In March of the seventh year of Wanli, the sea in the north had just melted and disintegrated, and the lucky ships carrying wool, goose down, grain and gunpowder had arrived at Majiagang.

The winter hunt is not over yet, and the hunters stationed in the Linhai hunting house for the whole long winter have been returned one after another, carrying the old bird guns of a few years ago on their shoulders, and the elk carrying frozen meat and furs, facing the cold wind in the roaring of the yellow dogs, one foot deep and one foot shallow.

Most of them wore thick fur coats or cotton coats that were above their knees, covered themselves tightly, stepped on wide and bulky fur boots, buckled iron helmets belonging to the Liaodong Army on their heads, and wrapped several layers of thick scarves around their faces.

The first hunter to come back is nothing else, one is to bring back some of the prey caught in winter, and after a few days of rest, he has to go back to the hunting house two or three times before the winter passes, so as to get all the prey back; Their second purpose is to sign in at Majiagang.

In this way, Zhao Yongxian, the magistrate of the county, knew who did not come back, and then sent someone to find it in a dog sled.

But generally not come back to find and can't live, last year Kaichun County went to the forest to pull back a statue, according to the old hunter speculated that he was in the inspection of his own trap when he stepped on the snow pit most of his body fell into it and couldn't climb out, and then until the coffin people maintained the action before death, with a smile on his face that didn't come out of nowhere, but it was scary.

Last year, the county had planned to send more hunters in teams of two or three, but that would require a larger winter hunting area, and it would be too late to make plans, so they would have to wait until the spring of the year to make plans.

When Zhao Yongxian, the magistrate of Majiagang, came back from the Northern Whaling Department last year, he brought with him a few fur jackets from the local people there, which were lined with clothes made of various animal intestines, which were very warm.

He has always been fat, and wearing this suit is even more powerful, even in the coldest season, he can go out for a walk, except that he can't open his eyes from the cold, and it is difficult to be affected by the cold wind at all.

During the Chinese New Year, everyone was in the city for the winter, so he took two guards who were more like bears than bears all the way up the flat-topped snow-capped mountains forty miles away, and this trip was planned by him since last winter, and in the summer he sent someone to build two small cabins on them, and stocked up on wood, kerosene, pots and pans and other utensils.

Taking advantage of the Chinese New Year, I climbed up to see the aurora.

When the hunting team came back in March, he also came back, and when he came back, he didn't say a word and asked the county magistrate to prepare a meal.

Several counties, Aimu in Jiexian County is the most idle, with more than 3,000 people in charge of the garrison, and the garrison only repairs one hundred households in the port, and the sense of existence is extremely low; Zou Yuanbiao is the most industrious, busy all day long to take care of the big county in an orderly manner, and the county officials are also the most complete, making Changsheng the city most like the county governance in the Ming Dynasty.

Wu Zhongxing is the most powerful, a good county makes him a governor, and it is also the county where the governance of the five counties is closer to Spain; As for Shen Sixiao, who went to Chile, he just left, and he didn't make any achievements, and he had the most no sense of existence.

And Zhao Yongxian, he is the most lively one, really, in this cold and freezing Majiagang, he can take the heart of the mountains and rivers to do the drudgery happily, I am afraid it is the only one.

Don't blame him for being playful, the winter here is too long, and there is only less than half a year to do business, and the idle time really makes people don't know what to do, and the time becomes too difficult.

The flag army is good to say, the snow is small to run outside the wall, the snow is big to run around the yard in the wall, the cold is not a queue or anything, but also can shoot targets, even the strength of the fight has to be placed indoors by the small flag officer to watch the drill.

But what about Zhao Yongxian, who knows the county, what can he do? Run, he can't run, it's okay to shoot with a bird gun, Ma Jin often sees Zhao Zhixian shooting in the camp in winter.

In the morning, Ma Jin went to the coast to watch the flag army burn the sled, and when he went out, Zhao Yongxian was shooting targets; Four hours later, Ma Jin came back, and Zhao Yongxian was still shooting the target, the only difference was that he drew a bear on the target - how lonely do people have to do this?

The lack of spirit must be replenished, so Zhao Yongxian took the opportunity of inspecting the Bull Demon King tribe in the Flame Mountain area in the northwest last year to go north along the coast to preside over the heavenly sacrifices for the northern natives living in the igloos, becoming the first person in the Ming Dynasty to step into the Arctic Circle.

This year, I climbed to the flat-topped mountain to see the aurora and lived a very happy life.

On the day he returned to Majiagang, he was just in time for the arrival of the fleet from Jincheng, which made Zhao Yongxian very happy, and said to Ma Jin while holding the plate while eating: "Ma Dujun, look, Zhao said that there will be no delay." ”

There is a huge crab shell on the plate, which contains yellow eggs and crab paste, overflowing with the aroma of wine, and there is a large finger-length crab leg meat on the side of the crab shell.

This dish is called Huadiao crab shell goose egg custard, which was made by the county magistrate Zhao Yongxian to teach the county chef to make it.

In addition to playing, the only thing that can make Zhao Zhixian interested is to eat, don't care about the ingredients he has never seen, as long as he feels that he can eat it, he has to try any way to eat.

He had eaten bison meat raw earlier, and he was idle anyway, and he should let a series of rumbling farts cultivate his sentiment when he had a stomach.

When he ate to the rise, Zhao Yongxian simply put down the porcelain plate, took the snow crab shell as a bowl, and ate a spoonful of goose egg custard and a spoonful of crab paste. Well, goose down is good; Wool? Well, wool is good; With these, the flag army can be warmer, are we enough cotton clothes to wear? ”

Ma Jin shook his head and said: "The cotton clothes are not warm in the second year, and they are wet and dry and wet due to the wind and snow, and there are also worn out and scratched, which has never been enough." ”

"Fur jackets are more durable, probably only forty percent of the flag army has both new cotton clothes and fur jackets, and the remaining three percent only have fur jackets and old cotton clothes, and the other three percent only have new cotton clothes without fur jackets."

It's not that the Oriental military government treats the flag army badly, it's really that cotton clothes are basically a consumable here.

Even if the night flag army wears brand new cotton clothes and cotton pants, they will still freeze or even freeze to death when they stand in the field in this place for a night, and the new and old cotton jackets cannot solve the fundamental problem of keeping out the cold.

Because the padded jacket does not block the wind.

The best way to keep out the cold is to wear cotton clothes and pants inside, and put on a fur jacket outside, and the sole of the shoes must be thickened, especially thick, in order to protect against the cold.

"With this batch of wool, plus the fur we harvested this year, we can make a suitable sweater and sweaters for the flag army, what is the letter from the handsome?"

Zhao Yongxian pursed his lips, to be honest, in this place of Majiagang, a letter from the marshal is far more useful than a boatload of wool.

"Dashuai...... The handsome man wrote a letter to teach us to make clothes, and he also painted, except for a little ugly, it was good everywhere. ”

Zhao Fatzi almost choked to death on crab meat.