope over ten zhang in length. The Ox-Slaughter and Tiger-Trap tribes each fielded ten men, lined up on opposite sides, picking up the rope and taking their stances. Besides the shallow ditch separating them, the officials had also planted a red flag at the rope's midpoint as a boundary marker, using drumbeats as the signal for the two teams to pull against each other.

At the sound of a drumbeat, the stout men of both the Ox-Slaughter and Tiger-Trap tribes clenched their teeth, leaned their bodies backward, and pulled the rope with all their strength, dust rising beneath their feet. The two sides were evenly matched in numbers and power, so they were locked in a stalemate. The red silk ribbon tied at the rope's center swayed left, then right. The rope, stretched taut, seemed about to snap, yet they crawled low and refused to yield.

Not only was the field tense, but the onlookers watched nervously too — ten men pulling, a thousand voices shouting, the clamor shaking the ground.

But in the end, the Ox-Slaughter clan emerged the final victor. The Ox-Slaughter crowd instantly erupted in huge cheers, surging forward to lift the ten warriors high, treating them as heroes, pushing them onto horses so the ten could flaunt their prowess.

The Tiger-Trap warriors scrambled up from the ground in disarray, their faces still defiant. But Gongsun Bailu, who had been ordered by Heifu to arbitrate for both sides, approached with a dark expression and said:

"You swore an oath beforehand: in defeat, hide no ill will; in victory, conceal no weakness. Tiger-Trap Luo, do you intend to go back on your word?"

"We dare not. The Ox-Slaughter clan truly has the greater strength. The Tiger-Trap clan concedes defeat."

Tiger-Trap Luo glared at his own clan's young men, sending them slinking back into the tribal crowd, where they inevitably endured a round of scolding from their kin. But this tug-of-war had been contested before several thousand witnesses, with the officials as guarantors — a loss was a loss, with no room for excuses.

Thus, this winter, one water source and one mountain ridge would go to the Ox-Slaughter clan for their use.

Next came the other three clans. Wherever there was a territorial dispute, they settled it by tug-of-war. Each sent out their strongest young men, some winning, some losing. At the very last match, just as victory and defeat were about to be decided, the hemp rope snapped with a loud crack — the competitors all tumbled to the ground in a heap, sending the thousands of spectators into roaring laughter.

By the time the sky darkened, the five tribes' tangled territorial disputes had all been resolved through tug-of-war. Compared to the old way, where every dispute settlement cost the lives of seven or eight tribal warriors, today's contest had, at worst, a few men who strained too hard and threw out their backs. It was truly amicable and harmonious...

Ox-Slaughter Li, Tiger-Trap Luo, and the other three were sensible enough to accept the outcome readily. Afterward, Heifu gathered the several thousand people from the five tribes who had come to watch outside Pengyang Town and declared loudly:

"While you were pulling the rope, this Commandant visited the elders of each tribe. They told this Commandant a story."

"In ancient times, when the tribes fought over pastures and water sources, they fought with short blades, to the death without end. Each struggle often left a hundred dead or wounded. The harshest winter, the worst famine, could inflict no greater loss on a tribe than that."

"So, decades ago, the five tribal chiefs gathered here in Pengyang and established a custom: henceforth, only ten men from each side would fight, and the victor would use the water and grass for one year."

"But even so, over ten warriors still died every year. Why suffer so?"

"Better a hundred dead than ten dead; better ten dead than none dead. From this day forward, whenever the five tribes have a dispute, each shall field ten men for tug-of-war in place of combat. What say you?"

The Rong of the Great Plain were often conscripted into the army, so they knew state law and military law and possessed a degree of discipline. When the Commandant spoke, the five tribal chiefs could only murmur their assent. As for the ordinary herders, they too felt there was nothing bad about this.

After the crowds of the five tribes gradually dispersed, a great bonfire was lit outside Pengyang Town. Heifu had all the sheep gifted by the five tribal chiefs slaughtered and shared among the soldiers who had accompanied him to suppress the private feuds. He even personally wielded the knife to carve meat for them.

The Commandant's approachable attitude toward the lowly garrison soldiers naturally won cheers from Wang Wei and the other troop officers. However, just as everyone was eating merrily, Gongsun Bailu sought out Heifu and presented his own view.

"Does the Commandant believe that the five tribes of the Great Plain will truly abide by the rules set today from now on?"

Heifu swallowed the roast mutton in his mouth, looked at Gongsun Bailu, whose face glowed red in the firelight, and said, "I fear not. Having them tug-of-war today was merely a stopgap measure — at least it keeps the five tribes quiet for a year and prevents unrest."

"This humble officer thought the same."

Gongsun Bailu's accent was impeccably standard. He said, "When too many cattle and sheep are penned in one small enclosure, they will still butt and fight each other — let alone five warlike tribes."

"What solution do you have?" Heifu asked.

"There are two methods." Gongsun Bailu bowed his head.

