novelraw Chapter 85: The Four Subjects of the Children's Examination
Chapter 85: The Four Subjects of the Children's Examination
Tu Feiyun was a man of his word, the kind who meant exactly what he said.
If he said he would take your life, he would chase you to the ends of the earth.
If he said he would support your business, he would support it with real silver.
He alone purchased metal ingots worth three thousand taels, giving Boss Tang's shop a splendid start on its first day of business.
Business matters had nothing to do with Li Qiuchen. His most important work right now was staying at home to keep the young miss company in her studies, while quietly cultivating on the side.
There were twenty-four named and established private schools in Yun County, and the only official institution was the county school.
The county school was divided into an outer hall and an inner hall, and everyone knew that only by entering the inner hall could one learn those legendary immortal arts and methods but the three requirements for entering the inner hall were extremely stringent.
Setting aside the matters of identity documentation and steep tuition fees, the children's examination that all candidates were required to pass demanded proficient mastery of four subjects: Classical Literature, Arithmetic, Ethics, and Ritual Law.
Classical Literature and Arithmetic were essentially language and mathematics. Candidates were required to have mastered all the characters in the Thousand Character Text, along with the historical allusions behind each character, and to be capable of composing written essays. They also needed to understand addition, subtraction, multiplication, and division, and be able to calculate accounts. Reportedly, the examination papers started with problems no simpler than chickens and rabbits sharing a cage.
As for Ethics and Ritual Law, there were dedicated textbooks for both, titled "Faxiang" and "Liji" respectively.The standing of these two books within Great Chu was roughly equivalent to that of the Four Books and Five Classics.
Though here, they were the Three Books.
Three Books, Four Treatises, Five Classics, Six Histories, and a hundred schools with a thousand collected works.
The moment Li Qiuchen heard this breakdown, his head had already begun to ache and this was only the official curriculum.
Works like the "Jingyunzi" and the "Senluojing" that he had previously cultivated from, which routinely ran to dozens of volumes and hundreds of thousands of characters, were not legitimate scholarly texts and would certainly not fall within the scope of official learning.
Eight thousand years of accumulated wisdom, and there was simply too much of it.
What was the point of writing so many books? Did anyone give a thought to the less gifted people of future generations?
A headache, but still something that had to be learned.
If it was decided that Wulala would not be entering the inner hall this year, he would need to start thinking about sitting the children's examination himself.
He couldn't truly waste a whole year of precious time doing nothing but minding a child.
The good news, at least, was that Wulala was learning quickly.
Her dislike of studying was genuine, and so was her intelligence. For anything that caught her interest, she could be said to remember it after a single look.
Zhang Shaoyao deserved a great deal of the credit here.
She was genuinely skilled at teaching children.
Since Wulala had no love for the dry and tedious text in books, Zhang Shaoyao varied her approach and told Wulala stories instead.
These were stories about the gossip and feuds, the grudges and schemes of the great households in the capital.
The respectable people in those grand families could play games with ethics and ritual in ways that yielded countless variations.
Li Qiuchen sat in on the lessons and found himself feeling deeply unsettled. Every time he thought a particular story had to represent the lowest point of human behavior, Zhang Shaoyao's story the next day would reliably bring him a fresh new surprise.
Time passed like a white horse glimpsed through a crack in the wall, swift and relentless. Before long, it was already the second month.
The second day of the second month, the day the dragon raises its head.
According to Zhang Shaoyao, the capital at this time of year was already warm with the first signs of spring, everything coming back to life.
Yun County was still buried in white snow, the ground frozen hard, with not even a trace of green visible on the wintersweet trees.
That was right. Wintersweet in the south might indeed bloom in the twelfth month, but here the wintersweet trees were still frozen stiff in the second month.
The children's examination for Yun County this year was about to be held.
Boss Tang stepped away from his many affairs to ask about the progress of Wulala's studies. Upon hearing the answer, he was genuinely delighted.
His own daughter could already recognize two hundred characters!
A miracle!
The money had been well spent!
He then tentatively asked Zhang Shaoyao whether it might be worth having Wulala try her hand at this year's children's examination.
Zhang Shaoyao said cautiously that it would be better to wait another two years, but if it was absolutely necessary to try, going in advance to get a feel for the atmosphere couldn't do any harm.
After all, failing wouldn't cost them anything.
As long as the master was happy.
The children's examination held by the county school was not the kind of rigorous, officially recognized examination through which one could obtain a formal scholarly title.
That kind was called the Children's Test, or the Township Examination, taken with the status of a child candidate to obtain the title of licentiate.
Accordingly, there were no particularly strict restrictions on age or other such conditions.
No restrictions was no restrictions, but if a candidate's qualifications were simply too poor, they would be politely turned away. Those whose qualifications were adequate could be considered.
For instance, someone like Chen Nansheng, whose family circumstances were modest but whose academic results were excellent, could genuinely be considered for a partial reduction in tuition fees then there was Wulala, also known as Miss Tang Xiaoxue, whose family had a great deal of money.
Tu Feiyun had spent three thousand taels in the shop, and Boss Tang had immediately donated that sum to the county school.
Li Qiuchen would have done the same in his place. Money could always be earned again, but the silver from that particular man felt ominous to hold onto. Who knew whether he had done something to the silver, only to come around ten days or two weeks later to audit your accounts?
One couldn't be too careful.
With that donation made, the matter of enrollment was no longer a matter at all.
The county school was merely adding one more desk.
Of course, the proper procedures still had to be followed.
On the day of the examination, Miss Tang Xiaoxue finally shed the crudely made mink coat that from a distance made her look like a bear cub.
Its insulating effect was genuinely beyond question, but there was simply no way to pick up a brush and write while wearing it.
She changed into a pink satin padded jacket lined with cotton fleece, with a white fox fur cape draped over it. Li Qiuchen suddenly realized, what the hell, this child was actually adorable, looking just like a little cloth doll.
"Don't you want to wear a hat to cover things up a bit?"
Miss Tang Xiaoxue had that signature Rakshasa white hair and the small horns growing from her head. Her appearance was entirely unlike that of a Chu person.
Adorable she might be, but Li Qiuchen was a bit worried that looking the way she did, she might draw cold and unkind glances.
"Cover what? Let people look, openly and without shame."
Zhang Shaoyao was completely unbothered by it, "The more you try to hide, the more guilty you appear, and that gives others the idea that they can push you around. People who like to gossip will gossip regardless of what you look like."
Li Qiuchen thought about it and agreed. As long as you aren't the one feeling awkward, the awkward one is someone else.
The personal maid Lamei was not allowed into the examination grounds, and this was the moment where Li Qiuchen's role finally came into its own.
He had been waiting for this day!
As for sitting the examination himself, he had no great confidence. But as a study companion to the young miss of the Tang family, going in alongside her would draw no one's attention.
Whether he could keep up with the level of instruction once inside was another question.
He would get in first and worry about the rest later.
Early that morning, Zhang Shaoyao had everything packed and ready. She dragged the young miss, who had been sleeping so deeply she had completely forgotten there was an examination today, out of bed, got her dressed and presentable, and loaded her onto the carriage.
By the time they reached the county school entrance, the road was completely blocked two full streets away.
The parents who had come to see their children off outnumbered the candidates by several times over, and the scene was thoroughly chaotic.
Li Qiuchen had just lifted the young miss, who had dozed off again in the carriage and wasn't fully awake yet, down from the vehicle when he heard a commotion ahead.
A little girl had climbed down from a carriage and accidentally caught her tail in the door.
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