Chapter 428: Three Burrows

In front of the Commandant's residence, Heifu stepped down from Yin Tong's carriage and took his leave. Gong Ao hurried over holding a cloth umbrella to shield him from the drifting snowflakes.

Heifu and his aides entered the compound, but instead of going straight to see his wife, he summoned Chen Ping, who had remained in Yiqu City, and questioned him in detail about the establishment of Yuzhang Commandery. Gong Ao also pricked up his ears.

Chen Ping knew that Heifu's thoughts were always with his old subordinates far away in Yuzhang, and had made thorough inquiries days ago. He reported: "The proposal came from the Chancellor, the Imperial Secretary, and the Commandant of Justice. They argued that Nan Commandery, Jiujiang, and Kuaiji are too vast for a single commandery to govern effectively, and that it would be better to establish new commanderies to strengthen control…"

Chen Ping said the most active proponent of this matter was the Governor of Jiujiang Commandery. Qin regulations stipulate that a governor must tour the counties every year to promote agriculture, and must inspect every county and town under his jurisdiction within three years.

This was a bitter hardship for the Jiujiang Governor. His seat of administration, Shouchun, lay by the Huai River, while the southernmost Shanggan County was north of the Five Ranges. A single round trip took three to four months. He also contracted an illness south of the Yangtze and nearly died on the road. After returning to Shouchun, the governor reflected on his ordeal and submitted a memorial to the First Emperor based on his own experience, stating that Jiujiang Commandery must be split in two, or else it simply could not be governed.

Thus, the commandery divisions took place this year. Apart from Yuzhang Commandery being carved out of Jiujiang, with its seat at Nanchang City governing seven counties, Hengshan Commandery was separated from Nan Commandery, and Zhang Commandery from Kuaiji.

"Where is the seat of Hengshan Commandery, and which counties does it govern?"

Heifu had no interests in Zhang or Kuaiji, and he knew Yuzhang Commandery like the back of his hand, having long anticipated it becoming a separate commandery. His sole concern was whether his hometown, Anlu, had been excluded from Nan Commandery.

"The seat of Hengshan Commandery is Zhu County."

Chen Ping continued: "The territory under its jurisdiction includes the E region and other areas that you, Commandant, seized with General Li You several years ago. Anlu remains part of Nan Commandery."

Heifu now understood. Zhu County was where he had once witnessed the Qin and Chu fleets clash on the Yangtze. The E region was the future Wuhan. This area had been temporarily administered by Nan Commandery and was only now formally established as a commandery.

It was rather amusing, come to think of it. When Qin unified the realm, the reason for establishing thirty-six commanderies was nothing more than the First Emperor, egged on by the Yin-Yang scholars of Yan and Qi, wanting to achieve the supremely auspicious "six-six number." After all, he had already decreed: "Numbers shall be based on six; tallies and official caps shall all be six inches; carriages six feet; six feet make a pace; harness six horses…" So cobbling together thirty-six commanderies was hardly surprising.

Naturally, such an artificially contrived number of commanderies was inconvenient for governance in some places, hence today's divisions.

Heifu speculated maliciously: "His Majesty probably saw that territorial expansion was imminent and that thirty-six commanderies could no longer be maintained, so he simply split off a few. After conquering Shuofang and Hexi, or even after swallowing Lingnan and the Hundred Yue, he could then piece together forty-two or forty-eight commanderies?"

In any case, for a superstitious obsessive-compulsive like the First Emperor, the final number of Qin commanderies absolutely had to be a multiple of six.

Heifu then lost interest in the matter, merely instructing Chen Ping to thoroughly investigate the native places and backgrounds of the senior officials in Hengshan and Yuzhang commanderies, as they might have dealings with them in the future.

With this, the reason for Yin Tong's sudden fawning intimacy toward Heifu became clear. Most of Yuzhang's county commandants were Heifu's former subordinates. In Yin Tong's view, drawing closer to Heifu would reduce resistance to his governance once he took up his post.

"Then Yin Tong naturally has to curry favor with the Commandant!"

Upon hearing that Yin Tong was going to Yuzhang as an official, Gong Ao spoke bluntly: "Is there a single county in Yuzhang without the Commandant's subordinates and fellow townsmen? To put it bluntly, this newly established Yuzhang Commandery is just like the Commandant's own backyard! Before entering a man's backyard, how can one not announce oneself first?"

At these words, Chen Ping immediately glanced at Heifu.

Heifu frowned. He looked around at the servants—all household members—and waved them away. Leaving only Chen Ping and Gong Ao, he lowered his voice under the porch and rebuked Gong Ao:

"Nonsense! Never speak such words again!"

With that, he left a bewildered Gong Ao standing there and strode off to the inner courtyard to see his wife.

