One
From Sichuan to Hunan, there is an official road to the east. When this official road came to a small mountain town named "Tea Cave" near the border of western Hunan, there was a small white tower by the stream, and a single family lived under it. There is only an old man, a girl and a yellow dog in this family.
a small stream goes down and flows around the mountain cave, and it joins the big river in the cave in about three miles. If people walk over the stream and over the hill, they will reach the edge of Chadong City only one mile away. Streams are like bows, and mountain roads are like bowstrings, so there is a small difference between the distance and the distance. The stream is about twenty feet wide and the riverbed is made of large stones. The still water, even if it is too deep to fall to the bottom, is still clear and transparent, and fish in the middle reaches of the river can be counted. The stream is a tunnel between Sichuan and Hunan, and the water often fluctuates. Due to financial constraints, a square-headed ferry was arranged. This ferry can take about 2 passengers across the river at a time, with both men and horses. When there are many people, it will come and go repeatedly. A small bamboo pole was erected at the head of the ferry, and a movable iron ring was hung. A section of waste cable was pulled by the flumes at both ends of the stream bank. When someone was in transition, the iron ring was hung on the waste cable, and the people on board climbed the cable hand in hand and slowly led the boat across the other side. The ship was approaching the shore, and the manager of the ferry shouted "slow down", so he jumped onto the shore and pulled the iron ring, so all the people, goods, cattle and horses went ashore and disappeared over the hill. The ferry is owned by the public, so the transition people don't have to pay. Some people were uneasy. When they grabbed a handful of money and threw it on the planking, the person in charge of the ferry picked it up one by one, and still stuffed it into the man's hand, just like the seriousness when quarreling: "I have a mouth, three measures of rice, 7 yuan, that's enough. Who wants this! " ?
but I can't. I want to feel at ease in everything. I don't care if I don't get paid for my efforts. Someone will take the money anyway. The boatman was ungrateful, and for the sake of peace of mind, he sent the money to the tea house to buy tea and grass tobacco, and tied the fine grass tobacco produced by the tea house to his belt, so whoever needs it in the transition will give it generously. Sometimes, when it is estimated from the air that the passer-by has attracted considerable attention to the grass smoke around him, he sticks a small sokcho cigarette to the man's bag and says, "Don't smoke this? This is good, this is wonderful, it tastes good, and it is also suitable for giving away!" Tea leaves are put into vats in June, soaked in boiling water to quench the thirst of passers-by ?
It is the old man who lives under the tower who manages the ferry. I have lived for seventy years, and I have stayed by this stream since I was twenty years old. I don't know how many people have crossed the boat in the past fifty years. I am so old. It was supposed to be a rest, but the sky didn't allow him to rest, and it seemed that he couldn't leave this life. He never thought about the significance of his position to himself, but lived there quietly and faithfully. Instead of the sky, he felt the power of life when the sun rose, and when the sun set, he didn't think that it was the girl who died with him at the same time. His only friends are a ferry and a yellow dog, and his only family is the girl.
The girl's mother, the only daughter of the old boatman, had an affair with a soldier in a tea cave 15 years ago, secretly behind the back of her honest father. After having a child, the garrison sergeant wanted to make an appointment with her to escape downstream. But from the behavior of escape, it seems that one violates the responsibility of the soldiers, but the other must leave his lonely father. After some consideration, the soldier saw that she didn't have the courage to go far away and couldn't ruin her reputation as a soldier, so she thought: We can't get together when we go to life together, and no one can stop us when we die together, so we took poison first. The woman is concerned about a piece of meat in her belly, so she can't bear it and can't make a claim. Things have been known to my father as a ferryman, but my father didn't add a weighty word, just as he had never heard of it, and he still lived a quiet life. While feeling ashamed, the daughter felt pity, and stayed by her father's side. After the baby was born, she went to the stream to eat a lot of cold water and died. In a miracle, the orphan has grown up and turned thirteen in a blink of an eye. In order to live in two mountains and many bamboos, the green color is compelling, and the old boatman casually picked up a close name for this poor orphan chick, called "Cuicui". ?
