Chapter 6 Decided to enter the palace to avoid disaster

In this way, the Li family lived a life of fear under the strange eyes of others.In the spring of the fifth year of Xianfeng (1855), Li Lianying was eight years old and reached the age of enlightenment.So Li Yu sent him to study in a rural school.Li Lianying is clever. Although she doesn't have the ability to memorize by sight, she has an amazing memory. She has mastered such enlightenment books as "San Zi Jing", "Hundred Family Surnames", "Thousand Characters", "Ji Xian Ji" and so on within a year. It's overripe.The next year, Li Wanzhi came back from Beijing and went to Haichao Temple in the west of the village to give alms. He asked the abbot for a pair of bowls and chopsticks for Li Lianying to use. Not even family members.These are obviously masterpieces after being instructed by experts in Beijing.

Li Lianying has always kept the matter of becoming a monk in mind, and will emphasize her identity whenever it involves solemn occasions.In the 20th year of Guangxu, when he returned home, he hung a large rectangular plaque on the main hall of the temple, and wrote four golden characters inscribed "Billion Years". .In the middle of the top of the plaque is also engraved with a large seal of Cixi's imperial pen.This plaque is thick and long. It was originally made of a piece of camphor wood. It is a precious historical relic. Unfortunately, it was stolen during the land reform in 1947, and its whereabouts are still unknown.To this day, Li Yingtai is used in all local inscriptions and inscriptions involving Li Lianying, afraid of using the word Lianying, so as not to make people laugh because of his status as a eunuch.For example, in the 23rd year of Guangxu, Dacheng County rebuilt the county annals, and he donated money to support it. The record in the "Dacheng County Annals" we see today is: Li Yingtai donated one hundred taels of silver.

Once the news spread that Li Wanzhi had placed an order for Li Lianying to become a monk at Haichao Temple, those who cared about it in the village said no.It is said that the Li family is deceiving themselves. The child is already nine years old and cannot afford to delay any longer. It is better to think of a surefire plan. Don't wait for something to happen and ruin the family. I regret that there is nowhere to buy the medicine. .Seeing so many people expressing doubts, the Li family was worried all day long with all the talk.After repeated discussions, I couldn't make up my mind.They think that it is inappropriate to be a monk or a Taoist, to be poor for a lifetime, to suffer for a lifetime, and to waste one life; More than enough, besides, the palace is no different from ordinary people's families, if something is wrong, not only will the child be unlucky, but the family may also be implicated, the risk is too great.The family was hesitant about this, and they couldn't make up their minds, but in the face of the discussions among the villagers, they had to make a decision quickly.

Li Lianying often heard family members talk about it, and outsiders also evaded and pointed at him, and gradually learned about these things.He thought to himself that he must make a decision as soon as possible, first to relieve his family's worries, and second, to stop the villagers from chewing their tongues.So, he weighed in his heart between being a monk and being a eunuch in the palace: being a monk is boring, bald, wearing sandals, dressed in gray cloth, carrying water and firewood all day long, and being a Taoist is nothing more than that!So, he said to his most trusted grandma: I don't want to be a monk or a Taoist in a temple, I want to be a eunuch in Beijing.In fact, he didn't even know what an eunuch was, but he had been to Beijing, but from his senses, he felt that the city of Beijing was bigger and nicer than the countryside, so eunuchs were no worse.In this way, he made his own fate choice under the complicated eyes of everyone.

A eunuch is a special product of the feudal system. A man who was originally well-behaved abruptly changed his physical structure and became more like a man than a woman. He became a deformed person and was enslaved by the emperor's family.This has been going on for more than two thousand years in Chinese history. Eunuchs were called eunuchs, eunuchs, eunuchs, eunuchs, middle officials, internal servants, and internal supervisors in ancient China.The title of eunuch first appeared in the Tang Dynasty.In the second year of Longshuo of Emperor Gaozong of the Tang Dynasty (662), the emperor changed the Dianzhong province in charge of cars and clothing to the Zhongyu province, and changed the supervisor to the Zhongyu eunuch and young supervisor.The eunuch and young supervisor here refer to the official titles that serve as such positions.Because eunuchs acted as eunuchs or young eunuchs, people called eunuchs who had existed and been in use for a long time collectively eunuchs.In the Qing Dynasty, Manchu called the eunuch Kualanda, and Chinese called it the eunuch of Neizuo Office.

In the sixth year of Xianfeng (1856), in the chilly spring, Li Lianying bid farewell to her grandmother, mother, teacher and partners, and embarked on the journey to Beijing again.This time is different from before, as the saying goes, mothers are worried when they travel thousands of miles, let alone going to the deep palace to live a life isolated from the world?Before leaving, the family burst into tears.The grandmother and mother who had always loved her had repeatedly told him that the palace was no different from the outside, and that there were more rules, and that he must be cautious and diligent in doing things, and only by pleasing the master would he have a bright future.Although Li Lianying didn't say anything, she remembered everything in her heart.After saying goodbye to his hometown and relatives, he followed his father on the road.