"Let's hear them."

Gongsun Bailu glanced at Yiqu White Wolf, who was dancing merrily with the Rong riders not far away, then drew close to Heifu and said in a low voice, "The first is to make the Great Plain Rong abandon herding and take up farming!"

"Oh?" Heifu looked at Gongsun Bailu with surprise. This man's insight was no common thing.

Knowing this was no place to discuss matters, Heifu excused himself to use the latrine and had Gongsun Bailu follow him away from the noisy bonfire, back into the town. Sitting face to face, Heifu's tone grew a few degrees more courteous.

"Please, County Commandant Gongsun, speak in detail."

Gongsun Bailu said, "The Commandant surely knows my grandfather's identity — he was the son of the Lord of Yiqu and Queen Dowager Xuan. King Zhao was magnanimous and understood the Queen Dowager's hardships, so after Yiqu was destroyed, he spared the lives of my grandfather and his younger brother."

"My grandfather was ashamed of his Rong blood, so he changed his household registration, considered himself a child of Xia, wore Xia clothing, spoke the Xia tongue, and changed his clan name to Gongsun."

Both cases involved a mother bearing illegitimate children with a wild man, but King Zhao of Qin and Qin Shi Huang handled them in completely opposite ways.

Though, come to think of it, Queen Dowager Xuan gave herself to the Lord of Yiqu for the sake of the state. Relying on Queen Dowager Xuan's sacrifice of her virtue, Yiqu was kept in check for many years, allowing Qin to strengthen its national power without any worries in the rear and to campaign ceaselessly among the feudal lords, reaping repeated gains. King Zhao of Qin knew of and even tacitly approved this matter: "The Yiqu affair was urgent; day after day I personally petitioned the Queen Dowager. Now that the Yiqu affair is concluded, I can finally receive my mandate in person!"

Lady Zhao, on the other hand, acted purely out of her own lust and even conspired with Lao Ai to rebel — so when Qin Shi Huang struck, he showed no mercy whatsoever.

Gongsun Bailu continued, "But my granduncle was different. He insisted on remaining a Rong, continuing to use Yiqu as his clan name, braiding his hair and wearing Rong garb, letting his hair down and folding his robe to the left, leading his clansmen in migration and herding, eating meat and drinking kumis."

One stem bore two fruits — and they represented the two ways of life in Beidi Commandery.

Heifu understood. So after three generations of accumulation, the Gongsun clan had risen to the rank of Grand Master, and Gongsun Bailu had even become the county commandant of a neighboring county, relying on his family's status as "distant royal kin" to gain more trust from the authorities than ordinary Rong people.

"Before my grandfather passed away, he admonished my father, uncles, and the rest: bury me in a tomb according to Qin custom; do not follow the Yiqu and Qiang-Rong custom of burning the body and scattering its ashes. And he said that to gain a foothold in Beidi, one must earn merit, gain rank, receive more land grants — and that nomadic herding is doomed!"

Heifu was rather astonished by the old Gongsun patriarch's foresight. Pressing further, he got Gongsun Bailu to explain the reason.

"My grandfather once served as Supervisor of the Pasturage Office. He discovered that a single household relying on livestock for its livelihood needed a hundred qing of woodland and pasture. Facing rain, snow, or calamity, they might still have to migrate just to survive. Yet a family of five, farming a hundred mu of land, could achieve food and warmth."

"Your grandfather spoke no empty words!"

Heifu nodded in deep agreement. This was a simple economic problem — and a choice laid before all the people living in Beidi Commandery, and indeed along the entire "Longmen-Jieshi" farming-pastoral divide:

"To sustain the same population, herding requires land a hundred times greater than farming!"

PS: From the "Treatise on Geography" in the Book of Sui: In the former Chu territories of Nan Commandery and Xiangyang, there is the hook-pulling game, said to originate from military drills. When Chu was about to attack Wu, they used it for training, and the tradition persisted unchanged, passed down through practice. When the hook is first pulled, there are drumbeats to mark the rhythm, and the crowd shouts and sings, shaking the distance and near. A common saying holds that this wards off evil and brings bountiful harvests. The custom also spread to other commanderies.

Also from the Mozi, "Lu's Questions": In the past, the people of Chu and the people of Yue fought naval battles on the River. The Chu people advanced with the current and retreated against it; when they saw advantage they advanced, but when they saw disadvantage, retreat was difficult. The Yue people advanced against the current and retreated with it; when they saw advantage they advanced, and when they saw disadvantage, retreat was swift. Because of this, the Yue people repeatedly defeated the Chu people. Gongshu Zi traveled south from Lu to Chu and thereupon began building naval warfare devices, creating the hook-and-brace equipment: those retreating were hooked, those advancing were braced. He measured the length of the hooks and braces and fashioned weapons accordingly. Chu's weapons were well-proportioned, Yue's weapons were not; because of this, the Chu people repeatedly defeated the Yue people.

(End of Chapter)