Cuicui grows in windy days, making the skin dark, striking green mountains and green waters, and a pair of eyes clear as crystal. Nature has raised and educated her, and she is naive and lively, just like a small animal everywhere. People are so good, like the yellow deer on the hill, never think about cruelty, never worry, never get angry. Usually, when a stranger pays attention to her on the ferry, she looks at the stranger with bare eyes, making it look like she can escape into the mountains at any time, but after understanding people's inorganic heart, she plays leisurely by the water. ?
The old boatman will stay at the bow, rain or shine. When someone transits, he bends slightly, leads bamboo cables with his hands and crosses the stream. Sometimes tired, I fell asleep lying on the stone in Linxi. People waved and shouted for transition on the other bank. Cuicui wouldn't let her grandfather get up, so she jumped off the boat. She quickly crossed the stream for her grandfather, and everything was smooth and never delayed. Sometimes I was on the boat with my grandfather's yellow dog. During the transition, I started with my grandfather. When the boat approached the shore, my grandfather was greeting the guests: "Slow down, slow down". The yellow dog jumped up first, and seemed to know how to do his duty. He held the boat rope tightly with the tugboat to approach the shore. ?
On a sunny day, there is no transition, and the town is long and idle, so my grandfather and Cuicui sit on the big rock in front of the door to bask in the sun. Or throw a piece of wood into the water from a height, and ask the yellow dog around him to jump off the height of the rock and return the wooden title. Or Cui Cui and Huang Gou are listening to my grandfather talk about war stories many years ago in the city with their ears open. Or my grandfather and Cuicui, each with a clarinet made of bamboo, played a song to greet the bride and send the girl to her mouth. When the transition man came, the old boatman put down the bamboo tube and followed him to the boat alone. The man crossing the river, one on the rock, saw the boat moving, so he shouted sharply:
"grandpa, grandpa, listen to me and sing!" " ?
Grandpa sang happily when he got to the middle of the stream. His dumb voice oscillated with the sound of bamboo pipes in the silent air, and the stream seemed to be a little lively. (In fact, the return of singing makes everything quieter. ）?
Sometimes the transition is a calf crossing the tea cave from the east of Sichuan, a flock, and a bride's sedan chair. Cuicui must be regarded as a ferryman, standing at the bow, lazily climbing the cable and letting the boat pass slowly. After the cattle and sheep sedan chair landed, Cui Cui will follow, stand on the hill, see these things go far away, and then go back to the boat and bring the boat close to the shore of home. And imitate the bleating of lambs and cows alone, or tie a handful of wild flowers to your head and dress up as a bride alone. ?
The mountain town of Chadong is only one mile across the ferry. When buying oil and salt, when my grandfather has to drink a glass of wine on holidays, when my grandfather doesn't go to the city, Yellow Dog will accompany Cuicui into the city to prepare things. In selling groceries's shop, there were a lot of vermicelli, vat of sugar, firecrackers and red candles, which impressed Cui Cui deeply. When I returned to my grandfather, I always talked about these things for a long time. There are many boats sailing by the river, and hundreds of boatmen are busy loading and unloading department stores. This kind of boat is much bigger and more interesting than the ferry, and Cuicui is not easy to forget. ?
two?