Gong Ao knew he had misspoken, but seeing Chen Ping's faint, ambiguous smile, he assumed Chen Ping was gloating. Fury rose in his heart, and he was about to shake his sleeves and leave when Chen Ping unexpectedly held him back and said in a low voice:

"Brother Gong, I deeply agree with your words. Yuzhang is indeed the Commandant's backyard!"

…

Gong Ao looked at Chen Ping strangely. As the respective heads of Heifu's civil and military aides, the two had never gotten along. This was the first time Chen Ping had ever agreed with Gong Ao. Had the sun risen in the west today?

But Chen Ping was a clever man; he stopped at that point and did not pursue the topic further. In his heart, however, calculations were already turning…

"I was but a poor scholar from Yangwu. Fortunate to gain the Commandant's recognition, he took me as a retainer, giving me the chance to display my meager learning. He has shown me the kindness of a true confidant."

He turned silently into his home, separated by a single wall. He saw his wife, warmly dressed, holding their son in the heated brick-bed room, softly humming a Wei folk tune. A faint smile touched Chen Ping's lips. Without disturbing her, he went to his study.

"The Commandant has granted me a salary of two hundred shi of grain. I eat meat, ride in carriages when I go out. My wife eats fine foods, lives in a spacious house, has ice in summer and a heated bed in winter. His generosity cannot be called anything but great."

"Therefore, one who serves as a private minister to a lord must scheme for his master!"

Chen Ping was a man of Wei, where the custom of keeping retainers was deeply ingrained—Lord Xinling in the distant past, Zhang Er in recent times. Thus, men of Wei readily accepted the relationship between a lord and his retainers; notions of loyalty to the sovereign and love of country were, by contrast, quite rare.

Now serving as Heifu's chief aide rather than a formal Qin official, Chen Ping was very clear about who his employer was.

"Feng Xuan once said to Lord Mengchang: 'The cunning hare has three burrows, only then can it sleep with its head held high.' How many burrows does the Commandant now have?"

Although Heifu had made all the minor clerks learn the abacus, Chen Ping still kept some counting rods at home. Now, he laid them out one by one on the table.

"Favor in the Emperor's heart—this is one burrow."

"Marriage alliance with the Ye clan; every county in Nan Commandery filled with Teng, the Interior Minister's, disciples and former officials—this is the second burrow."

"Three thousand sons of his home district, now spread across the seven counties of Yuzhang, serving as commandants, assistants, or minor clerks, their roots intertwined, their voices in unison—this is the third burrow!"

With these three burrows, Heifu was assured of thriving both at court and in the provinces. With them as a guarantee, Heifu's sugarcane and brown sugar enterprises could bring in a million a year without anyone daring to covet them, and he could afford to support the aides who followed him.

Therefore, Chen Ping felt that Yin Tong's going to Yuzhang as Commandant was truly a good thing. This man was not particularly skilled in military affairs; he might manage as a governor, but as a commandant, he would likely have to rely heavily on the chief clerks and county commandants. During his term, it would be enough to ensure the preservation of this "burrow" of Heifu's.

"Has all this, step by step, been the Commandant's unintentional doing, or deliberate design?"

Seeing Heifu's three burrows now complete, Chen Ping was somewhat taken aback. As his aide, could he only fill gaps and mend leaks, unable even to emulate Feng Xuan by opening a new burrow for his lord?

After a long while, Chen Ping finally placed a fourth counting rod on the table and smiled.

"Who says the cunning hare can have only three burrows?"

"The Emperor desires to open the frontiers; this is precisely the time for a man to use his martial skills. Beidi Commandery could well serve as the Commandant's fourth burrow!"

…

Unaware of the little schemes turning in Chen Ping's mind, Heifu entered the warm living quarters to find Ye Zijin doing something he had seen countless times in his previous life:

Knitting!

Ye Zijin was naturally delighted to learn of her husband's return, but at eight months pregnant, her movements were extremely cumbersome, so she had been unable to greet him at the door.

After waiting a long while and seeing that he still had not come, her hands could not stay idle. Unable to sit at the loom, she picked up a ball of wool yarn and two slender bronze needles from the table and sat knitting by the window.

Outside, white snow drifted down; warm candlelight fell upon her shoulders. That maternal beauty of comfort and serene grace was something words could not describe…

Heifu watched for a long time before clearing his throat softly and entering. A brief separation between husband and wife was far better than a wedding night. After a spell of tenderness, Heifu pointed at the knitted garment and asked, "Why have you suddenly taken up knitting this?"

Lady Ye, however, brought up a seemingly unrelated matter: "When was the first time my husband saw me?"

This was a life-or-death question. Heifu certainly had not forgotten: "The Double Third Festival in the twenty-third year, at the Flowing Water Pavilion by the river."