The tea cave is built by the mountain by the water. On the side near the mountain, the wall is like a long snake, climbing up the mountain. On the waterfront side, there is room to set up a dock by the river outside the city and park a small covered boat in the bay. When the ship goes down, it carries tung oil, green salt and dyed seeds. Upward, cotton, cotton yarn and cloth groceries are transported with seafood. There is a river street that runs through the docks. Most of the houses are landed and half are in the water. Because of the limited room, those houses are equipped with diaojiao buildings. Spring water rose in the river. When the water gradually entered the street, people on the river street used long ladders, one end on the eaves and the other on the wall. Everyone scolded and shouted, took their bags, bedclothes and rice jars, and went to the city from the ladder. When the water receded, they went out of the city from the gate. If the water comes particularly hard in a certain year, there will be one place and two places in the diaojiao building along the river washed away by the flood, and everyone will look at the city. Those who suffer losses also stare blankly, as if they have nothing to say about the losses, similar to seeing other irreparable misfortunes come under natural arrangements. When the water rises, you can also look at the suddenly widened river in the city. The flowing water is vast, and houses, cows, sheep and trees come from the upper reaches with the mountains and rivers. So in the place where the water level is slow, in front of the tax-closed barge, people often drive a small sampan. When they see a livestock, a small piece of wood, or an empty boat floating in the middle of the river, there is a crying voice of a woman or a child on board, they hurriedly take the paddle away, meet the target in the downstream, tie it with a long rope, and then paddle to the shore. These honest and brave people also love profit and fight for righteousness, similar to ordinary locals. Regardless of saving people and things, but also in a pleasant adventure, it is very agile and brave, so that people can't help but applaud it. ?
that river is the famous unitary water in history, and its new name is Baihe. After the lower reaches of the Baihe River meet with the Yuanshui River in Chenzhou, it is slightly turbid, which means a mountain spring. If you go upstream, the deep pools of three feet and five feet are crystal clear. The deep pool is reflected by the day, and the Guo Xuwei stones at the bottom of the river and the agate stones with patterns can be seen clearly. Fish come and go in the water, all floating in the air. There are many mountains on both sides of the strait, and there are many fine bamboos in the mountains that can make paper. They are dark green all the year round, which is eye-catching. People near the water are mostly in peach blossoms and apricot flowers. In spring, you only need to pay attention. Where there are peach blossoms, there must be people, and where there are people, you can sell wine. In summer, the dazzling purple cloth clothes and trousers are dried in the sun, which can be used as the flag of others. When autumn and winter come, houses on cliffs and waterfront are all in sight. The yellow walls and the black tiles are always in a proper position, and they are extremely harmonious with the surrounding environment, which makes people feel very happy. A traveler who is slightly interested in poetry and pictures will not be bored when he crouches in a boat for 3 days in this small river. It is precisely because there are miracles everywhere, and the boldness and exquisiteness of nature are all fascinating. ?
The source of the Baihe River comes from the border of Sichuan. Boats ascending from the Baihe River can reach Xiushan in Sichuan when the spring water comes. However, if it belongs to the boundary of Hunan, the tea cave is the last water pier. Although the surface of this river was about half a mile wide at the tea cave, when the water fell in autumn and winter, the river bed was less than twenty feet flowing, and the rest was just a beach of bluestone. Since then, the boat has been unable to go up, so all the import and export goods in eastern Sichuan have fallen into the water and landed from this place. The export goods are all carried by porters with Chinese fir poles on their shoulders, and the import goods are all moved by manpower from this place in bundles. ?
Only one garrison, adapted from Tunding in green camp in the past, and about 5 households are stationed in this local city. (Among these households, except for some small capitalists who own some oil mills in the mountains and fields, or who pay for oil, rice and cotton yarn, most of them are families who came here in those years and had military status. ) There is also a Lijin Bureau, whose offices are in the small temple below the river street outside the city, and a long letter is often hung. The director lives in the city. A battalion of soldiers stationed in the old generals' yamen, except that trumpeters went to the city to play with trumpets every day to let people know that there were troops stationed here, the rest of the soldiers seemed not to exist. In the daytime in winter, when I go to the city, I see clothes and vegetables drying in front of people everywhere. Sweet potatoes are hung under the eaves with vines. Pockets made of brown clothes are filled with chestnuts, hazelnuts and other hard-shelled fruits, which are also hung under the eaves. There are chickens crowing and playing everywhere in the corner. From time to time, some men occupy the threshold in front of their house to saw wood, or chop trees with an axe, and pile the chopped firewood into the open field like pagodas. Or you can see a few middle-aged women, dressed in starched blue clothes, with white buttoned aprons hanging on their chests, bowing down in the sun while talking and doing things. Everything is always so quiet, and all people spend their days in this simple loneliness. A little silence increases people's thinking ability about "personnel" and increases dreams. Living in this small town, everyone must also be in a separate day, pregnant with the inevitable expectation of love and hate for personnel. But what do these people think? Who knows. Living in a higher place in the city, one stop in front of the door can overlook the river and the scenery in the river. When the boat comes, it looks at countless trackers from the beach. Some of those trackers also brought snacks and foreign sugar from the downstream, but when they landed, they took them into the city to exchange money. When the boat comes, the children's imagination is on the one hand of those who pull the boat. Adults, hatching a nest of chickens, raising two pigs, asking the boatman to wear a pair of gold earrings, bringing back two zhangs of green cloth or an altar of good soy sauce and a double Mobil lampshade, have taken up most of the hearts of housewives. ?
Although this small town is so quiet and peaceful, the place is the junction of commercial transactions in eastern Sichuan, so the situation outside Xiaoxie Street is a little different. There are also hotels where businessmen stay, and barber shops that sit still. In addition, restaurants, grocery stores, oil shops, salt warehouses and flower shops all have their own status and decorate this river street. There are also shops selling sandalwood live cars, bamboo cables and pots and pans used in ships, and introducing people who eat dock meals as sailors. On the long table in front of the small restaurant, there are often fried carp tofu, decorated with shredded red pepper, lying in a shallow bowl with a lot of red chopsticks in a big bamboo tube next to the bowl. No matter who is willing to spend some money, this person can sit down beside the long table in front of the door and pull out a pair of chopsticks. A woman with very thin eyebrows and white powder on her face came over and asked, "Big brother, vice president, do you want sweet wine?" Want to soju? " Men with a higher flame are humorous, and they are a little interesting to the domestic shopkeeper. They will pretend to be angry and say, "Eat sweet wine?" Not a child, but also ask people to eat sweet wine! " Then, the bitter soju was scooped out from the big urn with a bamboo tube and poured into the earthen bowl, and immediately came to the side table. The grocery store sells Mobil oil and lanterns with Mobil oil, and incense paper. You hang tun tung oil. The salt stack heaps the green salt from the fire well. Huayizhuang has white cotton yarn, large cloth, cotton and black crepe silk in Baotou for sale. Those who sell ship's articles list everything and prepare everything, and occasionally there are iron anchors weighing more than 1 kilograms on the roadside outside the door, waiting for the price of the main consultant. Those who specialize in introducing sailors and eat at the docks are at home in Hejie Street. The doors are open all day long, and shipowners and all-hands sailors often go in and out. The place is like a teahouse, but they don't sell tea, and they can smoke instead of a cigarette shop. Although people who come here are talking about business on board, most people have certain rules when going up and down and rowing and pulling fibers, so there is no need to discuss the number. Most of them came here for a "get-together". Focus on "leading the charge" and talk about local current affairs, business situations in the two provinces and "new things" downstream. Most of the invitees are here when collecting money, and they are often held here when picking dice to see how many points are counted. There are two things that often become their business: buying and selling ships and buying and selling daughters-in-law. ?
With the development of business in metropolis, there is a certain kind of food eater. Because of the needs of businessmen and sailors, there are actually a group of people gathered in some houses with diaojiao buildings on the river street in this small border town. This kind of woman is not from the nearby countryside, or a backward woman who came to Hunan with the Sichuan army. She wore fake foreign silk clothes, printed trousers, pulled her eyebrows into a thin line, and covered her big bun with highly fragrant oil. When I have nothing to do in the daytime, I sit at the door and make shoes, embroider the double phoenix with red and green silk thread on the toe of the shoes, or embroider the pocket for the lover sailor, while watching the passers-by and killing the long day. Or lean against the river window and watch the sailors.