"Wrong."

A hint of mischief flickered in Ye Zijin's eyes: "Before that, my husband saw me once before!"

Heifu thought for a moment before recalling. Before their formal meeting, he had gone with the physician Chen Wujiu to search for bandage materials. At the weaving workshop in Jiangling City, they had happened upon a group of commandery officials' wives and daughters who had come to "promote sericulture." Ye Zijin was among them.

If he remembered correctly, she had been wearing a dark-blue robe in accordance with the color rituals for the third month. Her shoulders were thin, her constitution appearing frail. As she had not yet come of age, her hair hung down to her shoulders. She had been laboriously carrying a bamboo tray full of mulberry leaves, following her stepmother into the silkworm house.

Who could have foreseen that this maiden would later become his wife, and now was soon to be a mother?

Ye Zijin said, "According to custom, from the queen and consorts above down to the wives and daughters of commandery governors and county magistrates below, all must go to the local weaving chambers and silkworm rooms to personally pick mulberry leaves, raise silkworms, and spin silk — this is the rite of encouraging sericulture."

In the Qin dynasty, the emperor, commandery governors, and county magistrates, to show their regard for agriculture, would all personally go into the fields and touch the plow handle — this was called 'encouraging farming.' Their womenfolk could not be idle either; at the critical silkworm-raising moment in the third month, they too had to come out and personally perform these 'womanly labors,' to demonstrate an attitude of encouraging mulberry and silkworm work.

"But the Northern Lands are bitterly cold, with very little sericulture; even hemp is scarce. Thus the rite of encouraging sericulture is no more than a social gathering and amusement for noblewomen, with little effect in guiding the local common people."

Heifu understood. "So you want to change this custom?"

Lady Ye nodded. "Indeed. Two years ago, when the court debated whether to promote woolen clothing, did the Commandant of Justice not say: Observe the times to establish laws, accord with circumstances to establish rites; statutes, measures, and ordinances each follow what suits them; clothing, tools, and equipment each serve their use. Therefore, rites should be established according to local customs. In Beidi Commandery, encouraging sericulture can be retained — we need only replace mulberry and silkworms with wool, and the result achieved will be the same!"

"Did my husband not say that in the future, Beidi Commandery will raise more Qiang sheep, shear more wool to spin thread and weave cloth, so as to clothe and blanket all under heaven? This matter cannot be accomplished by the official weaving chambers alone; the common people also need guidance, and this should begin with the wives of officials."

Even at home, these womenfolk who lacked neither food nor clothing were encouraged to learn weaving and sewing — all part of these 'womanly labors.' The cloth and silk garments they wove would even be sent to the local chief official's wife to compare quality.

"The commandery governor's wife is advanced in years, so she entrusted this matter to me. I shall take advantage of this winter to learn it, and when summer arrives next year, I can lead the wives and daughters of the commandery officials to the newly built weaving chamber to spin woolen cloth…"

She took Heifu's hand and placed it on her own belly, smiling. "I can also personally weave a warm garment for our child, to ward off the bitter cold."

The same act of weaving wool, but what Ye Zijin used was cashmere — ten times more precious than ordinary wool. The garment she wove was fine, soft, dainty, and adorable, nothing like those bulky, clumsy woolens worn by the common soldiers.

"My wife is truly thoughtful. If this can be done, wool spinning will surely flourish greatly in Beidi Commandery!"

Heifu sighed with admiration. Though she had been reluctant to part when he left, even writing a boudoir-lament poem to express her longing, she did not spend her days weeping and waiting in vain. Instead, she played the role of the Commandant's wife — this was indeed the woman he had chosen…

But thinking of the not-too-distant future, of the scenes in the streets and alleys of Yiqu City after supper — a crowd of women chatting by the well while knitting woolens — Heifu could not help himself and burst out laughing.

"Why does my husband laugh?"

Heifu hastily changed the subject. "I was remembering when I was beyond the frontier. Along with the grain supplies sent to the army camp, there was also the first batch of woolens woven by the Wu clan this year, distributed to the officers and men to ward off the cold. Afterward, I told Wu Zhiyan that he could give Beidi Commandery's woolens a special name — like Lu gauze or Shu brocade — to distinguish them from the woolens produced in Longxi, Shang, and Daibei…"

Every region was already using its own customary terms to refer to silk fabrics from different places of origin — somewhat like later-era brands, though people of this age had no concept of branding yet.

"Wu Zhiyan heard this and thought it deeply sound, so he asked me to bestow a name."

"What name did my husband give the Wu clan's woolens?" Ye Zijin asked.

"I wrote it out for him on the spot."

Heifu suppressed a laugh, leaned close to his wife's ear, and enunciated those three words, one at a time:

"Heng, Yuan, Xiang!"

(End of chapter)